Savealot: More than just your average grocery store.

Hello hello boys and girls. Here we are and it's Tuesday night. There's a reason I didn't want to start posting on this blog and I'll tell you why: I love to write. (I also love to right as in "be right" but those occassions are few and far between so I'll stick with writing.) It's an addiction and I knew I'd be up at 11:30 when I should be asleep writing because something struck me funny during the day and I have to get it out before I forget. So here we go:

"Savealot" or "The Adventures of a Happily Married Man on a Tuesday Night"

Today I was busy slaving away at work trying to make the pile disappear and keep students and dollar signs from falling off the world when the phone rings. Kara was calling and started in right after I said hello. "I was going to text but I'm driving and I was just thinking how good your prime rib soup sounds for dinner tonight." Now, my accountant had already ok'd me to go eat lunch with a friend and put it on our debit card (above and beyond the weekly budget) so I knew the favor was being called in but didn't mind. Even though it didn't sound good to me for dinner (but it did sound good for lunch tomorrow) I agreed to make it.

For those of you who didn't know it, I can cook. I'm not big on advertisement or self-promotion, but I can cook. Without a recipe book. And so far Kara has liked everything I've made for us. The conversation continued, "But we don't have any cream of mushroom soup so one of us will need to buy some." In my mind, this meant "I'll go to the grocery store and pick some up while I'm out seeing clients today." But what it really meant was that whichever one of us headed home first would stop and pick up cream of mushroom soup at the store. So we agreed whoever got through with the day first would text the other and stop at the store.

Well, Kara had counseling appointments until 7 and I was going to work out and play racquetball, so that meant it would be 50/50 on who ended up going to the store. Fortunately, I finished up and was headed home by 7 and ended up going to the grocery store. Which for me, means Save A Lot.

Why Save A Lot? First, I hate going to the grocery store. HATE it. Crowded parking lots, crowded aisles, rude people, dirty floors, screaming kids, dogs running around... (ok, I'm getting a little carried away now. Back to my love of the GREATEST grocery store ever.) Second, where we now live it is not convenient at all to run to the real grocery store. But it's only 300 yards from our apartment. You could walk to it if you need to (but I don't- fortunately I have a faithful '97 Dodge Ram that gets me there and back). Third, Save A Lot knows how to focus on what is important and forget everything else. You don't have to walk through the tire section to find the milk. (If you want tires, there's a Dollar General right next door anyway.)

And speaking of food, Save A Lot has plenty of it. As I walked around the aisles, my heart lifted as I saw the plethora of food laid out in a cornicopia of gloriousness. Save A Lot has all the food men need: vienna sausages, corned beef hash, chili, spam, saltine crackers, mik, and canned fruit. You can even get salad if you want it. (But I suggest you skip the salad and buy canned milk because their shelf life equals the other products.) And deodorant- which is ok at a grocery store- but not tires. They even have a big bin of japanese peanuts (cacahuates japonese, just in case you want to ask for them in Spanish) by the checkout stand! Does it get any better than that? (No my friends, it doesn't!)

So I loaded up on all the stuff I love that Kara doesn't buy for me. Before you start thinking my wife is failing me, it's not that she won't buy it. It's just my little hamster-on-a-wheel brain doesn't think of this stuff when I'm looking at the grocery list. So I have to buy it all on impulse as I see it. (Much like everything else I try to talk Kara into buying when she lets me tag along on outings with her.)

To make a long story short, I walked up to the counter with arms loaded down with canned goods and dumped them out on the counter. Whereas a cashier at another store would've looked at me like I was from Mars, this lady just smiled and said, "Will that be all?" And I said, "Yes ma'am!" I wanted to hug her I was so happy to find all the stuff I love to eat. And on a Tuesday night. It doesn't get any better than it!

So I drove on home to cook for my lovely wife with the bright shining red beacon of goodness in my rearview mirror. Every morning I chug past you with my warm mug of coffee and most evenings I cruise by, comforted by the knowledge that those smiling windows will always have good food on the other side of them!

P.S. I did make it home with the mushroom soup. :)