Is an apology appropriate here?

Well, I apologize dear reader. It seems I was messing around with the design a little too much, and when I checked in this afternoon to start a new post - ACK!! My blog was a MESS!!! I think I've fixed it...thank goodness I'm not applying for a job in web graphics or designing websites!

I guess it was time for a new design anyway. The bright orange and pink is nice and festive for the holidays, isn't it?

Speaking of apologies, I am not so sure that there aren't a few people around here who owe ME an apology. If you want too much information - unsolicited - just go hang out at the local grocery store - Giant, or Acme, or occasionally Genuardis - and you'll learn lots of juicy tidbits about random strangers' relatives that you could have happily lived all your life WITHOUT EVER KNOWING!

For example: a few days ago I was in line at one of the aforementioned stores. I was sooo happy to have meandered around the store all alone, checking labels, marveling at the endless choices, and picking up everything on my list. I'm in the checkout line, waiting for my turn, and Great Grandma behind me blurts out,

"I would never show it off like that, even if had it."

Without thinking, I turn around and look to see what she is talking about. It's a magazine cover with one of the Kardashian girls looking dreamily at the camera with more exposed than covered. Frankly, I had not noticed. And if I had, I am sure I would not have cared one rat tail about it. The only magazine covers that grab my attention these days are Time, or Better Homes and Gardens. Occasionally Reader's Digest. And Taste of Home.

Wow. Am I old yet??

If I feel like splurging, I'll pick up the one with interesting looking recipes or a particularly newsworthy event in the headlines. But I won't waste my precious time alone looking at whatever-her-name-is Kardashian, or Cheryl Tieg, or Britney Spears, or George Clooney, or any of the Hollywood stars wearing ridiculous outfits that cost more than the GNP of a small country.

Well, ok, so maybe I'd at least slow down and glance at George. Just a glance.

Back to Great Grandma (hereinafter "GG"). She's looking disdainfully at the magazine cover, shaking her head, and once she sees she has my attention, really starts in on her diatribe about "girls these days." Briefly I wonder if I am being deposited into that group. But no time to ponder this!! GG has got a lot to say!

Speaking of Reader's Digest, I'll give you their version: GG's diatribe involved her sister's alleged virginity some 50 years ago, their sweet little Italian mother's insistence that she was really 5'2"and not just 5', and the rumors that swirled around after GG herself gave birth nine months and four days after her wedding.

GEEEEEEEZZZZZZZ. I have never seen a cashier move so S.L.O.W.L.Y. The transaction was taking so long I would swear the cashier had time to wrap every item separately in tissue paper, tape it enough to be shipped by boat to Hong Kong, label it with a label maker, and alphabetize it before placing it in the bag. I was running out of responses for GG. I think she must live alone. Mental note to self to quit going to the grocery store on a Tuesday at 10 a.m. More like Friday night around 11 p.m. All the GGs will be long asleep, and I can shop with the derelicts of society. They will be scary, possibly drunk, but at least won't try to unload on me their families' dirty laundry.

Back to GG and her lecture. She kept it up until I paid and was walking off with my receipt when she called out, "You have a Merry Christmas, dear!"

"You too!" I replied cheerily.

It was honest - I really meant it. But boy, was I ever glad to get out of there. Sometimes I just go to the grocery store to get away. You moms all know what I mean, right? It is SUCH A TREAT to grocery shop without one of my little ones grabbing at everything, pleading for such-and-such, or accusing one of the others of putting some forbidden item in the cart. And my boys. Well, they have wingspans of no less than 40 feet. You think about it, and you can't come up with any store in America - yes, I know, I haven't been in them all but this is a safe bet I promise - has aisles wide enough for a mother of a four-year-old boy to go down without him touching 90% of what's on the shelf and pulling off 90% of that.

Wait...no...I take that back...a mother of any boy. I am pretty sure my brother, who is what? 26 now? still has trouble not touching everything (sorry, bro). Let me prove my point for you. Brother is finishing med school. He recently finished a surgical rotation of some kind. I'm always asking him for funny stories, interesting things, and am in the process of compiling a list I'll someday publish of "Things Your Surgeon Won't Tell You." Of course, Brother is really my only contributor to this list, so I'll need to work on finding more sources. One thing your surgeon won't tell you is that a medical student and/or resident may or may not handle one or more of your internal organs while you are conked out dreaming nice fuzzy dreams. All in the name of education, of course. At least in the example Brother gave me he admitted he "still likes to touch stuff." And of course Chief Operating Surgeon said, "Why, yes, lowly medical student, you can put your fist in this here uterus!" This is when I thought how great it was Brother wants to be a surgeon so he can be in charge of all the touching of his highly-anesthetized patients!

Remember this post's theme is the appropriateness of an apology. I think, just for the record, Brother should offer his apology to the owner of that uterus. I know, she'll never know, absolutely no harm came from it, he'll be a better surgeon, blah blah BLAH! But STILL. I'm just sayin'...

So back to the enormous flow of unwanted information I get in the grocery stores. The more recent example is when Julia Childs offered me her advice on why I should purchase the big bag to put my Thanksgiving turkey in. I was just perusing the Ziploc containers in which I might use to send the kids' snacks and lunch items, but apparently Ms. Childs thought I needed help with my turkey. And I do. But that falls in the department of the United Brotherhood of the Organization of None of Anyone's Business!!

Not only did I learn how many ways she has attempted to keep her turkey juicy over many Thanksgivings past, but I also had to hear the sad tale of her husband's brother's cousin's unfortunate experience with a turkey fryer. It involved Poor Cousin running naked all over his yard with a Frisbee. I SWEAR I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP. I assured Ms. Childs I was not, nor now would I, going to consider frying my turkey. This did not assuage her concerns about the potential disaster for my Thanksgiving. Then I heard about another sister/cousin/relative whose back half of her house burned down because she forgot to turn the oil/fryer off after the frying was done. That oil just jumped right out of the fryer, which is electric she supposes, and ran all the way down the hall. Then the house took two years to fix, and the front half didn't match the new back half, and now they are using the big bag in which to cook their Thanksgiving bird BE.CAUSE. just putting a foil tent over it doesn't keep the juices in enough and smoking it makes it taste....SMOKEY!

Thank goodness. I was very concerned for a minute sister/cousin was going to attempt another frying!

Really, people??? I really want some answers about the whole turkey-fryer thing. Who thought of this? And why would you do that to a perfectly good turkey? Can you not just get your fry-fix at KFC? Furthermore, who gets an enormous vat of oil good and boiling enough to fry a 20 pound bird and NOT TURN THE FRIGGING THING OFF?!?! Is a fried whole turkey that exciting?? I just don't get it.

[alright...enough of the turkey frying discussion. I think it's out of my system...]

Ms. Childs also offered free advice on some catering woman who sits at a table in a different grocery store than where we were who will tell me how many pounds of turkey I need for the number of people I am serving and the amount of leftovers I want. Whew! WHO KNEW it could be so complicated just looking at Ziploc containers! I managed to make it out of that aisle and out of the store with no more advice or discussions on turkeys.

Again - an apology, maybe?? I want to go to the grocery store alone and be anonymous - be an invisible nobody! Is that too much to ask?!?

It is for the other GG who, staring at my items in my basket, asked me if I liked fresh asparagus better than canned. Well...probably...since I have fresh asparagus in my basket, but then I didn't know we were taking a survey! Or what about the other GG who, several weeks ago, who tried to strike up a conversation with me about her brother's mother-in-law years ago who scolded her for the way she cooked!! That mother-in-law was Sicilian, and came over from...guess where...Sicily in 19-whenever, and well...GG's pasta wasn't like Sicilian Mother-in-Law thought it should be.
WOW!

No where else up here do I find people so free with their opinions as in the grocery store! Something happens to people when they walk in the doors of the grocery store that compels them to share all kinds of details with otherwise uninterested strangers. The topic isn't limited to groceries either - that's just the segue into the more important and uncomfortable topic they really want to talk about!

I won't do it to you, I promise, when I see you at the grocery store. I swear. But if I do, accidentally, feel free to remind me an apology is appropriate, ok?