Cart conundrum turns shopping trip into contortion challenge

Shopping carts. That's all I need to say. You know what I'm talking about.

Let's start with the basic ordeal that everyone suffers with shopping carts. Why are they always broken? Wal-Mart is a multi-million dollar corporation, can they not afford upkeep on their equipment? Running into someone in the middle of Wal-Mart because the starboard wheel is cocked at a resilient 45 degrees is not my idea of a pleasant shopping experience. No one enjoys that.

The worst part is, these carts (most evidently shipped in from Satan's lair) get me every time. I can grab one on my way in the building, and before I pass the Wal-Mart greeter, looking smug for some odd reason, I know I've picked a bad apple.

Now there's a decision to be made. As if I'm not busy enough trying desperately to remember what was on the list that I left on the kitchen counter.

Do I return the cart to its defective friends, wrestling it backward and risk getting one that is worse? Nah, I won't be in here long, right?

Right.

Instead of making my life a little easier, I press forward with my defective hunk of rusted metal. You know how this goes. One hand is on the phone because I'm talking to my sister, who is having one of those days, and the other is on the cart.

The cart with one wheel cocked sideways.

What a site to behold as I careen down the aisles, knocking items off the shelves, boxes and bottles scattering everywhere. Children get "deer in the headlight" looks, not knowing which way to avoid me because my cart is snaking both sides of the aisle.

With all of the commotion, I'm just wandering at this point because I can't think of a single thing I came in for. I'm trying to hurry because I'm embarrassing myself.

In an effort to expediate the awkward process, I just start grabbing things senselessly, assuring myself that I'm getting the right stuff.

All the while, I'm trying to ignore this growing pain in my wrist. I know exactly what it is, but I sacrifice stampeding a small child near the cereal to assess the situation.

The cart is going right, I'm desperately forcing it left, and as I gaze at my hand tightly gripping the handlebar I think, "It really shouldn't bend like that." Meanwhile, Tricia is still on the phone, saying she is tired of the cat beating up the chihuahua, and I'm trying to remember if it was mozzarella or cheddar that I needed, thinking I should seriously consider a career in contortion with the way I'm manipulating my wrist into such unnatural positions, and would that pay off my student loans?

Multitasking to the extreme.

That's how you spend an entire paycheck at Wal-Mart. Go in for five things, come out with a cart full of debt. All because of a phone call and a faulty wheel.

The worst part is yet to come, however, because it isn't until I get home that I realize a hard truth - I purchased toilet paper that feels suspiciously similar to tree bark.

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Katy Blair, a Globe reporter and Effingham native, may be reached at 367-0583, Ext. 213, or at katyblair@npgco.com.