I Miss My Happy Hour

25 March 2020

As an accommodation to older Americans a number of grocery chains in my area have announced senior hours.  In my neighborhood these hours run from 7 am to 8 am.  Today I decided to brave it.  

At about 6:50 am I got to the East Lansing Kroger Store on Lake Lansing Road.  Standing there were two women about 5 or 10 years older than me waiting patiently for the door to open. Both women were observing the appropriate social distancing.  I got out and took a position also observing social distance rules.  Image a triangle with three equal sides of six feet and you will get the picture. My visual scan of the parking lot showed a number of cars, all with one person in each, also waiting for the store to open.  

As soon as the store opened, I allowed the two women to enter and get carts, wipe them down and head in.  As I started through the door, a wiry shorter gentleman basically elbowed his way in front of me and growled through his beard, “What do you think of this bullshit”. Not following social distancing protocols, doubting the real risk to senior Americans of the corona virus, and verbally aggressive even at 7 am-clearly a Fox News fan.

Once in the store it was kind of like smoke molecules moving to equilibrium in a closed box.  For the most part, other that the Billy Goat Gruff I had encountered, people were staying 10 feet apart even in the checkout lanes. Billy Goat Gruff was whipping up and down the aisles like a tornado with viruses spewing out of his spiral, as opposed to trees, cows and cars. 

Save for three single roles of paper towels the paper products aisle was bare.  Chicken and pork chops were in stock so I grabbed some.  However, the meat section was also empty except for the highest priced steak cuts and ground beef raised on an organic farm somewhere outside of Taos or Sedona. The fresh vegetable and fruit aisle had some of each. There was not as much selection as usual but it was adequately stocked.

At checkout the cashier wore disposable gloves.  To what end I wonder for the bagger did not. In 45 minutes, I had replenished my foodstuffs for at least another ten days.  I paid about 5-10% more than I would have at Meijer’s, my store of choice.  However, I kind of thought there would be fewer people at Kroger and anecdotally I had that confirmed.  Talked to a friend who hit the Meijer’s senior hour yesterday and she described the scene as packed.  Packed should not be a word associated with senior hour at the grocery store during a pandemic.

Sort of sad really.  There was time in my life where the only “have to be there event” was set at 5:01 pm on Fridays.  Usually there were libations involved, not virus killing wipes.