My local Stop and Shop is a very interesting place, it contains a million and one things I don't recognise and don't know what to do with them, on the plus side the staff are really friendly, happy and helpful which makes a change from some of the misery's I have encountered over here in retail, forget what you think about service in the US this little bit of CT seems to not want you to shop! any road up I like the staff they are really good (oh another notable exception Big Y Groton) my biggest complaint after "why didn't you give me a job???? I have rarely failed an interview before! I am a broken Women! (actually I think the lady was pretty honest at the time and said the hours I could do wheren't what they wanted, but we had a great chat anyway, she had twins too) is that the shop seems designed to stop you from shopping and Stop and Shop is not alone here and is not the worst by any means, some good mum friendly stuff is the wagons or carts or carriages can't remember the name, my people call them trolly's if that helps?? they have fabby cars on the front which you can tie down and trap your little darling or darlings, or one where they can sit facing the traffic as it were, by the handle and they have enough of these that I have always managed to get one even today at 14.00 on a Saturday...brilliant, I can also normally find them in the car park so transportation into the shop is eased, small males of the twin variety are hard to herd, and from that moment until I reach the door of the store bliss...
then it goes down hill... some of which is my ignorance of brands, words, etc and an inability to communicate in the same language, "your after Oregarknow herb?" it should be Oregano erb!, coriander? cilantro! aubergine-eggplant, -barcarb-baking soda, toilet roll- bathroom tissue, that ones raised some eyebrows I can tell you, at least I can be thankful I didn't ask for Bog Roll!
and then sometimes it becomes really, really confusing, Milky way is a Mars bar and Milky way is 3 musketeers??? Marathon is a snickers! oh no hang on that's my age! Snickers are Snickers, Chips are Fries and Crisps are chips!
one thing is that at Americans pronounce words as they are spelt which make sense its just 38 yr of pronouncing one way is hard to brake.
Oh and hands up UK people, who knew that Tuna comes in white? me neither! and it looks really odd, I like to pride myself on my knowledge of all things tinned and fishy and would regularly expound my theory's on pink and red salmon, farmed and wild, but White Tuna! who'd have thought it? I am having to reevaluated my whole life now.
Okay I am at the door of the shop, carts, trolleys whatever are difficult to navigate at the best of times but one heavily loaded with small boy twin things and about 1/2 mile long, the openy door things opens and I spend half an hour try to get through the EXTREMELY narrow corridor to the next openy door thing, I am shunting, 3 point turning, think Austin Powers in the transporter in Dr Evils lire! that me, not funny! I am forming a queue behind me! fortunately Americans are very polite, well I suppose they don't know who has a gun! and I am sure that I look like I am about to go postal by the time I burst through the second set of doors, it actually like being reborn as you shoot out of that narrow entrance!
As said before I don't understand alot of products, but I am getting better and "thank you globalisation" there are brands I recognise, hurrah!
So I go round the shop, well I say go round, I have to stop every 15 seconds as more that two carts and people browsing means that you are stuck! or if looking yourself, blocking other people! nightmare!
The pricing makes nooooooooooooo sense at all it has a unit price, I don't know what a units is? and sometime it will say on a paper ticket, for instance $1.25 and under price 4/$5! UH! of course it is! but another item will say $1.25 on the paper ticket and then 5/$5! which is a saving, whats going on?
Alcohol! don't even get me started! you can buy beer in a supermarket now, but not on a Sunday! no alcohol anywhere on Sunday it is a religious based law...in a secular country! mad!
Then the Bacon, forget it, gone is my smoked or unsmoked, back, middle its poverty bacon all the way (streaky).
Sausages again forget it, Italian is all on offer, sweet or spicey both yukky, but on a more positive note sausage meat is pretty much sausage meat yum!.
Veg- see previous post.
Then the check outs, forget queue busting...20 lanes 3 open and a mad women with a million coupon in front...oh no hang on that's me! see previous post- although once a checkout was opened and I was first but I think the supervisor saw my going postal look and thought it best to hurry me along.
Again on checking out the birthing process, I actually feel like cattle about to be milked the way they corral you at a funny angle, and the sweets and kiddy stuff on display! well what can you do with 2 children hassling you? that's right you take them off the small person and drop them on the floor! or in the magazine rack anywhere but where they are supposed to be! it makes my blood boil that they do this! I never buy, once in the UK I was in a super market (most in UK don't do this due to consumer pressure) and one of my boys 18 months at time took a bite out of a chocolate bar, wrapper and all, the cashier asked to scan it, I asked him who I should write too, to sue for my son ingesting a wrapper! and did he know what chemicals where in the ink! NO CHARGE!
Then home relief over for another week.
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