An open letter to the grocery cashiers of Buttcrack

[As I may have mentioned once or maybe a thousand times, I live in Buttcrack, MS, deep in the heart of Dumbfuckistan.]


Dear Grocery Store Cashier:

I belong to a sub-culture known in these parts as "Treehuggers". One of the quaint customs of my people is the use of re-usable tote bags at the grocery store. You may have heard of it before. I hear it's very big in Japan, this custom. Also in most places where people don't want to use a plastic bag for ten minutes that will then go into a landfill for decades. I know, it's a crazy idea. Humor me, though, okay? Approximately 9 out of the 10 times I get into line with my tote bag, you are dumbfounded. Even at the grocery store where I shop like three times a week. Seriously, whatever you are doing that wrecks your memory, cut it out, okay?

Let me help you out here with some advice.

1. Do not try to charge me for my own bag and be mystified that it lacks a tag. It's RE-USABLE, see? So I bring in my own.

2. This happens probably 5 out of 10 times: you ask, "Do you want me to put EVERYTHING in this bag??" Hm, I don't know. Depends on how much stuff I have. It's not a TARDIS, see, so if I happen to have picked out more stuff than will fit in the bag, then, you know, put the rest in disposable plastic. I will re-use it for cat litter. Easy peasy, see?

3. I realize that the custom in most stores is to put one item, maybe two in each bag. But I'm guessing that somewhere along the line, you learned NOT to put squashable things in the bottom of a bag. For example: eggs, bread, chips, $5 bags of organic baby spring greens, bananas; these do not go in the bottom. Do not give me the stinkeye when I stop you from dropping canned goods and orange juice on top of squashable things.

4. If I have, say, a box of cat litter and two smaller items, do not put the 15-pound box of cat litter in the tote bag. This is just fucking stupid. Would you put it in a plastic bag? No. Do you think the bag is made of woven titanium and not some kind of flimsy fiber? God, I hope not. Seriously, put the small shit in the bag, and I will carry the cat litter with the HANDLE ON TOP OF IT.

5. Do not bag my items in plastic before putting them into the tote bag. This just defeats the purpose. You DO understand the purpose, right? To not waste plastic bags??

6. When I tell you not to pre-bag my items in plastic, don't roll your eyes, take the item you already bagged out of the plastic bag, wad it up, and throw it away. I can't tell you how depressing it is when you do that.

Sincerely,
Jezebella

harassment via direct mail

So, this charming piece of crap appeared in my mailbox last week.





Jillian wants ME! to lose weight. Does she know me? Does she know every single person this was mailed to? No, no she doesn't. It's a piece of direct mail that landed in the mailbox of thousands, maybe even millions of people last week.

You know what I want? I want Jillian to mind her own fucking business.

Here's the thing. I could be a thin person with no need to lose weight. I could be an average sized healthy person with no need to lose weight. In other words, I could be one of the more than 50% of Americans who are average or below average in weight.

I could be recovering from an eating disorder, and therefore triggered by this random assault on my recovery. I could be a fat person who is struggling to live fat acceptance. I could be a fat person who is SICK AND FUCKING TIRED OF STRANGERS GETTING IN MY FUCKING BUSINESS. I could be a woman who is tormented by those "last five pounds" I think I need to lose, even though I am a perfectly healthy person with a perfectly healthy weight. I could be a person whose prescription meds, disability, or illness has caused me to gain weight, and I KNOW I've gained weight, and I'm uncomfortable with it, but I can't do anything about it without compromising my health. I could be a fat lazy gluttonous Fatty McFatterson who hears from everyone, all day, every day, that I am a Bad Person because I'm fat. Jillian has no business telling anybody they should lose weight. Screw you, lady, and get out of my mailbox. Stat.

I once spent a whole ass-load of time filling out forms and mailing letters in order to prevent direct mail garbage landing in my mailbox, and somehow all those do-not-mail directives have expired, so here they are again.

You know who wants to hear this shit from Jillian? Exactly nobody.