Armed with gloves, Purell and facemasks, we sallied forth this morning to explore the dangerous terrain of a grocery store. Terra incognita for over a month, we’d finally caved to the need for items beyond Amazon’s ability to deliver.
First, a great deal of strategy was required. The store needed to be overpriced and inconveniently located, so as to attract the fewest customers. The shopping list needed to be air tight, with no room for impulse buys or backtracking through aisles already traveled. All equipment needed to be checked in advance for pinholes through which sneaky microbes might invade. Sanitizer needed to be at the ready. Ditto, credit card… no fumbling for cash.
Upon arrival, we spotted a few other intrepid souls, all great distances apart and moving cautiously. We carefully stalked the produce section, standing well back to furtively scan the available items before plunging into the fray. While no one seemed interested in artichokes, we did note a mysterious convergence in the imported cheese section. Pasta was also dangerously populated and best avoided.
For approximately the price of a skydiving session, we completed our daring expedition and emerged triumphant with empty wallets and a full cart. I, for one, am exhausted by all this exertion and plan to take to my couch with the vapors.
As the famous Earl Nightingale quote has it: “Wherever there is danger, there lurks opportunity; whenever there is opportunity, there lurks danger.” Hopefully, the crisis will be resolved soon. There’s only so much excitement I can tolerate.
Photo by Juliano Ferreira on Pexels.com
olderfatterhappierdotcom 
Love this! So cleverly written and captures so well our own forays into the world of potentially deadly germs lol. Hope we all stay safe and maintain our sanity. 🥰
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Thanks so much! I’d say, “tomorrow is a new day” but more likely tomorrow will be the same day, LOL. xoxo
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This one made me smile. I also feel extra blessed during these times that my spouse is a chef by trade. I refuse to retreat into the world of grocery shopping, so we, and by we I mean him has crafted delicious meals from the pantry 🙂
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You are lucky indeed! We both enjoy cooking so are generally well stocked, but had procastinated to the point that it was inevitable 🙂 I do not plan to venture out again for another month!
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I had to laugh because my daughter is going through a brie phase so I’m in that cheese section. I hate grocery shopping. Like you, I choose the quietest market and mask and glove up. I’m very focused. They have the store laid out now so you can only shop on one direction so I make my list according to that map. No doubling back. I feel like I’m planning a military operation just to get bread and milk! Stay safe.
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What a strange world we are in when ordinary people should be awarded a medal for venturing forth for daily produce, although I think the Victoria Cross or the George Cross may be going a bit too far perhaps we could create a new medal and open it up to the supermarket who pays most money towards finding a vaccine. The Waitrose Cross has a certain ring to it!
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Haha, I love that! There could be other categories as well.
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I do recognize that feeling, even though I’m still staying out of the larger stores. Did I touch my credit card with my (presumably dirty) gloves? With my (presumably clean) hands? How did I get it out of the wallet? How do I get it back in? Do I need to cut the pocket out of my jeans now that I’ve touched it?
It’s horrifying.
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It’s a scary time, and doesn’t seem as though it’s going to get better any time soon. Who’d have thought a simple grocery run would be akin to jumping out of a plane with a possibly-defective-but-nobody-knows parachute?!
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