After church this morning, I went to the Vera Bradley Outlet Sale at the Coliseum in Fort Wayne. I don't know why I thought I needed to do this. I've been to it once before, but not on the last day of the sale, so I guess I just thought I had to see if they really marked things down at the end of the big event. I wish I hadn't gone.

After selecting purchases, we all register ourselves and then we are directed to the room where we must pay for our items. We are herded like sheep up and down aisles - sheep carrying pink garbage bags; many of us, sheep, wearing pink. (it never crossed my mind to wear pink). Finally I arrive at my designated paying counter - one with orange balloons. We are kept waiting a long time, because processing credit cards is taking forever. They tell us it's because the Alan Jackson concert, scheduled for this evening, has just screwed up everything. They are asking people if they can pay without using their credit cards. The lady in line ahead of me is also named LouAnn, but with no "e" she points out. She discovered this because our helper-lady, Suzie, is checking my photo I.D. She is very excited to have stumbled across another LouAnne, and tells all her shopping friends about her big find. Behind me is a lady with dark hair - she seems nice enough. She asks me what I think these things are that other LouAnn is buying.

"I think they're lanyards, aren't they?'

"I didn't know what they were." she said. "They're only a dollar."

She asks other LouAnn if she can see one. She studies it for awhile.

"Do you need all of those?" she asks other LouAnn, who has about eight of them.

"You can have that one," other LouAnn is gracious.

Lady behind me studies it some more then hands it back and says,

"Oh, never mind. I don't need it. I'm trying to be better about impulse-buying. Just because something is cheap doesn't mean you should buy it. I've given more stuff to Goodwill. Yep, I'm finally getting smarter. Just because it's cheap, doesn't mean you should buy it."

"It's easy to get swept up in it all," I sympathize.

Other LouAnn takes her eight lanyards and tosses them into the "I-changed-my-mind-box" underneath the counter and says, "You're right."

Three more minutes pass and lady behind me says: "You know, I could give those lanyards to my nieces."

She dives down into the discard box and comes up with other LouAnn's eight lanyards!!!! What was that - Some diabolic maneuver to get her hands on those lanyards? Other LouAnn has been duped! How clever. HOW VERY CLEVER.

Other LouAnn keeps apologizing to me because neither her credit nor debit card will go through.
"Oh, stop." I say, "it isn't your fault. It's Alan Jackson's."

Two men come by pushing a big cart that contains more "I-changed-my-mind-I-don't-want-this" items. Women are holding onto the sides of the cart and diving down inside to get one last shot at something they might have missed. They're flapping and squawking like a bunch of chickens all after the same grasshopper...... I write a check. I am embarrassed to be a woman.