November 13, 2010
My new eating regime has elevated grocery shopping to a whole new level of ugly.
Prior to my commitment to shedding pounds, I would grocery shop with such speed and intensity it surpassed rude.
And crossed the line into bad-mannered and loutish.
In other words, get out of my way.
I've often thought of making my own grocery cart, complete with horn and buffers to move people along if they are blocking my path to the finish line.
If you want to stand in the middle of grocery store aisles and talk to your next door neighbours as if they are your long lost cousins three times removed, sharing with them every single event in the history of your life, that's not my problem.
If you want to pore over every.single.grapefruit looking for the one perfect example of citrusy exquisiteness, don't do it while I'm standing there looking for three okay looking grapefruits to accompany my morning whole wheat English muffin and organic peanut butter.
If you insist on perusing the in-store flyer, while standing in front of the $1.27 a pound red grapes, don't give me the stink eye when I ask you to move.
Unfortunately, the grocery store has become even more of an exercise in patience for me than it has ever been before.
Because now I am so limited in what I can eat, I actually have to slow down, and take the time to look at what I am purchasing.
And it is beyond the boundaries of annoying.
Heading directly toward vexacious.
Not to mention time consuming.
Every Saturday evening, after my meal of baked beans and homemade bread, and a visit with Mum which usually means watching the news, we head to the sixth circle of hell.
The grocery store.
It was after ten o'clock when we got home last night.
Which is later than I ever want to come home.
But especially from the grocery store.
Grocery shopping, then, is taking considerably more time, because there are considerably more stops to make.
After dropping Keith at work yesterday morning, I went to the Bulk Barn.
Now, the Bulk Barn most days is busy but accessible.
So long as you don't make the mistake of going in there during a weekday lunchhour.
Literally a stone's throw away from the highschool, the Bulk Barn is transformed from 12.15-1.00 pm into a sanctum for sugar deprived, hormonally charged adolescents.
Older Bulk Barn employees, usually between the ages of 50-65 patrol the store with cinnamon stick batons ready to strike at the first sign of tomfoolery, chicanery, highjinks or shenanigans that may result from sugar devoid synapses firing in dangerous directions as the sugar seeking teenage denizens survey the bounty of sugar, salt and carbohydrated goods before them.
The only other place even more psychotic than Bulk Barn at lunchtime is McDonalds, which is within spitting distance of the highschool.
If you have the misfortune of being struck by a Big Mac combo craving during noon and one pm on any weekday, you may want to seriously reconsider how important it is to feed that craving.
Because walking into McDonalds at lunchtime, the McDonalds within spitting distance of the highschool, is like walking into the seventh circle of hell.
Hoards of hormonally charged teenagers pack the serving space.
A deafening cacophany of churlish chatter is thick in the air.
Frazzled McDonald's employees are running hither and yon, to and fro, like leemings looking for the edge of the cliff so they can hurl themselves into the abyss and escape the teen-hunger inspired chaos.
If you manage to get your food with minimal scarring, but lack the common sense to get take out, you then have to make your way through the masses to try and locate a table.
Every table is filled to capacity with ravenous youth slavishly gorging themselves on the mouthwatering delectability that is the Big Mac. Shoving fingerfuls of those gloriously decadent McDonald's french fries into their mouths, instead of savouring them, dipping each one methodically into the equally divine Heinz ketchup.
The only scarier place than Bulk Barn and McDonalds is any Tim Hortons between 7.00-9.00 am every morning.
So I just don't even go there.
Because if I did, I'd have to verbalize my burning frustration with the Timmie's drivethru.
The one I MUST pass each and every weekday morning to deposit Em at school.
The one where the line is so long, and the employees so slow that the drive thru line spills out onto Prospect Street, backing up traffic because half the city wants their caffeine freak on.
Where was I?
Oh yeah.
Bulk Barn.
Walnut halves, raw, unsalted, blanched, the life sucked out of them peanuts, almonds that have nothing on them except their skin, unsalted in the shell sunflower seeds, $21.00 worth of wild rice, and organic orange tea in unbleached tea bags.
Woo. Hoo.
I did purchase far more delectable goodies, but those are for the elves to bring to the Advent calendar.
The treats that my children, aged 21, 19 and almost 17 insist on still having each morning from December 1-24.
You'd think, given the effort I'm putting into weight loss, they'd be willing to forego the advent calendar ritual.
But apparently not.
Wretched swine.
First post-nursing home stop was Victory on King because that's where we get our meat, and most of our vegetables.
Kolach buns, if they've been brought in from Montreal and there are any left.
And the Globe and Mail, because the odds of getting the G&M at the Superstore after 10.00 am are nil.
Nada.
None.
I like Victory. The prices are reasonable and unless its the end of the workday therefore just before supper, or anytime on Saturday until 6.00 pm, it isn't busy.
We are in and out in 20 minutes.
Then, because it can be put off no longer, we go to the grocery store.
Two hours.
That's how long it took for us to get what had to be got.
To read labels.
Bicker.
Look longingly at all the meals that come in boxes and just need to be plopped in the oven, no effort required.
Browse slowly through the tantalizing baked goods, beckoning me, pleading with me to bring them home because they would be oh so good with a nice, hot cup of coffee.
Bitch because the store is being renovated and nothing is where it's supposed to be.
And what are the rewards for this torture?
This insanity?
One, the knowledge that I'll have to do it again in one week's time.
Two, having my children dig through the cupboards, excavate the freezer and mine through the fridge only to then look at me and state,
"There's nothing to eat in this house!"
Wretched.
Ungrateful.
Salt, sugar and carb loving.
Swine.
Title Lyric: McDonalds Girl by the Barenaked Ladies
Good read. I am glad to know I am not the only person to get frustrated by other shoppers. My goal in the grocery store is to get in, get what I need and get out. I find in Halifax living in the student core, my problem is groups of three or more people shopping together. They seem to feel the need to take up aisle and are unwilling to move because they are special snowflakes.
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