Loonie Bandits

Ever been at the end of your grocery shopping trip, when you're unloading your bags from your shopping cart into your vehicle and someone comes along and asks if they can buy your cart from you?  This used to be a half assed nice thing for people to do because then you didn't have to walk your empty cart "all the way" back to where the carts are housed to retrieve the quarter or *loonie that you put into the handle of the cart to free it from the chain gang it's attached to.

When I have the inner strength to withstand the horrid place, I will shop at Superstore. This is the place where you have to put up with incredibly rude and stupid people who travel in packs and like to stand in the middle of an isle like they are the only people in the store, while their children run around like screeching wildebeests, bumping into me while I try stifle my increasing frustration.  I then stand in a long line-up while people in front of me argue with the clerk about the price of box of frozen pizza pops. In the end I have to bag my own groceries while people push around me.

I'm always happy when that chore is over.

So when someone approaches me and offers a dollar for my cart my initial reaction is to be thankful that I have one less step before I can hop in my van and jam on the accelerator to get the hell out of Dodge.

But I have had two recent instances where I was asked if someone could give me a dollar for my cart, I said yes, and then when I was done unloading my groceries, they dump a hand full of silver into my hand and then make off with my cart - and my loonie.

The first time it happened I felt violated. Silly, I know, but I felt cheated and I was ticked off.  Steve reminded me that I still had a dollar, no matter how it was made up.  And I told myself that in the big picture, this was really not a big deal.

Today when I was walking to my van I was approached again by someone offering me a dollar for my cart.  I said, ok.  She then stood and watched me hump my loads of groceries into the back of the van in the blowing wind and rain.  I was temped to tell her to feel free to pitch in, if she wanted the cart faster.  And then I thought it strange that she would just stand there and wait for me to unload the cart instead of just walking to get her own cart.  It was when she dumped a handful of fucking dimes into my hand that I realized why.

I know, I know, it shouldn't be a big deal to me.  But it is and I'm not going to stifle my anger towards these loonie bandits any longer.

Did these people not know they were going grocery shopping where the carts require a loonie?  Plan ahead, Fuckfaces!  Get a loonie before you come!  Raid your kids piggy bank like I did!  And if it WAS a spur of the moment choice to shop where the carts require a loonie, get your lazy fucking ass into the store and change your handful of dimes in - like *I* do when I don't have a loonie.  Be responsible for your own loonie needs! Don't go all sneaking around the parking lot, casing the joint for a poor unsuspecting person with a cart, pretending you're doing them a favour because in reality you are a sneaky, lazy, unprepared asshole!

Yes, a dollar is a dollar is a dollar - but now my loonie is gone and the next time I need one, I will have to go out of my way to find one because someone else didn't bother!

And that? Pisses me off!



This post has been brought to you by my "Just Be Mad Sometimes" campaign, where I let out my anger instead of trying to stifle it with the Sister Mary Sunshine bullshit.

*To my American readers - as you probably know, our dollars are coins named Loonies (which is actually embarrassing) for the picture of a loon on one side.