Dear, Grocery Shoppers - 1. Well, Howdy! Aaron's Introduction

Hi! And welcome to our journal! This is a little project my husband and I wanted to start, and we had the desire to share this adventure with you, the GA community. Just as a little heads up to you, the reader: this is a very unprofessional and one-sided journal of our personal views as we encounter strange, funny, or just plain rude experiences at our retail workplaces.

My name is Aaron Stone, and I am a 27-year old overnight grocery stocker. I was raised in a log grocery store in southern Indiana, as I started working with my Dad when I was...oh...twelve? Eleven? Ah, who cares? Labor laws were broken since I wasn’t being paid a fair wage until I turned sixteen and was able to be employed by the store. I’m essentially a modern-day gay Abe Lincoln.

Dad is a meat department manager at a grocery store in a rinky-dink town in southern Indiana, and despite the tone I have set so far, he is my hero! The man just doesn’t know when to stop. And I don’t mean ‘stop.’ I mean ‘stahp.’ Ess-tee-ayy-aych-pee. Stahp! He’s been chopping meat, making homemade chicken salad by the tub, and slapping on price tags since he was sixteen. And now he’s pushing sixty-five. Like...stahp!

His work ethic rubbed off on me, and, combined with my Studio Arts and Business Bachelor’s degrees, I have the aim to become some fancy-pants visual merchandiser in a retail environment. Until then, I’m going to keep doing what I do best, and that’s bust some ass in a store...and make fun of customers behind their backs.

Oh, boy. My name is Aaron, and I like to make fun of people. <Hi, Aaron…> I’ve had this problem for several years now, and it has been egged on by my co-workers, as they can’t get enough of me and my jokes, references, and hypothetical assumptions of what people look like or how they act. Am I a mean person? Absolutely. Am I rude? Depends on if you’re my customer. If you are, then no. If you aren’t, then yes.

So please, consider this your one and only warning. I am a terrible person, and I will write things that may discomfort you. Not might...I will. I literally have no filter, and I will make fun of the things that would get celebrities cancelled in a heartbeat!

Now, I need to provide some clarification here. Am I the type of person that will make fun of someone using an electric wheelchair shopping cart if they’re overweight and, or may need it because their knees are weak? Heck no...that’s not funny. That’s just mean. Stereotyping people in a generic fashion that every Tom, Richard, and Harry does on a daily is beyond boring to me. I look for the funny things in life that no one, and I repeat, no one...could even think of. I also look at the hindsight of things that may have upset, disturbed, or frightened me as the event happened, and find great humor in it.

An example? Yes! Yes! That is what this journal is for! My husband also works retail, but he’ll be on here eventually to tell his story. But an example! During one of my first few months of hopping on a cash register at a large grocery chain in college, a customer came through my line. She was incredibly strung-out, had frizzy hair, was very fidgety, and in desperate need of an Axe body spray bath. This customer was purchasing one item, which was fine as I was operating an express lane. She slaps a big bag of frozen fish sticks on the conveyor belt. I repeat. A big bag of fish sticks. You know...that old high school joke.

Simple transaction. I let the conveyor belt slide forward, grabbed, scanned, and bagged the big bag of fish sticks. Tapping the ‘total’ key, the final transaction cost rings up to be five dollars and ninety-eight cents. To me...not bad of a deal! I mean, I like a good fish stick every once in a blue moon, but I’d buy a big bag of fish sticks for that price. Like, this bag of fish sticks was huge! This thing probably had about eighty or ninety fish sticks in it! And it’s not the crappy generic brand of fish sticks. It is, in fact, the name brand of fish sticks for those fish stick connoisseurs.

I let the customer know of how much her bag of fish sticks cost. And...well, she didn’t like that at all. “$5.98?!”

“Yes, ma’am. $5.98.” Give the money so my eyes can stop watering please?

“This is fuckin’ bullshit!” She became kuh-wuickly aggravated at the situation. I was confused. Huh...it’s not that big of a deal. Hell, the bag’s on sale. It normally rings up $7.99. She slaps her hand on the tiny countertop for old people to write checks on, and quickly storms off, leaving me with a big bag of fish sticks in a flimsy grocery sack.

Now, I have since grown multiple pairs of emotionally stable balls, but then, in my eighteen year old mindset, I was broken. Oh no! A distraught customer was incredibly dissatisfied with my and my company’s service! It. Is. The. End. Of. The. World! What was I going to do? Should I hand in my resignation? Maybe I should just leave college and go back home to sulk in front of my Xbox 360.

Let’s read that situation again, but we’re going to look at it in a comical light. I just got yelled at by a geeked out lady with frizzy-ass hair, over a bag of $5.98 fish dicks. That’s freakin’ hilarious! That’s some type of crazy Facebook video you’d see nowadays of a Karen-Gone-Wild.

I love looking at past experiences in a comical hindsight. Almost just as much as I love making fun of people, whether it be customers, random strangers on a street, or even my own co-workers. God, I love making fun of those guys! They’ll be recurring topics of conversation.

But the thing I love the most is sharing these experiences! With my co-workers, my family and friends, and especially my husband. He is one of the few people in this world that loves and appreciates my humor, and how much of an evil man I am. Just as I adore him and how he can’t stand people asking ignorant questions. We talked for a good fifteen minutes on the psychological science of a common customer question, which he was asked a few days ago by a lady in his store. “Hey, are you guys open on Christmas?”

Pause. Are we open on Christmas? ‘Kay, let’s break this down. Christmas, one of the most celebrated days of the year in America, and even in different areas of the world. A day that...for the most part, this whole country just...shuts down! The only two places I can think of that would be open on Christmas Day (COVID or no COVID), are McDonald’s and Cracker Barrel. Are you guys open on Christmas?

Pardon me, had to go smoke a cigarette as I pondered this. To quote my husband’s favorite lines, “Hell nah!” And, “Whatchu mean?” The big blue box retail store that my husband works for possesses neither golden arches, or a completely wooden architecture, ma’am. Part of me wants to move on, but I feel the rambling need to roast this lady! If it was Easter, I would totally get the question! If it were Labor Day, Memorial Day, New Year’s Day, or even Christmas Eve, I couldn’t even get mad at the question. Like...lady, Christmas is the one day where I could pass a Wal-Mart and see an empty parking lot.

This journal doesn’t get any easier on us, especially since we live in an area of Kentucky that borders the Ohio River and plenty of Hoosiers from Southern Indiana, who come to get their shopping done. This statement requires further explanation! Both of the groups of people I am referencing to go hand-in-hand. The Kentuckians for this area...are just the sweetest people I have ever come across in this world. They are kind, gentle, and literally would give you the jacket off their back. Literally! Old Mister McGoogin would lend you his cane if you sprained your ankle. When you would offer it back to him, he’d just say he could get another from the VA hospital. Sounds fantastic, right? Well, turn that innocence into downright inconvenience.

Say your occupation is to bag people’s groceries. You offer a lady with half a cart full of stuff to help her out to her vehicle, since that’s your job to ask and potentially provide that service. She politely declines, wishes you a great day, and goes on with her life. The next order is being slid down to your area, and you start bagging. That lady comes back and has reconsidered your offer. Now...you’re in a pickle. On one hand, your mind is fizzling like a Pepsi in irritation and you want to go help her. But, that means abandoning your new shopper that deserves your attention as well.

But, Aaron? How is this an inconvenience? It’s just a simple case of a mind changing. Oh, you silly, silly, little reader. You don’t know these people like I do. I won’t say this area of Kentuckians do this on purpose, but they know that they have caused this chain of discomforted actions, but have no remorse for doing so.

It’s like an elderly person, who uses an assisted living mode of transportation, with a driver who have no idea how to operate that vehicle. This elderly person will go to a place, like a Wal-Mart, walk to a random department, call their daughter and let them know they need a ride home because they need their insulin shot in thirty-seven minutes. The daughter, irritated that this has happened twice this week, finds the parent in the arts and crafts section, as per usual. With large puppy-dog eyes, the elderly person is profusely apologetic and states very negative statements about themselves, such as how useless they are and how they’re such a bother. The daughter shows her aggravation, but calmly lets the parent know that it is okay.

So...those are the Kentuckians in my area. Let’s focus on the Hoosiers! They do the exact same thing, but they have mannerisms and behaviors that belong in the Andy Griffith Show. Whether they act like Andy or Barney, they talk as if it is still the 1950’s.

“Well, gee, Aaron! Beautiful weather we’re having!”

“Sure is, Mister Peterson! Did ya hear? They’re callin’ for snow in three weeks!”

“Oh, dear! Better stock up on milk, eggs, bread, and bacon! How’s the waafe (wife, but I’m pulling some Twain pronunciation here) doin’?”

“Same as always! Takin’ care of the kids and making me a sandwich!”

The two groups can instantly tell each other apart. And not by looking at their license plates. It took me all of three months working at a grocery store in our town to learn the distinctions. You can’t discern them by looking at their wardrobes, as they dress almost identically as a group (men wear either Carhartt or Columbia everything, and ladies either wear Sunday dresses or jeans from the mens’ section). It’s all about the head movement. Are they bobbing their head waaay too much when they talk? Hoosier. Are they bobbing their head a lot? Kentuckian. Simple as that.

So I hope that this is enough detail for my environment for you to understand that I am serious and that these people are too silly to make up. Just the other day, I was stocking my usual aisle (The Dinner Aisle: spaghetti, salad dressings, and any canned meats you can think of). A middle aged man strolls on an electric cart and asks for canned beef tamales. These are super popular at my store, and due to the pandemic, it is a rarity to see on the shelf. I let the man know that we haven’t had it in stock this whole month! This wasn’t a lie, fib, or fabrication. Genuinely, either some old fart buys it all like a hoarder, or we just can’t get it in from the warehouse since there are larger stores in our company that get priority. He wasn’t visibly angry...just...disgruntled. So disgruntled, that he makes a lap around my aisle, passing me and my large pallet of products that need to be stocked. Then another lap...and another. Aaaand another. Each and every time, he stares me down as he drives by.

This journal will mostly consist of our weekly rants on silly interactions with our customers and co-workers that make us either pull our hair out, or cause us to drop to the floor in our poorly chosen laughter. It is these moments where our marriage is the strongest as we console one another in our daily workplace adventures. We simply wish to share these experiences with you, in hopes to find a common hilarity that will bring awful happiness to our dark and grim world. Our entries won’t all be as bad as an elderly person combating Alzheimer’s or how the strangers around us partake in the concept that the wife is to serve the husband. These are purely our observations, and do not reflect our beliefs. We just live in an area that is completely back-asswards, and we love to poke fun at it like the terrible people we are.

We hope you join us on this journey of our misplaced humor, and find our daily torture just as funny. The goal is to have a chapter/entry up once a week...or if there is an event that just to be shared, due to its insane hilarity. As we post our stories, we’ll tell more about ourselves and the people we work with, as they are an extended family to us...well...at least to me. The husband’s co-workers...pfft...they’re something, let me tell ya right now!

We’ll see y’all next week!