life lessons at walgreen's with bratty kids and screechy old ladies....
So I was out shopping (!) today, in and of itself a miracle of sorts because
a) I spent all week dying of some sort of stupid flu (and I rarely get ill) and
b) I really don't like shopping, especially "Christmas shopping," what with its roving bands of Annoying People which make an unpleasant experience even more so. It's like being an extra in the movie "Idiocracy," which isn't as fun as it sounds.
However, I did score a few wins. This year I fumbled Xmas cards a little because I didn't think to
a) make a cool custom card on Zazzle with all sorts of witty MUNI holiday goodness and
b) put it all off anyway since I've been spending most of my time working and looking for a new apartment (a circle of hell all its own, one I dare not write about because I think there's a law against using that much profanity in one blog post).
But I recovered, as I found a place that still had a stash of Palm Press SF-themed holiday cards, and thanked the attractive young woman at the store in the Mission profusely, without making too much of an idiot out of myself.
Anyway.
On the way home I realized I had forgotten to buy a few things, and went in to one of the millions of Walgreen's stores that litter the Earth. It seemed Everyone Else had the same idea and there was a nice long line. Little did I know I was about to also get a lesson in choices, staying the course, and all that nonsense.
So.
In Line "A," as we'll call it, we had a long line of hapless consumers, buying everything from that zany Santa that lights up and makes noise every time you walk by it, to gum, to hair freshener, to whatever. And in this long line, which was not going anywhere thanks to the person at the front paying entirely in loose pennies for 100s of items, we had a representative of the Annoying Kids Union, loudly destroying just about every package in his way.
I was waiting for the mother to do something, but in Today's World, that's a fool's errand. I saw the other line (we'll call it Line "B") was not so backed up, and figured I should just buy my notebooks, and assorted Necessary But Annoying Junk there.
Ah, but you see, Line "B" had a member of the Screechy Old Ladies Auxillary, Westside Chapter. Apparently Walgreens had offered 2 for 1 on some big bottle of flaxseed pills and they only had one bottle left. So in her loudest, screchiest, pick-the-cat-up-with-pliers voice, she DEMANDED they go find another bottle. And funny enough, she gets the clerk who speaks as little English as her. Irony of ironies, they both spoke the same language, but both insisted on English anyway, which made things even more drama-ey and drawn out.
When Some Hapless Hardworking Soul informed the cashier that, alas, the hordes of Visigoths had looted Walgreen's of all but that one last bottle of pills, all Hell broke loose, and I was trapped. I made the mistake of looking back at Line A, which had just cashed out the Annoying Child and Mother faction, and was now ready to take care of the guy with 50 extension cords (who, oddly enough had asked the clerk how much WEIGHT they could take...? ) who was behind me in Line A.
In other words, being in the Annoying Kid Line, or the Screechy Old Lady Line didn't matter. Either way I stayed stuck in the black hole of Walgreen's for the same amount of time.
I wondered for a moment if there was some lesson here, about sticking with the line you're in, despite the pain and discomfort, since jumping to another doesn't guarantee a better outcome, or a lesson in patience and the Christmas Spirit (TM) was being taught, or maybe it was a way for God to tell me I didn't need to buy notebooks, a pen, and whatever since it was wasting a Precious Day of Life.
After paying for my items and walking out I realized what the lesson really was: I fucking hate Christmas shopping, and I really hate stupid people who take up air and space in stores.
PS: I do like all my friends and family, and do enjoy giving you all cards, gifts and whatever. Next year, however I plan on not leaving this shit until the last minute, and I'm doing it all online so that you'll get better stuff, faster, and I can enjoy the rest of the season doing something productive, like getting a patent on child noise suppressors.
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