It used to be that clumsiness and ineptitude was just embarrassing, and best kept to yourself. Then Bridget Jones happened, and it was so great to have a book about being self-conscious and semi-insane over your own secret faults—someone else had written it, better and funnier than I would have, so now I didn't have to. Then there came the strange cultishness of chick-lit, where self-obsessed ramblings came to be packaged in book form all-too-regularly without a hint of irony, or context, or humour. Women engaged in subtle self-deprecating one-downsmanship at parties, and it seemed that there was always a more glamourous way to fall off a chair than the way I was doing it.
And now it comes to this: defeated by the cello bags at the grocery store. Opening these has always been a challenge, and one day it finally proves impossible: the bag remains aggressively two-dimensional, a sheer limp sheet of cello no matter how much I try to rub, tug, and blow (sorry) it into three dimensions. Finally, I have no choice but to sidle back to the bag spinner and get a new one, nervously tucking the failed case into the tie cup. I look up, sure I'm being scrutinized, either by my bitchy blond nemesis from work, or my stand-offishly handsome grouchy boss, or perhaps a quirky cute butcher with a raised eyebrow and a penchant for clumsy girls. Or perhaps the bag stand is about to be knocked into the grapefruit display by a grocery-robber run amok and I'll be taken hostage in a great big televised misunderstanding that all my friends will see.
But no. What actually ends up happening is that I can't open bag number 2, either, and I have to put the bag and the loose apples separately into my basket and take the whole thing with me as a kind of long-term project, and after about five minutes in line, finally get the whole thing sorted.
What an anti-climax.
We were the high-priests / the keepers of the backbeat
RR
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3 comments:
cello bags?
Do you mean the plastic bags? If so why are you not using a green bag. ;)
Hi Becky! It's Shannon. I finally stumbled across your blog and am reading with delight. I wanted to comment on this one because I too, am continuously confounded by the cello bags in the veggie aisle.
The "best" was when I somehow selected a bag that was open at both ends. A chocolate croissant was the unfortunate victim, passing through the cello tunnel to land sadly on the floor. I still feed a tad mournful just talking about it now.
Of course, in Bridget-land, I would have been distracted by a fetching bag-boy and would not have noticed the problem until there was a small mountain of pastries piled at my feet.
Welcome to Rose-coloured, Shannon! I, too, am now somewhat upset about that croissant. But there will be othre pastries in your future, I have faith!!
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