How Hard is It?!

Posted on August 13th, 2005 by Christine.
Categories: Pissed Off & Proud of It.

Make no mistake about it… this one is a rant. I am so so so so so so so so so so so sick of people who can’t do their damn jobs right. Yesterday, I go into a grocery store… Now I don’t know what kind of qualifications you have to have to work in a grocery store… at least to hold the job titled “sacker” which is essentially to put items into a bag, but I’m guessing if you’ve got two opposable thumbs and can get your ass to work when you’re supposed to, they’ll probably hire you to do this.

And it doesn’t seem difficult… the cashier slides a grocery item across a scanner. You, as the sacker, pick that item up and place it in either a plastic or paper bag (based on the patron’s preference) along with other like items. When I say like items, I mean… frozen things that are cold and wet should all go in the same bag. Cleaning solvents and things that you probably don’t want spilling all over your food– same bag. You get the idea…

So there are three guidelines to being a successful sacker:

1. Put like items together.
2. Don’t overfill the bags so that they are too heavy and tear.
3. Put all items bought into a bag.

Well, apparently, at the place where I shop (and spent $200 in groceries), those guidelines are simply too difficult to follow.

I come home and start to unpack the bags. Like items are not together. Some are… a few… I’ll give them that to be fair. But my shampoo was spilling out all over my apples (have you ever had to wash shampoo off of apples? It feels like a waste of time as you’re working that apple skin into a rich lather before you rinse and repeat).

The bags are overfilled. Well, some of them. Others have only one item for no apparent reason. I noticed this as I was putting them into my car and one bag had about 15 cans in it (hint: it’s okay to not follow the like items rule #1 if it means you will end up breaking rule #2). So the bags are tearing and the plastic strips that suffice as “handles” are cutting deeply into my wrists…
I end up repacking a few things so it’ll be easier to carry them up a flight of stairs when I get back to my apartment.

Third, yep, you guessed it. Where the fuck is my avocado? Hmmm… it’s on the receipt. I paid for my 79 cent avocado… but alas… it has turned up missing. Now, this is the one I find especially annoying. As I stood there after signing my credit card receipt, I had to point out to the guy that he’d forgotten to put a bottle of nail polish into my bag. “Oh,” he said and slipped it in with the shampoo and apples. I didn’t see the avocado, so I figured it was safe to assume it had already been packed (probably with the dishwashing liquid). But… I was wrong. No avocado. So I guess it never made it into one of my bags… maybe the person who checked out in front of me opened one of their bags to an avocado surprise when they arrived at home. How happy they must have been to be rewarded with an avocado they didn’t have to pay for… unless of course, the thing they were planning to eat for lunch, say… a package of hot dogs… ended up in someone else’s bag too. Well, avocados are better for you than hot dogs, so they lucked out.

I have, before, gone back to the grocery store to retrieve items that didn’t get into the bag. But this time, I did not. I had a busy weekend and no time to make repeat trips to a store because some dumb ass can’t figure out how to put groceries into a bag.
(sigh) Okay, rant over. I feel better now. Sort of… I know we can’t all be smart enough to be CEOs of companies and shit like that, but come on… regardless of what you do for a living, get your head out of your ass and do it well.

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