The Nostalgia of Grocery Store Fried Chicken

Life updates, words, and general chit chat from the week

Every week, I do the grocery shopping for our household. It’s a ritual I look forward to, stopping at Dunkin Donuts for an iced caramel latte (with oatmilk) and sitting in the Aldi parking lot to finish it while I wait for the doors to open at 8:30am. The other Friday morning shoppers like to line up outside the doors, but I consider that to be rude and unncessary, so I wait in the car with my coffee and my audiobook feeling superior.

Anyway. My coffee habits aren’t why I wanted to write about grocery shopping this week. After I grab all I can at Aldi, I head across the street to Giant Eagle for the rest of my list. And there, lately, I’ve been hit by a wave of nostalia every time I step out of my car and smell the scent of fried chicken and potato wedges being prepared for the day.

When I was a kid, my mom stayed home to raise me and my younger brother. This meant that we got to go pretty much anywhere she went, and we often accompanied her on trips to the local Kroger for our weekly shop. Call it a formative memory, but I can still close my eyes and see the layout of that Kroger, though I haven’t been there since I was quite small and I’m sure it’s been remodeled or torn down since those days.

Sometimes, we’d grab a big old bucket of grocery store fried chicken with a side of crispy seasoned potato wedges for dinner. This undoubtedly was a great way for Mom to avoid cooking, but still come across as a winner because this was a special treat, okay?

I haven’t had the stuff in years, but I can’t walk by that area of the grocery without thinking myself back to those days where my biggest concern was whether or not I’d catch the latest new episode of Digimon that week. So thanks, whoever preps the food at Giant Eagle, for always making sure that scent is up and running when I arrive at 9am.

What I’ve Been Up To

Work/Writing

I continue to write 2-3 (sometimes 4) articles a day for the new gig, and I am enjoying it so much it feels borderline illegal. Also recently sold an essay that will be published near Halloween about my former life as the office witch, so that was exciting!

General Life Updates

The fall leaves are turning and our yard is starting to look pretty darn magical. Alas, I am not built for cold weather, and I’m already feeling the dip in mood that always comes with being anything but warm and toasty.

Current Obsessions

Gaming

My first review assignment for the professional gamer life is Detective Pikachu Returns, so I’ve been playing that pretty much every evening this week in preparation. It is… not great as far as games go, to be honest. But, I am enjoying it anyway because it’s story driven and I am invested despite myself.

I also downloaded Pokemon Sleep because I’m trying to increase my Pokemon game knowledge, and I’ve always wanted to try it out. I have immediately become overinvolved in checking up on my cute little Pokemon friends and feeding Snorlax. (This is what you do in the game—feed Snorlax all day so he can attract cute sleepy Pokemon at night while you rest).

Words on the Web

Listen, I can’t even begin to cover everything I wrote this week. But I will highlight a few favorites.

First off, this homage to the pizza delivery missions in the 2004 Spider-Man 2 video game. I am quite proud of the featured image I designed for this one, which features the iconic pizza time meme and some PS2 and PS5 controllers.

Secondly, a roundup of official video game cookbooks that was not a good idea in terms of what happened to my Amazon wishlist. Let’s see if you can guess which one is already on its way to me, because I am weak and shouldn’t be allowed near cookbooks at any time, ever.

And that, my friends, is all I’ve got for you this week! I hope you enjoyed my little trip down memory lane as I try to make this newsletter less formulaic and more fun, for all of us.