IT'S IN THE BAG

Oh, how I love being an old, weak, helpless woman who can’t fend for herself!

Yesterday Big Bore decided he wanted some sand to add to his vegetable garden soil, so he toodled out to ALCO to buy some. He came back sandless and fuming.

“No sand available yet?” I asked, as he stormed in.

“Oh, they had some but they wanted ME to do THEIR work for them!” he boomed.

Now, normally all you have to do is tell the checkout person what you want to purchase from the outdoor display area, he or she looks it up in a little booklet, scans the picture to find the price, and then the buyer can just drive his car up to the item and load it. Easy. But...yesterday the check-out gal was clueless and asked Big Bore to haul in a 50-pound bag of sand himself and she’d then scan it. He was having nothing of it and huffed out.

I laughed and laughed. “Don’t sweat the small stuff,” I said as he continued to let off steam. Now, he is perfectly capable of having loaded up a bag of that sand in a shopping cart, wheeling it back in, and having the gal scan it, but he was fixed on the idea that it wasn’t HIS job to do so. Nothing would convince him otherwise. He was the customer and should be royally treated like one. I stuck out my lower lip and gave him some mock sympathy.

Well, I have the easy solution to this goofy consumer dilemma. I’m going out to ALCO to buy the sand. I will tell the checker I’ve had back surgery and cannot lift over 15 pounds, so I will need someone to load 10 bags into the car, please and thank-you. The manager, or some other manly person wearing a hernia belt, will be called to take pity upon me and will provide me with ace customer service with a smile, whether he wants to or not. I’ll stand by and watch in admiration, overjoyed that I'm not the one who's developing a case of back strain. Problem solved.

Ahhhhh. Big Bore will be playing in his sand pile in no time. All it takes is...True Grit!