Caution: Construction Area

It is impossible to stop into Wal Mart "just for a second," yet this is what I said to myself and I climbed out of my car and headed into the mecca of convenience.

Since my move, I now live roughly a minute away from my town's Wal Mart, which some would find appalling, but I find to be just wonderful. It is no longer a - gasp! - fifteen minute drive each way to what I affectionately refer to as Wally World. It is now a matter of a handful of seconds before I am out of my house and stepping through automatic doors and being greeted by a senior citizen.

"Hello, dear. Welcome to Wal Mart," an older lady in Lucille Ball's hairdo (only it was white instead of red) said to me today as I wandered into the store, on a mission for cold medicine and tissues.

"Hello," I replied, pressing forward and eager to get in and out of the store in less than ten minutes, and without spending $100.00, as I've been known to do.

But there was a problem: My Wal Mart is under construction. On its way to becoming a Super Center, my Wal Mart has been dismembered, reassembled, taken apart again, spread out and left a mess. The familiarity with which I navigated the aisles only months ago is gone now, and I am forced to wander aimlessly through rows and rows of cotton balls, makeup, chips, greeting cards, hair gel, shampoo, DVDs and car parts with only the far-fetched hope that I will somehow stumble upon the Equate Ibuprofen Cold & Sinus medication I'm counting on to keep my nose from running.

But finding medicine was easier than I thought it would be: The pharmacy was one of the first sections of our new Super Center to be remodeled. The tissues, however, were another story entirely.

The store has doubled - tripled, maybe - in size. And the floor plan changes almost daily. I know that the makeup is now located to the far left of the store, and I know that the music section is now what seems like a mile away from the front door, all the way in the back. But as far as finding anything else goes, it is only dumb luck that leads you to find it. Working off of the assumption that tissues would be somehow associated with Housewares, I followed the beacon of the large red sign boasting the same in the back of the store. But my path there was less of the straight shot I'd hoped it would be, and was more of a maze. At every turn I was met with another oddly-placed shelf, a rack of bras stuck randomly into the middle of a walkway, an aisle that dead-ended. What should've taken roughly two minutes (even in my big heels), took almost ten.

I found what I was looking for and headed out, my head throbbing and my frustration levels sky rocketing. I was more than ready to check out, to get on my way to pick up the Chinese food I'd ordered before entering the store. And that's when it happened.

I tripped. On my own goddamn shoe.

Thankfully, I didn't fall face first into the display of Larry The Cable Guy boxers I was passing (I believe it may have been the shock that a grown man would actually wear Larry The Cable Guy boxers that caused me to trip in the first place, but I can't be certain), but I did do it right in front of a bunch of teenaged girls.

And even at twenty four, feeling fabulous - even with a cold - in my somewhat transparent white t-shirt over my hot pink bra that matched the hot pink shoes I was wearing below my favorite fits-just-right blue jeans, tripping in front of teenagers - girls, no less - made me feel like a fat eight year old wearing a baggy sweater over leggings and dirty Keds sneakers.

They snickered at me - just as I would have done had someone tripped in front of me. I laughed, too, trying to show that I wasn't really embarrassed. But as I walked toward the cashier, I felt like a complete ass.

I know Wally World's expansion isn't to blame, but I can't wait until this shit is finished.