Or Are You Just Happy to See Me?
At the Hartmans today, Jennifer needed some sauces and I needed some mushrooms, of both the fresh and dried variety. Shiitake, for the dried, which I thought might be in "ethnic foods," which we all know is code for sauces soy and curry, and taco shells.
I am here to tell you that dried mushrooms have no ethnicity.
The next sensible place to look, J. surmised, was in the "health section" which we all know is code word for "delicate flower" (DF).
"And on the way," I said. "If we see someone, we can ask them."
It's good to ask for what you want.
We hit the DF section before we saw an employee, scanned the shelves, saw no shiitakes. We were about to leave, when I realized that we had just passed an employee who was reading the back of a box of DF mac'n'cheese. I thought maybe he was on break to be doing such a thing, but then thought "Well, he's wearing his uniform and name tag. Fair game." I doubled back.
"Excuse me," I said.
He didn't look up.
"Excuse me," I repeated. "Do you have any dried mushrooms?"
That got me his attention, and a closed-up wary look to boot.
On break I thought. But there was no going back.
"Do you have any dried mushrooms?"
I could see him trying to formulate an answer, and jumped in with what I thought might be helpful information.
"I'm looking for shiitakes, and thought they might be in with the health foods."
He spoke then, "Oh. I don't know. They'd be in produce."
I thanked him. He went back to the DF M'N'C, we went off towards produce. Just out of earshot, I leaned over a bit to Jennifer and said "I think he thought I was asking *him* if he had mushrooms."
"Yeah, I got that feeling too. He was very confused."
"I guess so, I mean, where would he have them, in his pants? Because I do not want to know if he has mushrooms in his pants. Why would some strange girl be asking him about his pants fungus?"
Jennifer snorted and leaned her forehead on my shoulder a moment as we both collapsed into a fit of giggles. "Why," she said, "are we unable to grocery shop together without something hilarious happening?"
Hard to tell if it's the Hartman's, or whether we're hilarious, or whether that poor man really did have mushrooms stuffed in his crotch and was afraid I'd found him out.
Pants fungus is no laughing matter... mine has been in remission for only a few months.
three things come to mind.
one, i call that the fruity section.
two, dried shitakes are all over our neighborhood, just not at the hartmans.
three, if i worked at hartmans and some girl with a ring in her nose asked me about my mushrooms, i'd think 'yep, just another day at work with crazy people'.
So, Megan, I read your post yesterday, and then I read Gabriel's comment.
Later a friend tells me about the mushrooms that were growing out of her toilet.
Even later, I innocently walk into H&S and wander over to produce, where I see an array of beautiful mushrooms of all kinds.
I instantly react... internally, I scream and gag, and I realize that I am unable to even think of buying them.
A collective thanks to all for putting such lovely images in my head, (Yes, I am lol)
gabriel: i recommend you should practice saying, "They're in the fruity section" just in case someone asks you if you have any.
shelley: 1) heh. me too now. 2) like weeds, practically, and i think i got gouged for portabellos at the hartman's. but it was 6 pm on a sunday and i didn't feel like trolling for an open store near RS. sheer laziness on my part. 3) from the look on his face, i'd wager that is exactly what he said to the first friend he ran into.
woodsy: in the toilet? gah! gah! horrible.