#GroceryShoppingProblems: 17 Struggles Post-Grads Endure To Fend For Themselves
Grocery shopping is essentially a new concept when you hit the real world. This isn't food shopping with meal points at your respective college, now you're actually using money you slaved away at your job to earn.
It's hard to spend your money on things like groceries because it feels like a waste. But is it a waste? No, not at all, I mean you can't not eat.
The alternative is, of course, ordering in or dining out for meals, but that just gets ridiculously expensive and what happens when you want a snack?
Here are the struggles most 20-somethings experience when they are forced to fend for themselves:
1. Eating everything you purchased in one day
Finally you get some groceries in your house, you’re feeling all accomplished and then 15 minutes pass and you make your first trip to the fridge.
This initial trip just leads to another (and then another), until your cabinets are essentially barren again and all you’re left with is a bottle of ketchup.
2. Getting the groceries to your apartment when you don't have a car
Having to bring your groceries from the store to your own shelves is a task in and of itself when you don’t have transportation.
Chances are you can’t even buy all of the items you need because you can’t carry them for the life of you. And who has time to make multiple trips to the grocery store? Not me, that’s for sure.
3. Carrying groceries upstairs to your apartment because you don't have an elevator
The journey doesn’t stop when you enter your apartment building, especially if stairs are your only way up. You must now lug the packages you barely were able to carry up the stairs and finally into your apartment.
This counts as strength training, right?
4. Parting from your hard-earned money
It’s disheartening to hand over the money you spent the past two weeks earning for something like groceries. We feel the same way when we pick up our dry cleaning or pay our rent.
You feel as if this is a waste of your money, but you have to eat, don’t you?
5. Realizing you forgot something
You made the time and exerted the effort; you pick out your Pinterest meal and are ready to go -- but, sh*t, you forgot the onions and garlic. How could you be so stupid? Looks like it’s a Seamless night for you.
6. Remembering you actually don't know how to cook
You found the recipe, you bought all the ingredients (hopefully) and think you followed all of the directions to a T. Too bad when you are ready to eat your creation, it neither resembles the recipe nor does it taste like it. #Fail.
7. Spending an hour preparing your meal and finishing it in five minutes
The reason you hate cooking is that it takes literally less than 10 minutes to consume, but close to 45 minutes to prepare. How does that make any sense whatsoever? This is perhaps why so many people choose to order delivery.
8. Packing lunch for work the night before
You slaved away to make your dinner and are virtually exhausted. But wait, the meal prep doesn't end there, as you now have to make your lunch for the next day.
Prepare to devote another 40 minutes of your time to chopping up vegetables, dicing onions and packaging your salad.
9. Realizing you only eat a handful of meals that you can actually prepare yourself
Congratulations, you made it to one week of cooking for yourself. Great! Except you just realized that you only actually like a handful of foods that you can prepare yourself.
You think you're on a hot streak of being responsible only to realize the wrap the corner deli makes is way better than anything you could whip up.
10. Becoming sadly aware of how much produce costs
No wonder so many people opt for fast food -- produce and healthy options are ridiculously expensive.
It’s bad enough we have to spend our hard-earned money on food, but this is just annoying. Shouldn’t you get rewarded for eating clean and not be punished?
11. Not being able to find anything in the grocery store
I feel like I’m entering a labyrinth every time I walk into a food store. I get it -- the aisles are numbered, but there are over 15 of them!
You get sucked into the black hole that is a grocery store and tricked into thinking you need items you never intended on buying in the first place.
12. Actually finding the time to go
Sundays are for hangovers, not productive activities. Between working, errands and social obligations, who even has time to make it to the grocery store in the first place?
Half of the establishments are already closed by the time you can find it within yourself to actually go.
13. Trying to take advantage of sales
If one jar of sauce is on sale that means you are buying at least three, but wait -- how are you even going to be able to carry this all home? You just can’t win at a grocery store, now can you?
14. Getting tempted by everything at the checkout counter
You didn’t even think you needed gum or chocolate or magazines or batteries until you hit the checkout aisle. This is just torture. You finally got everything you needed -- or at least that’s what you thought.
15. Going grocery shopping when you're starving is the worst idea ever
Have you ever gone food shopping high? Well that is just a rookie mistake; not only will you purchase every unhealthy item there is, but you will most definitely eat all of it the second you get back home.
All this will result in is A) resorting to delivery or B) going food shopping again the following day.
16. Caving into delivery after a week of preparing your own meals
You reward your valiant efforts of preparing your own meals by ordering Seamless three times on the weekend. But didn’t you deserve it? No, I’m pretty sure this is not how this is supposed to work.
17. Contemplating getting your groceries delivered
This sounds like a great idea in theory, but when you think about it, is this really the path you want to take? Can’t you just find an hour to go food shopping at some point during the week? I guess that really just depends which day of the week it is, doesn’t it?
