Waiting for Gouda

Figuring for some reason that we’ll soon need to be purchasing sundries in bulk, The Lovely Wife’s™ Moms bought us a gift Costco membership.

So we headed in to activate the membership and find out just why everyone goes crazy for the “shopping in a military hangar” experience.

We headed straight to the customer service counter, which is over by the food court area. Which leads me to ask:

Why is there a food court in the Costco? For that matter, why is there a Pizza Hut in my Target? Can we not make it through a 45 minute shopping trip without sitting down and eating? Are they trying to trick us into thinking that their giant, ugly, completely utilitarian acres of blinking fluorescent lighting, grimy floors, and zombified staff can pass for some sort of shopping and dining destination? Is it working? Are there people who actually PLAN on going to the Costco for shopping and lunch?

But, at the customer service desk, the man behind the counter is activating our membership. And what you may not have guessed is that the first step in activating your Costco membership is to discuss the purchase of another Costco membership. You see, our pre-paid membership was only a Gold Star membership. I know what you’re thinking. Only a Gold Star membership? Gold Star sounds pretty good. I mean, the card has got a freaking GOLD STAR on the thing! Nothing can beat a gold star, right?

Nope,” the guy tells us. “Gold Star is like, totally the lowest kind of membership you can have. Only lame people would only spend $50.00 for the privilege of spending money in our store. What you need is the Executive membership, which costs twice as much. Not only that, it’s a lot classier too, because it doesn’t have one of those tacky Gold Stars on it. And, if you give us twice as much money right now, we’ll give you a little bit of money back later.”

Well, that sounded pretty good. But we’d have to think about it.

We moved on to the second step. The second step in activating our totally lame-ass Gold Star membership was to sign up for an American Express credit card. Apparently, the giant warehouse thingy can only offer such great prices on things like incredibly affordable $100 cards that let you give Costco more money because of some incomprehensible and completely uninteresting deal that they’ve made with American Express. I’m sure all the Executive members out there know the details, but as far as I can tell, if you sign up for the AMEX card it allows you to use that card to give both Costco and Amex more money.

At that point, having already rejected his offer to give him an extra $50.00 for a differently colored card, I didn’t want to hurt the guy’s feelings.

I wanted to hurt the guy’s face.

Just give me my damned card so I can go ponder the pros and cons of a 12 pound box of blueberries!

Nope, not yet.

You see, Costco really doesn’t want just anybody coming in there and giving them money. The membership card itself is not enough protection to keep the rabble out. After all, as the man said, “You can’t just give your card to your neighbor Jane and let her come in here.”

First of all, how did he know about Jane? And secondly, I hate that bitch. I would never give her my card.

In order to ensure that I am not Jane, the Gold Star membership card is, in fact, a photo ID. The guy waves us around to the side of the counter where we take turns standing in front of what proves to be a .01 megapixel digital camera. I’ve include the actual photo from the back of my Costco card, enlarged and digitally enhanced to show all the available detail. Remarkable likeness, I think. There’s no way anybody besides myself, the registered card holder, could possibly pass for that grayscale blob.

Anyway, we were soon set free to wander amongst the giant industrial shelves. And I found, to my great disappointment, no 30-gallon barrel of pickles. I mean, isn’t that THE thing that everyone talks about getting at Costco, the 30-gallon barrel of pickles? We hiked our way up and down thousands of linear feet of shelving, and not a single giant vat of pickles.

Maybe they keep those in the Executive lounge.