I was in WalMart Sunday afternoon and traffic was fairly calm and sedate until this young father with four running and yelling kids came blasting through the store. Fortunately, I only had to cross paths with them once. Please, parents, leave your children with a responsible adult at home or outside somewhere.

Easy, don't pass. Wait until the person in front of you finds what they are looking for and then move forward behind them. Yes, it will take longer but if increasing risk to people in the store so you can get your stuff then maybe send someone else who understands the risk and has patience.

:1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

So, spending more time in an enclosed space makes more sense to you?

Nonsense. Do you not pass the car doing 20 on a 45 road? I’m not standing behind some label reader when I want to get in and out as quickly as possible.

Yeah if I just put ice cream in my cart, I'm not going to stand there waiting for Madam Fussy to argue with her kids about whether or not they are getting frozen pizza for dinner that night. And that's just the first frozen aisle. Now I have to deal with waiting in the next aisle, for whoever and whoever else taking their sweet time reading ingredients of things they know they were planning on getting anyway, because no one else exists, and no one else is trying to just get through that aisle without contracting a potentially fatal disease.

By the time I get to checkout, the ice cream is melted and I don't want it anymore.

Suffice it to say - I haven't bought any ice cream since Kilwen's closed. I really miss ice cream.

Why social distancing now?
 

Almost everyone is wearing masks at the grocery store. Social distancing was started to keep unmasked people from transmitting or contracting the virus.
So why are we so obsessive about this now?
Think!

Because probably at least 50% are NOT wearing masks. Personally I think this one way aisle designation is a waste of time but just as a result of trying to do SOMETHING when feeling helpless.

& round-abouts.

Driving to Northern Virginia just to get groceries seems a little extreme.:a040:

Sorry about your SpaghettiOs, Ed! I was doing a happy dance today when, after being out of stock for weeks, I finally scored two of my favorite penne and sausage frozen dinner.

I was at Publix Southern Trace on Saturday and didn't notice the blue arrows until I'd been down a couple of aisles. As far as store policies go, I'm more appreciative of restricting the number of customers, installing plexi shields at checkout stands, and of employees who wear masks. Especially at the deli counter.

I wouldn't mind alternate shopping days like during the '79 oil crisis. Heck, maybe we're even heading back to the days of rationing coupons!

Alternate shopping days were a headache. But also the population of the country was only 225 million, and the big box stores hadn't been invented yet so there many more stores of smaller size, so the population was better able to spread out and not all be stuck in the same inside spaces.

Today, there are 331 million, big box stores are a thing which attracts millions of people to them - and there aren't as many ma and pa stores in existence to accommodate them all, should they become overfilled.

I think one way aisles is a great idea

No, but neither does chaos and people bumping in to people. If you believe masks, gloves and spacing works then the risk in a store should be minimal. If you don't then don't go.

Gee but I’ve been grocery shopping forever and never bumped into anyone or experienced any sort of chaos. Where in the world do you shop? I wore a mask last week and hated every second of that. I do not wear gloves because I can wash my hands. Common sense has to take control and 1/2” tape on the floor is meaningless.