"Kabooms", Coffee, and Poop!
Copyright 2017 by Lori-Ann Willey
I’m a disgruntled shopper, so it doesn’t’ take much to frustrate me in a store …any store.
Today, for the first time, ever, I stepped foot into a Lowe's store. I will be honest and not only recognize but own the fact that I am a pessimistic shopper. Always, I want in and out, so always leave Dilly and Dally at camp. My sister suggested that I buy some Kow Manure for a couple problematic veggie plants, so taking up the suggestion, I thought maybe that while Paul has his next IVIG, I'd "visit" the Lowe's across the road. Today, was that day.
Things started going wrong at Walmart about 30 minutes prior, when, once at the register, I scanned the shopping list on my phone. “CRAP! I forgot the coffee!” We normally roast our own blend, but we’ve been busy or Paul hasn’t been able, so we literally ran out of coffee this morning. As I stood with a cart load of goods, I weighed my options. Coffee or no coffee? Because we were in the Bangor area for Paul’s IVIG infusion treatment, we couldn’t roast coffee, so luckily, we had some day-old coffee to sip. Paul needs a few days of rest after each treatment or he risks complications, encephalitis is one that we watch for closely, kidney issues, is another. He’s run into complications a few times before, so we take extra precaution these days. After I run that through my head, it could be a few days before we could roast another batch of coffee.
So, with those thoughts, I excused myself from the line and back-tracked throughout the store. It had been so long since we purchased coffee that I hadn’t a clue which aisle to find it. I asked two customers and they didn’t know either, so I wove up and down about 10 aisles until I finally found the coffee section. Then, the dilema -which kind? We know how coffee is stored and distributed. We also know how to tell if coffee is old or fresh just by looking at the type of bag or container it is in. Buying pre-ground is always a NO-NO and a huge one. That Walmart only carries one kind of coffee bean, the rest were pre-ground. Yes, I did the squeeze test on every bag hoping there was another brand of bean there somewhere. UGH! Knowing we don’t care for that coffee, I had no choice. We’ll be drinking that for a few mornings and then, appreciate our own fresh roast again. Even if our green beans are aged, it is still far better. It is time for us to restock on some green coffee for winter roasting!
As I approach the registers again, I noticed lots of people near the front of the store. I figured the lines would be full, but thankfully, they weren’t. A travel/tour bus had pulled up while I was doing the whole coffee search and debate thing. The people were of the non-Maine kind. I was glad that I was getting out of there while I could. Thankful, too, that the cashier also knew how to bag my goods. That made it so much easier to unpack and fill the coolers in the bed of the truck.
Off to Lowes for my cow poop. My sister told me they keep some outside and some inside. She said to look for the yellow bags. After I parked, I noticed the several stacks of bags, but being that I had to go inside a hospital afterward, I figured that I’d avoid the dirty bags and go through the main doors to search for the clean ones. Before me, there were two women. One had a service dog with her, and being a dog lover, my attention went straight to the dog, when “Kapow!” A loud clang. I half expected the dog to flinch at the noise more than I did, but that didn’t happen. I was extremely impressed …at the dog, not myself. The women tried desperately to separate two carts that stuck together. Then, again, “Kaboom”! Another customer behind me tried to do the same with two more carts. I didn’t flinch that time, but I did turn to see if the dog did.
By then, I made my own, “Kaboom!” I stepped aside and again, “Kaboom!” Two more carts were stuck together. As two men approached, I told him, “All those carts are stuck together”. He went to another row and “Kaboom”! Those too were stuck. Finally, I pulled a set of three carts from the row. Because of all the “Kabooms” around me, I had lost track of how many times I tried to pull different carts apart, but I think it was my fourth attempt, the man’s second, the women’s third or fourth, and there were people behind us all trying to separate those carts …the ones that failed for me and the people around me. I felt as I was in a train wreck with all the noisy carts banging around. Several clusters of two carts were scattered about behind me. It was awful! I applaud the dog greatly for his tolerance of it all, too. He was more composed than the shoppers at that point.
Happy to finally roll a cart away from the “wreck”, I wove around the garden aisles looking for yellow bags, or what I thought to be yellow bags, as I have a yellow/orange color deficiency. That means, I read the label of each yellowish / orange-ish bag I saw. When I could not find any upon the shelves inside, I sighed. My last resort was to step into the outside garden area. There, I found the bags. They were wet and heavy. If I had a sense of smell, I probably would know they stunk, too. The bags vented a bit through the small factory punched holes. Those were wet. The bags were wet all over. They looked dirty, but I can read and it clearly said Kow Manure, so as much as I wanted to convince myself that was dirt, I knew it wasn’t. “Really?” I mumbled to myself, “If I had known, I wouldn’t have fought with the carts for as long as I did!”
Trying to be mindful that I still had to go into a hospital, I almost walked away. There was no way to stay clean. The bags were wet, “dirty” and heavy. I was not wearing work clothes, either. Again, I almost walked away. Then, I said, “Frig it!” The man beside me stopped and wiped his hands clean, too. He grabbed another type of soil. His was dirt, but he had the same issue as I did. We just looked at each other with locked-in understanding, then continued to load our carts. Neither was impressed. He dressed nicely, so apparently, he didn’t expect a mess either. Suddenly, I didn’t feel quite so singled out.
My cart didn’t take so well to my navigational commands as I pushed it loaded with four large, heavy bags of poop to the register. To top it off, isn’t a store employee supposed to yield to the customer and not make a customer stop for them? Customers should always have the RIGHT OF WAY to the employee, but I seem to have that issue no matter the store I shop. I used to work at a store and I always gave way to the customer. That’s just the way it should be!
At the register, the older cashier welcomed me. I smiled and said, “I have four bags of poop.” She chuckled as her fingers worked the register. With a smirk, she mumbled, “Four bags of poop”. That seemed to make everything all better. Sometimes, you just need a friendly face belonging to someone with a sense of humor that melts away frustrations.
I have my poop on the back of the truck still, but I’ll wait until I have my junk clothes on, or maybe, it’ll just be better to unload it in the nude and then jump into the lake afterwards poop and all! “I’ve gotta clean that shit up”.
