Grocery Lists

The first time I ever heard about Milk, Eggs, Vodka, I was hooked.  Even though I've still never read the book (it's probably on some "books to read" list I've started and since lost), I was fascinated by the concept- a whole book of the grocery lists people leave behind in their shopping carts.

The website is amazing, too.  I took a lot of anthropology classes in college, and I feel like shopping lists are shockingly, unintentionally honest glimpses into our lives.  So, because imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, I started collecting my own abandoned shopping lists.

They're hard to find.  I've actually pulled out five or six carts to get to one deep in the line up just because I spot a piece of paper in there that I think may be a list (most often it's not).  When Ken comes home from a run to the store, bearing a list for me, you'd think it was a love letter in his hands, I get so excited.

I like to keep the lists in my wallet, so I can pull them out when I'm stuck somewhere that needs time to be killed, and look them over.  Such a mundane thing, really, but so interesting.
I think the guy who runs the original website puts it best:

Things learned

More people than I thought like onions. Mayonnaise is difficult to spell. So is banana, apparently. And anchovies. And yogurt. There are a lot of notepads out there touting the greatness of numerous bizarrely-named pharmaceuticals. I used to think my handwriting was lame. Now I don’t. And lastly, very few people leave their grocery lists in the cart like they should!

So when Ken came home today from taking Veronica to a well baby visit, and then to the store for still! more! peanut butter! the found list he had in his hand meant I knew what my blog post would be about today.

A exhibition of my own modest grocery list collection:

My very first found list, abandoned in a Whole Foods shopping cart.  My absolute favorite thing about this list is how "Cookies" is listed far away from everything else, as if the writer was unable to resist the call of baked goods, but banished the word to its own spot on the list, creating a visual distance, if not a physical one (ha!  it's still listed first, though!).

The next one I found months later at the Shop Rite.  Besides the artistic yearnings of the writer, and the hilarious use of "chicken boobs" instead of "chicken breasts" ("breasts" really is an unpleasant word), I love how "mixers" and "libations" have been added in at the bottom, in pencil, so you know it was a later addition, with optimistic space left for other possible items.

The next list was a double.  On the front was a note written on a pad of paper advertising some drug, and at first I spent so much time honestly hoping that JoAnn misspelled "Scarlette" and it wasn't the correct spelling, that I almost missed the list on the flip side.

Here's where I probably spend too much time looking at these.  For a long time, I wondered about the thick black vertical drawing on the list.  What was it?  Why was it there?  If it was nothing but a doodle, what kind of mind and mood did it hint about?

Then, I noticed the chatter in the list, and realized that the writer of the list was not the same as the intended shopper.  

"bag peppermint patties"
"bag of candy for you"
(keep your filthy paws off MY peppermint patties, you hear me?  If you want some, you can dang well get your own)
then this:
"kashi oatmeal (I don't like the kind you get)"

Through my extensive anthropological training, I've authoritatively concluded that the writer of this list is passive aggressive and has problems sharing food.  Also, s/he is very particular about oatmeal.

Today, Ken came home with the longest list yet, which not only covered an entire sheet of lined paper, but also had a post-it attached to it (not pictured)

And like the previous list, there was chatter in the writing that indicated the writer was not the shopper.  Also, judging by the different handwriting, the creation of this list was a group project.

I love the strange inconsistencies in the items:

"Tomato -2 (locally grown)

That's a pretty specific request.  Not "organic", not "heirloom", but "locally grown".  Someone who wants to avoid enlarging their carbon footprint by relying on food trucked in from far off places?

Probably not, judging by the items further down:

"Red Baron Pizza - if on sale".

I can tell you for a fact, Red Baron pizza is NOT locally grown around here.

Anyway, there you go.  My small and weird collection of grocery lists.  I'm a confirmed list maker, and I almost never to shopping without one.  And since I'm not only a list maker, but also a giver, when I'm done with my lists, I leave them in the cart as a gift to any other collectors may be skulking around Simsbury.