It’s spring in New Wye; about that there can be no doubt. The signs are disturbingly clear. Mere moments ago, in fact, the dog and I were out for a long neighborhood walk in the oppressively sunny weather and we were dive bombed by a swarm of furry bumble bees, each one of which was approximately the size of a baby’s fist. Spring has sprung!
I hated those bees.
As many of you know, I loathe and despise the weather here in New Wye, because apparently I am fated to always hate the weather wherever I am with absolutely no regard for logical consistency. Back in the relentless gray rains of Zembla, I would have cheerfully killed for a sunshiny day in the 70s, but currently I am so sick of that kind of weather that a week of severe thunderstorms, flash flooding, and tornadoes sounds like an amusing diversion. (We had several days of that last week, in fact, and it was quite pleasant indeed!)
I do enjoy shedding all over this gray sweatshirt, though.
While I am on the topic of my location’s shortcomings, can I just tell you about the bag boy at the grocery store the other day? I had only brought one of my reusable canvas bags in with me and all of my groceries wouldn’t fit in it, so the bag boy had to put the rest of the stuff in plastic bags. It was like he was on a mission to waste as any bags as possible in exchange for the bags I was trying to save by using my own. The following items were each placed in their own individual plastic bags: dog food, cat food, carton of soy milk, a candle, another candle, box of cereal, set of Ziploc containers, carton of grape tomatoes. EACH. IN ITS OWN. INDIVIDUAL. BAG. What the fuck, dude?
I was so busy wrangling with the debit card scanner that I didn’t notice the bagging situation until I had wheeled the cart out to my car, at which point I consolidated the items into a more appropriate number of bags, stomped back into the store, deposited the extra bags back at the bag boy’s station, and knowingly glared at him. I mean, I know it sounds ridiculous, but I am absolutely 100% certain that the egregious bag wasting was done on purpose as some kind of passive-aggressive sneer in the face of environmentalism. No one puts each individual item in its own bag — no way is that, like, standard practice, or anything. It just can’t be.
Pig feet: not actually a vegetable.
Of course, this is the same grocery store that stocks pig feet in the produce section, so one really shouldn’t expect much.
Raveling Out 
That bag-boy shit is ridiculous, and definitely spiteful. My favorite similar experience was when I was at TJ Maxx (just the once in YEARS; I hate that store) and decided to buy their reuseable bag because it is ginormous. The woman ringing me up was pissed because her boss told her to ring me up before taking her lunch, so she refused to put my stuff in the other reuseable bags I had brought (I did it), and then put the REUSEABLE bag I was buying INTO a plastic TJ Maxx bag. I snatched the bag out, gave her an incredulous look and put the rest of my purchased items in it before hightailing it out of there. Re. Diculous. Reason # 4875 I hate TJ Maxx.
Oh my god, that is ridiculous! Putting the canvas bag INTO A PLASTIC BAG? People are insane. But anyway, I’m glad I’m not the only one who interprets the bag boy thing that way.
I honestly should have complained to the store – treating customers with sly disdain is SUPPOSED to be so subtle that the customer doesn’t notice it! If my many years in customer service taught me anything, it was that.
The little girls at the Piggly Wiggly do it, too. I swear, we try to reuse them as much as possible, but I have more plastic bags than I will ever know what to do with.
Those aren’t trotters, by the way, they’re little hunks of salt pork. Note their proximity to the greens. You use them for the greens. Maybe not you, but people do.
Egon is the most adorably pensive dog ever. I wish he could have bangs that just fell into his eyes. He is the Conor Oberst of dogs.
I don’t know, I kind of wish they’d put ham hocks next to the greens around here. Or even sell any decent greens. It’s like stocking the hash browns by the eggs. Of course a hash brown don’t come from a chicken but it’s convenient.
Tell Egon my dogs miss his tininess.
R – Close enough, I say! They’re in a dubious, footly region.
G – Hilarious. He needs an ironic tee shirt and/or moustache.
D – Egon says hello to your dogs, but he looked a little worried when I reminded him about the whole beach thing.