Peer Pressure at Wal-Mart

I did my bi-monthly shopping at Wal-Mart the day following my colonoscopy. I opted to ride in one of those electronic cart thingies due to my injured right heel. That would have been perfect had the damn contraption not run out of juice mid-way through the store.


I’m a very deliberate and frugal shopper. My money has to stretch a very long way so I prepare a detailed shopping list and stick to it like crazy glue. NOTHING goes into the cart willy nilly. Using the back of my list, I add each item as I go, being sure not to go over my budgeted amount. Other women, seeing me carefully negotiating the price of each item, perhaps feeling a sense of camaraderie, offer their suggestions, with friendly smiles, about this item or that.


I was in the laundry detergent aisle, deliberating over prices and brands when a woman, apparently one of the afore-mentioned sort, informed me that the brand she selected was as good as or maybe even better than the brand that I had in my cart. And cheaper. I thanked her profusely as if she’d given me instructions on how to de-activate the bomb I carried in my cart that in a second would destroy pretty much all of humanity. Reversing my electric cart, I traded my choice for hers. She smiled triumphantly, gave me a thumbs up and rounded the end of the aisle to continue her campaign on another hapless Wal-Mart shopper.


The second she was out of sight, I placed her choice on the shelf and went to grab mine, hiding it under a huge bag of cat food, just in case I ran into her again.


I felt my electric cart running slower and slower, feeling intuitively with my sharp mechanical sense, that I would soon be completely out of power. Next aisle was the toilet paper one. I had always used Scott. Big fat rolls, easy on the sewer system. As I was reaching for it, another woman, red hair flying out behind her (her electrical cart was better juiced than mine) sailed by and yelled out, “Get Northern, it the best.”


Now I began wondering if it was my apparent handicap that elicited such seemingly helpful input or was it ‘Help Your Neighbor Day’ at Wal-Mart? Or…maybe these were disguised marketers for the companies in question…?


But I guess the bigger question is why do I feel compelled to acquiesce. This is Wal-Mart for heaven sake, not Macy’s or Bloomingdale’s. Who gives a crap what another shopper puts in their cart. The biggest question of all, why does that shopper…ME…feel the need to bend to this pressure.


As I pondered the enormity of these issues, the cart completely died. Still seated, I scooted the cart to the front of the store, which exerted quite a bit of effort, where I transferred everything to another cart with hopefully more juice and, quietly, like a spy on surveillance, scooted quietly around the store finishing my shopping!


$3.oo under budget