I freely admit that I love food. I like to think about food. I love to eat food. I don’t mind preparing meals most of the time — note I did not say all of the time. I don’t even mind meal planning. What I do mind is all the surprises when I pick up my groceries these days.
Pickup
Since the local farm markets are closed for the season, I am forced back to traditional grocery stores. I do not like shopping in stores the size of major league sport stadiums. Nor do I wish to use an app and a map to find the cereal aisle.
I am a proud quitter and thus switched to ordering grocery pickup. Some talented person picks my groceries and packs them up. I zoom up in my vehicle and they load the prepaid items into my car.
If I play my cards right, Mr. Wonderful zooms up in his vehicle instead. He’s a trooper about grocery pickup. This has the added benefit of my tricking him into unloading the groceries. Work smarter, not harder, fellow wives.
Substitutes
While ordering online, the grocery store helpfully offers to substitute something else if the product of my choice is not available. This is very thoughtful. On the other hand, it has revealed to me my inner princess.
I’m not about to cheat on brands that I’ve trusted since childhood. I must convey that Heinz ketchup, Oreos, and Tide laundry detergent are, indeed, the hills I am willing to die on. I will refuse a subpar detergent outright, and life is too short to eat store-brand cookies. Sorry, not sorry. Do not substitute my brand of ketchup. Ever.
Otherwise, I’m a pretty easygoing grocery customer if I do say so.
Shrinkflation
I understand inflation. Shortages. Price increases. I get it all. It’s almost tiresome to discuss at this point. What gets me is that I keep being shocked at the number of foods that are just so much smaller these days.
Why is this news to me? I should just expect it by now. Grocery pickup means that I often don’t see the items until I unpack at home. This is where the surprise comes in.
I legitimately just received a jar of mayonnaise that appears to contain roughly two tablespoons of product. It’s like mayonnaise for people who don’t actually use mayo I suppose.
A bag of corn chips that cost over $2 was barely visible to the naked eye. If packed in Mr. Wonderful’s lunch, I might throw in a magnifying glass so he didn’t miss it.
On the upside, eating exactly one and a half corn chips is certainly the healthier choice. I also have some teeny tiny ice cream — as it turns out, a “half gallon” container is not, in fact, anywhere near a half gallon. That’s on me for not reading the fine print.
A devout product of the digital age, I tend to just hit “reorder all” to make grocery shopping easier for myself. This means that I am ordering the exact same things I did last spring, but I am getting decidedly less of them.
No sense crying over (far less) spilled milk. It’s as if inflation has conspired to help me with weight loss, so I do have that going for me.
