Today I am reasoning with myself about Paul.

When he puts away the muffins, and he chooses from the large pile of gallon-sized zip bags one of the ones I use for muffin mix (visibly coated with white powder) (also LABELED IN PERMANENT MARKER), so that all the muffins in the bag are finely dusted with baking soda and flour and spices unrelated to themselves, does this mean he is blind as well as stupid? No.

When he reorganizes the basement, and now the boxes of handmedowns are in “the order he grabbed them” rather than in order by size, and when in fact he has made TEETERING STACKS of boxes so that if I need the size 4-5 long-sleeved shirts for Edward I first need to lift off FIVE BINS, the top one of which is higher than my head, does this mean Paul is a bad husband and father? No.

When he tidies up by putting a whole bunch of papers into the recycling bin without bothering to glance at what those papers ARE, and when some of the papers are Rob’s homework and some are my Dunkin’ Donuts coupons, does this mean I should divorce him and file for full custody? No.

When he goes to the store and comes home with weird specialized versions of things we buy in their normal versions ALL THE TIME (golden flaxseed meal instead of regular, large elbow macaroni instead of regular, canned pumpkin pie filling instead of canned pumpkin), does this mean my life is nothing but one long torment? No.

When I come home from the store where I have been purchasing the grocery items they “didn’t have” (which are all right where they usually are), and he says, “Oh, I need Tabasco sauce,” does this mean the only solution is human sacrifice? No.

My mom and I were at the store and we saw a plaque in the clearance section, and neither of us could make heads or tails of it. It is unfortunate that neither of us has a camera-equipped cell phone, but I copied it down exactly, punctuation and capitalization and centering and all, and maybe one of you will have an insight that will make my headache go away. Here it is:

in a

friend

FRIEND

you find a

second left

I mean, what? What does that MEAN? It seems like we should have a “best answer” contest or something.

It has long been my feeling that even though I am willing to pay a “Target tax” ($1.99 for an item at Target instead of $1.87 for the same item at Walmart), that overall I save money by shopping at Target. This is for two reasons, no three reasons, no FOUR reasons:

1. Target has sales. Target’s everyday price might be higher than Walmart’s, but their sale price is lower.

2. Target has good clearances. Target’s everday price might be higher than Walmart’s, but their clearance prices are way, WAY lower.

3. Cheapness is partly reputation—not necessarily deserved reputation. The FEELING is that Walmart MUST be WAY cheaper because they have a carefully-constructed reputation for it and because they are SO unpleasant in so many ways, but an actual item-by-item examination reveals that some items are a little cheaper and some are a little more expensive and basically they’re not cheaper. This is something I’ve been meaning to do a post on (comparing the prices at Walmart and Target of all the things I buy), but the research involved makes me feel like dying.

4. Walmart is a bunch of cheaters. The price marked on the shelf is lower than Target’s, but the price that rings up at the register is not. Or, the item will be marked “20% more free!” but will ring up at a price about 20% higher than regular price. EVERY store (of COURSE including Target) makes errors at the register, but in general the errors even out: some are in the store’s favor, some are in the customer’s. Walmart’s don’t balance out, and this has been true at all three Walmarts I’ve lived near and shopped at regularly, in three different states.

ANYWAY. So it has been my opinion that Target costs me less money for the way I personally shop: that is, for the particular things/brands I buy, and for the things I buy on clearance, and for how unwilling I am to drag a cart full of children over to Customer Service to fix a bunch of 24-cent pricing errors.

But today I would like to add “The Example of the Luvs Diapers” as YET ANOTHER reason I think Target costs me less money and Walmart’s reputation for cheapness is not fully deserved. Normally I buy all diapers at Target, the store brand ones for daytime and Luvs brand for nighttime. Today my mom and I were running errands and we needed to go to Walmart for yarn, and we weren’t planning on going to Target, and I was nearly out of Luvs at home, so I thought I’d better get a box while I was there. I don’t like giving Walmart my money, but I felt a little guiltily pleased to be “forced into” paying $15.97 for a box of Luvs instead of Target’s $17.99.

Then I got home and OH WHAT HAVE WE HERE.

Target’s box is on the left. Walmart’s is on the right.

Allow a former math medalist to walk you through the math, or perhaps you can join me at the riveting conclusion in the next paragraph. Walmart charges $15.97 for 70 diapers, so to find the per-diaper price we divide $15.97 by 70, and the answer is 22.814 cents per diaper. Target charges $17.99 for 80 diapers, so to find the per-diaper price we divide $17.99 by 80, and the answer is 22.488 cents per diaper.

Per 100 diapers, Walmart charges $22.81 and Target charges $22.48. Target…charges…LESS. That’s a pretty small price difference, and in fact I consider that “the same price.” But the issue here is not that Walmart and Target have a similar price on Luvs; the issue here is that Walmart has their own package size, which is smaller than the standard but not enough smaller to be obviously smaller, and that they charge “less” for it. The impression shoppers receive—even MATH MEDALIST shoppers who notice prices—is that Walmart’s prices are lower. Which would be fine IF THEY WERE. But I’m adding a fifth reason to my list:

5. Walmart has their own sizes on certain things. This gives the impression that they charge less, when in fact they are charging more.

Do you know, I was two classes short of having a minor in economics but I still didn’t understand until THIS WEEK that one of the arguments against chain stores is that they send the community’s money elsewhere. I got that a few days ago in a flash of insight (or possibly from a commercial on the radio I didn’t know I was listening to) as I was driving along mulling. I am in my MID-THIRTIES.

I think part of the problem is that when there are so! many! emotional! arguments! against something, it distracts from the PRACTICAL stuff—and if I hear too much emotional stuff, I generally start assuming there ISN’T much of a practical angle. Like, I am actually NOT sympathetic when I hear that the chain stores are going to put “the mom-and-pop stores” out of business. I think “mom and pop” is an excessively provocative term, considering that chain and non-chain businesses alike are owned by all kinds of people, some nice and some not, some parents and some not, and their motivations tend to be the same: make money.

I DON’T feel like making voluntary donations to keep a smaller company artificially profitable when a larger company can do the same thing more efficiently. And in my experience, small-business customer service varies just as much as chain-business customer service: some are great, some are crap, and not much seems to have to do with whether they’re owned by “mom and pop” or by an international conglomerate. Sometimes you get a jerk, and sometimes you don’t; sometimes a company has good policies, and sometimes they don’t.

But finally I heard it in more economics-minor terms: that all the money the citizens spend at the chain is therefore going out of state. If it were spent at a small, local store, the money would presumably be spent by the local owners at other local establishments; then those other local owners would spend THAT money at other local establishments, and thus the money goes around and around, profiting the locals and also profiting the local government as they take their cut with each changing of hands. OH! I see!

It’s not so clear-cut even then, of course. For one thing, the branch of the chain is still located HERE, so they have to pay taxes here. I think. Don’t they? Or is there something about paying income taxes only where you’re incorporated or whatevs? Still, property taxes, surely. And of course they employ local people, which means the company takes some of their out-of-state money and spends it back HERE. But still, I GET IT: I am in my mid-thirties and I see why smaller local stores can be better for a community.

What I DON’T get yet is how “seeing why smaller local stores can be better for a community” makes any difference once the chains are already here and the local stores are already gone. At THAT point—and that’s the point most of us are at—it’s hard to know what use this knowledge is.

I AM willing to pay a small/reasonable “tax” to shop “a better way” (which is why I’m willing to consistently pay $1.99 at Target for something that is $1.87 at Walmart, or buy the $4.75 partially recycled paper instead of the $3.50 non-recycled), but I’m looking around and I don’t see many options for the “spend local” idea. Non-chain groceries? Only from the farmer’s market, and that’s only certain things and only a few months a year. Non-chain Tylenol? Nothing but a overpriced-beyond-small/reasonable convenience mart, and also of course most of the money still goes TO TYLENOL, which is NOT local. Books? YES! But…again, much of the money still goes to the out-of-state publishers/authors, and also, the difference between local and Amazon goes beyond what I am willing to pay in the “small contribution to the larger good” category. Gifts? YES! But that’s a small part of the budget, and also what about Etsy? I love Etsy. Most of Etsy isn’t local.

You can see how all this might make a Target girl feel…compromised.

I have some MALE FRIENDS AND FAMILY who read this blog, so I like to be very careful to let everyone know what they’re getting into if I’m about to write about something Personal. So be warned: This post contains discussions of Kegels, which are exercises for the girly-bits. And that is ALL this post contains, so you are safe to bail.

Last chance to leave the room before I start using various v-words.

At my last GYN appointment there was a pop quiz on Kegels. I failed. My grade didn’t surprise me any more than failing grade on a physics pop quiz would have surprised me, because Kegels are not in my repertoire of party tricks.

I’ll bet our female ancestors were NEVER ONCE asked to exercise their pelvic floors. They may have had to deal with famine, log cabins and mud huts, crop failure, polio, assorted pestilences, but they were never asked to find a muscle by “stopping the flow of urine.” I have tried this, and it was unhelpful.

But now I am the owner of an actual pamphlet telling me I must do Kegels or else rue it later. The pamphlet takes a threatening tone with me, and I resent it. It shows me a drawing of a woman awkwardly carrying a large bag of groceries as she frantically pushes open the door of a public bathroom. THIS COULD BE YOU, the pamphlet implies. Wait, she has already checked out? This scenario would make more sense to me if she had a cart.

Then the pamphlet feels it has bullied me enough, and it takes a mollifying, patronizing tone. “Kegel exercises don’t require special clothing or equipment,” it reassures me, but I hadn’t been worrying about that. What kind of “special clothing” could there possibly be—let alone equipment? The pamphlet goes on to tell me that “no one can tell you’re doing them, so they can be done almost anywhere.” Oh, I am so sure.

But here is the final straw: after assuring me that Kegels don’t require special equipment, the pamphlet says: “Eventually, special weights that you place in your vagina may be recommended to help make your Kegels even more effective.” I would rather–FAR rather–pee my pants while carrying a bag of groceries.

KFed has left the building.

This visit, I’ve had an insight into my mother-in-law’s behavior. By profession, she works in a home for adults with severe developmental disabilities. I think this has given her an inflated sense of her own intelligence and competence. I think it has also given her certain habits of interpersonal behavior (i.e., telling adults what to do) that have carried over inappropriately into other, non-work relationships. And then let’s say that first one a second time: I think it has given her an inflated sense of her own intelligence and competence.

I would also like to take a minute to speak badly of her former husband, my father-in-law. He doesn’t get much press time because he’s absent, and there aren’t many good anecdotes about absence. One reason I put up with my mother-in-law is that as much as I dislike her, I approve of what she’s doing: she’s regularly traveling a long distance at considerable expense in order to visit her grandchildren. We never visit her, so she comes to us. I may feel like drugging her tea, but I like the concept of her visits, and I hope that if I drive my future daughters-in-law batcrap crazy (and I think statistically it’s likely to happen with at least one) they will nevertheless support the concept of me visiting my grandchildren. And I hope I’ll drive them nuts more in the “buys WAYYYYY too much crap we don’t want or need” category rather than in the “rolls her eyes and does jazz hands until homicide seems like a viable option” category.

My father-in-law, on the other hand, hasn’t ever visited. We let him know about each child’s birth, and he doesn’t respond. I send a packet of photos every month, and he doesn’t respond. I send periodic email updates on how we’re doing and how the kids are doing, and he doesn’t respond. I send an annual Christmas package (this is something I go back and forth on, also annually) and he never responds. The only time we hear from him is every couple of years when he emails me to tell me about his journey to find himself, and to place blame on everyone and everything except himself for his inexplicable behavior (it was a childhood brain illness! it was his upbringing! it’s because everyone spreads lies about him!). Then he disappears for another couple of years.

You know how at first it was so appalling that Britney Spears married that pinehole Kevin Federline, and then pretty soon it was like, “I never thought I’d say this but Britney Spears is making Kevin Federline look good.” My father-in-law is the Britney Spears to my mother-in-law’s Kevin Federline.

My mother-in-law has the greatest respect for a former co-worker, EVEN THOUGH the former co-worker is a Mormon. Despite being a Mormon, that former co-worker is a real good person in many ways!

My mother-in-law didn’t vote for Obama, herself, not because she’s racist. She thinks it would be GOOD to someday have A Black in office! Just not THIS PARTICULAR Black. The fact that she didn’t vote for him reflects positively on her: she is SO AWARE that Blacks = People Too, she can even distinguish one from another!

I was looking for a puzzle piece. She said archly that if I cleaned under my couch she thought I’d find a WHOLE LOT of missing things.

I brought up a bag of chocolate chips from the supply in the downstairs pantry, which is located in the part of the basement reserved for storage and workshop. She commented she’d noticed I wouldn’t need to buy chocolate chips for a good long time, heavens no! When was she inspecting the pantry, I wonder?

I came home from the store. She asked what AMAZING BARGAINS I’d found today. Jazz hands and rolling eyes.

She said she needed to know where our hand mixer was. I guess I don’t expect her to keep a mental inventory of everything in our kitchen, but I think we’ve had the “We don’t have a hand mixer” conversation more than half a dozen times now, so I’d expect it to sink in eventually. Instead, when I said “We don’t have a hand mixer,” she made this face:

Except her eyes were way buggier, and rolling around in her head, and she swung her face from side to side in addition to clapping her hands to the sides of it, and she made a loud strangling sound. I said, “Yes, I don’t know how, but somehow we’ve managed to survive all these years without one. It’s a wonder any of us are alive.” I said it like I was being funny. I was not feeling funny.

During dinner, she said out of the blue that she’d once been to this restaurant where they had “Lumpy mashed potatoes” on the menu. She couldn’t figure out WHY anyone would WANT lumpy potatoes. That is just NUTS. Why would you BRAG that your mashed potatoes had lumps? She supposed it proved they weren’t from a box, but LUMPS? Bleah! …Do I need to specifically say that at this dinner we were eating mashed potatoes and that they contained the occasional lump, or do you know my MIL by now?

Marie asked if knowing I could blog each thing my MIL said made it easier to deal with. YES. In fact, it makes it like a GAME. She says something and I think, “Yay!” and I jot it down. If she goes too long without saying anything good, I start getting anxious: “I’ll have nothing to tell them about! I’ll have to say she’s being fine and there’s nothing to report!” It reminds me of the fun of blogging dieting/exercising/cleaning stuff: shared sorrow is doubled joy.

And so dawns Day 5. Ah, Day 5. Day 5 is when, if she were staying a week, I’d be thinking, “I THINK I can make it. Just two more days.” The time she came for 2.5 weeks, I was thinking…well, I was thinking some dark, dark thoughts, and they involved shovels and moonlit fields and mysterious disappearances. For this visit, when there are 10 days but only if I count the arrival day, when she didn’t arrive until after lunch, and the departure day, when she’s leaving early in the morning—and I DO INDEED count those days, not with other houseguests but with her—I’m pretty sure I can make it but gee, 7 days would be better.

Day 5 is, I think, the day she settles in. She’s not feeling nervous or awkward anymore.

1. I bought Elizabeth two 2-packs of belts (on 75% off!) at Target, not because the child NEEDS four more belts but because I couldn’t decide between the two 2-packs (and because they were 75% off!). My mother-in-law had several things to say on the topic of belts, in addition to saying every 10 minutes or so, “Swistle! [Child] needs those pants pulled up again!”:

1a. I was saying the problem was that if I made Elizabeth’s belt tight enough to keep the pants up, it would bisect her. MIL: “Yes, well, the day will come when we’ll all be looking back and saying remember when Elizabeth had no hips?” Er, no. I don’t think we WILL be doing that. And I think that anyone who DOES choose to say such a thing can say hello to that shovel I mentioned earlier.

1b. We were at a store and Elizabeth saw a belt she liked and asked if we could buy it. My MIL said to her, “I know a certain little girl who has puh-LENty of belts, considering she can only wear one at a time!”

2. My MIL wanted to go to Walmart to buy the kids their Christmas presents, to avoid shipping costs. (She takes stuff to one of those mailing stores. I don’t think she realizes they charge A MILLION DOLLARS MORE than the already-expensive post office.) She suggested she get clothes, because “HEAVEN KNOWS they don’t need any more TOYS.”

3. Yesterday evening the topic of milk came up, and she said she just never could stand the taste of it, didn’t like it as a child and didn’t like it any better now. I said my mom didn’t like it either, but that I did like it, and that I was hoping that would help me avoid the osteoporosis my mom’s side of the family has had trouble with. My MIL: “Oh, I think that’s more a problem with petite women, and I really don’t think you qualify.” Me: “…Uh…I… [*mind searching desperately for ANY response*] …Well, both my grandma and my mom…” Mother-in-law, interrupting me to repeat herself: “I’m just saying, that’s really only slightly-built women who have trouble with that, and I really don’t think you qualify.” Me: *picks up a notepad and pen and wrote it down*

3b. Have I mentioned before the way she will repeat her first point nearly verbatim, as if making a second point? Well, she does do that. She’ll make her point, and if you argue with her, or if you make your own point, she’ll repeat her own point JUST AS IF she is refuting your point or shoring up her own argument, but she is saying THE SAME THING. It is nearly impossible to continue the argument without following her lead and repeating your own point a second time.

I sat down to write a MIL Update, but then suddenly I was, “…Wait. Do I write about MIL stuff here?” I can’t remember. I think what I do is write it, and then delete it later? Hm. I need to leave myself some notes or something.

I will start with the boring part, which is that the visit is going Fine so far. It nearly always DOES go fine for the first few days, before she gets comfortable. I still don’t like her, I’m not enjoying the visit, but I’m not SUFFERING. And it REALLY HELPS that this time we’re doing things the way we usually do them (and looking like experts at it even though she disapproves) rather than doing things the way she would approve of them (and looking like total incompetents). All right, now for the venty examples:

1. Rob and William came home from school. SHE ASKED THEM if they’d done their homework, then reported to me: “I just got the old ‘I did my homework on the bus'” and rolled her eyes. Which, um. I checked, and they HAD done their homework on the bus, and also? Why is she getting involved in this AT ALL?

2. Rob and William wanted to learn how to knit, so she taught them. My mom taught William last year; he hasn’t knit since then but picked it up quickly. Rob has never knit before. After no kidding LESS THAN AN HOUR she pulled me aside and said, “William may make a knitter. Rob? No”—with a pfff and a totally dismissive tone. NICE. He’s TEN YEARS OLD and this is his FIRST TIME KNITTING. And he was DOING IT: he has two inches of knitted stuff already.

3. We went to the store and she kept speaking firmly to the children. I wrote “sharply” there first, but it wasn’t quiiiiiite sharp. BRISK, though, and authoritative. “Edward! Stop that! Come here and hold my hand! Come on now, you didn’t get hurt!” And I gave Henry things to play with, and he was doing NO HARM and she kept taking things away from him. After I several times gave them back to him, she started instead lunging as if to take them, then correcting herself, then saying to me, “We’d better take those away from him, don’t you think?” I’ll repeat: NO HARM was being done to the items. And they were things _I_ was buying.

4. First she made several “funny” remarks about my bargain shopping. “Oh, Swistle and her 75% off!” with a little head waggle and widened eyes and jazz hands. Then, later, she told a lonnnnng anecdote about her stupid sister who always buys stuff she doesn’t need and doesn’t like “but it was ON SALE!”—using “stupid sister” tone of voice. The “but it was ON SALE!” chorus was repeated half a dozen times as her stupid sister was stupider and stupider about her purchases, which—and I’m sure this was pure coincidence—my mother-in-law remembered had been 75% off. This for purchases made back when she and her sister lived at home with their parents, and in her sister’s early homeowning days nearly 50 years ago.

5. At the table, in “I am repeating the tone of someone I saw on TV” voice: “Americans eat FAR too much salt!” (For the FIRST TIME EVER I pulled off the kind of response I always MEAN to give when she makes such pronouncements: I said “Mmmmmmmmmmm….salllllllllt.”) This WHOLE salt thing is because she personally has high blood pressure and has been personally instructed to cut down on salt. ALL AMERICANS need to obey her medical instructions, because what SHE does is THE ONLY WAY TO DO THINGS. If she were diagnosed with diabetes, we would ALL need to have insulin shots and Americans would eat FAR too much sugar. If she were diagnosed with cancer, we would ALL need to have chemotherapy treatments and Americans get FAR too little radiation.

6. Now she’s self-diagnosed herself allergic to eggs, too. No salt, no fat, no caffeine, no tomatoes, no eggs.

7. Regarding her cousin’s panic attacks, she told me: “I said to her, ‘Now there is just NO REASON for you to have a PANIC attack! WHY would you panic? You are JUST going to the GROCERY store!’ I mean, for Pete’s sake!”