Wal Mart

This is a rant about Wal-Mart. If Wal-Mart holds a special place in your heart, please read no further. Otherwise I'll offend you and we'll have a falling out and all over what? Wal-Mart. Not worth it people.

So I have a hate/hate relationship with Wal-Mart. I hate the dang place and I hate it that in order to get more, I really do have to shop there. So I've devised a game plan that will help me to win while I'm there.

First, you must come with a reliable shopping partner. No, your kids will not work because this shopping partner must stand in line the second you walk through the doors in hopes of shrinking your wait time to around six hours. If you do not bring this shopping partner, don't complain about standing in one of the two checkstands that are actually open for the rest of your life.

Second--this one is not for the sissies. You must go on the loudspeaker and announce for all available cashiers to come to the front to help check. This will accomplish two things--you might get a third check stand open and you'll get to see if there are actually employees working. This is the age-old question--does anybody really work at Wal-Mart? This second step should answer your question (the answer is no, by the way).

Don't expect them to ever have all of the self-scan stations open, either. It is a physical impossibility for all of those check stands to be open at once, what with no additional workers needed to run them. They just want to look fancy with all of their check-out lanes.

Third--memorize the lay-out of every item in every aisle throughout the entire store. You cannot win without this crucial step simply because you will not find an employee to help you out. And if by some freak chance you catch an employee wandering in from a smoke break, you really can't expect them to stop and pay attention to you. No, no. They just got in from a break. They need to relax.

Now every once in awhile Wal-Mart will throw something crazy your way in attempt to beat you yet again. For instance, they'll stick one of their "Associate Managers" in a random aisle and you'll think you've hit the jackpot because you'll actually get a question answered correctly. Then when you ask him if he knows where the sun-dried tomatoes are, he'll lead you to the baking aisle and make you stand there with him while he looks through the entire aisle for them. How much time has this wasted? Entirely too much. But do not panic, the line your shopping partner is in still has yet to move because the cashier cannot find the code for the freak pears and is still looking at the fruit chart (by the way cashier, I'm pretty sure that's it's by the rest of the pears).

Now if you have been able to get all of the items on your list (as well as the other random things that somehow always end up in your cart) and you're checking out, do not even attempt to have a conversation with the cashier. This is simply because there are two different types of cashiers--those that hate the world and those that can't stop talking. Either way, if you start talking, you're toast. Just sit there quietly while your stuff is rung up and get the heck out of there.

If you do all of these things you can, and will, beat Wal-Mart. Now, if I could just get Adam to get a raise I could start doing all of my shopping at Target or King Soopers.

I know I used the word "actually" a lot. It just needed to be done.

Even so, amen.