Sundays at Walmart

One never knows what one is getting into at Walmart. I go there about once a month to restock the house, feeling conflicted because I find the corporation's practices objectionable in so many ways, but I'm poor and their prices are just so much lower than anywhere else. I generally try and keep my head down and move quickly throughout the store, because there is frequently drama happening for customers and employees, and I can't get involved.

Yesterday, I noticed that they had all the back-to-school stuff out. This makes sense, as it is July, and they're going to need to clear this merchandise if they're going to get the Christmas stuff out by Labor Day. The inter-customer drama therefore centered around parents and 18-year olds, stocking up for dorms and first apartments. It should go without saying that this led to interactions of a huge variety of emotions. There was Bratty Know-it-All Guy, loudly correcting his parents on every statement they made about what he'd be likely to need for school. There was Emotional Disaster Area Mom, openly weeping over the storage bins. And, of course, there were packs of guys, buying Ramen and Gatorade, making furtive eye contact with gangs of girls, assuring one another that the wall clock one had chosen up was rilly, rilly cute.

I finally escaped into the grocery store part of Walmart, and picked my way through the usual Trail of Tears made by America's young people, many of whom needed to go home right this very minute, although they did not see it that way. I pressed on toward the cashier, and was brought up short by the worst transvestite ever. I got behind her (?) in line, so I could observe without being obvious. This individual was about 6'2", built like a nose tackle, with long strawberry blond hair that had been crimped. Crimped, I mean to tell you. Anyway, the look was completed with an enormous flower-print dress and sandals. I retrieved the giant box of cat litter from under my cart to take a good peek at the man-feet crammed into these sandals.

So here's my point to the extent I have one. This person can't help being tall and square. And if he likes dressing as a woman, I absolutely do not care. However, what I want to know is - did he get dolled up for yesterday's outing, do one last primp in the mirror and think, "Lookin' good!!" Is that the best he can do with what he has to work with, or was this outfit thrown together for a quick trip to the store? I'm dying to know if he dresses as a woman all the time (the hair would suggest yes), and if so, does he have better clothes than that ratty-looking sundress? Why am I not allowed to interview strangers at length? I just need information, is all.