$73 of Wine on the Wall... $73 of Wine...

Dear Matt Smith,

I remember telling you once, after my car was stolen (it's almost my year anniversary!), that when the police arrived on the scene and told me, "When your car turns up, we'll give you a call."
"When?" I said. "Or IF?"
"When," Grumpy Man said. "These things usually turn up."
I extended my hand towards his car window, and, incidentally, his face. "Hi," I said. "Perhaps we haven't met. My name's Meredith, and I'm the girl that nothing goes right for."

And so it goes, Matt Smith.
And so it goes.

Yesterday, after a very long day of teaching "Harassment Now!" (not later) to six classes of seventh graders, I ventured out to the local grocery store -- Cub Foods (I have yet to actually witness a cub there, but then, the Boy Scouts have set up their Christmas tree shop in the parking lot). I bought a few crucial items, including a delicious steak (excuse me... STEAK!) to cook for my meager supper. I did my banking, discovered that I had a bit more cash to play around with before Christmas than I had originally anticipated, and made my way to the local liquor emporium. (Yes, liquor emporium. Minnesota has a vast amount of liquor, but most of it is found in large warehouse environments, where the sky's the limit. Although, why would you want liquor to be in the sky? I'd rather have it in a glass where it's more easily accessible. Damn the sky AND its liquor.)

I perused the aisles for a decent, yet inexpensive, bottle of Merlot and spotted a local Merlot for about $8. I carried my find to the counter, pulled out my license and my debit card, and waited behind a goosy-looking woman who sported a cart filled with 3 cases of some ridiculously God-awful beer. I smiled at her bad taste, and hugged my delicious wine closer to me. The clever minion behind the counter took her check without asking for ID (stupid, stupid boy), grabbed all three of the cases, and carried it out the door to the goose-lady's car. I briefly entertained the idea of robbing the place blind while he left the store unsupervised, but was thrown back into reality as the chubby minion re-entered the store.

To make a short story even shorter, the stupid boy overcharged me. He failed to ring out the Goose's sale, and charged me for her skunky beer. I mentioned this -- because my first receipt read something along the lines of $44.21 -- and he made some brief effort to correct the problem, but ended up charging me an additional $30 or so. Eventually, the poor chubby, shaggy boy had to take $73 off of the card.

So there you have it, Matt Smith. The saga of my $73 bottle of wine. It's really not all that important, but it does illustrate the point that nothing good can come of buying disgusting beer.

Cheers,
Meredith