Devonne Brown

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Grocery shopping is a necessary evil. I don’t like shopping in the first place, and spending an exorbitant amount of money on sustenance seems like a sin. Life is so expensive, it doesn’t need to be so annoying to get the things I need and want.

Ordering groceries online for pickup has saved me from one of my greatest pet peeves, wet produce. I know spraying vegetables with water is a good practice to keep them fresh, but I don’t like touching wet things.

I like the thunderstorm experience at Kroger. The warning lightning flash and sound of thunder just before the spritz of water comes on, but I hate the cold wet feel of anything wet on my hands. I don’t even like the feel of a cold drink in my hand. I buy cabbage, parsley, and cucumbers regularly and know they need water to retain freshness, but handling them goes against my grain. They’re hard for me to touch. 

Green beans are the worst, wet, cold, gritty green beans. They have a sticky, hairy texture to them, almost like soggy sandpaper. They stray wet, have to stay wet. Then I have to wash them and string them when I get them home. My fingers wrinkle when I prepare them. I don’t buy them fresh from the grocery store often, only on very special occasions. 

Plastic bags are provided to contain wet produce to protect the rest of my groceries from the moisture of the produce. They’re damn near impossible to open and usually way too big. Like for ginger root, it doesn’t need a bag to protect it from moisture, but if I don’t put it in one of those plastic baggies, it will fall through the wires of my cart and onto the floor of the store, lost forever. 

Fresh produce from the grocery store seems to be bad for the environment. I should be like my grandmother and crochet rugs out of the plastic bags. She was smart that way. I even  have the right crochet hook and the skill to do it. She taught me how. I have saved enough bags to carpet a floor with them. I lack the will to do it. Great, now I have guilt too.