Pick up in Aisle Three (Or Maybe Not)

When we got home from a birthday dinner the other night, I took off my rings and put them on the coffee table. It occurred to me then that I might want to move them to the dining room table next to my keys so I wouldn’t forget them in the morning. But did I move them? Of course not. And did I forget them in the morning? Of course I did.

And it bothered me all day.

How strange that a couple pieces of jewelry can be so much more than a couple pieces of jewelry. My finger felt naked and I couldn’t wait to get home to slip the rings back on my finger. I didn’t feel less “married” – it just felt…I don’t know. Weird. And in the meantime, I hoped no guy was going to hit on me in the produce section at Kroger’s when I went in to pick up some alfalfa sprouts and radicchio.

Oh, wait. That hasn’t happened in a while. And probably not because of the rings on my left hand either.

Oh well – that’s okay. I’m not on the market and really don’t want anyone hitting on me in the produce section at Kroger’s. It happened before back in the carefree days of my youth and, frankly, it was always sort of a creepy experience.

It's curious to me that men hit on women in grocery stores, although I suppose the idea does make some sort of sense. You can tell a lot about a person by taking a peek in their shopping cart. If she has Similac and diapers in her cart, he might want to stay away. If she has the cart filled with things like Trix, Fruit Loops and Spaghetti-O’s, he might want to move on. Because if she doesn’t have toddlers at home, her taste in food probably was stunted somewhere around the third grade and he could have a tough time enjoying an adult meal with such a woman. Unless, of course, he himself is partial to chicken nuggets and Ding Dongs.

On the other hand, if she has a six pack of his favorite beer in the cart along with some steaks and a loaf of crusty French bread, he might take a chance and hit the jackpot. Sure, she could have a boyfriend at home, but nothing ventured, nothing gained – right?

The first time anyone hit on me in the grocery store was back in the day when I wore skirts and high heels to work. Stopping at the grocery store on the way home from work was the norm – and one evening some guy in a ratty old t-shirt and jeans that looked like they hadn't seen the inside of a washing machine in a while stopped me in the meat department. How's that for irony? Not the sort of “meat market” I was expecting!

Nevertheless, he chatted me up as I scanned the packages looking for a good deal. Being too polite to tell him to bug off, I endured his patter as he attempted to wow me with his pick-up lines. Which sort of bombed. Lines like, “Hey, that steak looks good – I bet you could cook a nice steak, couldn't you?” And “I love red meat – don't you?” were not exactly knockin' my socks off.

Thankfully, he didn't ask me out so I smiled at him and told him I had to be moving along. I stopped short of sprinting away, but the guy pretty much stalked me up and down the aisles after that, which definitely creeped me out. So I abandoned the remainder of my grocery list and made tracks for the cash register as fast as my high heels would let me.

I stowed the groceries in the trunk of my car – and then saw a car pull up behind me thus blocking me in. Yep, it was the same guy who by then had gotten bold and said he wouldn't move until I agreed to go out with him. Whoa. I never did respond well to either coercion or threats.

I told him in no uncertain terms to move his car, which he took as a sign to continue trying. Just then I noticed that the person who had parked in front of me was leaving – so I jumped in my car and took off in the opposite direction. I can't remember what happened next, though I'm quite sure I didn't drive straight home because I didn't want this character to know where I lived. I probably did my best imitation of Starsky and Hutch trying to lose a tail before finally heading toward home.

Sheesh. Not a great example of a successful pick up in a grocery store, that's for sure!

On the other hand, perhaps some folks have better luck. Hopefully with a little more finesse. After all, true love can be found in the strangest places. For me, it was on MySpace. So the meat department at Kroger’s isn’t outside the realm of possibility. I’m just glad I’m no longer looking.

So I won’t forget my rings again. Oh, and I’m really glad I no longer wear high heels. Take it from me - sprinting through a grocery store in them is not fun.

The "Check Engine" Incident

I just finished a blog about how my car was past due for its 3,000 mile oil change, and it reminded me of a story when I was in college that I wanted to share.

I didn’t own a car in college. Heck, I didn’t own my own car until I was 23 and realized that it was taking me 45 minutes to get to work – and I only lived about 5 minutes away. I even had to transfer buses downtown! (I didn’t know how close to work I actually lived because of, again, that whole “directionally challenged” thing. But that’s another story…)

Anyway, in the years before I entered the world of car ownership, my parents generously allowed me to borrow one of their cars, usually without requiring me to sign promissory notes. More often it was my dad’s ugly green Dodge/Plymouth/Chrysler/whatever car and not my mom’s sporty cream-colored Mustang, but I was happy to borrow any wheels at all, so I didn’t care all that much.

Their only requirement was that I had to put gas in the car. And they wanted me to keep it dent-free, but that was pretty much an unspoken assumption.

So one Friday night, my girlfriend Diana and I decided to drive to Salem to go dancing at a place called, “The Hunt Club.” Yes, I’m ashamed to say, it really was called that. What’s more, we went to this club whenever I came home for the weekend, which was fairly often – so we must have liked the joint.

(Oh, and just so you know, I wasn’t into “hunting” all that much. I was, after all, a serious college student and didn’t have time for silly things like chasing boys. Um, yeah. Okay, the truth is that I wasn’t into long-distance romances at the time.)

Anyway, we never made it to the Hunt Club that fine spring evening.

I had asked my dad if I could borrow his car and without hesitation he handed over his keys. That was easy, I thought. So I picked up Diana and, dressed to the hilt in our finest dancin’ clothes and high heels, we took off for Salem.

Between Alliance and Salem is (or was back then, anyway) a long stretch of 2-lane country road without streetlights.

There we were sailing along the road chattering away without a care in the world when about 5 miles before reaching our destination, the “Check Engine” light came on. I said to Diana, “Hmmm…wonder if that’s serious?” Diana, clearly not a car expert either, shrugged and said, “Dunno.”

So we kept on going. I figured I would call my dad once we reached the Hunt Club to ask him what we should do.

Oh, the irony of hindsight.

A few minutes later, we realized it was sort of serious when the car stalled and then died.

This was back in the day before cell phones, so I couldn’t whip out my trusty iPhone and call home. Instead, there we were on a dark, lonely stretch of road too far away from the Hunt Club and too far away from home. We sort of thought we remembered seeing a pay phone about half a mile or so back at a deserted gas station, but we weren’t positive.

For about five minutes we sat in the car debating what to do, but since no one passed our broken-down ugly green car the whole time, we realized we were going to have to hoof it back to see about that pay phone. Diana didn’t want to stay in the car by herself, so we carefully locked the vehicle and started teetering down the road in the dark in our high heels. There was no berm on the 2-lane road either and, again, no lights.

Now I realize you probably don’t know my friend Diana, but let me just say that the girl could talk. When I first met her in grade school she was shy and quiet, but then at some point in high school, the dam broke and all the things that she’d been holding back came out in a torrent. And she didn’t ever really stop talking. It’s one of the things I loved about her because I could pretty much just toss in an occasional “uh huh” and a “yeah” and she’d just keep on going.

So there we were click-clacking down the road in our heels. I was slightly worried about the car and praying that we’d find a pay phone once we reached the deserted gas station, and also hoping that maybe it wasn’t anything serious so we could still possibly get in some dancing and not waste our cute outfits. All these thoughts were going through my head when I took a step…and then landed flat on my back in a ditch! One minute the road was there, and then suddenly it wasn’t.

And as I was lying there on my back, I knew for SURE that we weren’t going to be dancing that night as my entire back – from my carefully coiffed head to the heels of my strappy lavender sandals – was now covered in mud.

Diana, oblivious, kept on walking and talking. After a few more steps, she must have realized I was no longer beside her. The next thing I see is Diana’s face looming above me from the roadside. As she peered down at me in the ditch, she said, “Jane! What are you doing down there?!”

Like I’d done it on purpose.

I said, “Well, I was getting tired, so I thought I’d take a little break and…what are you – nuts? I fell! Get me outta here!”

Right then the absurdity of our situation hit me and I started giggling. Then I started laughing. Once Diana realized I wasn’t seriously hurt, she started laughing, too, and it got so bad we couldn’t catch our breath. She just kept pointing at me and howling.

Finally, she managed to pull herself together and reached down to help me climb out of the ditch. Then, she looked at me and said, “Jane! You’re all covered in mud! We can’t go dancing now!”

That did us in. We were both doubled over laughing so hard we had tears running down our faces. Which ruined our makeup, but was sort of a moot point by then anyway.

I don’t remember what happened after that, except that we did reach my dad who came and picked us up in my mom’s sporty cream-colored Mustang. Probably he brought a towel so that I didn’t get the interior muddy, but again, it’s all sort of a blur.

It turns out that Dad’s car was out of oil, which he’d intended to replace, but had forgotten about before handing me the keys.

Filed under the category of “Duh,” a car without oil is not a good thing. And, yes, we fried the engine. And I never saw that ugly green Dodge/Plymouth/Chrysler/whatever car again.

Surprisingly, my parents didn’t give me a lot of grief about killing their car, but I suspect that my dad felt responsible and was willing to take the blame for the incident. They did, however, impress upon me the importance of immediately stopping if ever the “Check Engine” light comes on again in any vehicle.

This has happened a couple of times since then and, you should know, I positively panic. My instant reaction is to stomp on the brake in the middle of the freeway in rush hour traffic and stop the car right then and there. Fortunately, I am able to realize the foolishness of such a decision, so I pull over to the side of the road. But I do so immediately. And then I whip out my trusty iPhone to call for help.

Oh, and I rarely wear high heels anymore. If you’re ever forced to walk down a dark, lonely country road, it’s far better to be wearing flats.