Mistaken Identity

Going to buy the weekly groceries is always an outstanding event for Jamie and I. As we traverse the aisles at the supermarket we always stop and chat to friends, new and old. This Saturday was no exception, I had a lovely long chat with some friends while Jamie walked up and down the aisles and filled our shopping trolley. The checkout was no different, Jamie discussed the price of eggs and bananas, (currently in Australia if you can afford to buy bananas you are counted as being amongst the rich and elite). Finally I had to rescue him as the lady next to him in the queue began telling him her experiences with her three teenagers. The girl at the check out was very happy to spend time chatting with us as well and I was relieved to finally be leaving the store.On the way out we stopped at a newsagent and left the shopping trolley close by. At last it was time to leave the Centre so taking our trolley with us we loaded up the car and drove home. Once there we unloaded the car and started packing away our groceries. Half way through this task Jamie said 'did you buy orange juice and ice cream?' 'No' I replied. I went to the bag and found that it contained nothing I had brought at the store. We decided that the checkout girl had put the wrong bag with our groceries. However when we searched the rest of our bags we found that they were all filled with someone else's groceries. It was very disconcerting, I couldn't imagine what on earth had happened to ours. Then we realized the mistake, somehow we had taken away another person's trolley and left ours behind. So we reloaded the car again and hastened to the shopping centre. Leaving the car parked in a five minute parking space we unloaded the shopping bags. I raced to the supermarket and Jamie raced to the newsagent. I was half way through pouring out my tale of woe to the girl behind the checkout when she interrupted me and finished my story for me. 'Go to the newsagents, they are waiting for you.' Back I flew to the newsagent and there was Jamie with our trolley. The woman behind the counter at the newsagent had taken out all our meat and perishables and kept them in the refrigerator for us. She realized we must have taken the wrong trolley and had taken down the other person's name and phone number so they could be contacted.Again, we pushed the shopping trolley out of the shopping centre to the cheers of quite a few onlookers, loaded the car and drove home.I don't know why strange adventures happen to us, I'm sure we don't look for them, but then again, who knows?