Humiliation is always on sale.

Let me start by saying that while thriftiness is a learned art, the absense of finesse can be a terrible thing.

Several months ago my friend Tara introduced me to the thrill of couponing. You might wonder at the overkill of the term "thrill", but to couponers out there, there really is an element of excitement to how low you can go at the checkout counter. I have a very complicated system of organization that should earn me an honorary degree from some fine institution. I started out simply using coupons, but graduated to electronic doublers, discontinued items and other high level strategy planning.

One of my favorite jackpots is found at Kroger. They have shopping carts located between the aisles and the pharmacy that are filled with clearance items that are half priced. Tonight, I picked through them, found some Cascade at half price and located my coupon to get a dollar off. I'm rockin'. I go down the next row and when I come back out near the pharmacy, I see there is a cart I've overlooked. You never know. The Holy Grail could be lurking there.

So I approach it. Park my cart beside it and begin to eye where to start. I locate a 24 pack of Deer Park water. A staple! At half price! Yippee! I am bending over (yes, from the waist...picture it) and am sideways maneuvering it out from beneath the cart when I see feet. As I look up, for the very first time, it occurs to me that I never actually saw those orange half price stickers.

I am pawing through this woman's cart (yes, this woman standing right there)... and her groceries... and, say it isn't so...why, yes, there's her purse sitting in the baby seat.

This would be an excellent time for the tornado warnings to start sounding. Or for Elvis to enter the building. Anything.

As the words, "Oh, no...Is this your cart?" come out of my mouth, I picture what she witnessed from the pharmacy counter. I am a crazy woman manhandling her bottled water. She actually said (insert drawling Southern accent here) "I just thought maybe you really wanted my water." I can see that this impossibly put together stranger (well, actually I'm the stranger) really wants to get away from me.

As I continually try to explain myself while backing up, I say to her "maybe this will be funny by the time I get home."

I then had the pleasure of scouting out the rest of my list while muttering "that did not just happen" and praying to not see her at each corner I turned. I will admit to loitering at the paperback display while waiting for her to leave the store. I doubt she saw me hiding there. She was too busy double-checking the contents of her cart.