DATELINE: Saturday, November 22, 2025. Kroger, Dayton, Ohio: Aisle 12
“Okay. I have to get parsley, and then we are done.”
“What’s it for?”
“The stuffing.”
“You cannot get parsley today.”
I look at my husband, who is shaking his head emphatically.
“First of all, who made you the Thanksgiving police? And more importantly, Why? What’s it to you?”
“If you get parsley today, it will be dead in five days. It will be all wilty and slimy.” He put his hand on his head, and hit himself twice, as if implying that anyone buying parsley today was nuts.
“No it won’t. I put it in a glass of water.”
He rolled his eyes. “As I said, wilty and slimy.”
“I change out the water, for God’s sake.”
He laughed derisively. “Get it on Wednesday, so it will be fresh. Fresh when you make the stuffing.”
It was my turn to roll my eyes. “If you think that I am going to come here on Wednesday, when they need police to monitor the parking situation, fight my way into the store, go to the produce section where they will most likely be on their last bunch of tired parsley, then stand in a long line of people with carts full of pumpkin pies, dinner rolls, ten pound bags of potatoes, Pepperidge Farm stuffing mix, butter, full carts–all for one little sad bunch of parsley?” This is your suggestion?”
He nodded. “Wait. What about dried parsley?”
“You mean those flakes in a bottle that have absolutely no taste whatsoever?”
A few people walked by and looked at us askance. I wanted to ask them their opinions, but I knew that would be an escalation that I really didn’t want. I just wanted to get my parsley and go home.
He raised his voice a bit. “You mean there is an entire industry of parsley dryers that get paid to pick the parsley, lay it out on platforms to dry it, then send it to processing plants where they chop it up, put it in jars (another entire industry), and then label it (a whole factory that makes labels), and send it to Kroger where people buy it because it doesn’t taste like anything?”
I felt a little stab of pain behind my left eye. “Apparently, there is a segment of the population that thinks dried parsley is delicious. I am not in that segment.” I shot him my most evil look. “So I am taking this bunch of parsley,” I shook it, “And I am putting it right here in this cart,” I set it on top of the ten pound bag of russet potatoes, “And we are going to check out.”
He put up both hands, palms facing me in surrender. “Fine. But I am not making a parsley run on Wednesday.”
We made our way to the checkout. The cashier scanned my parsley and said, “Oh, do you use this for garnish?”
“No. It’s for the stuffing.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Really? You put parsley in stuffing?
“Yes. There is parsley in stuffing.”
She shook her head. “Ok then. How soon before this dies will you make your stuffing?”
Dried parsley. I sent Charlie back for dried parsley.