Nov 18, 2010

Man Shopping

(DISCLAIMER: Please don't think I'm not grateful for the wonderful hubby I have. I am!!! But you just have to laugh about things in life because they're true...and funny! I have permission to share...so laugh along!)

No, I'm not talking about shopping for a man.
For this post Grocery shopping shall be defined as: When I go grocery shopping.
And Man Shopping shall be defined as: When Jason goes shopping...for anything...that I've asked him to get.

Ladies, you know what I'm talking about don't you?

Have you ever noticed how a grocery store has the inate power to strike fear into the minds of otherwise brilliant men, rendering them helpless and paralyzed to accurately follow even the most detailed list? I mean, this must literally be what men see as they stand in the aisles.

Seriously. There's GOT to be some force field around every store that sells groceries, or some weird 3rd dimension that only men fall into when they cross the threshhold through those automatic sliding doors. That's the only explanation I can think of for my husband's inability to read, obtain and come home with the items I put down on a list. The man is an engineer. He's responsible for writing the instructions on how to fix our Navy's Submarines....ya know, those silly old contraptions that take thousands of our armed forces gazillions of feet under the ocean waters to keep our nation safe. And yet...when the man goes grocery shopping.....

Tuesday, bless his heart, Jason volunteered to shop while I went and got an (8 month overdue) haircut. I gave him a list. It had details. For heaven's sake it had details! The flippin' list took me just as long to write as it would have taken me to actually go and shop myself. It specified flavors, sizes, name brand or store brand...dang, I even drew pictures of the tough stuff! And still...still THIS happens...here's just a small sampling:

-I wrote 1 peach or nectarine
-He came home with 6 tangerines...(of which we already have an entire bag in the fridge.)

-I wrote fruitables - VERY BERRY (because that's the only kind Ella likes)
-He came home with fruitables a kind she won't drink. (he insisted I did not specify until I showed him the list and he was like, "Oh. Yup. There it is. Very Berry. In bold.")

-I wrote ORGANIC whole milk 1/2 gallon (because that's the kind a size Ella and the little girl I babysit drink)
-He came home with one pint regular whole milk (he had not even an veiled defense or explanation to offer on that one)

-I wrote 3 pkgs active dry yeast (I even drew a picture of what the packages look like and wrote "each pkg. has three sections. I need 3 pgks")
-He came home with one package because "it's got three sections! I thought that was three!"

-I wrote Bread Flour (And had an entire conversation about this one before he left because I KNEW he'd come home with regular flour)
-He came home with NOTHING (He insists the grocery store - where I buy my bread flour every month - does NOT carry bread flour)

-I wrote Some Hearty Bread to eat with soups and dinners (woe to me for not giving some more specific instruction or diagram for that one)
-He came home with THREE different kinds because he says he didn' t know what I meant.

And that my friens is the difference between Grocery Shopping and Man Shopping.

3 comments:

Cheryl said...

The poor man! I was in hysterics after the first one! :-) I think he is afraid of getting the wrong thing. You should totally buy the groceries and let him stick to the cooking (or submarine fixing)!

Diane said...

Please give him an "A" for effort! Gotta love him for sure!

Jessica said...

I had a friend that saw a husband in a grocery store with a list with the isle number listed for each item....this was followed by a phone call to his wife that said he couldn't find that isle...the store had been torn apart and the poor guy couldn't find anything! At least a A for effort. I'm sure his wife thought he was crazy when he couldn't find isle 5 :)