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The Twilight Zone

Today was a "Me" day.  Twice a month an angelic women (whose name I will not give for fear that you will steal her from me) watches my maniacs from 9:30 am to 3 pm free of charge. I have no idea why she would offer such a thing, but I'm not digging.  You never know when she may realize the error of her ways.  Up until this fall, these "Me" days were unplanned.  I would run errands ALONE, shop ALONE, have lunch with friends ALONE, stare off into space in complete silence ALONE.  You know, all the things moms put on their bucket lists.  It was glorious.

Then this fall I decided to sacrifice my "Me" days to work in Paige's classroom.  You can hold your applause.  I get plenty around here.  You see, Paige is a quality time kid and I saw this as an opportunity to give her some of my undivided attention.  Plus, that laminated "Volunteer" name badge makes me feel important.  So instead of having 5 1/2 hours to myself, I have exactly 1 hour to do everything before I need to be at school.  Everything usually amounts to a quick grocery trip. And I do mean QUICK! 

Today, however, in an effort to make this week a complete educational bust, our school was cancelled.  Seriously, a holiday, a delay, and a cancellation in three days??  Anyway, despite our school situation, my Angel phoned to say that she would still be happy to take the kids for the afternoon.  Can you hear the Hallelujah chorus?!

At 12:30 I dropped off all three kids and made my way to Meijer where I purchased a Grande Low-Fat Upside down Caramel Macchiato.  I then proceeded to meander the aisles sorting through coupons and snagging deals.  Life is good.  That is, until I entered the soup aisle.

Now, I am not an impatient shopper by nature.  I am courteous, forgiving, and all smiles most of the time.  And when I entered the aisle to find a women in a motorized cart filled to the brim balancing a very large dog bed on top all while clearing an entire shelf of canned soup, I just waited patiently until she was done.  And then when the woman behind me had her motorized cart blocking the entire selection of chicken broth, I waited for her to finish before grabbing my items.  Then as I found myself trapped between her cart and her friends cart, I tried to stay calm.  By the time I zig-zagged past them at the cookies, I was ready to keep my distance. 

I turned the corner into the cereal aisle found a place to park my cart and scanned the sales still a bit annoyed by the hassle of the soup aisle.  And then it happened.  Down the cereal aisle came two motorized carts carrying a husband and wife.  As they passed me arguing over how much coleslaw mix to buy, I began to think on the odds of having this many scooters in the store, but before the thought could really take hold, two MORE came rolling towards me.  As I watched the parade of 4 driving down the aisle, it took everything in me not to let out an audible laugh.  Instead, I shook my head and said to myself "Erin, you have entered the twilight zone. Proceed with caution."

Comments

  1. well, look on the bright side....at least you didn't have to navigate the caravan of scooters with 3 kids in tow!

    ReplyDelete
  2. you crack me up girlie! Hope the rest of your "alone day" went well! Thanks so much for calling me the other day. I had a blast with the kids!

    ReplyDelete

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