Weekend Mosts

You remember that page in the yearbook where they had the Senior Mosts? You remember! They would tell you who had the prettiest eyes, who was the biggest flirt, and of course who was most likely to succeed. Well, this is like that. But different.

Most Blatant disregard:
I was in line at the Pak n' Save grocery store not far from my house. Ordinarily, this would not have been my store of choice, but it was late, I didn't feel like getting back on the freeway, and I was HUNGRY! I'm never really a fan of the warehouse type grocery stores. I enjoy the order and simplicity of a smaller, more manageable place, that is somewhat organized. If there's too much going on, I don't usually find what I'm looking for very fast, and I get frustrated. Similarly, I can't shop at a place like Marshall's or Ross. People always tell me how they get great deals at these places, but I don't really have the patience to rifle through 563 articles of clothing to find something buried deep under some other stuff. Besides, they rarely have things in my size anyway. So I'm at Pak n' Save on Friday night and I'm hungry and I'm trying to grab some things as quickly as I can, doing a quick plan of the next 4 of 5 meals that I might be able to create out of these $25 worth of groceries (because that's about all I can afford til payday). I also had to grab a $25 gift card for my daughter to give to one of her friends that was having a birthday party, but more on that later.

I've finally got my items (spaghetti sauce, eggs, pinto beans, milk, salad mix, potatoes, etc.) and headed to the line. With this little bit of groceries, I headed straight for the express line, 15 items or less. It was much shorter and should move quickly. There was another line open and most folks in it had big baskets full of stuff. Most of the people in my line had the hand carried baskets, like me, if any at all. Except for this one sista whose turn it now was to move her stuff up to the counter. None of us really noticed that she had a basket until she kept unloading and unloading and unloading. It was like Willy Wonka had invented a never-ending grocery basket that could hold the contents of the whole store. She must've been pulling stuff out of this basket for a solid 4 or 5 minutes. At first she was just doing it at her leisure, as if she were the only person in the room. But then folks started to get visibly perturbed, shifting their weight to their other foot, sighing loudly, sucking teeth, rolling eyes; all of the things from the passive-aggressive handbook. Then Shaqwuita got in line behind me and I thought it was 'bout to go down.

"Oh hell to the naw!" she exclaimed, head almost rolling right off her shoulders as she invoked the Reverend Dr. Whitney Houston. "This b**** is trippin'! What? She cain't count? She know that's waaaaaay more than 15!"

Ol' girl with the Whole World in her Cart ("she got the whole world, in her cart...she got the whole wide world, in her cart...she got the whole world, in her cart...") looked up from over the rim of the basket (she had climbed inside it at this point to continue extracting groceries from its depths, placing them on pulleys to get them up to the conveyor belt). Even the lady at the register had her hand on her hip now, as she scanned this mother lode of processed foods with robotic precision using her free hand. Shaqwuita felt like she had to reach out and touch someone at this point. Luckily, she had a cell phone.

"You would not believe dis b*****! Yeah! I'm still here. I know...this b***** is crazy!"

Fifteen minutes later, I was finally through the line and getting into my car. Clearly her time was more valuable that all of the rest of ours. Especially Shaqwuita's.

Most Annoying:
Remember the gift card that I bought? Well, my daughter didn't end up going to the party so I went back to Pak n' Save and tried to return it. (That $25 would be a nice addition to the $1.72 that's in my checking account until Friday). With receipt in hand, I walked up to the customer service counter and met with the very "friendly" Michelle who didn't even look up from her magazine when she asked "can I help you?"

I explained that I had purchased the Best Buy gift card here the previous evening and was here to return it.

"We can't do anything with that, you need to go to Best Buy," as she promptly went back to reading her magazine.

This was not the end of the world. At least Best Buy was in the adjacent parking lot. I walked out and went over to Best Buy and waited in their customer service line. Some lady in front of me was giving this poor high-school kid, who probably wished she were home doing homework instead of collecting minimum wage at this retail establishment, the business about some faulty steam cleaning vacuum that had destroyed her carpet. When it was my turn, I stepped up calmly and explained my situation. She retired to her manager's office and then came back to tell me that I would have to take care of this at Pak n' Save. No I was annoyed. On the way back to my car I called Pak n' Save in hopes of talking to some manager instead of having to deal with Ms. Congeniality again. I talked to Cary who gave me a very encouraging, "No problem, come on in!" as I pulled into his parking lot.

No one was at the desk when I returned to Pak n' Save but a security guard asked me if she could be of assistance. She went looking for Cary and when she couldn't find him, asked Michelle where he was. Michelle was now working at a register (I guess she finished her magazine) and started loud talking when the security guard went over to tell her that somebody needed some customer service.

"I already TOLD him that we can't help him. He NEEDS to go to Best Buy!"

Just then Cary appeared and was very helpful. He looked at my receipt and made some phone calls and then finally came back to me where I was standing to give me the bad news, but is effort softened the blow a great deal. I was stuck with the gift card, unless I wanted to mail it in and wait for them to send me a check.

Most Random Thought:
What does motor oil really taste like? Yeah, I know. That's even more random than you thought that I, the Red Baron of Randomness (yeah, I know...that's lame, and there's no real practical similarities there, but it was better than the other choice , Rick James, that came to mind) could come up with. You're probably still trying to get your head wrapped around just how my brain, scrambled as it is, would ever stumble upon this. Well, this is something that I usually say whenever somebody says something like "..it's an acquired taste...,". I usually follow that up with, "you could probably acquire a taste for motor oil too, but that doesn't make it a delicacy...," quite pleased with myself, countenance giving this very fact away. I never really give it much thought, but as I was pumping gas on Saturday, with nothing else to fill up those few minutes of watching my last few dollars go into that gas tank, I gazed at a can of Castrol GTX on a rack near the pump. It looks like it would go down kind of smooth. It kinda looks like something that they make at Starbucks. It would stick to your ribs. It would probably be a good real replacement, like a protein shake or something. No? No! Yeah, I know. Hey, I told you it was random.

Most shocking development(s):
Pistons lose to Sixers in game one of their first round playoff match-up. And...it was at the Palace. Detroit knows they're not supposed to lose their and to the Sixers! The Jay-Z and Mary J. Blige concert was postponed. The reasons surrounding this one were very mysterious. One of the theories caused me to learn something new (see below).

I know there was something else shocking that happened but my a.d.d. is kickin' in so I can't remember. Perhaps it was my team losing to a bunch of geriatrics in our "old-man's-used-to-was-league" game. Before I start pointing out the fact that we had only 5 guys (among them, 1 guy with a blood clot in his leg who has strict orders not to be doing anything strenous, ESPECIALLY basketball, and another that collapsed and nearly passed out 2 minutes into the game the week before because the severe respiratory infection that he had been suffering from was not allowing him to take in enough air), and they had 3 subs on the bench giving them 8, let me remind you of how youth should've prevailed here. The youngest guy on the other team had the salt and pepper greying going on. Several others were very bald. Most were certifiably silver citizens. One of the guys I was guarding was actually about my height, but had those shiny shorts with the belt in them like the Fort Wayne Pistons or Minneapolis Lakers used to wear. I think he was the power forward that played with George Mikan in the '50s. Yeah...that's where I recognize him from. He's the guy whose shot Bill Russell redirects in those old black and white highlights. On one of the rebounds that I grabbed over him, he got mad and swung his cane at me after I was undeterred by his attempts to knock me off the post with his artificial hip.

One thing about old cats though, is that you KNOW they can shoot. It's true what they say about shooting a jump shot. It's like riding a bike. You never forget how to do it. Well, maybe you adjust it to a set shot, but it still leaves your hand the same way. They wouldn't be playing if they couldn't still shoot, because they sure can't jump anymore and aren't blowing by anybody. At least I didn't think they would be. At one point, I had to ask one of my teammates if he were in foul trouble because surely that had to be the reason why he was making Old Man River look like Sweetwater Clifton. This dude was scoring at will, dribbling with one hand, navigating his walker with his other. And when somebody is moving that slow, you're in such disbelief that you just watch them score. I came over and blocked some of the shots from the weakside, but on others I didn't bother, because I didn't think I had to. On one play, I left my man to go all the way to the other side of the key to block a guy's shot, but my man was still in the way, so I could only get enough of my hand on the ball to slap it off the glass. But some other old guy grabbed it, so I blocked his shot too, again to one of his teammates. This happened about 4 times as I was up and down like a pogo stick, while my teammates stood and watched, one of them in my way still. None of them thought to grab the ball, so eventually somebody grabbed it that I couldn't get to and he scored. Can you believe that we were actually down by 17 at one point? Well, when the other team is giving you a steady dose of uncontested layups and 3-point set shots that they were given enough time to line up with their scopes like army reconnaissance snipers, you're going to be down. We made a valiant comeback though, pulling to within 6 with a minute left. I hit two late 3-pointers to cut it to 3, and had another roll around the rim 3 times with 11 seconds left that would've tied it. We had to foul them after that, and of course they made the free-throws. Could there have been anything more shocking? Hmmm. I can't recall.

Most laugh out loud moment:
We were heading to the car on our way to the park and my daughter decided that she wanted to take the stairs and see if she could get to the bottom (6 floors down) before my son and I did on the elevator. Usually, the two of them would race, but my son was starting to feel the effects of a cold and wasn't quite up to it. The elevator doors opened and we stepped in as she darted out the door to the stairwell. As the door to the elevator started to close, I could hear her feet pounding down the stairs, probably annoying whomever lives in the unit on the other side of that wall. Hey, you know what they always say: location, location, location. My place is at the other end of the hall. My son was leaning against the far wall nearest to the touch pad since he fashions himself a modern day Marco Polo, always wanting to be in charge of getting us to the correct floor, beating the "door close" button to death in the process. As soon as the door was secure and at the precise moment before we started our descent he looked up at me, across to the opposite wall that I was leaning on, fixed his eyes upon mine and proceeded to let out some sufficiently foul smelling and quite audible flatulence. Pleased with himself, his blank look turned to a wry smile as a look of sheer horror took over mine. I ceased to inhale another breath. Thinking to myself, "this is what it must feel like when a fish is lying on it's side, outside of the bowl like in those asthma commercials, wishing it had air". Was the elevator even moving? The bell signifying the passing of each floor seemed to come as infrequently as church bells ringing at high noon on a Wednesday afternoon. Like an evil villain now, my son's smile was quite pronounced at this point, his lips finally bursting with laughter that he could no longer contain.

I practically fell out of the elevator when the door finally opened. But after that first big gulp of air that my lungs sucked down, I too let out a hearty laugh.

Most playing on their juvenile sensibilities:

When you're broke, as I frequently am in these days of high gas prices and recession, you have to find creative ways to entertain yourself that won't break the bank. When these ways are free, its even better. This becomes more difficult by an order of magnitude when you're talking about kids. They want to go to the movies, eat at McDonald's, go to Six Flags or anything else that the myriad of commercials and billboards tell them every second of every day that they should want to do. Saturday, I found a nice free activity as Target was having an event at the Museum of the African Diaspora in San Francisco, and even had catered hors d'oevres to go along with it. (The pomegranate meatballs were wonderful!) Sunday, however, seeing ol' dad's team get dismantled by Naismith's original 5 wasn't quite enough entertainment for my two little rascals.

I had to go to the old standby, the Park. Unfortunately, with a splint on her finger, my daughter could not play basketball or climb on the monkey bars, so we I chose one that had lots of grass and vast open spaces. Other than that, there's not alot to do at this place. For views, it's an A+ as its bay side location gives the best unobstructed view of the City of San Francisco, The Bay Bridge, and the big metal, trojan-horse looking cranes that decorate the port of Oakland. If you're not flying a kite or having a barbecue, there's not much else to do, however. Banking on the fact that my kids are so competitive (I wonder where they get that from?) it was not too difficult to devise a plan to keep them occupied. I had them engage in a series of races that would both keep them busy and keep them from freezing as the 85 degree temperatures from earlier in the week were distant history as the mercury now dipped to 49 late on this Sunday afternoon. First it was the bear crawl race (which, she said she could do with no problem. What? I checked first...geeez!). Next was the hop on one leg race. After that, the running backward race. The crab walk race was next, followed by the duck walk race. The grand finale was the regular sprinting foot-race. However, to make sure that my son didn't hip check my daughter into next week like you may recall from a previous post ( http://dailywithdestah.blogspot.com/2008/01/8-is-great.html ) I used the park's unique configuration to my advantage. There are converging paths that run from the corners of the big grass field, making a big X right in the middle of the park. I stood at the middle and instructed them to each pick a corner to start in. They stood there, revving their little engines waiting for me to give them the starting signal as they glanced across the field at one another out of the corner of their eyes. With much less fan fare than Rizzo getting Danny Zucco and the boys started in their race through the Los Angeles Canal system or Pinky Tescadero popping bubble gum and blowing huge bubbles as she dropped the handkerchief to get the race between Fonzi and some other guy on Happy Days going, I gave them the "on your marks, get set go" as I dropped my right arm. Like they were shot out of cannons, they took off, giggling and thundering down the asphalt paths just as fast as they could go. Near the end of the race, I became quite concerned that I was going to find myself smack dab in the middle of an August Wilson play, as these Two Trains were running on a course right for me and looked to be getting there at the same time. Doing a timely two-step though, I was able to get out of the way just enough and to grab my daughter at the same time so that we all didn't go down in a heap. They were ready to go at this point.

Most educational moment:

One of the good rumors I heard about the cancellation of the Jay-Z/Mary J. show was that April 20 was a "holiday" of sorts. A holiday? Hmmm...news to me. I thought I was going to be outta luck until at least Memorial Day. Cinco de Mayo is a celebration, but nobody stops work for it, at least not around here. Apparently, April 20th is observed as a counterculture holiday by folks that often partake in a friendly game of puff-puff-give. You can look this up on wikipedia. Seriously. Apparently, back in 1971 some clever co-eds from San Rafael High School in Northern California started convenening at the Louis Pasteur statue at 4:20pm each day to take a toke. And so were born the phrases 420 Louis!, 420 friendly (as you might see in an ad "wanted: roommate...420 friendly") and the cleverly titled album by Method Man 4/21: The day after. I'm not quite sure what the significance of Louis Pasteur's statue was here (other than a place to meet), since I don't think he had any scientific breakthroughs involving cannabis or under its influence. Nor am I aware that Ms. Blige nor Mr. S. Carter had a particular affinity toward it either. It shall forever remain a mystery.