Down at Kohl's

1. I found four unscented ivory pillar candles on a clearance shelf. They were $2.99 each and with another 30% off, the final price was $2.10. Serious bargain!

2. I got in line at the checkout with my bargain candles. The woman in line ahead of me was digging in her purse. She pulled out a container of breath mints and offered me one. I said, no, thanks.

3. Did I have nasty breath? Was I encroaching into her space bubble so she would be aware of this? Did I unintentionally make eye contact and invite her interaction with me?

4. She had a number of items and offered twice to let me go ahead of her with my four bargain candles. I said, no, thanks.

5. I declined her offer of letting me cut in front of her mostly because she already had a pile of stuff on the counter and the nice young man had already started ringing up her purchase. 

6. I was beginning to regret not taking her line-cutting offer when the last thing she pulled from the bottom recesses of her cart was a Kohl's shopping bag. I thought she was going to attempt doing a return.

7. At this point I am amused, I can't imagine what else could possibly happen to further slow things down.

8. The woman ahead of me then pulls a pile, seriously, a preposterous pile of old Kohl's sales flyers and coupons from the bag and asks the nice young man to go through them to see if any are still valid.

9. Just then, another nice young man opened up another checkout and asked me if I'd like to be next. Well, naturally I said yes and was out the door while the other checkout line still had not advanced.

10. This shopping trip was made even more memorable by a woman with rainbow-dyed hair who left a wafting cloud of patchouli in her wake as she browsed the clearance racks in the junior department. I was happy to see that hippie culture is alive and well.