Wednesday, July 12, 2006

She's About to be Unleashed!

Ok. This may seem a bit mean, but I've been sensoring myself for so long around here that I've turned this once thriving and relatively interesting blog into a boring place to visit and THAT'S why I think my readership has gone to shit. So here you go!

Body Odor in the Hood!
Ok, as I have stated before, we live in the hood. Our neighbors(not ones on our street, but close by) "have they own shopping carts".

Anyway, we used to have an Albertson's grocery store close to our house and periodically we would shop there. Nice store, well appointed, but the prices were slightly higher than H.E.B., so H.E.B. got most of our business.

Well a few years ago, Albertson's left the Houston market(or at least our area of Houston). The building was empty for at least 3 or 4 years. This whole area hoped that there would be either a Kroger or H.E.B. come in and use the space. Nothing happened for a long time, although rumours of a store coming in would float around every once in a while.

So finally, we drive by and see that FoodTown has bought or leased the building! Yay! Since the Randall's that was closest grocery store to our house closed, there was no choice but to drive 5 miles up the street for milk at H.E.B. Not a biggie usually, but periodically, you needed that one item and were too knackered to drive all that way to get toilet paper or bread. AND there was NO WAY you'd go to the convenience store to get those items, because you would be scheistered out of all of your money!

It was about 4 months ago when we saw the sign. We'd drive by sometimes whilst going to Wal-Mart or Teotihuacan (Great mexican food place! West Airport & Fondren on the SW side) and see the progress they were making. We noticed two days ago that FoodTown was having a Grand Opening! Finalement!!

I had a 'running list' (for those who are not familiar with the term, that is a list that you start and add to everytime you run out of something.) going and we had quite a few things on it. The hubby decides last night that he wants to go check out the new store. I tell him that I have a list, but I wanted to go too. We got the boy to put on his shoes and off we go to the new grocery store! How exciting! (Seriously, we NEED to get out more!)

We arrive at the store and it looks like ALL of the new inhabitants to our area have decided to "go shopping" at the same time we did. Not suprising, it was after 6pm on a week night. We get into the store and it looks pretty much the way it when it was an Albertson's, except that the colors have changed from blue and white to cream and maroon.

As we were walking along looking at everything, noticing prices and the condition of the produce, meat and products we noticed that the stockers were still setting up and that we were the palest people in the whole building. Not a problem, just an observation.

Some background on me, I have very sensitive olfactory senses. When I was pregnant with the boy, I could smell cigarette smoke from a car that was four or five cars away with closed windows and the recycle a/c on. Even now, my sense of smell is very accute.

As we were winding our way through the store to procure our items, I would be assaulted by massive body odour. Just the thought off it makes me cough. Even the hubby noticed the sent, but it didn't bother him as much as it did me. And it wasn't just once, but many times throughout the facility. It seemed that everywhere I turned there was a person who smelled like they hadn't washed that day and were stuck in a hot building with no air circulation and were swathed in musty human sweat. Blech!

It wasn't just older men either, there were ladies and kids that offended the nose as well. I'd walk down an aisle and there was the smell, I'd turn to get away from the odor after getting what I needed and turn right into another area where it was even more odiferous! I couldn't wait to get out of there, but the hubby wanted to look around some more.
Holy Crap! I really thought at one time that I was gonna throw up.

The only place were I could get away from the pungent fragrance of the shoppers was over by the meat counter. Then we saw some interesting items they had for sell; lengua(cow tongue), beef kidneys, livers, pigs heads and feet, and bull fries(bulls balls). Eek Gads!

I teased Owen with the lengua and asked him, "Owen, what does that look like?" He read the lable and said " cow tongue?" and I looked at him and pretened to lick him. He was sufficiently grossed out, my job was done. :-)

He noticed the kidneys and said several times, "Look mom, they have beef kidneys!" Two young teenaged black girls were standing in that same area while I was looking at the ground round. They repeted what he said and I looked at them and said, "They have bulls "thingies" over there too. " They looked over and said, "EEEW!" Then showed them to their mammah. Again, my job was done. I love 'messing' with people. Hehehe.

When we finished looking over the entire store the hubby was ready to go. Thank Heavens! But wait! I spoke too soon, around the corner to the register and WHAM! My nose was hit again by another stinky person! Geeze! God Bless America! Ya! Dave even asked, "I don't smell that bad do I?" (He can't use antiperspirant or deodorant because it irritates his psoriasis.) I told him, not right now, but after you've mowed the lawn or worked out in the garage you sometimes smell that way. He was resigned to the odor, but since he takes showers everyday, it wasn't that bad.

We finally got out of the store at $60.81 worth of damage. Not bad, but not cheaper than H.E.B. Since my nose is hardly ever assaulted at H.E.B. we'll keep shopping there.

Whew, do you smell something?

9 Comments:

Blogger Rowan said...

I totally sympathize with you!
I too cannot stand certain smells, I get terrible migraines and 2 days ago in our local walmart, there was this really smell woman, wet from the rain, wearing a tube top and no deodorant. She absolutely reeked of dead sweat. Everytime I moved to get away from her, she ended up being right behind me anyway. My guess is the smell you were marauded with was the same stinky gent/lady in the store...yuck!

2:06 PM  
Blogger M said...

Oh yeah. Other than amimal musk, human musk is a really nasty smell. Sulphur is pretty bad too.

4:32 PM  
Blogger Greg - Cowboy in the Jungle said...

In the beginning that sounded like my old hood near the beltway north and veterans.

8:46 PM  
Blogger M said...

Hey Greg! Nice to see you around these here parts! Yeah, I know that area, not that different from where we live. We have all of the Katrina "victims" in our hood. Crime has gone up like 200% since they've been here.

6:30 AM  
Blogger Jackie said...

I feel for you, I can't STAND B.O. Blah!!!

And pregnancy makes me smell better than a drug dog too! Cigarette smoke, coffee, and the smell of rubber-like tires and some shoes-will send me running!

2:39 PM  
Blogger David said...

What does H.E.B stand for?

6:28 PM  
Blogger M said...

Hey Jackie! Welcome back!! Nice to see you here. :-D

During my pregnancy I felt like a blood hound.


H.E.B. stands for Henry E. Butt Grocery stores. I think the very first store was in Kerrville, TX., where my grandparents lived. I've always shopped H.E.B. since I was a child. When the hubby and I got married I moved with him to the Richmond/Rosenberg area and had to shop Kroger. When we moved to Houston, we had to wait a few years for the Houston metropolitan area to catch up with the rest of Texas and find out what great stores H.E.B.'s are. They started out with HEB Pantry stores, then moved into the "big" HEB's. Now we have Central Market which is more upscale than the larger stores. You can get gourmet items there and they have a cheese and deli dept., artisan breads, fancy desserts including wedding cakes, meat and seafood area including live fish, lobsters and shell fish(clams, mussles, etc.) and more. It's a really great store. If you look on my flickr pics you'll see some broccoli & cauliflower that I saw at Central Market. It was so cool that I HAD to take a picture of them!

7:40 PM  
Blogger darl said...

hmmm. . bull balls eh? Reminds me of going to Fiesta when I was a kid. You have to go to the one in the hood. hehe((. I remember I used to poke at the frozen section until one day I realized I was poking at a frozen, decapitated pig head. I never poked at the frozen section again, even to this day. Yeah. H.E.B. sounds better. ;)

8:51 PM  
Blogger M said...

Pokin' at the pigs heads... They are pretty gnarly. What are worse are the suckling pigs. They have their insides cut out and it looks like they are smiling about it. YUCK!

4:23 PM  

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