You Can Take Your Nickel And Shove It In Your Piggy Slot

For those of you who aren't familiar with them, Whole Foods is a supermarket chain that caters to the tree-hugging, hippie-like, granola munching type of person...who also doesn't mind paying $20 for a tomato.  Apparently, there is also a prerequisite for guys working there that you must be hot.  I'm not sure I actually have SEEN that requirement written anywhere, but it's pretty damn obvious by the crew working in the one near my store.  But I digress.

I was standing in line to pay for a soda and a water today in the this-should-be-an-express-lane-but-everybody-takes-too-damn-long line.  Ahead of me was your typical Los Gatos, California housewife:  perfectly coiffed blonde hair, little gym fitness body, probably on her way to play tennis with the girls.  Oh yeah, and dripping with jewelry.  She could definitely afford a $20 tomato.  In her hands was a tote bag from another "upscale" grocery store known as Trader Joe's.

So Whole Foods has this policy that if you bring your own bag, you can either have five cents deducted from your bill, or have the five cents donated to a charity.  They used to let you choose one of several charities, but I don't think you can do that anymore.  I used to give mine to the Humane Society, but there were other charities for battered women, hungry kids, save forests and help farmers grow tomatoes that sell for $20.  Overall, a pretty good cause.

So here's this woman ahead of me who probably gets her weekly allowance from the Federal Reserve directly.  What does she choose to do? Hell, she gets that five cents deducted from her grocery bill, of course.  Didn't even think about it.

I'm not sure why exactly this pissed me off so much, but it did.  I'm struggling to make ends meet, I'm paying the equivalent of four years' tuition to fill up my tank each week, I've given up $20 tomatoes.....and this woman awash in gold and hubby's credit cards can't cough up the five cents to give to charity?  Somewhere down the road, she'll attend some high-profile shindig with the benefits going to some cause she won't remember, all in the hopes of landing her picture on the society page.  Makes me ill.