From Our Print Edition

An intercepted verbal battle between Vinnie Vendor and Rhonda Retailer (remember them?) as we bid adieu to a horrible year.

VINNIE VENDOR: What’s with all this phony “temperature taking” of customers before they come into your stores, Rhonda? You’re not fooling anybody with those silly little wands you point at peoples’ foreheads. Taking their temperature because of COVID, right? Hah! We know you’re erasing the brand loyalty in their brains and making them buy private label. You’ll do anything to grab an extra buck, won’t you?

RHONDA RETAILER: You’ve totally lost it, Vinnie. I know 2020 has been a tough year for everybody, but this is off the deep end. They’re thermometers, Vinnie. Thermometers. And if you’re not careful, I’ll find an old-fashioned one and stick it where you won’t like. But now that you mention it, it might be a good idea to find a way to help our private label. We’ve caught on, Vinnie, that Category Captains are really blood drinking, shape-shifting alien reptiles out to destroy us.

VINNIE: We are not aliens! You’ve been spending too much time exploring Area 51 again, haven’t you? I can always tell, because you’ve been tweeting lately about us causing global swarming.

RHONDA: Warming! You’re causing global warming, idiot! And it was frozen food vendors who secretly killed Zachary Taylor with iced milk!

VINNIE: Oh, come on, Rhonda. What’s “Kroger” spelled backwards?

RHONDA: Whaaat?? “Regork.”

VINNIE: Precisely! I rest my case.