Guilty Pleasure #52

With the exception of when I am running in a hundred different directions and have little time to shop for food, I love the grocery store. I’m not sure when it started, though I know it wasn’t when I was a kid. More often than not I would choose to sit in the car while my mom went in to get what she needed. (Keep in mind that in the 1970’s this was very normal.)

Anyway, at some point when I became an adult I really started to enjoy the grocery store (except for that one time that lady touched my meat and I bubbled over to the degree that I wasn’t even myself). I shop at a few different stores but I do have a favorite: it’s the grocery store closest to my house, and I’ve been shopping there since they opened nearly sixteen years ago. Many of the people who work there today have been there from the very beginning, and it’s nice to see familiar faces when I check out.

My grocery store is part of a huge chain but is one of their smaller stores, and every now and then they are understaffed for the amount of customers they have in the check-out lines. That’s when I jump in to help.

I bag my own groceries, and I love it.

In a grocery store that employs baggers like mine does, it’s not typical (and there’s no need) for a customer to bag her own groceries, even if the baggers are busy at other check-out lines. In fact, I see very few people who will jump in and do it. It seems like many would rather wait for the baggers to appear from wherever they were otherwise occupied, no matter how long it takes. Not me.

I’m pretty sure that I enjoy bagging groceries so much for two reasons:
1. It’s a good way to exercise your puzzle-solving skills (in other words, I would never put a gallon of milk in the same bag as the eggs because I know what would happen if I did)
2. I enjoy having control over how my groceries are packed.

As it turns out, my Type A personality doesn’t even take a break for grocery shopping.

I was thinking about it on my way home from the store today, and the idea of bagging groceries for a couple of hours sounded really good to me. Is that weird?

Wait, maybe you shouldn’t answer that.

3 Comments

  • Tara R.

    I will bag my own groceries if it’s busy and there’s not bagger, but for me… it’s getting everything into the cart – Tetris style. I can get in one cart, what most people need two to fill. It’s a skill I picked up from my engineer husband.

  • Grandma W

    For me I like to bag also. In fact I like to organize even when I put items on the counter so that like the freezer items are together and the canned items are together etc.

    I don’t like for they to bag up the m,ilk or the soda, it is a waste of a bag. I also like to take my own bags I hate all the plastic bags or the paper ones when I can use the reuaeable ones.
    Love
    Grandma W