A Few Questions Ma'am

Has anyone else noticed that checking out at a store in the mall is getting increasingly more personal and time consuming? I used to run and hide when I would go to the store with my mom and they'd ask her something like, "What is your address, zip code, SSN, etc?" and she would look them in the eye and with her blood chilling Mom voice say, "Can I just pay for this stuff please?" The girl behind the counter would flush red and mention that they have to ask this stuff and Mama would say, "Well, that's fine but I don't have to answer. Now, do you want my money?" Of course, she's actually my hero for not taking a bunch of crap from the mall checker girl, but I'd usually still be hiding due to my fear of conflict. Well, no more!

Recently, I went to the mall on a mission to buy a dress to wear to Blake's office Christmas party. I didn't expect to find anything, but amazingly, I popped into the maternity (yeah, not sexy) store and found the perfect dress on the rack at the FRONT of the store. Wow. Anyway, the hot pink strapless dress was the perfect size (read that - tarp like)and it was cheap. I have to let everyone know that it was marked down to $16.99. Seriously...

Well, being the only person in the check out line, I assumed (incorrectly) that I could check out quickly and be on my way. Whatever. Well, I took the cornea searing tarp/dress up to the counter and the painfully young looking girl started to ring me up. First question: "What is your phone number?" This is usually an easy answer but I always give the wrong number. Well, I must have given Motherhood Maternity the right number at one time because my stock wrong number was not pulling up my record (why they have to have a record on customers is beyond me and frankly a little irritating). So, next question: "What is your address?" I've mentioned my unwillingness to enter into conflict, so I went along and gave my address. I mean, who knows? When they sell my info, I'm sure that I will be ecstatic to receive every baby related mailer in the universe.

At this point, I think about 5 minutes had elapsed and we hadn't gotten to the scanning of the card. I'd lost patience because I was so hungry that my legs were beginning to shake and I could only think about Auntie Anne's pretzel sticks. Store chick looked at me and and asked my due date. I was getting irritated. All I wanted to do was buy the damn dress and I felt like this transaction was turning into a police interrogation. Again, I answered the question and tried to smile but I think it was maybe more of a grimace at that point. She finally rang up the sale and told me all about how she had just marked the dress down and didn't I have great timing. Yeah, great timing.

So, about this time, the computer Internet connection jammed up and I started to think that using a credit card for this purchase was a bad idea. While we were waiting for the credit card scanner to run, store chick decided to finish up the CIA dossier that she'd been building on me and asked if I'd like to enroll in the Motherhood Maternity 529 plan card (I'm sure MM gets great return on investment). I declined on the grounds that I already had one with an actual financial institution. I declined two free magazine subscriptions and I also declined further info on cord blood storage. Then, the final straw. Standing there with what was, at that point, a fairly good sized check out line, store chick looked up from her cash register/big brother device and asked, "Are you going to nurse?" WTF???

That was it. I instantaneously became my mother. That's all it took. It was like the Big Bang. All the irritation of the last, oh, I don't know, twenty minutes had taken its toll. I gave her my meanest look and heaved and sighed and said something scathing like, "I don't know, yes, I guess. Why?"

Given that level of venom, she immediately finished me up and sent me on my way.

After I got my pretzel sticks and made it back to the car, I called Mama and told her all about my experience. She felt really bad for me and was extra incensed on my behalf. I feel sorry for the store clerks that she may encounter between now and Christmas...