Bagging Groceries

Bagging groceries should not require an advanced science degree. I think it's a fairly simple concept to grasp: heavy stuff on bottom, breakables or light things on top. Simple. However, I am actually considering changing shopping locations due to the severely incompetent bagging going on at my local Sprouts store.

A little background may be appropriate here in order to give you a clear picture of what's been happening. I shop at Sprouts because their store is filled with fresh meats and produce. There are not a lot of packaged choices which is fine with me being as I don't eat a lot of packaged foods. I love Trader Joe's and shop there on occasion since it's close to my apartment and they sell a lot of convenience foods (read "packaged" and "microwavable"). I also love their coffee selection. And their eggs are cheaper. They also are incredible pros at bagging groceries.

At Sprouts, they do not like to place in bags: eggs, melons, and potatoes. I like for all of my groceries to go in bags. That's why we have bags. I do not have proper pockets to stuff all my groceries in to get them from my vehicle to my upstairs apartment. That's why some genius invented bags.

Last summer, I brought in 5 bags to Sprouts. I bought my groceries and watched while the young kid bagging used 4/5 of the bags, put one unused bag into another bag, placed the carton of eggs on the seat of the cart, looked at me and said "Sorry, I don't know where else to put them."

How about in the empty bag you just stuffed into another one? Really??!!!

On multiple occasions at Sprouts (well this particular store anyway), I have had items just set into the cart when they could've easily been placed in the bags that had only a few items.

If you ever have the opportunity to shop at Trader Joe's, you know that they are amazing baggers. I have never seen grocery bag Tetris go so quickly, smoothly, and efficiently in my entire life. They usually get everything into bags with one or two empty bags left over. They are amazing. I have told them this. Their response? "It's because we actually care if your groceries make it home in one piece or not."

Today as I pulled my bags out of my vehicle at Sprouts, I actually groaned from anticipating the bagging that was about to happen. Mainly because I needed eggs. And buying eggs at this particular Sprouts store is a good way to guarantee that things will go badly. Shortly, I will address my plans to prevent this from ever happening again, but let me tell the story first.

To set the stage: it's finals week, I ran a marathon a couple days ago, have since stayed up late finishing presentations every night, and my left ovary has been stabbing itself since early this morning. I'm tired. I'm irritable. I'm a total jerk.

I brought 4 bags.

I placed the eggs on the belt first, to give the checker plenty of lead-way to figure out what she was going to do with them. Like a heads-up. Hey, eggs! Start thinking. I also know that baggers (Trader Joe's anyway) have a process with eggs and bananas. They get bagged last.

She ignored the eggs and began pulling food from further back. So the belt didn't move. Mind you, there was plenty of counter space to her left to put the eggs. If she had placed stuff on the counter, I could've bagged everything. But she was bagging as she went. Meanwhile, I could not get the little separator stick onto the belt because she wouldn't move the eggs so that the belt would move. Instead, she started talking to me about other flavors of the immunity drink I had bought. I decided to just breathe and be patient.

Finally she moved some stuff so the belt would move. My bags were all out of my reach and I was helpless to watch as she very slowly bagged my groceries. She handed me a half full (see that optimism there?) bag to place in my cart. As I placed it in the cart I thought "At this rate, I will definitely run out of bags".

She handed me the 5 pound bag of potatoes to place in my cart. Ok, that's fair. You're probably not going to put a ton of other stuff with a 5 pound bag of potatoes.

"Do you want the melon in a bag?"

"Yes please". This was a small "personal size" watermelon.

"Okaaay....." she said as she lined up the open bag and literally bowled the melon into the bag.

Ok. Whatever. Breathe.

The store heater kicked on and begin blowing right on me. My left ovary continued stabbing in pain (yes, I had taken something for it, no it was not helping).

"How about this one?" Cantaloupe.

"Yes please."

"Weee....pshew....". Sound effects while bowling the second melon into the bag. "Sorry, I've got to entertain" she said.

I forced a chuckled. She handed me the bag. With two small melons in it. I was very close to losing my shit. The heat was stifling, I was tired and miserable, and this lady was on my very last nerve. Very last nerve.

I'm trying to practice kindness, patience, and compassion these days. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. What can you do?

She managed to get the eggs in a bag which was a little surprising. She put them on top of stuff, which is good. As she let the belt bring food toward her, he pulled my bananas off some other item and tossed them further down the belt, where they landed on the other side of my separator stick. (OMG!!!) It was at this point I noticed the large line had completely shifted over to the other checkstand and there was absolutely no one putting their groceries on the empty belt behind my stuff. No one wanted to be in her line. As a matter of fact, they had all decided that they would rather wait an extra ten minutes in a longer line, than use the line I was in. My checker looked up at the situation as well, seemed to assess it for a second, then continued with my stuff.

She tossed the spinach to the side. I took the opportunity to place it in the half empty (not so optimistic now) bag in my cart.

"I was going to place that on top of the stuff here", she said.

"Oh that's ok, I got it here. It won't squish anything".

Finally, as the forced heat was beginning to make me nauseated and I felt I could no longer contain my agitation, she handed me my receipt and I was free to go.

As I stepped out into the cool air, I took a few deep breaths and decided I was never shopping there again.

I may try another Sprouts that's only a little further away.

Since I really can't say I'm never shopping there again, here's my plan. Next time I have to go there, I will keep my bags to myself so that I can bag my own groceries. When the checker says they can get it, I will insist and say no, no, I like bagging my groceries. Maybe even say how fun it is. I don't know.

Why is this so difficult? After doing a quick analysis of what was in my cart, I had already made a plan for the best way to bag the groceries. Five seconds max. What's heavy? What can be squished? People, please, I urge you: stick the damn melons in a bag. We only have so many hands. I am not going to carry two melons, a bag of potatoes, and a carton of eggs separately into my apartment. Heavy things on the bottom, squish-ables and breakables on top. There is no more science involved than that.