An interesting thing happened the other day: I went to a Wal-Mart and the experience did not completely suck.  Nor did it magically evaporate 30 minutes of my life that I’d wish for back once I vacated the premises.  I parked, entered the building, picked up my purchases, and I was back out the door in less than five minutes.

Thanks to these gigantic, orange obelisk-like technological marvels, Wal-Mart created a system where customers like me could pay for our stuff online, and pick up our goods at the store without the need to interact with the worst part about going to any Wal-Mart in the first place – people.

When mythical wife made an online purchase with a store pickup, and then asked me to make the pickup, my initial reaction was like OJ Simpson cringing in the courtroom; the idea of going to Wal-Mart is tantamount to being asked to go to Christmas mass.  It’s just something I really don’t ever want to do, but given the need to begin amassing as many diapers as we’re likely going to need, it was a necessary evil.  Frankly, if I had to go to a Wal-Mart in the first place, I went ahead and capitalized on the same deal mythical wife did, and placed an order myself, because we may as well get double the diapers if I’m going to make a single trip.

I assumed I’d have go to the dreaded customer service line where there would inevitably be a mix of people attempting to return something they obviously used but are trying to spin as being defective, someone trying to cash a paycheck and bitching about the unreasonable fee that they’re collecting to do so, or other schlubs like me picking up online orders, but probably weren’t even remotely close to being fulfilled.

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