God Do I Love The Market Basket

Did a grocery shopping run to the Somerville Market Basket this morning. It's always busy and I have yet to go on a weekend, when I am sure it is an absolute disaster. There's sawdust all over the floor and a whole aisle of Goya brand food and stuff from Brazil and a league of nations walking through the aisles. I had a nice conversation with an elderly gentleman in the checkout line about the pharmaceutical industry. He's always calling his representative to give his opinion. His wife is on two kinds of nasal sprays and one of them costs 150 dollars alone. He was impressed by all the vegetables I was buying.

My family has a long and proud history with the Basket. I remember going in with my Grandpa after he'd had his stroke. The only words he re-learned were Jesus Christ Almighty, Fuck You, and No. He wanted to buy a big jar of pickled pigs' feet so he pointed at them and grunted. Then he gave me a whiskery smile when I grabbed them for him. I also remember him eating oatmeal rather sloppily. He was kind of a bastard, but that's a story for another day.

I also used to take my Babcia shopping there once a week when I lived with her. She'd zoom around with her grocery cart buying all sorts of crap, like Coffee Nips and jelly doughnuts. She would actually rub her hands together in glee in front of the dougnut case. I used to lose her in the store with some frequency, because it was filled to the brim with stooped-over white-haired ladies pushing carts.

Dr. Moo worked at the Basket in high school as a cashier and my brother was a grocery boy. Lots of girls from the store used to call my brother, as he was a particularly handsome grocery boy. When they called and my father answered the phone he'd say to my brother "It's another Market Basket ho." The Basket is also famous for chasing down shoplifters. At my home store, in Londonderry, NH, blue-jacketed grocery boys used to fly down from the office, leap over the dairy cases, and chase them out the door to tackle them in the parking lot.

But the best part about the Basket by far is that you can get a whole lotta groceries including a big bag of frozen shrimp, yummy organic cookies and a bunch of double-a's for your battery-eating Walkman for only 67 dollars.