Grocery Store

When I was a kid my mother would shop for groceries at a store twenty minutes away. There were closer stores, and I remember asking my mother why, oh WHY did we have to go so far away for groceries?

Today I tried a new grocery store. Well, the store isn't new. I just don't like going in there because the few times I've had to grab small items there it seemed... grungy. And my grocery store, the one I usually shop at, it really nice! The produce section has fake trees for ambiance, the aisles are wide enough for carts to pass each other, and I KNOW WHERE EVERYTHING IS. Seriously, you can NOT underestimate this when you're shopping with three kids.

But I tried the new store because I had heard from several people that it was so much less expensive to shop there.

It was, to say the least, a frustrating experience. The produce looked like it had been swept off the street - there was no fresh clean look about it. Dirty, in fact. And I couldn't find tomatoes or carrots. I later learned that lots of tomatoes have been pulled, which makes me wonder about the hard pink ones I eventually bought. Anyone hear anything about carrots?

Then everything was in the wrong place. I couldn't find what I needed, cereals were all jumbled together, the sweet ones with the healthy ones, which made it VERY hard to suggest good choices. They didn't have the all the brands I use, so I had to make some quick choices as the boys ran around like lunatics.

In the end I didn't spend as much as I usually do. And it's true that some items did end up being less expensive than at the store I like. But it still isn't clear to me if the overall total was lower because if the prices, or because I didn't buy everything I had set out to.