See You Next Tuesday at Rainbow

I just got in from shopping at Rainbow Grocery. As much as I love the products the store sells often I cannot stand my fellow customers. It was the last day to use the January 20% off coupon, and this year, Rainbow is only doing those coupons every other month. I should mention, complaining about Rainbow is a favorite past time.

Today the checkout lines stretched all the way back to the produce department / dairy & frozen foods. It was nuts. As the set-up has been for the past couple of months you have to line up in the aisles, waiting behind the taped limit lines. You keep the alley between the checkout stands and the aisles open to cross traffic.

In front of me in line, by three people, was a very old Asian woman. Her cart was filled with produced. She moved very slowly. I would guess she was around 90 years old. I'm notoriously bad at guessing ages. Maybe she had Progeria and was really sixteen. She made it to the checkout stand and struggled to put her bags on the conveyor belt. Produce kept falling out of the bags. Her movements were as slow as a two-toed sloth. They were as slow as if she was doing Tai Chi in slow-mo. I'm being insensitive. She was totally Japanese so she'd be doing what, Aikido or Taikiken in slow motion?

Everyone just stared at her struggling. She placed a bag of apples on the conveyor belt and they started tumbling down onto the floor. She braced herself, one hand on the cart and one hand on a display case and strained to pick up just one apple. It was obvious she was going to fall flat on her face trying to get the others. No one was doing anything. I put my basket down on the ground to keep my place in line. I made my way over to her and started picking up the apples. I unloaded the rest of her cart for her. She was very smiley and bowed several times to thank me.

I walked back over to the line and the lady who had been behind me had pushed my basket out into the aisle. She wouldn't make eye contact with me. I picked my basket up, said "excuse me" and tried to move into front of her. She had the audacity to tell me I lost my place! I had to use every bit of impulse control not to punch her in the taint!

I did an over-the-top exaggerated eye-roll and laughed at her. The guy I was behind turned around and gave her dagger eyes. He looked at me and said, "I think you were in front of me, no?"

"That's right, I was. Thanks." I said as I moved in front of him.

The lady pitched a fit. She was so pissed she started screeching about line cutting. Over walks one of the security guards. The lady said I was taking cuts. That's when one of the cashiers from another line pipes up by saying the lady was mistaken which just made the woman more irate. It was capital A Awesome! She just kept huffing and puffing and saying how it wasn't fair.

As the cashier was checking me out she looked over at the woman and said to me, "That lady's a real bitch. Coupon days bring all the cunts out."

Indeed!