I need an adult!

Zane and I were brought up as good, behaving children who listened to our parents and didn't speak to strangers. But the one thing we were never taught was how to survive in small town America. Here, rules are made to be broken.

While strolling in the local grocery, Zane and I were casually discussing the benefits of ground meats, as often is our Wednesday night ritual. This gentleman nearby felt it necessary to join our dialogue. Zane told the gentleman "Sir, this is an A-B conversation, so please C your way out of it" but he was relentless. He first tried picking us up by telling us to get "real meat" not the turkey we were oggling and when we didn't tell him our social security numbers he continued.

I was mesmerized by the chip in the lense of his glasses while Zane kept petting his Ned Flanders moustache and giggling at its softness. Our new friend asked us if we knew about "The Barn" and literally was aghast when we said no. He wanted to know where we were from to which Zane hesitantly and generically answered "we just moved here." This did not appease Mr. X as a sufficient answer, so he grilled Zane further "Where's here?" he demanded. Zane, shaking, whispered "Athol." This was what our local stalker was looking for, and he went on to describe how to get to this mysterious "Barn" in Greenfield (a nearby town) "around the rotary, below the train tracks, round the corner, to the right." We nodded as if we knew what he was saying just to get him to stop talking.

What is "The Barn" you ask? It is the best place in the area to get discount groceries! We were told about the deals on things such as....

A 6 pound wheel of Brie for $7!
50 pounds of Barbeque chicken for $15!
3 for $1 6 month old frozen vegetables!
Expired meat of a wide variety for low low prices!
2 for $1 moldy sour cream pints!

I mean this stuff was amazing... and for this man to graciously tell us how to acquire our monthly alotment of excessively large quanities of moldy produce, I mean.... wow.

So as we slowly backed up from our friendly, and probably poisonous pal, plotting our nonverbal escape route, MRS. X comes from behind us! Seems like Mr. X must be quite insistent on his Barn promotions because Mrs. X had a neck brace on as well as Band-Aids strewn about her. We decided to nod some more.

The lovely, and scary, couple asked us some more about ourselves. It began to take on the feel of "why don't you two come to our house... why don't you two get more comfortable... have you seen how nice our bedding is...?" I think I've seen some YouTube videos about these type of people. After mentioning something about a swing set, or something, Zane started grabbing at my arm. They gave us their card and told us to call... what for, they never said. As we checked out, guess which friends found us in the SAME cashier line! I checked a few times before pulling out of the lot, but I think we lost them.

Oh, gotta go, someone's knocking on the door. Boy, people sure are friendly here!