Sunday July 13th, 2003
Ralph's Grocery Cart Fiasco
I woke up this morning at the crack of noon slightly hung over and starving. Other than some mustard and a few packets of Del taco hot sauce my refrigerator was a graveyard of fruits and vegetables I had every intention of eating when I purchased. Being out of clean cloths I threw on the least smelly apparel my floor had to offer and walked the four blocks to the local Ralph's supermarket. Usually I get a basket and just enough groceries to fill two bags for my walk home but it seems that Ralph's was having a number of great deals on everything that I simply couldn't pass up. I grabbed a cart and started filling it up. I figured there are enough homeless people around my area that no one's going to notice another guy pushing a grocery cart down the street. This will henceforth be known as mistake number one.
$113.46 was my total (But my verified savings was $47 which means if I was willing to pay the bullshit exaggerated price they say it's worth before a sale I'd be both stupid and out almost fifty bucks.) So I pushed my cart out the door and went to the curb when the cart suddenly just stopped. I was still pushing but it wouldn't budge. Turns out that Ralph's has this device I never really noticed on the wheels to prevent people from trying to take a cart on the sidewalk. Both front wheels were now locked shut. I spent a few minutes "fixing" them and pushed the cart two inches before it locked again. Of course at this point one of the old men standing out front decided to be helpful and point out that the wheels lock. I thanked him for the advice.
Now I found myself faced with two options. I could run home, grab my car, and drive back. This would probably result in me having to wrestle a frozen pizza away from the crazy homeless man who bares a striking resemblance to Santa Clause and smells like Pink's. I could also try to drag this cart the four blocks to my apartment. Guess which one I chose.
It took me about five minutes to find a way of lifting the cart and walking at the same time without having the backs of my ankles torn up by the cart. At this point I find myself walking in front of the cart and pulling it like some kind of grocery bag rickshaw. I get about half a block to the first red light and I'm out of breath. It's almost a hundred degrees out, sweat is pouring off of me and the light turns green. I lift the cart and start to walk into the intersection. A car trying to make a right turn waits slightly less than patiently for me to cross the lane and begins honking. I finally get to the curb just before being hit by a soccer mom in a Rav-4.
I lean against a chain link fence to get my breath as I wait for the next light. The light turns but screw it, I'll wait for the next one. My cart looks like it's about to tip over so I lunge to grab it, not realizing my pants are snagged on a loose barb from the fence. My groceries are safe but now my entire right pocket is loosely hanging off my pants. The light changes colors and I start dragging my cart across the street again.
I reach the two-block marker and god takes mercy upon me. Someone has abandoned a Rite Aid card on the corner of the street. I begin to move my bags from the one cart to the other and realize that the Rite aid cart is smaller than the Ralph's cart so I begin to put the extra bags on my arms. I'm now pushing a Rite aid cart down the street, drenched in sweat, bags falling off of me, wearing dirty cloths that are now ripped with my boxers and leg hanging out for all to see and looking slightly worse off than some of the homeless people in my area. I reach my apartment door to see my landlord watering the flowers. Great, the perfect conclusion to a wonderful morning. I unload my groceries into my apartment and take the cart back out front. My landlord is still watering plants so I decide to at least pretend I'd walk the cart all the way back to the Rite Aid and not just leave it on his lawn. I go for about a block to get out of his site and let go of the cart about where I found it and a homeless man comes up from behind the wall I didn't see to grab the cart and sneer at me. Maybe it was his before and I stole it, either way I don't care.
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