The Lovely Carrost

Yesterday we went a-shoppin at the nearest Safeway. The woman at the till was more cheerful than a substitute kindergarten teacher. Her entire face was built around her smile. Her fluffed-up helmet of hair rested on her cheeks, which were held in place by a constant upturned mouth. I'd never seen someone whose face depended upon a constant supply of cheer.

What's more, she was enthusiastic about the products she was ringing through. Her enthusiasm must have been genuine, because once you reach the till lineup at a grocery store, your purchasing is pretty much done, bar the occasional Archie digest or tube of chapstick. If you're going to buy a silicon grooming glove for the cats or a sealed package of bacon shavings, you've probably made the decision by that point and thrown it in the cart.

She was particularly enthusiastic about the carrots: "Aren't these carrots just lovely?" she said as she rang them through. I can't lie, they're pretty nice carrots, colourful and sweet:

With regulation size kazoo

Having no geologist's pick, I threw in the kazoo for scale.

Anyway, the next thing she ran through was the butternut squash.

And she had absolutely nothing to say about it. I think the smile even faltered for a moment.