you have a cart full of groceries and are standing in the middle of Wal-Mart and an announcement is made over the loud speaker that all customers needed to leave the store as quickly as possible in an orderly fashion due to some circumstances that came up and the store would open back up as soon as possible.

Yeah those were the words Caleb and I heard about 30 minutes ago. We had a nice morning at church and decided we would grocery shop for the stuff I needed for the rest of the month (last night I actually made out a menu plan for the rest of January!!! Yeah me).

Things were no different this time as we entered Wal-Mart, nothing out of the ordinary. We spent about 15 minutes in the Subway where we split some nachos & cheese and a pop. The both of us needed to eat something so we could each take our medicine. After that we grabbed a cart, Caleb complained about how long the grocery list was and we were on our way. No big deal. We’ve been in this Wal-Mart a gazillion and one times. It’s in a nice neighborhood.

The first time the announcement came I looked and Caleb and asked him if he heard what the man on the speaker had said. Of course Caleb hadn’t heard. Then just as soon as I had asked the getleman was back on the speaker repeating the words. All customers please leave your unpaid items and exit the store as quickly as possible in an orderly fashion due to some circumstances. I look around and everyone else in the aisle doesn’t seem to be paying attention, they continue shopping.

I on the other hand decided that we had better leave our cart and get the heck out of dodge. Because (1) I’m smart and follow directions (2) I have an overactive imagination and because we are in the city that mind of mine went into overdrive of all possibilities going on and (3) I remembered back to my days as an employee at Wal-Mart and the few circumstances that would warrant customers being asked to leave the store – a bomb threat or a gunman.

Do you know what it’s like asking a group of a gazillion people to leave a store in an orderly fashion? It was like a heard of elephants once everyone caught on to what was going on and we needed to get out of there. I couldn’t believe how some people were acting and I was not happy when a woman pushed my son out of the way to get herself and her daughter passed us.

As we exited the store my mind was in overdrive and Caleb told me that he was a little creeped out by that and scared as to what was going on. When I saw the police cars and watched more come in as we walked to our car and even as we left the parking lot I was definitely wondering what the heck was going on.

I have to say that at first I was irritated that I had a cart full of groceries and was being asked to leave the store. But after exiting the store all I could think was oh well I can get another cart full of groceries anytime. Suddenly groceries didn’t matter anymore. All that mattered was getting the heck out of there and home. And then my mind went to oh my goodness I so totally have to blog about this!

I’m thinking it had to of been something like a bomb threat but of course until news is released about the incident I won’t know. I certainly hope they have it on the 6 o’clock news tonight!!!!!! I need to know what happened in that store today that caused customers plus employees to be evacuated.

UPDATE:

Caleb and I went grocery shopping at 6:30pm. Wal-Mart was shut down for about 3-4 hours while cops investigated the bomb threat. Nothing all that exciting. The cashier that I talked to said they had one last year too. So that was our excitement for the day. Thankfully it was just a threat.