The Hunt for My New Iron

I went to Walmart to pick up a few emergency items...toilet paper and cat food. Other people have things like milk and bread on their shopping list. I always seem to be out of TP and cat food? I used also fill my never ending need for hairspray at Walmart - but they no longer carry my brand so I have to make another trip for that (better stock up).

While I was there, I decided to pick up a new iron (isn't that on your emergency shopping list too?). I have actually been wanting this iron for at least 3 years now. It's from Black & Decker, it's called The Classic. My mother has it and I use it when we visit her in Pennsylvania. It looks just like the old iron I used as a kid (I loved ironing pillowcases - I don't do that anymore). It heavy, gets really hot, and makes great steam. The only thing missing is the black and white fabric covered cord.

At one time I had plans to decorate my laundry room in a kind of retro kitchen kitch. You know, bright cheery colors like this.

I have a bunch of vintage kitchen towels and table covers in these colors also. Just picture a shelf full of old canning jars filled with buttons, clothes pins, detergent etc. And one of those tin signs that say Laundry.

Well those plans changed when we moved to Arizona. The laundry room in our house here is right off the kitchen, and these colors would not work well at all (our house in California had the laundry room at the end of the hall so I could have done any color scheme without worrying about how it flowed from the other rooms).

But I needed a new iron, and decided to get it anyway. Guess what. Walmart no longer carries it. They have recently re-merchandised their housewares dept and the adorable iron that I have been coveting for years was not there! Gasp! I didn't panic though, all those years of retailing kicked in. I knew there must be a clearance section somewhere where the put all the discontinued items...maybe it would even be on sale.

After searching for some time - I found it. In the clearance section (by the pool supplies?). One lonely box left. The iron was only about $25 to begin with (from what I remember), so I was excited that I was going to get a deal. We finished our shopping and headed to the check out line.

That's where the trouble began. I ended up in line with one of my not so favorite cashiers. Yes, I go to Walmart way too often, I'm pretty familiar with the employees. I should have gone to another line, but we weren't in a hurry so I stayed.

You guessed it - the iron didn't have a tag and the UPC was not scanning. My little checker tried it several times - very slowly - looked for her glasses - punched in the number by hand...no luck. On goes the blinking light. She stands there and waits for someone from customer service to come and help.

I won't go into all the details, but after 20 minutes of listening to my little checker complain about how terrible Walmart is to work at, and how stupid all the managers are (her words, not mine) they finally came back - and not with good news. The price on the iron was no where to be found. They could sell it to me, but it would have to be at the same price as the other irons. Can you believe it - I'm thinking I'm going to have to pay even more for this discontinued iron that it was originally priced. I must really love this thing. Turns out - they only charged me $20 (well $19.97 actually).

So now my new iron is finally at home with me. I won't get to decorate my laundry room as I had originally planned, but I'm happy I finally made the purchase (maybe I learned something about the perils of being a procrastinator?).

I also purchased a bottle of distilled water. We have lots of minerals in our water here that leave crusty deposits on everything. This is what my old iron looked like because I used tap water. Yuck!

After all that work, I have decided to treat my new iron with more respect and it will from now on only receive distilled water, and hopefully live a long and happy life with us.