Underwear Purchase

I needed some new underwear, so I went to Target Friday during lunch. (I would say I was shopping for something less intimate, but the actual product figures into this tale. Sorry if you’re now thinking of me in my underwear. Pervert!)

I went back to the men’s department and found what I wanted. But there was only one pack, and I needed two. Oh well, I took what they had. I didn’t want to go stand in line and buy just a pack of underwear, because buying just that brings attention to the fact that underwear is what I’ve got in my hand. I don’t know why, but I’m not completely comfortable standing in line with a bunch of strangers, holding my underwear, and only that, in my hand. And then having the clerk ring it up.

So I looked around for something else to buy. I found some shirts I liked, but dammit, no medium size. I thought America was all overweight. Why is it always the size medium stuff that gets sold out? I looked around some more, but couldn’t find anything. So I sucked up my prudishness and walked up to the checkout lanes.

I stood in line behind a woman buying out the entire store stock of wrapping paper. After a minute, a Target employee came up to me and said, “You can go up to the popcorn register, and check out up there without waiting.” I’ve been given this direction before at Target, so I didn’t think about it and just left the line and went toward the popcorn register. Halfway there I remembered what I was going to purchase: my underwear. I’d be even more uncomfortable handing these to the popcorn clerk. Fortunately, or unfortunately, there was no one at the popcorn counter. So I quickly walked back to the line I had just left.

No new customer had gotten in that line, so I got my place right back, and the clerk was halfway through completion of checking out the woman ahead of me. Then another Target employee suggested I go to another check out lane for faster service. I looked over, saw one woman with no cart, and followed the suggestion. But when I stepped up to the lane I saw that the woman there had about two dozen very small items on the counter, and the clerk was scanning each one and putting them in a bag. I looked back to my former line. Two more customers had joined that line and moved up to take the space I had vacated.

As I stood in this new line waiting for the clerk to get through all the woman’s stack of stuff, the woman that was ahead of me in the previous line finished and walked away. The new customer that had taken my slot in the line checked out and finished about the time I finally stepped up to be checked out in my new line. So I would have been better off just staying where I had been. Sigh.

Anyway, I bought my pack of underwear and left the store.

On my way home from work that evening, I stopped by another Target to buy the second pack of underwear I needed. I went through the same process as before, including looking for something else to buy with my one pack, but again I couldn’t find anything I wanted in my size. I went and picked a line to stand in, and while waiting, I texted Wifegrit to ask if there was anything she needed from Target. While waiting for her reply, a Target employee suggested I switch to another lane for faster check out. Since I was waiting for a text reply, I didn’t want to check out yet until I knew I was done shopping. So after several seconds of me not moving from my spot at the end of the line, the employee said, “Or you don’t have to switch.”

I got a text requesting one more item, so I left the line to get it. I came back, checked out, and went on home.

Did you read all of this? Did I make buying a pack of underwear an interesting story, or are you just that terribly bored? Are you now, or still, picturing me in my underwear? Sorry. (Pervert!)

Bullgrit