When a man starts his day and heads out to complete a few errands, he does not expect disaster to strike. But strike me it did this afternoon when I discovered my favourite grocery store had hiked its price of peanut butter by 50 cents a jar. At the rate I go through peanut butter, it didn’t take me long to realize what a hit this was going to inflict on our food budget.
And while I don’t begrudge the store the extra 50 cents, it was the lack of notice that sent me into a mini shock. They didn’t phone me to let me know that the price, which had been the same since back in the day when John Wayne still went by his real name, Marion Morrison, was about to shoot up. No letter in the mail. Not a text message, no email. No Facetime chat on my phone. Nothing. That’s what is so disappointing.
So now that the one-kilogram jars are out of my reach, I noticed they hadn’t gotten around to increasing the price of the two-kilogram buckets so I lugged a couple of them home, though I pulled a muscle in my left arm dragging them to my trunk.
With enough orange juice and peanut butter and with the passage of time, I will get over this. But I have been let down.
And I have to admit, I don’t like being let down.
Also, like a slap in the face, they tacked an extra dollar onto the price of raspberry lemonade.
I won’t lie.
It hurts.
©2021 Jim Hagarty
