So off I go to the Post Office. I need to turn right, but I get in the wrong lane and there is a solid line of traffic on all sides as I pull up to a red light. “But,” I think to myself, “it always happens that someone starts off slowly from a red light leaving a break in traffic, so I will have my chance to move over.” And that is exactly what happened. Some days are like that. :)
And just at that moment I remembered that I had a bunch of newspapers in the back of my car to drop off at the recycle center which happens to be very close to the Post Office! What luck I remembered that now rather than just as I was arriving at my next destination. True, I had several bags of cardboard and plastics to recycle that I could have thrown in the car before I left home, but these newspapers had been sloshing around in the car for a week. I drove into the recycle site and dumped them off feeling just a tinge of righteousness. I noticed the other people driving up and dropping off their recyclables: An old man in an old van wearing a golf cap, a well-dressed woman in a smallish SUV, a dad with his kid. I remembered the first time I started recycling which was only a few years ago. I drove into the recycle site and was quite amazed to see the good people of Knoxville–such ordinary folk–pulling in and dropping off their stuff. There was nary a Prius to be seen—well maybe there was one—I felt quite embarrassed that I was a newbie and had been negligent for so long. Though in my defense, for some of those years our garbage service had taken our recyclables–but they had long since decided that it wasn’t worth the effort.
I drove on to the Post Office; it was 12:30. “Perfect,” I thought, “Rush hour at the Post Office. Well maybe they will have all the windows open.” I walked in. Three of four were open. Well, it could be a lot worse. I counted the people in line: Only nine. Theoretically, I would be the “third” person in line, and if each person took just two minutes, I would be up in six. I didn’t quite make it in six, but close. But just as I was about to have my turn, another Post Office worker appeared; I thought he was going to open up the other window. But he asked if any of the workers needed to go to lunch. I turned around to look at the line which by this time had more than doubled. I stepped up to the window and the woman told me my box would be in California in two days for $32.50. I glanced at the computer screen to verify the $32.50; one other price also listed on the screen was much higher for overnight service. I asked if there was a lower, slower rate. $17.00 for delivery in a week. Wonderful! Funny that the $17.00 rate had not even appeared on the computer screen until I asked.
I returned to my car and headed to my next destination, Kmart! I never go to Kmart and at one point in my life had sworn off ever even so much as looking at a flyer for Kmart (because of repeated snafus I’d had), much less actually going there. But that was many years ago, and now I was looking for a particular item, and it so happened I had seen it right there in the Kmart circular. But as I drove off toward Kmart a faint alarm sounded in my brain. Kmart had closed down more than a year ago. I quickly called Russel and ask him to google Kmart and find out if there was one left in the area. But not so.
So I detoured over to Target. As I tried to turn left onto the main street the woman in the car a head of me was having difficulty turning left. An occasional car straggled by slowly from the other direction, and I know she did not want to hit it—and certainly did not want to disturb any Christmas reveries the occupants might be having. So while an entire brigade (a brigade consists of two to five regiments or battalions and approximately 4,000 to 5,000 troops) could have turned left, I sat there calmly, sitting up straight, smiling and loving everybody. Finally my turn came, and I squinched through before the light turned heavy red—pale red is still ok when there are no cameras at the intersection.
I took a parking space in the furthest possible corner from the entrance; I try to sneak in a little healthy walking whenever I can; (and it was also the only open space I could find.) It took me at least 10 minutes to locate the $35 sale duvet that I had noticed in the circular. I wasn’t really planning on buying a duvet, but I thought since I was there I would drift by the bedding department. So after searching each aisle twice, I finally located the sale duvets hidden on the pillow isle; the color was much different than the one pictured in the ad, so I moved on to other items on my list, Fortunately, by now I was out of the buying mood. (But in case anyone is in the market, Target has the best selection of cotton bed comforters and covers. That includes Bed Bath and Beyond, Linens and Things, Tuesday Morning, The Home Store, Marshalls, TJ Max etc. I know because whenever I am in such a store I drift by the bedding.) But right now I decided to drift on by the tools, which all looked much nicer than the Big Lots variety I had already bought. But, too late for Russel, sigh. Then I drifted by the Christmas DVDs. I love to watch the original Grinch cartoon and A Charlie Brown Christmas with the kids. I have home-taped VCR copies that are running a bit thin, so I thought I’d splurge and get the DVDs. I found the Grinch at McKays Used Bookstore some time ago, but am still on the hunt for Charlie Brown. A Charlie Brown Christmas had been advertised at Kmart for only $12.99; but at Target it was $19.99. So I turned up my nose and drifted out of the store, checking the price of the POST granola cereal our family devours on my way. It was a pretty good price, but as I said, the mood for standing in line with my plastic had passed.
So on I went to Walgreen’s. I have been feeling more positive about Walgreen’s of late and had noted a number of items I wanted to get or check out. Some years ago I swore off Walgreen’s (hmm if only these stores knew they had really ticked me off) because whenever I went in to get an advertised item it wasn’t there. “Oh our store didn’t get a shipment of those.” Or “We have sold out of that item.” But time goes by and I had forgotten all those bad memories. Plus I do most of my digital photos through Walgreen’s and have been quite happy with them. However, today I found nothing I had circled, and I wasn’t in the mood to ask about it. So again, I huffed off without buying a thing.
Starting the car, I began to feel quite proud of myself; my shopping day that had started out with ominous tones—spending $38.00 in Big Lots for nothing much, could have easily snowballed into a route. To reward myself, I stopped at JoAnne’s and bought the blue-polka dotted wrapping paper I had resisted a few weeks ago.
And so a Merry Christmas to all you shoppers. Actually I don’t have all that many items to shop for because I told my family that I was buying them garage sale items or 90% off clearance items throughout the year. Then in addition I would just give each person some cash to get what they really wanted. That way I wouldn’t end up buying things for them that they didn’t really want, or things that they wanted, but not enough to give their own money for—even if it was Christmas money. You with older kids have probably noticed that little phenomena. “Oh yeah, get me this and that or that and this.” But actually if they have the cold hard cash in their own little hands, they are not willing to part with it for said item. And I may even give up buying the garage sale items because I end up with too many little things to wrap and wrapping takes a long time. And they, poor souls, no doubt end up with too many little things to find a place for or to stick in drawers–though I have told them they are more than welcome, after a hearty "Oh! thanks Mom!" to recycle the items or send them to Goodwill. Hmm, perhaps I am sounding a bit scrooge-like. I’m not really feeling particularly scrooge-like and to prove it, tomorrow I will include the words to a beautiful Christmas song I heard today.
Merry Christmas to All
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