Cheese, turkey breast, and a fistfight please...

So this weekend I experienced my most exciting trip to grocery store ever. As I'm sure you would agree, grocery shopping is not exactly the most glamorous chore ever. But sometimes, excitement happens when you least expect it.

It was about 8:30 on a Sunday night, in my little teeny suburban town. I went to the deli counter to buy some cheese, and got in the obligatory line. Suddenly I hear yelling, and I look up to see what was going on. I see another customer - a pretty big and muscular guy - screaming at someone behind the counter - a young looking and scrawny kid about 19 or 20. Suddenly the big guy walks behind the counter, still screaming and grabs the kid by the throat. He's actually choking this kid and then punches him in the face. Everyone is yelling at him to stop, people are grabbing their cell phones to call the police, and a couple of brave customers even got behind the counter to try and break it up. I swear to God, I didn't know where I was for a second. This kind of thing is not supposed to happen at the Giant in Souderton. This is a nothing little town.

So eventually the guys are separated and people try to figure out what prompted all this. Supposedly what happended is this kid made some sort of disparaging remark about the customer's wife (who was in the store, but was doing other shopping while he waited at the deli counter). Apparently these 2 are regular customers and the kid had been saying stuff to/about her for a while. I guess he couldn't deal with his wife being disrespected so he felt he had to defend her honor. I have to say, that while I admire the sentiment of standing up for your wife, there has got to be a way to deal with it in a non-violent way.

What really killed me was the fact that this dude would start a fight in front of his 10 or 12 year old son. Is that really the behavior you want to role model to your kid? Especially since it was obviously not a fair fight - the kid was a beanpole and this guy was all muscle. The couple even tried to leave before the police got there, not believing he had done anything wrong. But the cops got there as they were leaving, and all of us who witnessed the fight were asked to give a report. Muscle Joe got arrested, and the manager took the kid outside to talk - I'd be curious to know if he still has a job. Even though he was the victim in this situation, other customers claim they did hear him making comments about the guy's wife. Definitely not appropriate.

So what was supposed to be a quick trip to pick up a couple items turned into an hour of drama and reports. So be careful next time you have a "mundane" chore to do. You never know what kind of excitement and fireworks might be brewing ahead at that post office or Target.