Nasty Incident at Local Indian Grocery Store

     Needless to say, I was there with the sole purpose of buying groceries and nothing more. However, since  it is humanly customary to greet people when you enter, especially if the person is the grocery store-owner's wife who is staring at you as if seeking a greeting. Well, I courteously complied by saying Hi! and smiling  but received absolutely no response in return, only that silent, intense stare. As I fiddled around with my credit card in order to access the store's ATM machine, she continued the staring. I chose to ignore it at first. Then I chanced to say something about the weather to try to break whatever tension there might have been.  Result? Absolutely no response except to turn her back and moved away a little bit from the counter.

     Again I chose to ignore it, although I was beginning to feel as if I was being told to leave.  instead. I fetched some cold cuts from the freezer, cold cuts which her husband orders specially for me, placed them on the counter along with some bottled water. She in turn, began going through the items still ignoring my attempt at a conversation as I mentioned the Corona Virus. This time her eyes bulged  in my direction a bit after sneezing into her forearm and giving me the shut the hell up look. At that point I had had enough. I calmly told her I didn't want the items and would place them back in the freezer. Without asking me why, she  says.

     "You can't come in here and do that. You placed this on the counter and now you have to buy it!""

     This irrationality, which borders on the insane, caught me by surprise, and for a split of a second I believed myself in the presence of some madwoman recently escaped from some local insane asylum.  In short, I felt that any move that I might choose to make away from that counter and towards  the exit without purchasing the items would have resulted in my getting shot or tasered, or having the police called on me after getting hit over my dome by some two by four..  So I didn't risk that possibility. Instead I calmly asked her why I had to buy those items? Her response was:

     "Why are you changing your mind?"

     This at least was better than before since it was within the realm of the sane. I responded with.

     "Because I keep  talking to you and you keep ignoring me. So I think you don't want me in your store and are telling me to leave.

     She responded with:

     "That is because I don't want you to think I am trying to give you the Coronavirues! I apologize!"

     I knew the explanation was unsatisfactory since it doesn't make any sense. But I  chose to be done with the whole weird matter by  purchasing and leaving. I then stayed away from tat store for maybe a month. But whenever I see her there, I don't go in-and if I go in and see her-I immediately leave.