Mama Goes Shopping--Euro-style

With our car out of commission until sometime next week, we've been walking everywhere over the weekend. This AM, Evan and I took a walk to Ric's, a locally-owned not-too-big not-too-small grocery store about a 20-minute walk from our place.

I like shopping at Ric's. While the prices are hardly competitive-- the one time we shopped there for the week we actually spent MORE than we would at Kroger or Meijer-- the store is naviagable, they actually ask if you want paper or plastic bags, and usually the bagger asks if he/she can help you carry things out to your car, if it looks like you need the help.

Let me say before I begin my next section that Evan and I went to Ric's to buy milk, and that's it.

After I bought the milk, I thought, let's go check on the wine deals. Ric's does have competitive prices on beer and wine. But, since it was only 11:19 AM, and you can't buy alcohol until noon on Sunday, I didn't venture to put any in my cart. But, since I couldn't buy the wine, and I couldn't buy JUST milk, I found a bunch of other stuff I needed: a bar of Lindt 85% cocoa chocolate, a jar of marinated artichoke hearts, some pizza crust mix, and a small log of herbed goat's cheese. The latter three items will become dinner tonight, and the chocolate, well, sometimes you just need to have it around, is all.

After you've walked around a grocery store for awhile and filled your cart up with stuff, do you ever think: what do my food purchases say about me? If I deconstruct the choices I made today, a disturbing truth emerges: the items in my basket were more Euro than American... stinky cheese, random weird vegetable preserved in oil and herbs, crusty bread... very dark chocolate. Therefore, my tastes are more Euro than American; and therefore, I am more Euro than American. I even walked to the shop. And when shopping, piled the items in the little compartment beneath Evan's stroller. I'm pretty sure I even said, "Cheers," to the checkout girl.

I want my car to break down more often. I think it's helped me rediscover my true roots. Cheers.