Vermonter is best grocer bagger

upi ^ | Feb. 15, 2011

[JoeProBono]

Krystal Smith, 24, bagging groceries at the Hannaford store on North Avenue in Burlington.

[GnL]

But can she bag the most dreaded of the processed meats...the canned ham?

[Oberon]

Q: You know why she wasn't allowed to pick a different prize instead of the one she got?

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....wait for it....

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...because baggers can't be choosers!!!

[JoeProBono]

[Notary Sojac]

Looks like she is using good old paper bags. The kind that actually, you know, hold stuff.

Most of the stores around my area have followed Wal Mart's lead and now use only those plastic bags that are about 2 molecules thick and disintegrate if you try and put more than three cat food cans in them.

[EyeGuy]

Are the Communists allowed to buy their own groceries in the Peoples Republic of Vermont?

It is easy to be a speed bagger when all you have to do is make sure you place the bean sprouts, on top of the Tofu bricks.

[Montanabound]

They allow paper bags in Vermont??

[knittnmom]

Wow. There’s a prize for almost everything, it seems. Wish she worked at my local grocery - we have to remind the bagger not to put the eggs in with heavy things, or sideways. Bagger actually did that once, tucked the egg carton along the side of the back, eggs fell out, cracked, made a mess of the handy recyclable cloth bag. Now we put the eggs on the conveyor last, and ask for them to be in a separate bag.

[JoeProBono]

[WOBBLY BOB]

She looks to be at least a 2 bagger.

[Nea Wood]

Good one!

[JoeGar]

But can she bag the most dreaded of the processed meats...the canned ham?

I assume you mean Spam. I love fried Spam sandwiches, but my father wouldn't eat Spam because that was the only meat he got to eat in the Philippines during WW2. He swore that if he survived the war he would never eat it again -- and he didn't.

[Ellendra]

Same with the tomatoes. They like to put the tomattoes under the canned goods or the bottles of detergent.

[JoeProBono]

[Daffynition]

Stanley Goodspeed: Look, Im just a biochemist. Most of the time, I work in a little glass jar and lead a very uneventful life. I drive a Volvo, a beige one. But what Im dealing with here is one of the most deadly substances the earth has ever known, so what say you cut me some FRIGGIN SLACK?

Glass or plastic, glass or plastic?

[GnL]

Actually it is a Curious George reference. I have two small kids.

[Daffynition]

Bet you didn't know that 1852 Francis Wolle patented in the United States, and later in France and England, a machine that he devised for making paper bags. It was the first of its kind, and covers the fundamental principle of the many similar machines that are now used. **She** was from Jacobsburg, Pennsylvania.... and ...**drum roll please**....in 1870 Margret Knight invents a device to cut, fold and paste paper bag bottoms.

[What's a bag without a square bottom?]

[I Buried My Guns]

As a yoot, i was a bagger at my local Alpha Beta. My training took about two minutes but it has stayed with me forever; most of it is common sense.

Sadly, the kids today do not get that two minutes of training, and our eggs suffer for it. Now that I am officially an older person, I am not shy about correcting them, and sometimes I even join them in an effort to get my stuff loaded quickly. For some reason, they act like i am intruding on their turf sometimes.

[Daffynition]

Sorry ... think I got my *i*s and *e*s mixed up on the *Francis* thingie.... it's been difficult since the *injury*. Breathe Daffy breathe!

[EyeGuy]

Grocery bagging is an art and a science. Additionally, no two bagging experiences are the same; an infinitely variable, three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle.

Quite interesting and challenging, if you approach it with the proper atitude.

At root, it is an exercise in hard-won experience, practicality and common sense, which means of course, that it is beyond the limited capabilites of your average Ivy League faculty member.