Whew, what a downer!

I just re-read my post from yesterday and I think I owe everyone a great big apology! What a big pile of moodiness I was yesterday!

Obviously, I shouldn't write while hungry. From now on, I commit to only write posts after a large meal or snack.

Speaking of which, we went to the grocery store today, so my hunger pangs should be held at bay for a while.

However, today was sprint-shopping, the most nerve-wracking kind. Tony and I left the house at 11:40 to go to Sam's, knowing that I had to be back for a phone conference at 1:30. Which would have been plenty of time, except we stopped at a neighbor's for 10 minutes to chat and invite them over for drinks and stuff on Saturday (adding a few more items to my grocery list at the same time!). By the time we got to Sam's, I had approximately 20 minutes to shop, check out and get everything loaded in the car. It normally takes me that long just to reach the back of the store.

Add to that the fact that Tony got a call from a very chatty customer 30 seconds before we pulled in to the parking lot and we had what I like to call "a situation." I abandoned Tony in the car with nary a glance over my shoulder and sprinted through the parking lot to the store, shoving old ladies and SUVs out of the way as I went. (Sidebar - why is it that people in SUVs backing out of parking spaces inevitably have to stop and start over? It's not a semi, people, it's a Jeep Liberty. I've had dogs bigger than that.)

As soon as I hit the store, I was in the zone, digging out my list, tossing my coat to the doorman (what, your Sam's Club doesn't have a doorman?) and speed-walking toward the dog food. Only to realize when I got there that there is no way I can pick up a 50 pound bag of kibble. Well, not if I want all of my internal organs to stay internal. I picked up dog Christmas presents instead, including Beggin' Strips (the dog equivalent of Combos, I'm convinced) and some chicken-scented chew toys (I'm hoping they smell like COOKED chicken and not BARNYARD chicken).

After that frivolity, I scurried off to the food section, desperate for some sort of acceptable, grown-up appetizer for Saturday's cocktail gathering. Normally, I'd serve pizza rolls and Doritos, but I think this get-together requires more finesse. Our neighbors seem fairly sophisticated and spray cheese on Ritz Crackers just doesn't seem appropriate.

Dashing wildly from aisle to aisle, I filled the cart with a random collection of frozen and not-frozen bites, hoping a theme would emerge besides "Lacy's Desperate Attempt to Seem Cultured." Sadly, none did. We'll be eating chicken sausage, bruschetta, frozen shrimp and whole apples, I guess.

Once Tony joined me, I force-marched him all over the store, making him pick up the heavy stuff, yelling at him to keep up and at one point, stomping my foot in the dairy section because he wouldn't shut up about his customer and help me figure out if we had enough food for everyone. He's so selfish sometimes.

Twenty minutes after sweeping through the front door, we were on our way back to the car in a driving rain, only to be foiled when Tony put all the groceries in first and forgot about the dog food. This is how we ended up with our legs sticking out the front doors of the Mini, trying desperately to jam a bag of dog food the size of a fifth-grader behind the front seats. We did it, but it wasn't pretty.

As we rocketed home, I realized we'd forgotten the wine (kind of important for a cocktail party) and the trash bags, but that was collateral damage we'd just have to live with. I've done too many surgical grocery strikes to believe that everyone comes back alive.