So, Thurston Howell and Lovie, with their shopping cart between them, are taking up fifteen linear feet of the serve-yourself part of the cheese-and-charcuterie coolers at Fresh Market.
She's spending an interminable amount of time trying to attract the attention of one of the guys across the deli island, who are frantically slicing meat and cheese for the three or four customers over there, standing on their taped X's. Since all she's doing is making little half-hearted waves of her hand and their backs are turned, this isn't going well.
I'm hanging back six or eight feet, tapping my toe. Factory packaged pre-sliced cheese is gone and all I want is a slab of Emmentaler & maybe Gruyere or Gouda.
Finally I manage to flag a deli clerk down and point him toward Mrs. Howell, who's barely tall enough to be seen over the cooler.
Clerk: "Can I help you?"
Mrs. H: "Do you have Brand X cheese spread? He really likes Brand X cheese spread."
Clerk: "It's right over here."
Mrs. H: "All that's over here is beer cheese. He likes cheddar."
Clerk: "All we have is the beer cheese."
Mrs. H: "But do you have cheddar? He likes the cheddar."
Repeat the above exchange two or three more times, with slightly different phrasing each time, as though Lovie is sure that, if she formulates the question right, the clerk will admit to having a secret stash of Brand X cheddar spread in the back.
Finally the clerk convinces them and Thurston and Lovie wander off toward the registers, freeing me to step up to the self serve cheese counter and start looking for Emmentaler and Gouda... only to have a Members Only jacket and Sansabelts try to insert itself between my grille and the cheese. It's Thurston, standing in the foot of space between me and the cheese counter, asking the clerk if he's
sure there's no cheddar spread.
Pepper spray out of pocket, I'm like "
HEY! SIR! Can you step back?" while doing so myself. I don't really think I'm going to need to spray dude, so it's as much of a fidget spinner as anything else. My thumbnail flicks at the safety lid* for something to do.
Dude lived in such a Thurston-centric universe he barely had any idea someone was yelling at him from an arm's length away.
FML. People are too dumb. Let's walk hand in hand into that last midnight and leave this place to the orangutans. They can't possibly be any dumber.
NB: "Spicy Treats Dispenser" shall be referred to as "Social Distancing Reminder Spray" for the duration of the current unpleasantness...
*
If you're going to pocket carry spray, something like POM with the spring loaded safety flap over the actuator button is infinitely superior to the twist nozzle kind, unless you like spraying your crotch with liquid fire. I mean, if you do like that, I'm not going to judge. No kink-shaming here.
.
