That Lady

I was that lady today. After writing about that kid yesterday, I guess I deserved a little humbling...

It all started with hamburger patties. I was asked to pick up about 50 burgers for a church event. My husband suggested I go to Smart and Final. I'm not a S&F or Costco frequenter. I'm one of those people that ends up at the grocery store 5 times a week because I don't plan ahead and buy in bulk. Then I usually complain about how many times I have to make runs to the grocery store or how we don't have any food in the fridge. Like right now, I'm starving. But the good 'ole ice box is near empty. Thank God my kid is drinking formula and breastmilk. Pray for my husband!

So I go into Smart and Final and of course I'm totally overwhelmed and giddy. I want to buy everything. I'm a sucker for the sensationalized great deals. Those flashy red stickers screaming buy buy buy! Buy NOW! I have the baby with me and it's almost nap time. Which means I have a very short window. But I can't stay focused because all the red stickers are screaming at me to buy buy buy! So after pulling myself away from the avocado section where I'm stalling for like ten minutes deciding whether or not I want to start Cub on avocado yet, I park in front of the meat section. And there they are, fresh fat hamburger patties packaged in 10's. Easy enough, I buy 5. But dang, they're expensive! Is S&F really that great of a deal? I don't think so. But we need the patties and it's for charity, right? Gulp. Fine. I'll chalk it up as a donation.

After cruising through the check-out, I manage to lug these heavy fresh patties to my car, baby and all, and the random items and avocados I've managed to bring along because they were a "good deal".

Flash-forward to this morning. I'm told we needed to get the FROZEN burger patties not the fresh ones. The tube-like kind in the plastic bags. You know, the inexpensive, thin ones? Nice. Here we have these big, beautiful, plump, fresh and very expensive charity patties, and I got the wrong ones. I was not looking forward to convincing the store manager to accept these fresh patties back after they've been home with me for 24-hours. But so be it.

Long story short, I drove back to S&F this morning with my big, beautiful, plump, fresh and very expensive patties. I explain to the manager and he's surprisingly cool and accepts them. I then hurry over to the frozen inexpensive aisle and I'm good to go.

Here's where I became that lady -- the "Return Lady":

With the thin, inexpensive patties in cart, I'm able to slide to the shortest line. A few people follow me, hoping to move through the line quickly. Then it's my turn. I have to explain to the checkout clerk about the return and the manager, yada yada. She then has to punch in all these codes, re-scan my receipt, and all this other stuff I won't bore you with. But the point is, now everyone in the line is giving me the evil eye, bouncing on one hip, sighing and what not. Then Cub starts crying and to make matters worse my signature won't take on the little electronic pad.

Then it happened as if in slow motion...

I look behind me at all these irritated, grumbling faces and I realize it -- I'm her. I'm that lady. Everybody hates the Return Lady. In high school and college working retail I couldn't stand the Return Lady. She slowed down the lines, hogged the registers, blocked the potential commissions and always had some annoying, long and drawn out story about why the items didn't work for her. And today, that was me. I was her.

Does this mean the next time I'm behind that lady, I have to be more patient and forgiving?!!