The holidays are here

The cheerful music, the sparkling decorations, the specialty coffees at Starbucks. All these things tell me that the holiday season is upon us. But mostly I can tell this because people suck.

I went to Savemart this evening to buy groceries. The Bee Gees were crooning in an unnatural falsetto over the sound system. My daughter toddled along with me, pushing a miniature shopping cart and insisting on filling her tiny, "Customer in Training" basket with our comestibles. Those who have known the subtle, easy-going demeanor of a toddler know that you gotta pick your windmills.

Syd then ran straight for the bulk candies and snarked down a fist-full of candy corns before I could wrench her away from the bin. My gawd, she is so my daughter.

Other than her highness having various issues with virtually everything-- declaring each item at eye-level as "mine"; the sudden change of heart from one direction and the immediate scurry across the store in the dead-opposite direction; and her ability to develop spaghetti limbs at random-- the trip was typical. We had a delightful time. Really.

So we go to get in line-- I, the mother of the beautiful, sunshine girl, and she, the ruler of all humanity-- whereupon some sneaky woman promptly and unceremoniously cuts in front of us in line. Throwing the elbow, no less!

She was really sinister, too, because after she juked her way past me, she tried to fake-out the woman ahead of me. No go there. Still, I didn't seem to mind, I mean-- she was buying a can of Maxwell House. That's all. One lousy can of one lousy coffee. Clearly the woman had no taste to begin with, neither figuratively nor literally.

So the line is long and snaky and another clerk comes forward, and opens a new line. This puts me second in line to the juker, who promptly rammed her way in front of me YET AGAIN. But here's the surprising part: Yet another woman tried to squeeze her corpulent self in front of me in line. AND she had a cart full of stuff.

Well, no sir, I would not stand for this and I actually said so, quite forcefully... in my brain. Out loud, my voice-- not unlike the Bee Gees overhead-- squeaked, "Excuse me, but I was next."

"WHHAAATT??" said Mrs. Big-boned, eyes a-bulgin'. "Are you ACTUALLY saying YOU'RE NEXT?!"

"Yes." This made her spittin' mad. So for fun, I added, smiling, "I'm next." What was she expecting me to say? Oops, no, since you yelled at me threateningly over your tub of "I Can't Believe People Actually Eat This Crap," I'm going to back down? That I'm going to let you and your Barbara Bush eyes thrust your way ahead of me the way I allowed the tasteless juker to do? No ma'am. No ma'am. I wasn't going to stand for it.

Before I could squeak anything more, her husband chimed in with, "Aww, honey let her go. She's just got that tiny little cart." It was like a movie. We all turned and looked at the ridiculously small, miniscule "Customer in training" shopping cart, at my bunch of bananas, yogurt, ziploc bags and Syd's puppy.

Dramatic pause.

SYD! Where was Syd??

Panic sets in as I realize I had lost sight of my little tornado for a total of 3 seconds. Was I crazy?? She could have dismantled the entire cereal aisle in that time!

"I right here, mommy," says a small voice, peering from behind a display of Krispy Cremes. Awww, she IS my girl.

I scamper over, grab my beautiful monkey all wrapped snuggly in her lavendar faux-fur coat, and kiss her sticky cheeks.

Jabba the Bulgy Eyed, whose veins are now so large and throbbing so intensely they're obscurring the store's flourescent lighting, grumbles loudly in that bricka-brakca-fricka-fracka Fred Flintstone kinda-way, and lumbers over to another aisle.

The song changes to a cheery jingle about an elderly woman being carelessly trampled by a group of heathen deer. Holiday lights shine. Tinsel glows. The air drips with good intention.

And that's how I really know it's the holiday season: People suck.