Shopping trip turns ugly after honest mistake

 

It all went downhill after I realized my error and tried to correct it. I was in Winco shopping and had managed to get all my groceries bagged and into the cart when I realized that I had forgotten to pay. The cashier was done with their shift and had gone home, and the store was closed and dark. 

I should have just took the windfall and pushed my shopping cart to my car, but I was afraid they'd review the security footage and discover the error in the morning. I thought I'd better go wake up the checker at home and get her up out of bed to come back down and correct the mistake before they or I got into trouble. 

It wasn't my favorite checker Ele, as I had thought, but Arvada King, my former supervisor at Esplanade Manor. Arvada "Ice Queen." The skin picker, who sat for hours with tweezers, plucking eczema scabs from her arms without looking up. <shudder>

There would have been no love lost, should she have gotten in trouble, but still my conscience bothered me. So there I was, knocking at her bedroom door, which was conveniently located somewhere in the store, but strangely resembled one of the doors in my own house. 

Back down to the grocery store floor we went, and the unbagging and rescanning began, ever so slowly. To top of the sense of urgency, I had some family members, who had driven me to the store, that were now waiting on me to complete this process. 

The more hurried I felt, the slower I went, which is typical of my work ethic in general. People were getting pissed as I inexplicably began screwing around with light fixtures by taking the lightbulbs out and messing with the sockets. 

It wasn't my fault that they had loose electrical connections. It was a safety hazard which I felt compelled to correct, although I was a little worried while working on the live circuits. The fixtures would hum loudly as I attempted to tighten them up at the base. 

Eventually, I got all my groceries bagged and paid for and left the fixtures as they were, in somewhat better condition than I had found them. Now I had to find my people and get home. 

I didn't see them right away, but I did run into Chris Christie, who was wearing the blue plaid shirt that I bought at Walmart two years ago, and which has been hanging in the bathroom, on the shower robe door hook ever since.  He wasn't doing the shirt any favors, as it fit him like a sausage skin, stretching its buttons to their limits. 

"Hey, how'd you get my shirt?" I yelled at him, but he kept walking. 

Next, I saw Dennis Terpelle, a salesman for YC Honda who always reminded me of Eb from Green Acres, also wearing the same shirt. I looked around the store and noticed that quite a few other people were all wearing short sleeve blue plaid shirts exactly like mine. 

Ok, this was getting surreal and conspiratorial, but at least it wasn't theft. I made a joke to Dennis about starting a singing group, like a barber shop quartet or maybe a be-bop group. 

"Doo-wop," he corrected me and I laughed. 

Things were beyond ridiculous, so I guess that was a fitting enough place to end the dream, awakening to the scratching and scuttling of guineas on my roof. 

"Get off my roof, you assholes!" I screamed at them futilely, as I finally committed to getting out of bed to start my day.