Fast Fiction

As blogged yesterday, The Man and I went to Whole Foods yesterday morning.

We picked out our Sunday evening meal which was to be a baked chicken with root vegetables (parsnips, potatoes and carrots).

After returning from the marathon The Man set to prep the chicken and opened the 7-pound, free-range, organic bird. It smelled like a garbage dumpster on a hot day. We’d gone right from the grocery store to home and put it in the fridge right away - that bird was bad when we brought it home, that’s the only explanation.

We immediately put into several plastic bags to cloak the smell, dug out the receipt and I trucked back up to Whole Foods - at the exact time that I loathe shopping, 5 PM. The place was mobbed, but I got up to the service desk and returned my chicken. The fellow kind of glowered at me, as if I’d some something wrong and I said I was concerned and that they should check their entire inventory because there was definitely something not right with that bird.

He nodded and gave me a merchandise credit. I’d presented my receipt and the original packaging and he was giving me a merchandise credit? He said I could redeem it for cash at any of the checkstands - and I glanced around to the Sunday pre-dinner lines and sighed. I was there to get a replacement dinner anyway (we were going to now have leftovers and a big salad so we needed some greens and tomatoes).

I fetched my new food and got in line, cashed out and thought to myself that when I’m paying $18 for a chicken, I should get much better treatment when they sell me a spoiled bird. Starting with an apology.