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I report. I deride.
Thursday, February 5, 2015 at 12:44PM 
Tuesday afternoon, at our local Kroger, I experienced grocery-store rage.
Patience not being a virtue I possess in any readily-discernible amount, perhaps an episode of grocery-store rage was inevitable.
However.
What happened was this:
I had a limited amount of time to trot into the store and pick up four things -- which ended up being five on account of, pork loin was on sale for one ninety-nine a pound -- before I was needed at home.
It was the worst time of day for traffic, and you know how that is. But I'm not copping to road rage.
I buzzed around the perimeter of the store, making good time and arriving at the till with twenty-eight dollars and forty-six cents worth of necessities.
I pushed my cart into a line that looked short. As in, there was but one order ahead of mine and it appeared to be almost completely processed.
The folks being checked out were a lady of about sixty and a man who looked to be around thirty-five.
Caucasians, dressed casually but not fancy. Nothing about them really stood out except that the impression I got was mother-son. I could be wrong but you probably would have thought the same.
Mom needed to lose at least seventy-five pounds and seemed a trifle odd; I wasn't sure why. Nervous. Son was clean-cut and came across as normal in every way.
Yes; in my spare time, I profile complete strangers. Not maliciously but with mild curiosity. If you don't like it, you can always click out.
Because, having left my vocab cue cards in another purse, I had nothing else to do, I glanced at what the two seemingly healthy, unremarkable, vanishing-middle-class people in front of me were buying.
It was a large order. Mostly name brands, several fancy marinades and sauces for meat, et cetera. Nice groceries. A lot of very nice groceries, I noted.
Okay.
Then I was distracted when mother and son (let's just go with that version, why don't we) commenced to dither over whether either of them could make a Kroger-Plus Shopper's Card available for the cashier.
The scanning of which (the card; not the cashier) applies discounts to your purchase total.
It took basically three eternities for mom to locate said scrap of plastic on her keyring which was jammed with such scraps from stores all over town and even in other galaxies.
(I refuse to put those plastic things on me pirate keyring; step off, way off. My Kroger card had been sprung from my wallet and was even then in my hand in anticipation of actually having my paltry few viands checked out on that calendar day.)
At any rate, fortunes were made and squandered and the big-as-your-face iPhone18SDP (Super-Duper-Plus), yet to be invented, passed into planned obsolescence in the time it took mommie dearest to produce the Kroger plastic scrap.
In desperation, at one point I even offered my Kroger card for swiping.
The unpleasantly-plump lady acted as though my credit-card-sized plastic scrap was radioactive, declining to accept it with hand-fluttering and eye-rolling, no smile.
Okay.
In due time the planets aligned like such as that the cashier concluded his laborious scanning of the boatload of groceries and announced the total: Three-hundred-two dollars and change.
I thought, Mercy. That's after the Kroger-Plus card discounts.
An additional millennia (give or take) elapsed while the mom-son duo brought their payment source out into the light of waning Kroger day.
Meanwhile the cashier had begun -- and was taking his sweet time -- loudly lecturing the bag boy on proper procedure for packing up three hundred dollars worth of food. Much instruction about canned goods on the bottom, making for a good foundation.
I looked around me, silently seeking sympathy from fellow gridlocked customers. How many times have I winced when cans were thrown in on top of bread, and nobody said a word or thought anything of it?
Or when two jars of pickles and one strawberry jam were pitched into a single bag of plastic the ply of an anemic generic tissue, with maybe even a hole in the bottom, to clink and clank dangerously against one another?
But, okay. The teachable moment and all that.
Meanwhile the son had swiped what appeared to be a debit card and punched in his PIN and I spied a wee flicker at the end of the five-mile black tunnel that had become my existence.
So then the next thing I knew, the cashier was saying: That'll be eight oh one. As in, eight dollars and one cent.
What?
I thought, I thought they owed three-hundred-two and change.
I wondered whether, at the beginning of the check-out process before I queued up, mom and son had produced a stack of coupons that had been deducted at the end.
Were they extreme couponers? Was there a sneaky crew from TLC nearby, aiming their cameras at our checkout lane? I patted my hair and hoped my nose wasn't shiny.
But something about the demeanor of the mother-son shopping pair told me they weren't all that into reality. So what was the deal?
I snuck a peek at the big-screen register total -- at Kroger everyone and their Aunt Mildred's vegan, gluten-free cousin's blind pet ocelot can see exactly what you've purchased and what it costs -- and the answer was revealed.
Right at the bottom, in capital letters:
EBT TRANSFER
Oh. Okay.
Mom and son are likely still stashing into an already-bulging pantry their two-hundred-ninety-four dollars worth of groceries bought for them by the government. Wait. The taxpayers.
And yes; that makes me mad. I freely admit it. Judge, don't judge. That's your prerogative. It won't change anything.
And no; I don't know the specific circumstances surrounding the subject never-missed-a-meal woman and her grocery-shopping buddy who may or may not have been her son. I don't have to.
If you walk into a market under your own steam and walk out with over three hundred dollars worth of food that you yourself didn't have to pay for because you have a government-issued welfare card to swipe, there is something wrong. I don't know what it is in every case, but something is rotten in Denmark.
A pastor friend tells me that select folks in his congregation receive so much government aid for food, they can hardly use all the food they get. They give some of their primo groceries away for lack of space to store it.
They even swap food items amongst themselves for other goods and services.
They think nothing of it.
My daughter, a single mother who works her tail off to provide for herself and her child and who as a matter of sheer principle is not on welfare, was offered milk at the store by a woman as, side-by-side, they wheeled their carts out to the parking lot.
The woman had received more milk from welfare benefits than she could possibly use before it spoiled.
Don't tell me people are hungry. I don't believe it. Millions who could work but won't, have become fat and lazy. Victims? No. Feckless puppets duped by a lie? Yes.
They are willing accomplices, thieves, criminals, colluding with a corrupt and abusive regime, sluggish parasites who don't know or care that they've been assigned by those in power a minuscule value, and that merely as tools.
It is immoral.
And do not tell me that the majority of those who receive government benefits either need or deserve them. On his best day, having slept in the house and dined on turbo-charged Wheaties for breakfast, that dog will not hunt.
If fact if you have convinced yourself of that, I feel sorry for you. I don't know how you can be so naive and survive in this cruel world.
Forty-eight million people -- up fourteen million from 2009 -- in America receive what we once referred to as food stamps, which current mode of delivery is the doppelganger of a credit/debit card -- just like the ones used by actual paying customers who have worked for the money -- so as to remove the last vestige of a stigma from those who are shamelessly on the take.
What has happened to our country? Barack Hussein Obama has happened to our country. Food-stamp president? He's the coffin-nail president.
God help us. God, please help us.
TG said I should write to my congressman about what I saw. I plan to do that and I hope The Honorable Joe "You Lie!" Wilson has an appetite for the authenticity and intensity of my grocery-store rage because somebody needs to do something.
And that is all for now.
=0=0=0=
Happy Thursday
Reader Comments (13)
I knew it! About 1/2 way down, I knew what was coming!
And, you want to know what I saw the other day? The Subway shop has a sign in their window
EBT Accepted here! WHAT???????????
I had to walk back by to see if I was hallucinating. But, yes, it's true. How many people work at least one job, and some two who would LOVE to have a free Sub?
Girl, don't get me started. After I retired, I worked as a cashier for our local grocery store, and when I'd get home I would take a shower and get the "bad thoughts" I'd felt that day out of my head. Some of what I saw broke my heart, while other thing blew my mind!
I've got the bronchitis, and need to get off here. But, as usual I really enjoyed reading your post, and like you I feel it SO WRONG!!
xoxo
Dear Jenny, I'm spending my old age trying to be nonjudgmental, but you're killing me here. Also, I had to look up "viands" - now I'm excited about when I might use it. I don't think we bestow dignity by allowing misuse of any benefits. Nor do we encourage a speck of self reliance or self-respect. My mother drummed into me (she was a single mother - my father died when I was 9) that there is no free lunch. I believe it to this day, though I still believe in charity and in trying my very best not to judge, especially not knowing the circumstances. As always, your writing provides ample fodder for thought. (PS Don't buy light or lite anything - too much processing or other additives you don't want...)
@Sally ... first girl, I'm so sorry you're sick. I know how brutal bronchitis can be ... so take care but thanks for taking the time to read! I know exactly what you mean. One doesn't know whether to laugh or cry sometimes. xoxo
@Barb ... haahaha made you look. Viands is a great word, as is postprandial, which I use every chance I get. I hear you about not wanting to be judgmental; neither do I. But even making allowances for what we don't know about a situation, what I saw on Tuesday at Kroger was just plain wrong. We were poor when I was a kid. Welfare? Never. Never ever. We ate beans and rice several times a week. Fast food or eating out, back then? About once a year. Nobody has enough humility or common sense to do that anymore.
OK about that salad dressing ... don't worry. It's been on my shelf forever; I don't even know how it got there. Salad dressing fairies? I make my own vinaigrette from balsamic vinegar and olive oil. xoxo
Oh yes - I'm feeling it too! I don't have a problem with helping those who really need it. And it should be help for a period of time until they can get themselves on track, not forever. But paying for better stuff than I can afford from my paycheck is not a help. And making it easier and taking away any embarrassment is also not good. It takes any any incentive or desire to make it on your own. Kudos to those like Audrey who don't take the easy way out!
I hope your Joe Wilson takes this seriously. Something tells me he doesn't appreciate this type of thing either!
@Mari ... I agree that those who need help, should get it until they can do for themselves. If that's all the welfare system provided for, I'd have no problem with it. Sally spoke of seeing that EBT is welcome at Subway. It's also welcome at the meat market where we shop, to get the highest quality meat we can afford. EVERYTHING there is expensive. But the storekeepers LOVE welcoming the EBT card; more money for them, more sure-thing customers buying their high-dollar goods. I'm sorry but if you don't work, you shouldn't eat steak. Period. I'll let you know when I get a form letter back from Mr. Wilson. xoxo
I love it when your sentences are so funny I have to read them twice just to laugh again! Several of those on this post...
@Sydney ... hey cutie, I was thinking about you only yesterday, wondering if you still tuned in to my rantings. Good to hear from you and if I brought a smile to that pretty face, so much the better. xoxo
I read every one! I love keeping up with you and the cuties….
@Sydney ... I owe you an email, long overdue. I'll see to it soon. Love to your fam. xoxo
I shake my head with wonder and disappointment about how many are getting food stamps these days. The amount is staggering. And I don't see evidence of widespread hunger that liberals assert. Our society is changing rapidly, and evil leaders like Obama are greasing the skids for the download slide.
And on a sidenote, I despise all those stupid grocery cards. That is one reason why I avoid Krogers at all costs. Ever since Publix opened in my end of town, it has been my grocery store of choice.
@Donna ... hey girl. I hate the cards too and I love Publix. But Kroger was closer haaahaha.
What really angers me? The morons voted him back into office....He's going to do everything he can to destroy this country before he leaves office in 711 more days!
Yes, I'm counting...I have a counter on my IPhone and I'm not afraid to use it!Hahaa
This is just part of the "plan".
I've been in your shopping day shoes.
hughugs
@Donna ... your counter ... I LOVE THAT! But we will be saddled with paying him -- and for him -- for the rest of our lives, both literally and figuratively. It is an abomination.