Expectations...

Life is about expectations. When you have cancer and a blood clot in your leg, expectations for most things get thrown out the window. You learn to accept whatever you get (Suz would disagree with me as she says I have become a bit of a diva throughout this. I cannot completely deny these accusations...) This doesn't apply to all areas of your life however, sometimes you only accept the highest quality of products or services. Sometimes average is just not good enough. If you asked me right now what that would be for me, the answer would be grocery store power scooters. From reading the last blog, you know that my time spent on the power scooter at Publix was a glorious time. They basically have the Cadillac of grocery store power scooters. You also know that I now have an urge to test all other grocery store scooters so that a correct comparison may be formed. Well, today we all came one step closer to having a true definition of excellence where power scooters in grocery stores are concerned. I went to Kroger.

Sundays are our usual grocery store day, so I knew it was coming, but to tell you how obsessed I am, Susan says, "I think we'll go to Kroger, their coupon deals are much better." to which I reply, "Agreed, plus I've never tried their scooters." She just starts laughing, but I know she wants to know how each store tests out against Publix as much as I do. So off to Kroger we went...

Suz dropped me off at the door so I wouldn't have to try and fit my crutches in the basket with me. Much like the chemo treatment room, I'm usually the only person under the age of 70 that you see in the store riding these things. I hobble over to where they are and sure enough, Two 70 year olds are sitting in two of the scooters, the gentlemen seemed to be quite focused on the lady, which led me to believe that he was spitting some serious geriatric game to her. While I know nothing about geriatric game, I assume it involves telling the ladies things like: which fiber additive or Metamucil flavor you prefer, comparing which restaurants give the best seniors discounts, and/or opinions on which medicare supplement plan is the best bang for the buck. As I hobbled by, they both looked at me as if I didn't belong when I hopped on the scooter. Upon initial inspection, you can tell that Kroger hasn't updated their scooter fleet in quite awhile. The seat on this thing looks wore out (its either that or this Kroger location has a larger percentage of super fat & lazy people that use the scooters even though they don't need them.) I hop on and go take off, but they take off is more like a sputter. Its so slow that, I'm actually contemplating just hobbling around the store. If the one at Publix went roughly 5-7 mph, this thing at Kroger was as slow as molasses. I actually contemplated racing one of the many old ladies to see if they were faster on foot, but feared losing too much.

The good news is that in a rousing move of solidarity, it seems that all grocery stores have requested that the back-up signals on these scooters to register just under, "jet engine taking off" on the sound decibel list. For these you also have to click another button into reverse before turning around. At least in Publix, the turning radius was good enough that I could avoid an aisle if I needed to, alas here at Kroger I was forced to plow through an old lady's perfume cloud because there was no avoiding it. Sidenote: Do the elderly purposefully spray i on that thick daily or is it to avoid bathing?? I mean this lady had perfume on so thick, she literally could have soiled her pants right beside me and I would've had no clue unless someone called for a cleanup on aisle 5. I also hope she enjoyed her damned green beans that took 12 minutes to select.

All in all, we can conclude that as of now Kroger has the shittiest power scooter fleet. I will imagine Wal Mart is worse, but I cannot stress enough that given what and whom I usually see operating these scooters at their stores, I'm a bit more reserved towards sitting in one myself. I may do it for the sake of research, but not before I soak it in Purel or use at least 2 boxes of those wipes they provide you with...