I'm Shmuck. Nice to Meet You.

I am one of those crazy moms who braves the grocery store with all kids in tow. And yes, I'm WELL aware that there are many moms who have MORE kids than I, or maybe you even have TWINS to deal with. Doesn't make MY trip to the grocery store any easier.

I have the little one who sits up front facing me and chews on the unbelievably filthy handrail during our whole trip -- unless I dare to give him something we plan on buying; in which case he decides that his shopping trip must consist of dropping it on the floor every five seconds, while chewing through any sort of packaging it has. (Hey, maybe I should just give HIM those annoying toy or electronic or makeup packages that take me 38 minutes to rip through. He might have the item out of there in 38 SECONDS flat!)

Then I have DC, who simply must touch EVERY THING SHE SEES. Seriously. I think she thinks she will die if she doesn't touch everything in the store. Besides that, she runs through the store either screaming or growling like bear ... for 45 minutes. But I remain calm, thinking to myself, "Well, she's not hurting anybody. And I do(at least) go during the week and middle of the day so it's not completely busy. And maybe if I ignore her she'll stop. Maybe. Probably not, but maybe."

And last but not least there's Miss Priss, who prances through her life as if she's on stage performing The Nutcracker. But not the regular Nutcracker. The musical. It's the musical where she's gotten to make up a song that never ends, about a girl who's lost and very sad and tries to find some friends to play with but there's nobody to be found until she comes across a terrible monster who scares her away and she runs through the forest to narrowly escape her death only to find that her prince is sick and SHE must save him before he dies so that they can fall in love and have true love's first kiss and get married. It's a good song, really, but after the first ten minutes just about anybody would get the jist, and she could end it right there and we'd all be impressed. But for some reason she thinks it needs to go on and on. And on. And on.

I'm also one of those mom's who tries to usually put the cart away where it belongs after unloading my groceries into my car. It's the least I can do, after subjecting the store's employees to my traveling circus act. But today was different. I was tired. I was hot. I was just plain lazy. And there happened to be no car parked in the spot next to me. Would it really be so bad to just leave the cart there for one of the bag boys to take back to the store? I mean, I certainly wouldn't be the ONLY one doing it that day, right? I'm probably one of only a very few people (with kids) that usually puts it back anyway. Not rationalizing, of course, just stating the facts.

So after I close up my car, I put the cart in the spot next to mine and let it go. Now, I'm no pro at leaving my cart just anywhere, so I didn't watch it to see where it would land. I just figured it would coast down the parking spot until it hit the concrete block in front. I hopped in my car and started it up. As I looked up, I noticed that there was a couple in a car in the next row over (that faces us). Not directly in front of me; they were in front of the empty space. The space that today I decided was reserved for my empty shopping cart. I saw them watching the cart. I saw them looking at me. And I felt so lame. But for all I know, they are the kind of people who let their cart soar down the parking lot EVERY time they go to the store. Maybe they couldn't care less that I dumped my cart convieniently next to my car instead of it's little cart corral further down the isle. So I just ignored them.

As I backed out of my spot, I then noticed a nice black BMW parked in the next spot over from my cart's parking spot. And I noticed there was someone inside. And they started to back out, but just a couple of inches, and then stopped. When I saw my very own little shopping cart smacked right up against their fender, I wanted to slink down in my seat and hide. Through two sets of tinted windows (his and mine), I could FEEL his eyes glaring at me, staring me down. And I kept on backing out. As I slowly drove past him on my way out of our isle, I was seriously expecting someone to jump out of that cute little car and scream at me. I thought maybe I should stop, get out, apologize and take my cart to it's home where it belonged. But instead I just left, feeling like a total idiot.

Yes, I have a name, but you can just call me shmuck.