Learning the Secret to Shopping Happily

Saturday morning I did my weekly grocery shopping run.  It has actually become a somewhat fun undertaking since I have picked up shopping for Suzanne/Ryan's household as well as ours.  The degree to which my daughter and son-in-law eat healthier than the Missus and I do has been fully revealed to me these past few weeks as I look for items Suzanne has on her shopping list that I have never seen on ours.  It is a multi-purpose exercise. It keeps my daughter and son-in-law out of the store and it gives me something new to do.  

Apropos of nothing, I have noticed these past few Saturdays how many men, shopping solo, have picked up the mantle of "family shopper".  In addition to our gloves and our masks each of us is armed with a shopping list.  Given that preparing a shopping list is on the medal stand right beneath asking for directions on the "Things Men Do Not Voluntarily Do" list, it is fairly easy to spot my married brethren.  It is also fairly easy to surmise how long one of my fellow travelers has been married by seeing how he behaves in the store.  

I was in the aisle that has dairy products (block cheese, shredded cheese, and yogurt) on one side and bread on the other when I came upon a relatively-new husband.  He was actively engaged in some sort of video chat (Face Time, I presume) with his wife while he was looking for bread.  My choice of preposition here is deliberate.  The bread aisle looked in large part as if it had been mistaken for the toilet paper aisle with large swaths of empty space where loaves usually are neatly stacked. 

Based upon the conversation I overheard between this husband and his life's one true love, she had directed him to buy a loaf of Arnold bread.  He had one problem carrying out that directive:  There was no Arnold bread to be bought.  Not a single loaf.  At some point, him telling her that failed to resonate with her.  As I approached him, the couple's conversation became "spirited".  So much so in fact that he moved the phone away from his face, turned it around so that his wife could see the bread shelves for herself.  Then, in a move proving once again that stupidity is indeed the flip side of valor, he crouched down in front of the empty shelves, gestured dramatically with his other hand (the phone-free one) and quite loudly said, "See? There is no bread! Do you believe me now?"

I passed him in one direction while a fellow marriage veteran whose name I do not know but with whom I share Saturday morning shopping duties passed him in the other.  As our paths crossed, I tossed him a "get a load of this guy" look while gesturing in the direction of the newbie.  In response, he said simply, "Rookie".  We both laughed, shook our heads, and kept to our appointed rounds.  

-AK