those ladies and their carts.

I am a sucker for those old ladies who give out the samples. I'm usually not an impulsive buyer. I come in with my list, organized by isle, and pretty much stick to it. But if one of those white-haired cart wheeling ladies lures me in with a promise of a tasty nibble and then starts going on and on and on and on about how delicious the fish is... how utterly tasty the bread is...how they've never had a produce quite as sweet. and then proceeds to give me the 74 year backstory on the product. How easy it is to prepare. Where it's located on the shelf. How great the price is. How they just love it. How it's the healthiest food known to man... I pretty much end up buying it. Not even because I really want a pound of talapia... but because I want to make them feel like they are doing a good job.... almost like charity.

(Similar to the homely little neighbor girl who came to my door last fall and sold me an $86 serving of soup for a school drive... a soup that I never did end up receiving by-the-way. Or the little kids and their lemonade stand. Malls need to replace all those slick young men behind the kiosks trying to pawn off expensive lotions with little old ladies. "Would you like to try my $93 an ounce hand cream? My husband just died. I eat all by myself every night. You would like a squirt! great!" Who would have the heart to not make eye contact with them and slide over against the wall as you walked past?)

Back to the grocery store. How can I say "no" and just walk away after she's talked to me so long? What if that's what she's gotten all day... people using her for a snack and walking away. To bare the guilt of rejecting someone. Hmmm.. I think I just stumbled upon a much larger issue. {Mentally assessing}... yes. A reacuring theme in much of my life. Something I may need to work out later.

Enough physcho-analysis for one day... I need to find a good talapia recipe.