The Joy of Shopping

I'm not one to spend hours shopping (unless a college football game is on TV). But sometimes a girl has gotta shop. I'm not talking picking out a lawnmower or a storm door. I'm talking feel-good, frivolous, fun shopping. I'm talking shopping for stuff I don't need and didn't know I wanted.

Shopping in Buffalo, WY is not the same as a big city shopping experience. The majority of stores here are Mom and Pop, and the only chain stores are Shopko and Family Dollar.

If I want to go to the big chain stores, such as Bed Bath & Beyond, I either have to drive to Casper, Wyoming (a little over 100 miles away) or Billings, Montana (a little over 160 miles away). It's pretty common for Buffalonians to go to Billings for the weekend and indulge in a shopping extravaganza.

I like shopping small and local, so I mostly shop in Buffalo. But sometimes, the better deals are out of town. And one thing I learned from my mother is how to shop for deals.

If I'm not into long drives, which is most of the time, I like to swing by Walmart in Sheridan, WY, a mere 30 miles away. I imagine that is a horrifying thought to some of my friends, but Walmart has great prices, and the entertainment value is priceless. People who shop at the Sheridan Walmart are surprisingly normal, unlike some other Walmarts (if you want a giggle, check out http://www.peopleofwalmart.com/).

However, it's impossible to avoid the Walmart abduction experience. That's when I walk into Walmart with a small list of three items to buy, get sucked into the store, lose hours of my life, and finally escape with a shopping cart of mildly useful things I didn't know I needed. With a bow to my friend, Lyndi, for helping me to compile the typical contents of a Walmart shopping cart:

Back scratchers in the shape of little monkeys
A package of 3 of those round toilet bowl discs that turn the water blue.
Five 10-pound bags of pasta because it was on sale.
A family size jug of fish oil capsules.
A new type of hand lotion that comes in a pump action bottle, and promises to cure dandruff and insomnia.
An emergency case of water in case someone cuts a line and the power goes out.
Lemon Pledge, because it was there and reminded you of your mother
Two tubes of toothpaste instead of one (they were on sale of course)
A huge box of tough strength band-aids for the zombie apocalypse
Two small boxes and 10 canisters of Crystal Light for those hot summer days and thirsty zombies
Two huge plastic bins, with matching tops, to store stuff (and who doesn't have stuff?)
A picture frame.