Groceries and Attitude

Eliot and I were the only campers on Friday night at the US Forest Service campground. Still, the camp attendant was around several times in the early morning. (I heard her little golf cart go by.) Finally it seemed she couldn’t stand it any longer and knocked on the side of the van at 8:15 a.m. I shouted at her that I was still in bed so she went away but not before informing me that I could drop of my $24.00 fee at her campsite at the campground entrance. As if you could easily sneak away when you’re the only vehicle in the campground.

It seemed like a good idea to get some provisions before heading for Lone Pine so we stopped at the local Vons which is a grocery chain down this way. I picked up the usual – apples, oranges, bananas, beer, ice – and headed for the checkout. I realized that I didn’t have a shopper’s card for Vons and asked the woman behind me if she would mind if I used hers. She was quite happy to do that. There was a huge line up which I guess is to be expected when you’re shopping at noon on a Saturday.

The older gentleman who was working checkout was not the fastest I’ve come across. At first I thought he was a ‘trainee’ but he seemed to know all the customers and as I eavesdropped he was having an animated conversation with his current customer about dog food (although he did allow that he was really a ‘cat’ person).

When it was my turn, I handed him the shopper’s card that I had borrowed from the lady behind me. He took it and immediately put it aside saying:

“I’ll do that later. I have a system.”

When he scanned the bag of carrots I was buying, he asked me if I had the coupon for them.

“Coupon?”, I replied.

He looked at me over the top of his glasses and gave a big sigh and dug out a copy of the flyer to find the scanner code for the discount. I explained that I was from ‘away’ and that my grocery shopping at home was always much better organized. He seemed less than impressed and merely rolled his eyes.

I was finding this all quite hilarious as was the woman whose card I had borrowed and the clerk himself, I do believe. I escaped with my dignity but just barely.

Then it was off east on Hwy 178 and up over Walker Pass to Hwy 395 and north to Lone Pine.

Descending from Walker Pass

Lone Pine is a small town east of the Sierra Nevada mountains in southern California. Just west of the town is an area called the Alabama Hills. Starting in the 1920s, the Alabama Hills became Hollywood’s go-to place for filming movie westerns.

And we’re spending three nights camped at the Tuttle Creek campground courtesy of the BLM (Bureau of Land Management) for $5.00/night. It is a spectacular location with beautiful views in all directions. It’s been pleasantly warm during the day and freezing cold at night. Typical for the high desert at this time of year.

Since Eliot decided we should be up at sunrise on Saturday morning I got up and took a few photos. This is actually the moon setting behind the Sierra Nevada mountains as the sun was rising.