How do you shop? For me it depends on what I’m shopping for. There are those stores that I go to that I’m determined to be in and out as quick as possible. I go in get what I’m planning on getting and leave. This usually happens when I go by myself to purchase clothing or food. Some would say that is the male hunter instinct. This can be annoying to my wife when I go shopping for something like clothes and manage to find what I’m looking for right away. She’s more of the gatherer type so can’t understand, how I do it. She will shop and shop buying much more than she needs, knowing that after a fashion show at home she will choose to keep some of the articles purchased and will return the rest. It’s my understanding that that is also a stereotypical female trait. It works for her, so I don’t complain. Actually it helped me during my recent Mother’s day shopping excursion.
I knew what type of clothing she desired, so I went to numerous stores and purchased, more than I would normally have given her (mind you that I was willing to let her keep it all) and then let her choose what she didn’t like, what didn’t fit, what she preferred and then let her do her usual returns and exchanges. I believe all parties were satisfied.
Of course there are other stores in which, regardless of what I intend to purchase; I can get lost in the world of possibilities and spend much more time than needed. This happens more frequently in electronics, hardware, and bookstores. (Again am I being stereotypical?) The difference here is that I don’t usually buy things I don’t need. I have to set an example for my son who is not allowed to make any impulse buys. I usually either end up with what I intended to buy or nothing, with thoughts of future purchases. I just spend a lot of time there. There are times when my wife is exactly the same. Well not for the same types of stores as me, for her it is online shopping. She can spend hours researching and looking at clothes, things for the home and garden, and gifts for others. She’s getting pretty good with e-Bay.
Food shopping in general can work both ways, fast and slow. I prefer fast, but sometimes get stuck. I’m geeky enough to have a program on my PDA that is cataloged to our local King Kullen Supermarket. All I have to do is check off the items I want from my shopping list and it sorts them by aisle and makes my shopping very efficient both in time and purchased items. I only go up and down the aisles I need to. My wife goes up and down every aisle when she shops. Her PDA is a piece of paper in which she lists the things she wants, in relative proximity (on her list) to where it would be placed by aisles. I have been known to use her list when there are only a few items to get.
There are times when I take the normal types of shopping and end up lost in a world of prices and other equally disturbing conundrums. There has been many a time I’ve purchased products which have been criticized with, “Do you know how much you paid for those grapes?” (or whatever food I purchased). It was on the list so I grabbed what I could reach. Or the fruit looked good and I thought the price was okay.
Getting lost when I food shop with a list that either I created from a recipe that uses odd ingredients happens a lot. My goal remains to get out of the store as quickly as possible. This gets complicated when asked to purchase an endive or kohlrabi, or some other equally bizarre rarely purchased produce. In our supermarket very few items in the produce section have labels associated with them. It’s like by living on Long Island, everyone thinks you’re a farmer and know everything about produce. What is the difference between a turnip and a rutabaga anyway?
I guess as I grow older I will continue to evolve as a shopper. Who knows, maybe someday they will be able to embed a chip in my head so that all I have to do is think about what I want and I will be directed to the right place. Of course then I’ll have to think of a better way to use coupons to save money, but that is topic for another day.
