25 Days of Christmas Memories - Day 22

This year I've decided to write a special Christmas memory for the 25 days of Christmas. Each day until Christmas day, I will share a funny Christmas moment, memorable gift exchange, and my happy moments with family.  I hope you enjoy!

22nd Day of Christmas

I just had to write about this because it is too funny.  This memory is from Saturday and had to be written about.

Jared's parents are arriving tonight for the holidays.  Because Jared loves to cook, he plans out all the meals in advance, creates this insane shopping list, and we prepare as much as we can beforehand.  We had been meaning to go to the grocery store all last week but have been too tired or busy for it.  Finally on Saturday morning, we decided it was time to do our big shop.  We got up early and were out the door at 7:30 in the morning.

Now to set the scene, I must also note that where we live in Connecticut, there supposedly was going to be this gigantic blizzard on Saturday night.  Now here in Connecticut if the weatherman even says the word snow, everyone and their mother runs to the grocery store to stock up on food for a month, buy shovels, and make sure they have enough bottled water to keep them alive for weeks.  I think it's hysterical.  There is no way we'll ever have so much snow that we won't be able to leave our houses for days upon days.  There are such a thing as snow plows that we do pay for people!  In any event, the entire state was freaking out (my mother included).  People were canceling their plans before a snowflake fell.  I knew the grocery store was going to be crazy but I didn't expect it to be too busy when we got there so early.  I was mistaken.  The roads in town were cluttered.  People really were freaking out.

When we got to the store, the parking lot was packed.  We immediately regretted not going to the store the night before.  We parked in the last row, grabbed our reusable bags and took the plunge into the madness both shaking our heads in regret.  When we got in the store, we found it insane.  There were lines all the way down aisles, traffic jams with carts, and whole sections of food already sold out.  It was laughable how crazy some people are when they expect snow.  We busied our way getting everything on the list as fast as humanly possible.  When our cart was full and all things were checked off the list, we gloomily started towards the registers to find our place in line.  Of course the store only had like six registers open which was very annoying so the lines were out of control.  I made my way down to the end of the bank to the self check out lines.  Honestly I hate self check out lines unless I have one or two items.  I don't get a paycheck from the store, so why should I struggle to do it myself?

The lines at self check out were not as long so we decided to brave it.  After about 15 minutes in line, we got our turn.  We strategically planned the best way to do things the fastest; Jared would scan and I would bag.  We got going and were flying through it like it was our jobs.  I secretly thought the grocery store execs were looking out over the store wanting to promote us as employees of the month - if we had worked there of course.

Things were great, items bagged, and just one more thing to scan - then everything went down hill.  Try to picture the most packed grocery store you can, lines up the whazoo, and mass chaos everywhere.  Our register line had picked up since we got there so there were at least a dozen impatient and irrational people waiting behind us. All of which should have been grateful at our top speed check out soirée.  Jared got to the last item and bam the machine froze.  He tried to get it going but it was hopeless.  I ran over to the woman to ask her to come help when she got a chance as I heard all the patrons behind us groaning (you know like when you get someone in front of you haggling every price or buying things without the price tag - takes forever!).

The lady came over a few minutes later to find a frozen machine.  She then had to go get a supervisor to look at it.  One look at it and she said, sorry, it's frozen, we'll have to check you out again.  She put up the "closed" sign in front the person behind us.  Jared was humiliated thinking it was his fault - even though it wasn't.  I was aggravated with just the thought of unpacking our 10 bags and repacking them.  Then when all seemed hopeless and miserable about the situation, one scrooge lady who was behind us gives Jared a death stare and says, "Thanks dude".  Our jaws dropped as she stomped off to another lane eyes still blazing with rage and hatred at the two schmucks who "broke" her lane.  Jared was flabbergasted as was I.  He looked over at her saying, like it's my fault.  Then just for good measure yells, "well Merry Christmas to you!".

We just stood there frozen laughing and unable to believe the nerve of that woman.  The store clerk also was shocked.  She brought us over to a closed register and got us checked out in no time - of course us both getting evil stares from everyone waiting in long lines.  It was truly awkward. After unpacking 10 bags, getting them rescanned, and packing them back up, we made our way out still in shock over that rude woman.  When we got to where she was, Jared was going to say something stupid but she looked away, obviously in embarrassment of her actions.

I definitely would classify this as one of the most all time craziest shopping experiences.  Tis the season...