T and I went grocery shopping as we do on weekends. We shop at Walmart and meet near the registers, after filling our baskets - to check out. I watch the register total mount higher while he packs the bags into our empty basket. Once the groceries are rung up, I will hand the cashier my Walmart card and have enough put on it to pay for a tank of gas at the station on the corner of the lot. We like to use that station because they give you 3 cents off, when using a Walmart card. It kind of feels like taking advantage of the system - to get that cents off the price of a tank. Groceries in the back seat, I drive around to the pumps with T. and he gets out to start the pump and fill the tank. Usually things go well.
Yesterday, not so much.
He got out and had a slight problem locating the gas tank door and I got out to show him where it was. I got back in the driver's seat, thinking things would go as usual. Put in the card, choose the grade, begin fueling. It's a routine he is familiar with. He has done it lots of times.
T. called me to come back out, slightly frantic. He had shoved the gas card up inside the receipt slot, instead of the card reader. He couldn't get it back. I got out. We couldn't even see the card. He pushed the pump button to generate a receipt. It seemed a logical step to him. Nothing happened.
The guy on the other side of the pump was kind of peering around the corner toward us. If he had offered to help we might have accepted but I believe he was laughing too hard to speak.
I would just have left the card stuck inside the pump and driven off, except that it did have $30.00 on it.
I told T. to go tell the person inside the little office what had happened and ask her if she could retrieve our gas card. He went. She came. She unlocked the little door and opened it to reveal the receipt roll and our card. She handed it to T. We thanked her profusely and she returned to the office.
T. went ahead and successfully pumped the tank of gas, and from that point onward things ran like clockwork. He mentioned that this was the first time he had ever tried to put the card in the wrong place. Now I know, I can watch him to be sure he isn't repeating the error.
I keep seeing that guy on the other side of the pump laughing without understanding. But you have to keep your sense of humor and it was kind of funny as it unravelled.
If this weren't bad enough, I passed the spot pictured in the next image - on the way home. It is deceptively lovely and covers a vast field that is just coming into bloom after the cold of winter. We should be rejoicing over the fact that the long days of cold and early darkness are coming to an end and the Spring is bursting into bud before our very eyes. We should be glad, except that this is part of a large field that is directly across from the church we attend. I drove along beside the blooming fields as I headed out in the morning and returned in the evening. For those highly allergic folk who haven't guessed what this is, don't get too close to the photograph. This is the weed commonly called Red Top. It is an amazing sight to behold a half mile long parcel of field that stretches from the road, clear back to the next section at the tree-line. The setting sun sets the color to glowing a shade of red that's hard to describe. Not because we don't have the words; it's hard to describe because we are rubbing our noses and snuffling back a sneeze as we hastily roll the windows up all tight and turn off the air conditioning. Just the thought of this huge field makes my nose itch and tingle. My eyes start to water. I need to get some tissue and quit thinking about pressure in my sinus. I need to go now.
