Strangers

Does anyone out there think about politics when grocery shopping? I know I don't, at least I never did until tonight.

I was in the checkout line, thinking about check out line kind of stuff. A young man came over to bag the groceries, which really makes me happy. So I was in a pretty good grocery shopping mood. The friendly clerk was scanning my groceries when she started talking about Iraq. She said she started to cry when she heard that a 21 year old soldier died. I said "Oh, that's sad". Then she snapped at me that she didn't want to talk about it or she would start to cry again. So I said "Sorry" because I certainly don't want to make the check out lady cry. Then she started rambling a bit and I decided it was best that I not speak anymore. I've never had a check out person get mad at me and I didn't want to start tonight.

Another time, I was at the hair dresser and it was only the first or second time she had done my hair. She started telling me all about the great movie she saw that weekend. It was "An Inconvenient Truth" by Al Gore. She went on and on and I have to say it was sort of annoying. She's a nice girl and all, but come on. I'm not about to disagree with someone holding scissors that close to my throat. So I just kept my mouth shut. The funny thing that day was that it was about 10 degrees Fahrenheit outside. I think people should only talk about global warming when the temperature is above, say, 90 degrees.

The moral of the story is this: when you talk to strangers you should ramble about political things so they have a story to tell people later on.