Just Sorta Creepy

The inside of the produce cooler.

Produce has to share with beverages.

Sometimes produce has territorial wars with beverages.

I find them very diverting.

It starts with some naive beverage guy moving his beer

into the Produce Only Zone.

I move it back.

And he moves it over.

And I move it back.

And he moves it over.

And I move it back.

etc etc etc

Until notes get posted

and lines get drawn.

BUT

no one can stand against my

persistence

and my

focus

and my

fervor.

And then?

I WIN.

Becuase I am vastly underemployed

and need lots of diverting 

to get through a day successfully.

Where Banana Boxes Come From/Intro To The Produce Department

There are lots of local people,
farmers, mini-farmers, and just plain regular folks,
who deliver seasonal produce to us.
So far, none of them have figured out how to grow
local, organic, artisan Vermont bananas.
So... 
We have two main produce suppliers
to bring us bananas.

One is a big restaurant/etc supplier out of Albany, NY.
They deliver a whole lotta crap,
like raw meat and fish,
towering stacks of containers for prepared food,
baked goods, cheese, drink mixes, sauces, dressings,
etc-etc-etc-they-seem-to-keep-everything-in-their-warehouses,
and, of course, produce.
Stuff from them often seems like it fell out the back of the truck
on the delivery run.

The other is a medium size produce supplier
based somewhere in Vermont.
Stuff from them is sometimes rotten,
like once last summer we got a case of rotten moldy broccoli.
YUCK!!!
It is not easy to forget something like that.

They both deliver through the red door.

(Remind me to tell you about the delivery doors sometime.)

The driver stacks the produce across from the Produce Room

next to the produce cooler.

Note the bananas on the bottom of the stack. 
Now you know where banana boxes come from.

The Staff Person In Charge of Produce (Anonymous By Request,) got tired of trying to explain to all our various produce suppliers which was produce cooler.

In this neighborhood of the store, there is the Produce Cooler, the Meat Cooler (sometimes referred to as the Walk-in,) the Dairy Cooler, and the Deep Freeze Walk-in, so she painted a chalkboard on the produce cooler door and chalked it up with pretty letters. She did that becuase she is clever and has initiative.

Ths archeologist is IN

Compressors and fans are everywhere underground.
The Red Compressor has always been particularly interesting to me.

That is my Raisin/Popcorn Backstock Storage Area directly to the left of the Red Compressor. The astute observer will be able to identify the location of the red shopping baskets.

On Wednesday I heard it chugging, which is fairly unusual,
so I went to stare at it for a while.

I puzzled over why it would be chugging and I suddenly knew what the Red Compressor was for -- THE AIR HOSE ON THE OUTSIDE WALL BY THE SODA MACHINES!

And then I realized what THIS box is for. This is a NEW box. It controls the NEW solar panels on the roof. They were installed about 2 years ago.

SO... my befuddled brain told me that if this box is for the solar panels, and this box is on the wall next to the Red Compressor, then I must be standing under the coffee area by the registers. 

But I was waaaaaay wrong.

It is waaaaaaaay more better 'n that.

As I slept on it Wednesday night it became clear to me that things weren't adding up. The Stairs to Nowhere go to the air hose wall and the Red Compressor and Solar Panel Box are one basement over from those stairs.

So when I went in Thursday morning I paid special attention.

 Looking to the left I could see the peak of the old original Merrill & Sons building.

See the blue fence wall thing on the lower left? Those are the customer restrooms.

And when I saw that I GOT IT! The Red Compressor is  UNDER THE OLD OUTSIDE WALL OF THE ORIGINAL STORE BUILDING! So I went back down to the Red Compressor area, to the last aisle where I found the J. R. Liggett's Old Fashioned Bar Shampoo, and saw THIS... THESE ARE THE ORIGINAL BASEMENT STEPS GOING UP TO THE OLD ORIGINAL FRONT DOOR!!!!!!


Now doesn't that just blow your skirts up??
Click here to see where these stairs are.
(partially hidden to the left behind the circuit panel board thing)

(I will be examining the old floor joists and foundations and sill plates 'n such. I think the wine cellar is a good place to start.)