Shopping

Megan will tell you that I am surprisingly one of the most opinionated, difficult and pickiest shoppers you will find. When it comes down to it, there's some stores that I love to go to and others that I loathe and would drive way out of my way to avoid. Recently my list of places to avoid has seemingly common themes. I will tell you the stores, and you tell me if you can relate to what I think they have in common...

The stores I hate shopping at are:

1. Wal-Mart
2. Lowes
3. Walgreens

SUDDEN DISCLAIMER: If you or anyone you deeply and lovingly care for works at these stores and if you are easily offended, please don't read past this point. I have a lot of inner grief that will be relieved through this post.

What they have in common:

1. Unhelpful Staff
2. Unfriendly Staff
3. Never quite the right item
4. Cheap crap from China (identical items across the stores)
   
5. A million cash registers that aren't open
6. What I need is always in the far back corner of the store
7. Bad reputation

Since they have so much in common, it is a common misunderstanding that Wal-Mart owns Lowes and Walgreens, but I guess they don't.

Though I find shopping at theses stores extremely frustrating and un-enjoyable, I make it a point to go there one or twice a year so I don't forget why it is that I don't like going there. In fact, on Saturday I was really worn out from doing sprinkler work but needed more parts to finish up and since the Lowes is closer than the Home Depot, I thought I would go there. This is what ensued:

1. As I parked the car some other person in a whitetrashmobile was trying to leave the parking lot by pulling straight through my chosen spot. It was awkward, but I didn't back down cause I totally got there first.
   
2. I entered the store and was immediately surrounded by a barrage of ugly and worthless seasonal lawn decorations. There was so many, I was suddenly overcome with bewilderment and fear as if I was being entertained by a group of angry clowns that were closing in on me from all directions, closer and closer...
3. I regrouped my thoughts and then said OK, I know where the sprinklers are at Home Depot, they are near the front and very easy to find. So I walked toward that area of Lowes, but no, there were no signs indicating sprinklers in that area of the store. I quickly turned around and walked toward the clown mob, thinking that sprinklers are somewhat seasonal and they might be near the rest of the seasonal garden equipment.
   
4. I searched row after row of foul cheap imported garden decorations and by then I could smell the clown halitosis and I got dizzy.
5. Just then I saw someone carrying forth sprinkler parts from the back corner of the store. My beacon in a sea of grossness, I headed toward thence he came.
   
6. After passing light bulbs, vacuum parts, shower inserts and toilet bowls, I finally found the sprinkler parts along a dark aisle in the back corner of the store.
   
7. The selection was very disappointing. I found some of what I needed. What else I needed was a RainBird rotary head (part number 22SA) that is interchangeable with the 1800 series bodies that I bought a few weeks ago. After diligently searching I found they had the rotary head already connected to a body. But all I needed was the head!!!! I was getting frustrated.
   
8. I picked up the head+body and walked around 25% of the store looking for someone to help me. No one. Not a soul.
   
9. Finally, I met an "associate" that was heading toward the back break room or something. I asked him if they sell just the head. He said, "if we don't have it over there then we don't." Oh c'mon! What kind of a stupid answer is that? I told him again that I had looked all over and not seen it, but I wanted to know for sure because I didn't need to buy the body and just wanted the head.
   
10. So he did what must be basic "Hello, I-work-at-Lowe's-and-I'm-an-idiot" training and he radioed for backup.
    
11. Another "associate" came after a while, who knows where he was hiding, and I told him my same predicament. He had to look at the shelves but then told me it came in the head+body package only. I told him Home Depot had it as a head only and he didn't care. He didn't even offer a price match. At Home Depot they will do that and they will take Lowes' coupons.
    
12. Then I walked all the way back to the front of the store, past the toilets, shower inserts, vacuum parts, light bulbs and hideous garden decorations to find that all 35 cash registers were closed except for the self-checkouts. I hate self-checkouts. Have you ever tried to buy a lot of tiny, seemingly weight-less sprinkler parts at a self check-out? I hate those scales. One time only the self check-outs were open and I was buying really heavy bags of gravel and I was so mad that a real person wasn't available to help me that I totally piled all the gravel on those stupid bagging scales and I jacked that machine up good. Next time I will sit on it and jump on it if doesn't work good. HA!
13. Anyway, I am angry.
    
14. The lady that was helping the self checkouts was scary looking
15. I left the store and came home and finished my sprinklers and stayed out working on them under some big halogen lights til midnight. It was like a football field, it was so cool. Then I was really tired. While I was doing that Megan went to Walgreen's to get a prescription and they were closed before the closing time listed on the door and then she got really mad and she swore.
16. then today we went to Wal-Mart, but we decided to go to the new one in Cedar Hills and that one was not ghetto like the others. It was ok but the price check scanner in the middle of the aisle wasn't working so I unplugged it and after a few minutes it worked again. It was an OK Wal-Mart visit.
    

So now we don't have any more money, but it's ok because we don't like shopping at those stores.

END OF RAMBLINGS