Meijer and the TMI scale

if you recall, I nearly Southern-Belle swooned upon seeing the new digital produce scales with accompanying sleek and silent label makers. #verklempt

being a Meijer customer since 1996 (yep, that's the year we moved to Michigan, 20 years! wait, where's my anniversary cake?!), I knew that "coming soon" in Meijer speak translated to, "eh, check back in about 3 weeks."

"coming soon" just couldn't come soon enough for me, and yet... it did!

5 weeks later...



isn't it beautiful? those are my apples, wrapped in noisy cellophane, sitting on a super high-tech stainless steel scale, with a legible label and upc code that the u-scan wouldn't dare reject and or give me computer-voice attitude.

I stood with hand over happy-thumping heart and reveled in the glory of the digital-scale. #herbivoreomnivorevictory 

go ahead, zoom in on the pic, look at that color screen giving the exact weight and subsequent price-- even the tares! no idea what a "tare" is or why I should care, but if someday I took the time to google it, I'm sure I would (maybe) learn to care. 

scan over to the right side of the screen, see the "Nutrition Facts" table? you thought that table was only for containers of yogurt, or jars of pickled beets, or bags of Doritos, but no(!) clearly, fruit and vegetables have nutritional information too! who knew? 

for instance, good news, a medium apple (1 serving) has no:
fat
cholesterol
sodium
or... protein 

hmm. hang on... 

but it does have: 
22 g of carbs 
16 g of sugar(?!) 

*Atkins gulp*

suddenly, I find myself questioning my abiding love for the Honeycrisp. my eyes leave the so-called "Nutrition Facts," hoping to unsee the troubling truth. 

my optic orbs search for refuge, or at least a distraction, at the "Description" title-- alas, more "information": 

apples are members of the rose family?! that's as earth shattering as the day I found out bananas went extinct in 1950 and now we eat cloned bananas! if that doesn't knock your yellow socks off, here's another fun banana fact--technically they're also herbs. 

there are 7000 apple varieties? I only can list off six, maybe seven varieties--has my life up to this point been an apple mockery? will I ever experience the other 6,993 apples?

apples float because 25% of their volume is air? math, and liquid displacement, isn't necessarily a pet interest of mine, so I let this one pass with a, "huh." #movingon

what really rocked my world was the bold "Storage" title. not ever have I refrigerated an apple. and that's the apple that broke my factoid back.

"TMI." I whisper.

I snatch my labeled bag of Honeycrisps (aka 66 g of carbs & 48 g of sugar roses) off the scale. a tinge of unease that the Scale of Too Much Information has tainted my go-to lunch bag fruit. 

and yet, even in that moment... I couldn't wait to see what the TMI scale had to say about brussels sprouts. #blechh

Meijer and the scales of equality

if I had to label, or classify myself, I'd say I'm your typical omnivore.

I like plants.

I like meat.

I even tolerate them both on the same plate. 

it's about equality, people. E-qual-i-ty.

and just to be clear, I respect the other 2 -vores; the herbivores and carnivores. heaven knows I've had a few close calls with them when they morphed into angry-vores. more than once, under the superstore's roof, I've been just i n c h e s away from certain death(!)-- if it wasn't for my sharp mind, and the brussels sprouts distraction... *shutters* that herbivore would've gutted me. #smalltalkgonewrong

so yeah, respect.

but let's be honest. there is a bias toward the carnivores at Meijer. the biggest, glaring example that comes to mind is this...

versus this...

(full disclosure, the 2 pics above are google images. thanks, google!)

meat is weighed via super exact, digital-displayed science, wrapped (sometimes pre-wrapped!) and the smooth (never folded) UPC code label is affixed; with nice large type. ta-da! your brain-cell killing time at the cashier and/or u-scan just shaved off 2 minutes! lucky you, carnivore. lucky you. 

whereas, the herbivore and omnivore suckers are still dealing with the Machiavellian world of spring scales. and don't even get me started on the minuscule, always crumpled produce "labels." 

or the phenomena of me choosing all the beauty Honey Crisp apples to discover at the u-scan that none of my choices have a PLU label! sucks for you herbivore and omnivore, you get 4+ minutes added to your brain-cell killing check-out experience. #podiumofpowerpolitics

yep, the Meijer herbivores and omnivores have been dealing with these inequality shenanigans for decades, with only a brief respite when we stumble into a Wegman's, or some other type of unknown store, that cares for the struggling plant-eater.

so imagine my SHOCK when I approached the beloved Honey Crisp apple display...

(full disclosure, that's my pic. you can tell because it's a little blurry--my hands were shaking with excitement)

*silent rejoicing*

*clutches heart moment*

*remaining brain-cells squeal with delight*

equality, "coming soon."