ZoomBoy and I enter the 9th Circle of hell–aka the grocery store at shift change. We are buying two boxes of chocolate chip cookies to give to his dance class and are running the clock, so seeing the vast assortment of humanity in front of us at the check stand is disconcerting, and frankly, we hate them all. We hate the women who is, inexplicably, buying ten frozen pheasants–I guess they were on sale? We are hating the little Honey Boo Boy, who won’t stop whistling, and we are especially hating his father, who is buying the six pack, and who will not shut this kid up. We are very much hating the kid who is complaining viciously to his grandfather about “all the gorum store people who won’t stop messin’ round.”
I swear to God, it’s like our California Safeway opened a back hell-portal to Maycomb County, GA, circa 1930.
And just as we were drawing up to the register, another character from To Kill a Mockingbird spoke up.
“Oh my God– HE’S the sexiest man on earth? Oh he is NOT the sexiest man on earth.”
She is talking, of course, about John Legend–and the disgust in her voice was… unnerving.
“That’s because you’ve never seen him play Jesus Christ,” I said, pretty sure that would shut her up.
It did shut her up, for a moment. She probably considers herself a Christian. “Well, I don’t think he’s sexy,” she sniffed. “I like my men to be…” Zoomboy and I met eyes. “…tall,” she finished.
Ladies and gentlemen, I do not think she had a problem with his height.
And then, as ZoomBoy and I smirked, we heard a small, indignant voice from the line at the register next to us.
“He’s 5’9″!”
We cracked up, and the harried clerk rang up our cookies, and the woman sputtered and tried to explain that five-nine was NOT that tall.
And I hoped our local Safeway could go back to modern day Cali just as soon as humanly possible.
