Crash McGoon Strikes Again...

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ooh, Jackie Blue...

You like your life in a free-form style,

You'll take an inch but you'd love a mile,

There never seems to be quite enough,

floating around to fill your loving cup....

ooh, Jackie Blue...

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("Jackie Blue", Ozark Mountain Daredevils)

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I'm trying to get up my nerve to go back to Walmart...

I need to go because I've started a new, very enjoyable hobby--- beading --- and I need some little doo-dads called "crimp loops" or some such. (My mother turned me on to this addictive hobby and she gave me hundreds of wondrous, gorgeous beads made of glass, crystal, cloisonne, filigree metal, abalone, etc.) Anyway, the "crimp loops" are used to make closures for necklaces and such. I've made three necklaces so far which are long enough to go over one's head without needing a clasp closure. (I simply tied knots in the beading wire to join the two ends.) But now I want to make some shorter necklaces which will be too small to slip over a person's head; thus, I'll need "crimp loops" and clasps to make up the closures. (If interested, you can click on the pic to see the necklaces more closely.)

But... um... I'm feeling rather cowardly to show my face at Walmart so soon after the Coffee Aisle Incident.

I don't know what it is between me and Walmart but I don't seem to be able to get in and out of that dang store without committing some kind of major blunder. And the Coffee Aisle Incident was a definite blunder--- and is still weighing heavy on my mind. And on Blaine's too.....

Lord, but that man acted like The Coffee Aisle Incident was a completely chaotic donnybrook, which caused me to indignantly defend myself by telling him that it had been an unpleasant incident for sure, but not to the overly dramatic extent he was claiming. I remarked that I certainly hadn't heard anybody screaming "Oh, the humanity!!"

I mean, dadgum! It could have happened to anybody!

But I did learn some valuable lessons from the whole event:

1. Don't stuff your little coffee bean bag so full of coffee beans that you have trouble closing the bag with those little wire tie-tie's on the two sides of the bag, as this common mistake may cause one to lose control of the bag... and then, in a panic, begin madly fumbling and juggling the bag absurdly before dropping the stupid thing entirely, causing a wild shower of approximately 150 coffee beans to bounce their way down the aisle like Aggie marbles;

2. Should you spill that entire bag of 150 coffee beans as described above, it is best NOT to yell ugly cuss words like "Holy Shit!" when you realize that the 150 coffee beans are bouncing up and down at least three feet off the floor, creating chaos and bedlam on the coffee aisle;

3. Should the other people on the coffee aisle start slipping, tripping, and falling on the 150 coffee beans (which by now have merrily bounced their way down the complete length of the aisle) do not continue to holler more ugly cuss words since you've already offended and shocked everybody with the "Holy Shit!" epithet;

4. Don't even THINK about getting down on the floor to try cleaning up all the errant coffee beans...

.... JUST GET THE HELL OUT OF THERE AS FAST AS YOU CAN, no matter what insults Blaine is emitting.

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And then there was that dreadful Changing Room Incident.

Okay, as everybody knows, I... uh.... can sometimes lose my temper a little bit.

(Let's not go there, okay?)

(Thanks... where was I?)

Oh yes, the Changing Room Incident.

So one day I was shopping for jeans and I went to the changing room to see how the pairs I had chosen looked on me. The changing room attendant waved me back towards the left end of the two rows of cramped try-on cubicles. I pushed open the door of one cubicle and surprised a lady who was in there with her daughter.

(They must have been shopping for bathing suits because the lady was half nekkid and trying desperately to squeeze herself into a Catalina bathing suit which was obviously too small for her.)

"This cubicle is OCCUPIED!" the furious lady yelled at me. "You should have looked under the door to check before you entered!"

I quickly backed out of the cubicle, apologizing profusely. Then I turned to search for an unoccupied cubicle. I was irritated, thinking to myself that the lady had been overly harsh with me, since people accidentally charging their way into occupied cubicles is a common gaff in the world of trying on clothing.

And then it happened....

I overheard what the lady remarked to her daughter....

"God, what a total DUMBASS," she exclaimed loudly, loud enough for ALL the occupants of the changing room area to hear.

And I know... I know....

Yea, verily....but I know I should have just let it go. And I'm very ashamed at what happened next... but I was feeling rather grumpy that morning and her insults had irked me even further. And then... before I knew it... it just popped out.

"Oh, shut up!" I snapped back at the lady.

And then all hell broke loose....

"What did you say to me?" the lady screeched, bursting out of her cubicle snorting with both nostrils like an angry bull, now completely stuffed into the too-small Catalina bathing suit.

And then the changing room attendant, who had heard the whole exchange, came running in and began berating me loudly like there was no tomorrow.

"How DARE you tell another customer to 'shut up'!?" she exclaimed. "Everybody knows that you are supposed to look under the door of a cubicle to see if it is occupied or not!"

And then, to my utter mortification, the occupants of three other cubicles emerged from their cubicles to add their own scathing criticisms of me!!

"That was SO RUDE!" one of them hissed. "Were you raised in a barn?! You should be banned from Walmart!"

Good God, but had I just instigated an actual riot in the Walmart Women's Changing Rooms?! Could a person be arrested for telling somebody to "shut up" in Walmart? And so, in a panic, I dropped the jeans and fled, my face burning red as a beet with embarassment. (And so I didn't get any jeans that day...)

(Yeah, I know... But have no fear, because my temper is a frequent uncomfortable topic in my sessions with Fred. His exact (and embarassing) diagnosis for that type of my behavior is "Bo goes back to Junior High.")

(Fred's favorite saying to me about how other people perceive me is "You are not what you FEEL; you are what you DO.)

(Which, when I think about it, is really scary......)

Sigh.....

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And then there was the Men's Underwear Incident, which I maintain here and now is Walmart's fault.

Blaine and I were shopping together one day and I had insisted that I be the one to push the cart. And I've talked about this before--- about how Blaine doesn't like it when I'm the one who's pushing the cart. He complains that I "don't look where I am going" and crash into things--- and he calls me disparaging names like "Crash McGoon", which really irks the daylights out of me.

I mean, it's not like I've ever had a four-cart collision, you know? For God's sakes it's only a dang Walmart cart. So what if I lightly brush against a few objects here and there? And for that matter, I think that Walmart should install Stop Signs at certain dangerous intersections, like the one between the bakery and the produce section.

(The lady who went.... uh... headfirst into the Valencia Oranges bin was quite understanding about the whole thing.)

Anyhoo, there we were that day, shopping in the clothing area, and Blaine was AGAIN moaning and groaning about how I can't "drive" the cart right.

"Holy Hannah and I'll swoney!" I exclaimed, losing patience with him and this whole issue. "You are such an ass! We've been in here for nearly two hours and I haven't touched one single thing with this cart---and yet here you are griping!"

And then I pushed the cart right smack dab into a rack of men's long underwear.

Damnation!

Naturally, I was utterly exasperated by this appalling turn of events--- and so I attempted to clear my way out of the whole mess by madly thrusting long underwear aside while roughly jerking my cart clear, totally not realizing that one of the rather large, multiple-page cardboard price-tags of one of the underwear pairs had entangled itself on my cart.....

And then, after I'd made a couple hard tugs on my cart--- and to my horror--- the whole entire rack of that damnable underwear suddenly tipped over, coming perilously close to falling completely over--- and I had to grab it to keep it upright, at which point I managed to shove my cart away where it promptly knocked to the ground several packages of men's boxer briefs which had been stacked on a nearby shelf--- all of which caused such a commotion that every Walmart customer within 100 feet stopped and stared, all while Blaine laughed his head off....

(I'd really like to forget that whole incident.)

(Sigh again....)

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And, unfortunately, there is another thing I do at Walmart which causes all who know me to come to the belief that I am as nutty as a fruitcake. (And whether or not I truly AM as nutty as a fruitcake is beside the point.) And I am confounded on what to do about this issue because it's something which is totally automatic and natural to me.

It is that I talk to myself out loud as I shop. And I don't mean mumbling a few "hmmm's" or "that's nice" comments here and there. No, I have entire conversations with myself. I also argue with myself, berate myself, tell myself jokes, and ponder a plethora of issues with myself.

But surely I'm not the only person who has ever talked to herself in Walmart? Surely there's others??

I never thought anything about it, to tell you the truth. I mean, who cares? So big deal, I've said things out loud like "I wonder if I should get this frozen pizza that's on sale? No, the last time I got it Blaine said it gave him diarrhea...", or else

"Good Lord, would you look at the price of Poppin' Fresh Biscuits?! Hell, I can make my own with Bisquik for a lot less than that---and, frankly, I wish someone would take a rolling pin to that idgity-looking Pillsbury Dough Boy...", or else

"I wonder if anybody will notice that I've got twice the number of items for the '20-items-or-less' cashier? Naaah, that guy behind me looks dumber than a box of rocks...."

And a good friend of mine, Carrie, who has caught me talking to myself in Walmart on more than one occasion, states that I look like a "complete looney toon" when I'm doing it.

But what the hell--- I don't care what people think. Looney toon or not, it's a free country, dammit.

Where in the heck was I going with all this?

Oh yeah, I'm wondering if I should show my face at Walmart so soon after the Coffee Aisle Incident. I really do need those little crimp loop thingies.

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There are three Walmart's in Overland Park. I've only shopped at two of them. There is that third one on Metcalf....

Yeah, that's it. I'll go to that one....

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