Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Creepy Fish Guy

Okay, so I go to the cheapest grocery store in town. Not because it is my favorite, but because it is the cheapest. (This is not the store where I rudely abandoned the cart full of goods.) I would love to go to the superfancy Tom Thumb with its neat rows of produce all shiny, its free sample cappuccino and its fancy shmancy spices and sundries. But then my bill would be about $20 higher a week. So instead, each week I shlep over to the sketchy stripmall 1970's-esque Brookshire's, a fine facility if you're okay with less organized produce, fewer selections of products, and mostly fresh fish. It gets the job done and allows me to mingle with more interesting people.
This grocery store must reach out to the masses with their hiring policies, because they consistently have the most eclectic collection of employees I have ever encountered. I feel like I know them all intimately after chatting with them once a week for a couple of years. I've even named most of them. There's Man with Funny Arm who is super friendly and even once searched for Super Pretzels for me when they stopped carrying the product. There's Lady Who Stopped Growing Too Soon who kindly steps off of her stool each week to put my Bud Light on the counter. There's Guy With Missing Patch of Hair Who Carries My Groceries who is so chipper and excited to be placing my groceries in my car each week that he waves at me when I walk in the door and always changes check outs to bag my line.
There's nothing like feeling welcome in a grocery store, right? If you take a good look around at my fellow patrons, you'd understand why GWCMG is so glad to see me. I've always noticed that the other shoppers are a bit...well, uncivilized. So maybe they might occasionally shop in a bathrobe, or maybe it sometimes takes a little longer to wait for them to pay with food stamps, but hey! I'm saving money.
But tonight. Oh, tonight! Tonight, I went to the grocery store in the evening. 8:30 to be exact. On a Tuesday (it's always Tuesday), which just adds more flavor. There were people in the store not wearing shoes. Shoes! What happened to No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service?? But this was a very necessary trip, so I gritted my teeth, gripped my cart, and pressed on. No one was going to stop me from saving money.
As I was out of town over the weekend, it didn't occur to my pumpkin Mike to go to the grocery store and we are now completely and utterly out of food. As in only butter and beer in the fridge out of food. Since I have to take my lunch to work, this is a mighty big inconvenience for yours truly. So after a sketchy lunch of cheese, a Snickers mini, and Jello, off I went to the grocery store after my tennis match. In a tennis skirt: error #1.
It seems that no one in Brookshire's has ever actually seen a tennis skirt. There was much staring and some inappropriate pointing. Which leads me to Creepy Fish Guy. CFG is a Brookshire's fish counter employee who befriended me about two years ago when he saw me at church. Every. Single. Week. since that day, he has asked me if I still attend the same church. It's our little ritual every weekend. Didn't expect to see CFG on a Tuesday night. You'd think the dude would go home sometime. No, no. Instead, he comes up to me as I (tried to quickly) push my cart past the fish region.

CFG: Hey! You still going to that church?
Me: Heh, heh...yep. Still going! [push cart faster]
CFG: Do you, uh, play tennis? [staring]
Me: Yep. [me now clearly in Other Meats aisle, CFG tailing me with fish gloves on]
CFG: Do you play near that church?
Me:
CFG: Is it a church thing? The tennis? [staring]
Me:

I managed to escape quickly to dairy, which is really not his forte, so he didn't drift much past the pork section, staying safely within his Fish Realm and was left to wonder.
So. There I am. I did manage to get my microwave popcorn, which is what I have been craving since Sunday night. Can anyone tell me why, oh why, I always talk myself out of real popcorn in the snack aisle and into reduced fat styromfoam-fest popcorn. WHY? WHY?? It's such a disappointment.

2 comments:

Eddie said...

You are so mean! Throw the guy a bone. Maybe that tennis skirt will get you some free fish. OK, this comment sounds waaaay too porn. It's just downright fishy. Thanks folks, I'll be here all night! Be sure to tip your wait staff. Haha! ;)

Editor in Chief said...

OK, that is super-creepy. Next thing you know, he'll be driving by the church, looking for tennis courts. Please, for your own sake, go to Kroger or Albertsons! Or HEB if there is one in the area (I don't know you're 'hood very well, sorry). It's the cheapest of the ones I mentioned. I have never even heard of the shady grocery store you are going to, which is suspect enough!