Peas Call

I try to be on top of the latest trends in technology but nothing could have prepared me for the cell phone vending machine at the grocery store.

You can buy a cell phone at Kroger’s?

Yep, there it was big as life between the ice machine and the bar-b-que display, a bright, shiny cell phone vending machine with brightly shined cell phones behind glass like candy bars, which is pretty much what it was: ear candy.

Insert a credit card, key in some information on the little touch screen display and clank-bang a cell phone drops down a chute and you’re on your way.

I thought, oh, great, now we’ve given little kids something else to whine about at the store.

“Mommmeeeeee! I wanna cell phone. I wanna cell phone! CELL PHONEEEEE!”

“No, honey, you already have a cell phone. You don’t need another cell phone.”

“Mommmmeeeeee! I wanna BLUE cell phone! BLUUUUE CELLLL PHONEEEE!”

As if we need something else to spoil kids with. Why, when I was a kid I was lucky to get a gumball that cost a penny. And, I’d have to walk to the store to buy it. Uphill. Both ways. In the snow.

“Another gumball, boy? What happened to the one we bought you two years ago, huh? Spoiled brat, I tell you. When I was your age we chewed tar from the road.”

It won’t get any better, either. Years from now we’ll be hearing the same conversations.

“Grammaaa! I wannnnnnt one! PLEEEESSSSSEEEEEEE!”

“I told you no. You haven’t used the anti-gravity belt you got last week. You’re not getting another one.”

“But, Grammaaa! I wanna BLUUUUE one!”

Is there no safe haven even at a grocery store? It’s not like a grocery store had its own line of cell phone, you know, like Apple or Blackberry.

But, isn’t that a great idea! What if grocery stores could market their own line of distinctive cell phone that would allow you, the customer, to distinguish yourself from all those pink, black and blue cell phone owners.

Fruit and vegetable phones could give grocery stores the competitive advantage they need in the fierce cell phone vending market.
I can see the marketing campaign now...

Who’s that cool person with the cucumber phone?

Got cauliflower ear?

Corn is so obvious a choice it doesn’t bear mentioning.

Lettuce talk!

So much phone, so little cabbage.

His and hers: a pear.

I’ve bean meaning to call you!

Is that a banana in your ear or are you happy to call me?

Orange you glad you bought this cool fruit phone?

Onions bring a tear to my eye, but your call brings a smile to my lips.

The possibilities are endless. I’ll expect to see fruit and veg phones on the stands within a week. You just can’t hold back great ideas like this.