Everything will always be alright when we go shopping. . .

September 1, 2010

Last evening, I come home from work. Its about 9.30 pm. I go upstairs to throw myself on the bed and staple my fan to my forehead.

On the bureau is Reilly, Emily's 16 year old, six toed brown mackerel tabby. His head is hanging over the bureau, and his eyes are saying, "Drench me. Drown me. Shave me. I don't care. Just end this hell."


He looked so forlorn and pitiful that I had to pet him, love him, and try to convince him that the deep fat heat fryer we currently live in will cool off.

His response: to head butt me.


Showing me love and affection. (I am somewhat skeptical of this because I've seen him to the same thing to the toilet.)

And leaving clumps of cat hair stuck to the sheen of sweat covering my forehead.

Now, I'm not only hot and sweaty, but I have fur bits sprouting from my forehead.











It's so hot, I willingly went to the mall this morning.


Okay, sort of willingly. Keith had to work at 10.00 am, and Emily had a book bag snafu that warranted attention, so I found myself leisurly strolling through the mall, basking in the air conditioning.


Bookbag snafu you ask???


Emily was so excited last evening when I picked her up from work: she had a new bookbag, purchased with her own money.


Its midnight, hot, I have cat hair sprouting from my forehead, I am tired and I still need to get home and staple the fan to my forehead, or, sleep in Frankie's puppy pool.


The kids are talking to each other, and possibly me, but I'm not sure. All I hear is a mumble of voices and the click, click, click of phone keys as they text their friends, or not unimaginable, each other.


Keith and Em then decided they want to to McDonalds, at midnight.


I've done this before. . .they miss supper, didn't have enough time on their break to eat, so they want to fuel up before they go home to wind down from the hectic hurly-burly of Empire Theaters.


And Tuesday night is cheap night at the theater, $5.99 a ticket. Cheap tickets + a heatwave = a stampede of people who want to spend enough money to earn them seats in the blissfully airconditioned theater.


It is absolute pandamonium on Tuesday nights.


They were tired, hungry, weary of the harsh work world their mother has forced them into because she doesn't want them laying around like couch potatoes all summer.


I despise McDonalds' Drive-Thru at night. Or anytime. And I really have no use for drive-throughs in general.



I never know if the tinny voice barking from the thingy you talk into is actually talking to me. I mean, how come people working drive-throughs always sound like they are talking to you from the inside of a tunnel, padded with burlap bags, with their mouths full of marbles?


So, Emily is blasting Glee from the cd player, with Rachael wailing a Barbara Streisand tune about no one raining on her parade, and Keith is in the back seat reminding me that he wants TWO double cheeseburgers and a large rootbeer while Em is beside me repeating over and over, "three bbq sauces so I'll get two" like she is some sort of Thorazine induced fugue state.


FINALLY the marble mouth speaker person apologizes for making me wait and asks me what I want.


At least that's what I think he said.


I YELL at him, "TWO DOUBLE CHEESEBURGERS, A LARGE ROOTBEER, A NUMBER ONE WITH A SPRITE AND THREE BBQ SAUCES SO I'LL GET TWO!"


I am sure that people in Saint John heard me.

And then I drive off to wait in the line for the next window. The marble-mouth speaker person is babbling something but I didn't wait to hear what it was.


It's busy. I am wondering what the hell all these people are doing at McDonald's after midnight. I didn't have a choice but to be there, but what evil force brought out all of these fast-food manic denizens of the night?????????


So, amid the marble mouth yelling behind me, the resounding bass beat of Eminem from the car in front of me, manned by young men who don't look old enough for puberty, and the van of squealing 16 year old girls behind me, I hear, just barely mind you,


"And I paid $90.00 for my bookbag, but I thought it was supposed to be half off."


My mother senses start tingling, and all of a sudden the background noise of the midnight McDonald's drive-through becomes a soft hum, and all I hear over and over in my head is "$90.00 for my bookbag."


I spin my head around to Em. I say, "Did you say you paid $90.00 for a bookbag and it was half off. You mean the bookbag sitting on the front passenger side of the car, which is not plated in white gold with full carat diamonds, sapphaires, emeralds and rubies as glittering accessories was regularly $180.00!!!!!!!"


She looks at me as if I've just had a lobotomy.


"No. It was regularly $90.00, but I thought it was half off."


I ask her what I thought was the only logical question, "Well, how come you bought it then? Why didn't you just say you didn't want it, and take it back to the shelf?"


"Because I didn't want to look stupid."


I was, for a fraction of a second, rendered speechless.


Eventually we get our food. Marble mouth is actually a middle age man. I am still stuck on the bookbag, while Em and Keith rummage around in their McDonald's bags ensuring the got what they asked for.


While driving home I asked her if she really meant to by a $90.00 bookbag with her hard earned hourly minimum wage.


I calculated that she had to work 12 hours to afford that bookbag.


She said, no, she meant to spend $45.00 of her hard earned money.


Which, in a roundabout way, explains the book bag snafu and why I was in the mall first thing this morning.


We amble towards the store. Em was right: there was a promotion for bookbags. And in Em's defense, the signage was strategically laid out so that even the savviest of shoppers would have been blinded by the

sign outside of said store.

Missing the entire meaning of the sign.

Upon closer inspection, meaning a magnifying glass the size of the Hubble telescope, I was able to discern that below the blazing 50% off, the sign actually said:

Buy one bookbag at regular price and get 50% off the second bookbag.

Em was pissed off at being dupped. She walked around the mall lamenting poor signage and the tricks merchants use to entice people to trade their cows for a handful of beans.

She did was anyone in her position would have done.

She returned the bookbag of false promises, got her money back, and found a just-as-nice-bookbag for $45.00.

And she had enough for a pencil case and lunch.

Most importantly, she learned a valuable lesson:

Always read the fine print.

Happy Birthday JM!

Title Lyric: Shopping by the Barenaked Ladies