A Strange Shopping Trip

So today at the store the woman ahead of me in the checkout line (we’ll call her Jane) had a very full cart of items. Groceries, household items, office supplies, clothing, etc. As the cashier was finishing up with the person ahead of Jane, Jane began taking items out of her cart and holding them up one by one, inspecting them. Holding up a pair of jeans, shaking them out, turning them around, checking the size. Holding up a gallon of milk, looking at the expiration date, turning it around in her hands, shaking it a bit. Holding up a package of pens, reading the brand, straightening out the plastic, inspecting individual pens within the plastic. This went on and on. She was sorting the items into two piles. One she put on the conveyor belt, and the other she set aside. This was a long process, and both the cashier and I were just waiting. I could have gone to a different line, but to be honest, I was curious to see what Jane was doing.

After she had finally finished sorting everything, Jane put the “other” stuff back in her cart and pushed the cart up to the cashier. Jane told the cashier that she didn’t want the stuff in the cart. We aren’t talking about one or two or three items here. She had well over half a cart of stuff she didn’t want. Jane also told the cashier that she would need a second cart to take the things she did want out to her car, and could she (the cashier) please have someone bring her one?

I thought I was going fall over. It seemed so surreal. The cashier, however, didn’t seem fazed. Is this something that happens with any sort of regularity? Do people really do this all that often? And if they do, can’t they make these decisions before getting into the checkout line? Has anyone else ever seen something like this happen?