Corned Beef Petunias

Sometimes when I write this blog, I have an idea already in mind to flesh out and create.  Other times, the blog idea comes to you.  Today was such the case.

My wife and I took advantage of the lovely Spring day...By lovely, we mean temps in the high 80's and hot.  We enjoyed a family morning at the Annville Memorial Parade out in the heat.  In the afternoon, we went shopping for some half-moon plant stakes.  I wanted to work outside in our front yard, planting and starting mulch.  We are also looking for some additional plants.

We made some stops at Lowe's, a local Nursery, and our local Wal-Mart.  Again, the intent was to look for specialty plant stakes first, and then plants.  Normally, we don't shop for plants there;  however, I have learned to trust my wife.  While looking at the plants, there was a discount rack in the back.  All the plants were half off.  Most of these are actually not bad.  They need water and have the dead flowers and leaves picked off.  I have watched my wife bring these plants "back from the dead," and have them flourishing again. 

We got several Dianthus and Petunias in different colors and made our way to the outside register in the garden section.

Here is the scene.  One worker on the register and another worker sitting on a folding chair nearby.  We put our purchases on the table to be rung up.   My wife told the woman these are all half off and marked that way.  One of the plants had a UPC label, but no price on it.  She started to scan and things went fine until one of the plants had an issue on the scanner.  She needed to find someone over to help.  At this point, there were several people in line behind us (who eventually went inside to pay) because the chaos was just beginning.

There is an LED screen that we can see, showing us the prices as they are scanned.  When she gets to one of the Petunia's to scan, it says "not available."  When she tries again, it says "Corned Beef" for $2.35.  Not a Petunia for .91 cents.  She tries to void it out, and it pops up again, this time with "Corned Beef" for $4.71.

Hmmm, something's not right here.  She calls a man over from the Garden center to explain what is going on, asking what their department code is.  He tries to scan and gets that same "Corned Beef."

Now it gets better.  Sometimes at Wal-Mart when you walk around, you can never find someone in the department you are in when you need help.   Well today, if you were there when we were, I can tell you why no one was around---they were with us.

The man who came over, went and got another Asst. Manager to come out.  She brought (2) people with her.  Now we had (5) managers (!) at the register to see what was happening.  They void out the entire order and start again.  .88, .44, .44, .44, .91. .91, .91, $2.36 Corned Beef...Not again.

Now this time, the manager did an override and manually entered the price as .91 cents for a petunia.  Oh, that plant that did not have a UPC Label on it, they gave it to us for $1.00.

What an adventure.  Well, the plants are, well-now planted, and here is a shot of the receipt with the Corned Beef Petunia.  Now that would be quite the hybrid plant to see...