TMI

I love coupons. The only thing better than coupons for items I want is coupons I know my family or friends might want, whether for clothing, personal products, groceries, or anything else. 

Coupons make shopping fun.  I’ve always gotten a kick out of coupons that print after the purchase of a product, say at Shop Rite or CVS, which mirror what I’ve just bought or my buying preferences overall. That’s great thinking. 

Since my daughter Allison lives in NYC and also goes to CVS periodically, it’s been normal practice for me to notify her when I had received coupons via email that I thought she might want.  Over time she figured out that if she’d give the cashier my phone number, she’d get the same coupons I would, as well as those that reflected her buying habits.  With advances made to this process, she can now access the discounts right off the bat when she enters the store by plugging my phone number into a cool new coupon machine and, like magic, a couple feet of discounts will pour right out.    

Last weekend when she was home, we went together to CVS because we each had a few items to get. She made a beeline for this new fancy machine – clearly not the first time she used one like it – and was delighted when she found a coupon that she could use.    

“I can tell when you’ve been buying candy because I see candy coupons,” Allison said as we walked to the cash register.  WHAT?!?!?  Did she just say that?  OK, so I do buy a candy bar here and there.  But really…is there no such thing as privacy?  Do all my bad habits have to be publicized?  It’s like an email was sent directly to my daughter telling her how bad her mommy’s been. 

What if I was a dating single mom now, like I was 15 years ago and had bought some personal products which therefore printed out similar coupons…maybe she’d say to me, “You’re not actually doing THIS at YOUR age, Mom, are you?” (condom)  or “Mom!  Please tell me you’re not going to have a baby!”  (pregnancy test) or “Ewwww…A fungal infection, Mom?  That’s nasty.”   TMI...no doubt about it.    

Who would’ve ever thought that my guilty pleasures could be revealed through the sharing of coupons, of all things?