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I do most of the grocery shopping late at night by myself.  I don’t love trudging through the aisles half awake, dodging shelf stockers and large groups of teens, but I have little choice. During the day is out of the question. Grant is THAT child at the store. From the second I put him in the cart, he wants out. I spend so much of my time distracting him to keep him calm, that I end up distracting myself from the task at hand; namely picking out food. I often leave with a crying 1 year old and a mish mosh of groceries that don’t come close to resembling a coherent meal. So I often go when I’m already out for the evening, whether for book club, my scripture study group or meeting. The only problem with this is that I’m often exhausted and this had led to two brain malfunctions resulting in serious humiliation.

Incident #1: I was invited to a Christmas party at a girlfriend’s house for appetizers and dessert. The other purpose for the party was so that a mutual friend could display her jewelry that she sells. The company is called Paparazzi and basically it’s super cheap costume jewelry. Everything is 5 bucks. So I went that night, had a wonderful time and bought a super sparkly three tiered gray necklace. It coordinated perfectly with what I wearing that night so I wore it on my way out. Despite being tired, I knew that I should stop at the grocery store before going home. It helped that I felt super cute that night. Since I was feeling festive and pretty, I was a lot more interactive than I usually am at the store. Typically I am a head down, get business done kind of gal. You could probably mistake me for being a little cold. But this night was different. I was talking to the stock boys, exchanging pleasantries with passersby’s and making chit chat with the cashier. She was a teenager and seemed bored so I though I’d compliment her on her sweater and ask about her upcoming dance. She was pleasant enough, but something was off about our conversation. I started to feel a little dumb for having engaged her. Did she think I was old and lame? Anyway, I wouldn’t let it get me down. I got home and starting unloading the groceries. I went into the living room to find Jordan when I passed by our large mirror. I stopped dead in my tracks and burst out laughing (the laughing you do when you are beyond embarrassed). Sitting on my shoulder and hanging down the front my shirt was a tag the size of Texas! My necklace that it was dangling from was even tied up in it so that it looked like a jumbled mess on me. I felt like such a dork! Of course I had to replay the scene at the store over and over again and think of all those poor people I had talked to. Maybe they were too tired to notice? I certainly was! It was 11pm after all.

Incident #2: Last night I was doing major shopping so the cart was pretty packed. I was running out of room in the basket, so I decided to place my jars of spaghetti sauce on the bottom rack. I knew it was a bad idea the moment I did it but I think I was too tired to care. I got halfway down the aisle before it happened. One of the jars rolled right off sending glass and sauce everywhere, including my new winter boots!  Because it was so late at night there weren’t many people around to ask for help. I had to stand there like a goober waiting for someone to walk by. Eventually a man stopped. There were a few that just walked by and stared. I decided to cut my trip short and check out without running into the same cashier from the other incident. One of my boots is permanently stained pink where there was once white rubber and I’m now reconsidering my night shopping routine.