Anyway, speaking of old folks at the grocery store, a few weeks ago, as I was wheeling my loaded buggy out to my car, I saw an older lady about a quarter of the way down the parking lot, facing the grocery store, with one of those Kodak FunSaver disposable cameras that old ladies seem to adore for some unknown reason. You know the ones:
Ridiculous. And the lady was all happy and excited, and she was snapping photos of the front of the store. Bewildered, I slowed my buggy down and tried not to be too obvious as I looked back at what in the WORLD she could possibly have been snapping photos of, and saw another older lady (apparently a friend of the FunSaver lady) standing beside the door of the grocery store, grinning, posing, and hollering back "HOW'S THIS...CAN YOU SEE ME"? And I was like:
LOL WUT?!? The whole way home I pondered what in the WORLD those two ladies were up to. Finally I came to the conclusion that they were either:
A) senile, and thought that they were on vacay,
B) crazy,
~or~
C) The old lady posing in front of the grocery store had just been finally declared cancer-free, and the two friends were documenting each and every little thing she is now able to start doing again now that she's better.
And then I felt like an ass and stopped thinking about it.
But that was several weeks ago. TODAY'S old-folk grocery-store adventure unfolds as I was at the checkout. I was in the lane closest to the main entrance, where they conveniently have several benches for people to sit on and wait. As the cashier was *booping* my groceries, I of course did my usual casually-let-my-eyes-wander to see what weirdness I could spot. And there she was. Sitting on the bench. An old lady. I wouldn't have thought twice about it, except for what I witnessed her do next. I secretly watched her, and every person that walked by (and there were a lot of them), she examined up-and-down, slowly, and you could read the very thought that was on her mind; it was clearly written all over her face. And each of her thoughts were like "eww". Old people and toddlers; you never have to wonder what they think. Because they will tell you. Loudly, and embarrassingly.
The lady also seemed to really take extra interest in peoples' shoes for some reason. Who knows, maybe she had to wear feed sacks tied to her feet to school uphill both ways 20 miles in the snow when she was little, and it caused her to be envious of peoples' footwear thereafter. You never know about people.
But what I witnessed next was the funniest part. There were two scruffy, hippie-looking kind of guys that walked in and purchased some beer. One of the guys had MAJOR dreadlocks. When he walked past that old lady on the bench, her expression was PRICELESS. She did her typical up-and-down scrutiny of him in minute detail, but when she got to the dreads, she literally started shaking her head NO NO NO and physically shuddered violently as if it were the most disgusting thing she had ever seen.
I thought it was both amusing and crappy at the same time. Not that I either endorse or denounce the scruffy/dreadlocks/beer-drinking lifestyle; I'm remaining Switzerland on the matter. But after the lady did that, I couldn't help but think WELL WHO IN THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, OLD MS. DEPENDS-DON'T-STINK!
Then I thought back to when people thought that rock stars back in the early '60s were horrible and filthy because their hair was "long" (a/k/a touching their ears):
...LOL it's cool, bros...
And indeed in the Victorian era, it was practically the same as seeing a lady completely naked if you were to so much as catch a glimpse of their ankles (and they didn't even have to be bare):
And what about the *WOOL* bathing suits?:
Heck, this particular beachwear getup used to be the "thong" of yesteryear:
JUST LOOK AT THIS TRAMP!
And pants? Don't even get me started on the subject of pants:
I mean, really? Well, enough of my rant. I guess my point is that people never cease to both fascinate and repel me. I mean, everyone truly is unique; like snowflakes, or fingerprints...everyone truly is one-of-a-kind, and has their opinions, which they are entitled to. But we're all on this planet for a relatively short amount of time. If some dude wants to use the time he is given to run around with matted-up hair, that's his own business. As long as he isn't hurting anyone, who cares? The shampoo/conditioner and comb/brush companies will still survive without his support. Live and let live.
And the old lady? Well, as I got finished paying for my groceries, and was wheeling my buggy past her, I could feel her critical eyes burning through me up-and-down with laser-precision. Gee, I can only hope that my shoes met with her approval.
And I guess that's why I like cats more than people. :/
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