Yesterday, I was at Aldi. . .ALDI people. . .not Wholefoods nor Trader Joes. . .nor even Wegmans. . .I was at A.L.D.I. And there I was buying cheap "Clancy" brand snacks for my kids. . .and $1.99 cherries and other good buys, when dag gum. . .blocking my access to knockoff Nutella was this young 20 something mother with dreadlocks in a half done up man bun. . .(Except some of the dreads went past her shoulders). She was reading the dag gum labels and comparing seed grains. Knock off non-nutella is near the flax and chia seeds and the quinoa and the couscous. And all I wanted was the my knock off non-nutella. But because I am a patient woman, I waited patiently. . .And suffered in silence.

My aisle friend was caucasian. She was wearing a mushroom and oatmeal colored skirt that looked like she made herself on a loom at a summer camp in the 70's. I couldn't tell what sort of blouse she was wearing because she was also wearing her three year old daughter in some sort of Kangaroo pouch. The child looked like she could walk, but maybe she couldn't. But what was weird was that the child was strapped to the FRONT of her mother. As a mother of a number of children myself, I am of the humble opinion that the reason God intended pregnancy to end at 9 months and not at 3 years is because the dag gum kids get too big and too dag gum heavy to be walking around reading seed packages whilst you are pregnant. . .So why some women want to do this to their backs. . .I don't understand. what to wear for the sister of groom

Now, not to brag, but I am a little bit gifted when it comes to communicating to the innocent. It might be my gentle nature, or my ability to burp the entire alphabet or make weird faces, but whatever it is, children gravitate to me. So while Kashi-Go-Wash (the name I gave the mother in my head) was comparing seed packets. . .I decided to make faces at the front facing daughter . . . who was facing me as I was behind the mom. Occassionally I do this in church, so obviously this should also be very acceptable at ALDI.

First I gave little Kashi a smile, (so she could understand I was not some sort of psycho). And she was shy, as her kind tend to be. . .but then I pushed my nose with my finger and made my tongue pop out---A tricked I learned in the trenches back in battlefield of Chancellorsville in '99. The child hid in her mother's apparently open blouse.

Kashi-Go-Wash realized that there was stranger-danger in the area and turned to eye me (the stranger) up and down. In my store bought pantaloons and factory dyed tunic, clearly I did not pass muster.
However, I did not let my status as stranger deter me from making some new friends. And I am not one to leave any human without experiencing my dazzing charm and gift of gab, I said to Kashi-Go-Wash;

"Are you getting some re-fills for your pet?"

She looked at me like I had four heads. Clearly she needed some more Hiney dazzle. So I pressed on; "You're holding chia-seeds. Are you re-filling your chia pet? Which one do you have? I once got a Duck Dynasty one at a White Elphant, but then one of my kids broke it before we could make it grow."

Kashi-Go-Wash was not impressed with my charm. She didn't say a word. I mean not even acknowledged that we shared a similiar almost interest in chia seeds. Meanwhile, little Kashi was kind of peaking out but she might have been nursing. It was hard to tell, the Kanga thingy also looked like it also might have been made on a loom. Maybe she kept little Kashi strapped to the front so she could nurse, or maybe she didn't didn't trust her own loomed handicraft.

But it was awkward because Kashi-Go-Wash was a legit crunchy mom reading the package of organic seeds and I am a legit anti-crunch who only wanted Aldi knock off Nutella because I like to I dip my GMO enhanced gluten pretzel sticks into the smoothy goodness of the chocolatey hazelnut butter.
I grabbed four containers and left. (We hide food in my house).

Semi-true story.