By Lynde Evans
"Ya sure gotta lot o' nuts there," the man said as I maneuvered the grocery cart loaded with its precious cargo to the checkout stand.
"What are you gonna do with all those nuts?" the cashier asked as he weighed each bag.
"Feed them to my parrots," I replied.
"Feed them to your parents?" the sacker asked.
"No, my PARROTS...my birds," I answered, trying not to laugh as the vision of my mother perched on a T-stand eating a walnut appeared in my mind.
"Boy, you must have a lot birds," the sacker said as he put the bags of nuts in yet another bag and then back into the cart.
I didn't really want to say that I had already been to a couple of other supermarkets, and the amount of nuts I was purchasing here was very small in comparison to what was already packed carefully in my truck. Some things are just better left unsaid.
Yes, today was the annual "After Holidays Nut Run." It's the day when I run my own "marathon" of sorts driving to the local supermarkets to stock up on the current crop of nuts for the 'Caw Crew, that will, hopefully, last them through the coming year.
This year's run had not been as eventful as some years passed...well, that is, up until I was in the check out lane at the very last store.
On this day, no bags caught on the shopping cart and ripped open. I now double bag the nuts and tie knots at the openings, no more twisty ties. Neither did any break open in the truck. The nuts that I hadn't found when that happened one year provided quite a feast to the mouse that had taken up residence in the truck. "The Mouse That Road," as I called him, hitched a ride in a sack of newspapers my mother had given me to use in the bottom of the Crew's cages. Ah, but that's another story.
As usual, hardly anyone asked me why I was buying all those nuts. They just glanced and looked away as if it were common place to see a person bagging fifty plus pounds of mixed nuts in tiny plastic produce bags. Some must have thought I was a store employee because, occasionally, they would stop by my cart, inspect the bags of nuts, and start to take one.
When I explain that the nuts in the cart were ones I had already bagged to purchase, they would reply, "Oh, I thought they were being sacked for mark down." Well, actually, they had been marked down, but this was "self-service" and no one seemed willing to stand there and sack their own.
There are a few who will continue with the conversation. Most, though, just resume their shopping without saying much more, and I go back to patiently sorting out all the almonds, filberts, walnuts, and pecans. There isn't much left in the bins after I have finished, except for shell pieces, damaged nuts, and a large mound of Brazil nuts since not many of the Crew will eat them. If I do put one in their bowls, they will usually toss it out after giving it that "one-eyed" glare.
Over halfway through the day, a delightful inquisitive girl of about four or five came running up from behind me interrupting my monotonous task. As she stood on her tiptoes peering into the nut bins, she asked "Whatcha doin?"
Oh, just getting some nuts," I answered.
"Can I help?" she asked as she reached into the bin and grabbed a walnut. "I'm, doing OK, but thanks anyway," I replied.
"Grandma, I'm over here!" she suddenly yelled, to someone out of view.
"Are you gonna eat all those nuts?" she asked as she watched me put another bag into the cart.
" No," I answered, "I'm going to feed them to my birds."
"My grandma feeds the birds, too, but she doesn't feed them nuts," the little girl said in a matter-of fact manner.
"If the birds your grandma feeds are wild birds outside, I don't think they could crack these nuts open," I responded.
"Do you know what a parakeet is?" I asked her while I began to fill another bag. She nodded her head.
"Well, my birds are much bigger than the parakeets," I continued.
The little girl looked down at the walnut that she was still holding in her hand and asked, "And they can crack these open?"
"Yes, they can," I told her.
"Wow!" she exclaimed, " they sure must be real strong!"
"Yes, they are," I replied thinking about how the Crew could amazingly maneuver the nuts around in their beaks and effortlessly break them open.
Right about then, "Grandma" appeared. She smiled at me and asked the little girl to put the walnut back in the bin. As the two of them headed down the produce aisle, I heard the little girl telling her grandma about the big birds that could crack those nuts all by themselves.
There really weren't too many nuts at that store, but the conversation with the little girl was a pleasant diversion in a day that had so far been uneventful. I hoped I would have better luck at the next supermarket on my route, but neither of the next two had any nuts left. They had already removed their displays for the season. Some of stores that I had gone to earlier in the day had done the same.
It's pretty much a guessing game as to which stores will have any nuts remaining after the holidays or if they will even be marked down. Since it takes a large amount of nuts to keep all the beaks in this 'Caw Crew happy, price becomes a very important factor.
I was a bit tired at this point in the "Nut Run" and my back was beginning to ache from bending over nut bins most of the day. It was also becoming dark and close to the time for the evening birdie activities. Before going home, though, I decided to stop at one more store.
Well, you would think by now I would have learned that one lesson in life which states: "Never do anything preceded by the words "one more," as in "one more" turning of the nut on the bolt or "one more" trip in the truck before filling the gas tank.
This last store still had quite a few mixed nuts left, and after spending well over an hour sorting through them, I decided "enough is enough," and made my way to the checkouts.
The checker was a tall, rather lanky young man with red hair cut neatly in a flattop. He had been talking and laughing with a girl about his same age who was sacking groceries when I wheeled my cart into the checkout lane. I started placing the bags of nuts on the conveyor belt and didn't look up again until I had finished.
When I did, I saw that instead of weighing each bag individually, as all the other checkers had done, this fellow was piling them on top of each other. There were now five bags stacked rather precariously on the scales. I don't know if he was trying to impress the young lady by showing her how high he could stack them or if he wanted to find out if bells would ring when the scales went over the weight limit. Before I could say anything, he plopped the sixth bag on the stack and began to punch in the code on the register. At this point, the bottom bag busted open from the weight of the others, and the whole stack came tumbling down.
As they fell, the top two bags hit the edge of the counter and split open spilling their contents. Another bag slid off onto the floor and broke open as well. The close to twenty-five pounds of walnuts, filberts, and almonds that had taken me over a half an hour to carefully sort, were clattering and scattering on to the counter and across the floor.
Now, I have never taken the time to count how many nuts there are in a pound. I guess that number would vary depending on the size. What I can tell you, though, is right then, there were a few hundred of them bouncing and rolling around in the area of the checkout where that young man, young woman and myself were standing.
For a moment, the three of us just stood there watching the nuts go rolling by. People in other checkout lanes had now stopped what they were doing and were looking in our direction.
It seems in this year's "Nut Run," the nuts, with the assistance of one very red-faced young man, had become active participants, and were now racing in all directions toward some imaginary finish line. After we had watched the last few nuts reach their final resting place, the young man slowly turned to me, apologized for what had happened and very sheepishly offered to replace the bags of nuts that had been broken.
It was difficult to explain to him that the task would involve more than simply scooping up and bagging a bunch of nuts out of the bins. I definitely was not up to sorting through any more nuts myself after witnessing this catastrophe. The best thing, I thought, was to leave this "one more" store with the remaining unbroken bags before something else happened.
The checker this time weighed the remaining bags individually and handed them to the young woman who carefully put them in paper sacks. I paid for the nuts, picked up the sacks, smiled at both of them then cautiously headed toward the door trying to avoid stepping on any of the nuts on the floor. I put the bags of nuts in the truck with the others and started for home thankful that this year's "Nut Run" marathon was almost over.
...Across the "finish line," with hands held high, ran the exhausted runner amidst the ear pounding cheers and wild jubilation of loyal friends...
Well, actually, I entered the front door of the house carrying bags of nuts in each hand and received the normal enthusiastic greetings of "Hi" and "Hello" from the 'Caw Crew intermingled with a few yells and laughter.
Those joyous sounds were all that this marathon runner needed to know that the efforts of the day had been worthwhile.
As I passed out nuts to the Crew, a few more than usual as an after "run" celebration, I couldn't help but think about all those nuts that were lost as they went scattering and rolling across that supermarket floor. There was probably more than an adequate supply of nuts after this year's "Nut Run," but the thought of replacing them still entered my mind.
Well, maybe tomorrow I would go shopping at just one more store.
"Reprinted with permission from the Companion Parrot Quarterly" http://www.companionparrot.com
PET BIRD REPORT: ISSUE #52, April 2001