A few months ago a friend and I ventured into the untamed wilds of Burnaby, in a valiant quest for foodstuffs from UnSafewayTM. All factors of our endeavor were going smoothly. The ingestible items destined for the evenings meal had been obtained, and a suitably short checkout lineup discovered. At this point everything went to hell. Trouble was afoot. There seemed to be a great amount of debate over the price of two bags of prawns and whether they were on sale at that point. Other clerks were called to the scene, words were exchanged, debate ensued, and the friend and myself were left languishing in line for a period of time greater than it had originally taken to obtain the foodstuffs in the first place. As is the UnSafeway’sTM custom, the verbally disagreeable miscreants were ushered off to the customer “service” counter, likely to remove the troublemakers from the checkout line minion’s presence, but also to alleviate the growing discomfort in line behind them. The event was over, dinner was purchased, and the day unfolded in a predictable manner (except for the bathtub fiasco).
So in the sequel to the initial procurement of food items, I once again found myself in an UnSafewayTM, albeit this time in a more northern location in Burnaby. This was the same day. The search for candy had drawn me back into it’s tempting black hole, and I was once again there to feed my addiction to sucrose – my drug of choice. Once again the items of culinary sin were obtained, and an apparently suitable line was chosen for its lack of customers, and for the historically cheery disposition of the checkout line minion. It was not to be. As sure as sugar gets me to that special place, the rabble rouser in front of my in line had a penchant for particularly vehement discourse with the checkout line minion over his attempts to purchase a box of smoked salmon. I don’t mind smoking salmon, but its too hard to light – could this have been the source of his outer turmoil and pain?
This particular lineup trouble maker wasn’t as agreeable as the perpetrators of the prawn incident earlier in the day. He was a tad angry, and was subsequently sequestered to the customer “service” counter. He was not happy at the prospect of relocation. When he got to the “service” counter – the checkout line minion phone her friend at the counter and asked to listen into the conversation there. She did – which definitely slowed up the service those like myself who were left suffering in the lineup behind the aforementioned vocal carnage. The thing that will no doubt plague me until my death will be that I never learned the nature of the smoked salmon dispute. So it ends, another horrifying tale of my time spent at UnSafewayTM. The obituary will mention this incident as contributing to my brain aneurysm.
Its ok, you can look now – the rest isn’t as scary.
So a couple days later we went to a airport hanger style store where you need a membership. Didn’t have membership with us, so we had to ditch the items at the counter until we went and got a new one. So – got back in line, which was now the LONGEST line available. Again, there was a big argument in line ahead of us…. Waited through the whole damn line – and they didn’t hold the items like they said they would!!! So we left. Another gratifying shopping experience….I don’t know what this all proves except that nobody should ever go shopping with me ever again….
In other exciting news – I bought a new jar of Strawberry jam!!!!!! A simple thing, really, but not without its difficulties. When I got home I discovered that it wasn’t in the shopping bag as I might have expected. So searched my car – no jam to be found. I searched my place for it, lest it might have scampered its way out of the bag before I could discover the escape attempt. No dice. So gathering all the courage I could, I ventured back to UnSafewayTM to obtain a new one since they obviously had forgotten to give me my jam. I even came armed with a receipt. In what is likely the most amazing moment of my life, I obtained my jar of jam with no fuss from the minimum wage minions whatsoever. Truly strange indeed. On the way up the cement front stairs of my place, I dropped the hard earned jar of jam and it broke. Perfect! Murphy strikes again. Utterly defeated from my jam experience, I sat down on the couch, and discovered the original jar of jam nestled between the cushions of the couch!!
Sigh…..
We now return you to the year 2002, already in progress on a planet near you…..