"If they can't sell it, they are not going to stock it." I had to laugh at this - not at the quote itself, but just my local Wal-Mart. Here in Wyoming, January equals snow and ice - our Wal-Mart hasn't had any Ice Melt for over a month "because it's a very popular item right now". If they'd stock it, they could sure sell it!! On a brighter note, our Wal-Mart did away with all embroidery/cross stitch (DMC) thread about a year ago. It's the only place in town that sold it; next nearest store is 50 miles away. There was such a HUGE outcry from all the local ladies, that we now are able to buy DMC embroidery floss again. Sometimes the squeaky wheels DO get the grease! Cate in WY - wishing I had Ice Melt for my walkway............

Bad, intolerable behavior based on the "not Me" or not my responsibility and I agree that tv shows and computer games hone in on behavior that is bratty, sassy to parents, overly sexed material, and downright criminal as in stealing cars. I will have to add that in a mob situation one goes with the flow or would get trampled on also. It was a terrible tragedy and it would have helped, maybe, if a loud speaker had announced that only 10 people would be let in at a time, every 3 minutes. Personally I have never shopped for any Black Friday specials.

I go to a CVS pharmacy which is about 3 blocks from my house, and I have to say, they are without doubt the most careful ppl I have ever dealt with in my life. There are five ppl working in the pharmacy at all times, and 3 of those 5 ppl are licensed pharmacists and the other 2 are licensed pharmacy techs. When you go in to the pharmacy area in the store you go to a window where you hand your prescription in. The pharmacy tech takes your prescription and then asks to see your I.D.. Even though they know you by name, they still require you to present an I.D. card, which she checks against the name on the prescription. When it matches she logs the prescription in, then puts it in a little drawer that slides through the glass panel into the actual pharmacy area. Inside that glassed in area there are two pharmacists who fill the prescriptions then they go to the other end and pass them out to the desk where you pick them up. The person at that desk then takes all the bottles or packages out of the bag and checks them one by one against what was originally logged in. If there is even the slightest doubt about the count, that pharmacist will count the pills again to make sure you have the correct amount. In addition, there is a label on each container that gives the full description and the drugs letter or number markings so they can be positively identified. When he/she is certain that all is correct the bag is stapled shut and placed on a holding rack till you come to pick it up. When you go to the counter to pick up your meds you are once again required to show your I.D. which they verify against the presciption, then they open the bag and confirm that you are getting the correct number of containers before they will ring up the sale. If someone comes to the counter and needs to talk to a pharmacist, the one who verifys the bags will come to the counter. According to the girl on the counter the pharmacists in the booth have a phone, but it will only make outgoing calls so they can call a doctor to verify a prescription. All incoming calls are handled by the pharmacy techs or the pharmacist outside the booth who verifies the counts, but under no circumstances are the pharmacists behind the glass filling the prescriptions to be disturbed. About two months ago I had to undergo a minor surgery and when I turned in a prescription from the surgeons for some meds to prep for the surgery the pharmacist checked the computer and told me that the drug specified was contra-indicated with one of my COPD drugs, so they had to call the surgeon and explain the situation before they would fill the prescription. It turned out the surgeon was not aware of the other drug, but he changed my prescription to another drug that was okay. To my complete surprise, about three months ago the pharmacy called and said their records indicated that I only had 8 more days on an inhaler that I have to use twice a day. They asked me if I had an apointment to see my doctor to get refill and I said no. The pharmacist then asked, would you like me to call your doctor and schedule you an appointment? Sure, I said, and a half hour later my doctors office called to tell me they could get me in the next day. Jan uses the same pharmacy and one day when I was there I asked them if she could pick up prescriptions for me? The girl said sure, but you will have to sign a consent form and I will put a note on the computer that you have authorized her to do so, otherwise no one but you can pick them up.

For decades my trips to Walmart were few and far between for a number of reasons I've outlined before. About 2 months ago a new "Super" Walmart went up not too far from from me. I decided to ignore the order given by one-who-shall-remain-nameless who ordered me to stay out of "her" Walmarts and I ventured in to look around. The big advantage is that it's open 24 hrs so I can go in during the middle of the night and avoid a lot of the traffic, although you do get the restock traffic which can be as bad. At least in this area Walmart has been forced to clean up their act a lot from what I've seen and heard, especially since Target changed the smaller stores to P-fresh. They've also converted a few stores to "Super" Targets. Target has clearly made a concerted effort to take some grocery business from the competition and with the prices I've seen, they will accomplish that. So, back to the comparisons: Carts, not much difference. Walmart's of course are new at this store so they *should* be in good shape. Target's were replaced not long ago and the plastic carts are all fine and seem to hold up a lot better than I thought they would. So equal ground there. I'll say this for the new Walmart, it's still pretty clean, and quite well maintained so far so on that level, comparable to Target. Although I suspect there's some corporate big dogs in there controlling things during the break-in period at least when I've been there. Some very definite non-Minnesota accents floating around! Pricing? Well, I've noted pricing so far on about 40 items in the local "big gun" grocery store (Cub), Target and Walmart and was quite surprised. I knew Target beat Cub on a lot of things and thought it'd be interesting to see how Walmart compares. They run a lot of TV ads comparing receipts from Cub & Walmart and claiming to be so much cheaper. I note they don't compare to Target and it's clear why. About 1/2 the items I've compared so far are identical in price. There's a number of things where Walmart is a penny or two cheaper. But there were also several things where Target was 25¢ to a couple dollars or more cheaper. I'm going to say that all in all they're pretty comparable (especially depending on what you buy, how much and how often of course). FWIW, over the past few years, a couple of the local TV stations have done their own price comparison of the stores and 2 out of 3 times Target beat Walmart quite significantly. The station's claim was you'd save $400/year at Target over Walmart in their comparison. The last one had them essentially neck in neck but an ever so slight edge to Walmart. Two big differences though that I've seen. Meat and produce. Hands down better at Target in both departments. This has been a good year for grapes so I thought I'd get some while I was at Walmart last time, but after tasting one, and spitting it out, I guessed the season was over. Two days later, at Target, I bought 3 pounds of delicious grapes. I bought apples at Walmart and thought they should be good, after all they were Honey Crisp. Bought 3, threw two. I buy apples at Target year round and never had a bad one yet. I guess I should add a third difference. Clearance items at Target. (Never really see anything on clearance at Walmart.) I like checking what's on clearance. I often seem to find something of interest and for things like cleaners and personal care items, when I have a coupon, I couple it with something on clearance and it's cheap for a good quality item. I dislike paying full retail for things like toothpaste, deodorant and the like when it's on clearance so often. Couple other things I noticed: Walmart was cheaper on can coolers, but $2 higher on the same brand name underwear. Plus Target had a "value sized" larger count package available that made it cheaper yet. The first time I was in the new Walmart, people were nearly tripping over themselves asking if they could help, which was *highly* unusual for my normal Walmart, uh, shall we say, "experience". But that situation is pretty much the same as at most of the other places around here these days. (The strategy is for every employee to make contact with every customer they can, and you don't just tell them where things are at, you bring them to it for the "personalized" touch and to help cut shoplifting since people will think they're being noticed in the store.) But I've noticed that is wearing down each subsequent trip in there. Maybe the employees are getting sick of it. Could have been that they just started the job and were excited to have the job at first, IDK. Hard to say, but I'm curious to see what will happen with that. I haven't gone to other Walmarts around here for a long time so I can't say if they vary prices from store to store but they do vary at Target and I do find that a bit annoying. They're all within a few miles of each other but the prices can vary. So will I be a Walmart regular? (Whether or not I'm "ordered" to stay out! LOL) I guess I might pick up a few staples during the middle of the night if I'm up. Not too sure I want to go there during the day. Target can be busy but still not the issues that I've encountered before in the W place. Have to wait and see I guess.