Jingle All the Way, the Sequel

I hadn’t gotten Cowgrit a Christmas gift yet, and there was only a few days left for shopping. Now, I didn’t forget (no, really), and I’m not the type to always put it off till the last minute (again, really), but with all the crazy busy I’ve been these past few weeks, I just hadn’t had a chance to shop for her. She knows this, and she hasn’t had much time to shop for me, either. We’ve even discussed our busy situations in relation to getting each other a Christmas gift.

I’ve been to various stores a few times, but either she’s been with me, or I was on a defined mission, with limited time, to pick up specific stuff for our boys. I simply haven’t had time to freely shop for anything.

Yesterday, I took the boys out to look for something for her from them. While shopping with them, I found a perfect gift for her from me. Unfortunately, the store was out of the item. I was determined to get it, so I planned to go back out later last night to find the item in another store.

After the boys were put to bed, and the house straightened up, I told Cowgrit I was going out to shop. (I’ll call the first store I went to that morning, “A1.”) I was heading for store A2 to see if they still had the item in stock, but on the way, I saw store B1 (a different name store). I figured it couldn’t hurt to check it out, since I’m passing it anyway.

Store B1 had just one item of the category I was looking for, but it wasn’t the one I wanted. I picked up the item to read the box and consider it just as another man came up to the shelf to look. After a few moments, it became apparent that he was waiting on me to decide whether to get the item or not. We exchanged a few polite words. Although he never came out and said he was hoping I’d put the item down, he did hover pretty long beside me, at the empty shelf. I decided to get the item just in case I couldn’t later find the one I really wanted. I left the poor guy broken-hearted at the shelf. I purchased the item and left to continue my search.

I went to store A2. They had just one item of the category, but not the one I really wanted. As it was actually better than the one I had just bought, I decided to buy this one, too. I could just return the first one.

I then went to store A3; they were sold out of all items in the category. I then went to store A4, and they too were all sold out.

So I went back to store B1 to return the first item. I had purchased the item with my debit card, and the category of item is moderately expensive, so I wanted the refund put back in my account. For some strange reason, the store could only give me cash back. Annoying, that. Now I’ve got this wad of cash to put back in my bank account, but it’ll be four days before any bank is open again.

I got back home at 11:30 p.m. — two and a half hours of driving and searching for the gift. But, I’ve got the gift I want to give Cowgrit. Now to just get the time and privacy to wrap it up. At the rate my time has been going lately, she may just find it under the tree wrapped in the plastic store bag.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com