Today I was followed around in Walmart by in store security.

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My wife is busy shopping for what she wants while I am shopping for things that I want. I first went in to get a garden hose washer that fell out when I disconnected my hose for the winter and it landed in the leaves and was never located. I also looked for some other lawn and garden items but they had hardly any inventory So I went out with my small purchase after paying for a few of the items I wanted using a pre-paid visa gift card. I went out to the car to put them away then went back inside and looked around for my wife who was somewhere in that Walmart maze. I couldn't get her on the cell phone and couldn't find her so I decided to do some more looking around for a few good bargains. I found some things in the hardware and tools area and picked them up and then went to pay for them again using that 20 dollar prepaid visa gift card. I took the second batch of items, including a party hat for the 2017 New Year's Eve celebration party. I took them out to the car and then tried to call her again and still just got her voice mail box. I was getting tired and walked all over the store, looking for my wife. I finally found her and was glad. I went to her with a few more items I had picked up from the grocery area of the store. She was not quite ready to checkout so I told her I was going to the in store Micky D's for a coffee. But they said the coffee had to be made so I asked if it would be ready in about 15 minutes. He had no idea how long it would take. I went back and found a smoothie in the produce area with blueberries and bananas. I paid for them separately while my wife continued her shopping with the rest of her and my items still in her cart. I stood outside the Walmart and drank my smoothie. The 3rd time I went back inside I was hoping my wife would be finally done shopping. She was almost but not quite. We finally managed to get the rest of what she wanted to purchase and got into a line. Then as we waited, this guy from security, wearing a walkie-talkie on his hip and obviously eyeing me over. I looked back at him, standing behind my wife and I was standing in front of her with the items I was about to purchase and he stood there looking at me and acting as if he was going to buy something but walked away when he realized I was not a shop lifter. LOL I thought my Visa Card was going to cover the cost of my final purchase but it was declined. I had to pull out a 20. I paid in cash. My wife paid for hers separately and we both walked out the door. This time, the lady at the door, the Walmart greeter, paused to look at my wife's cash register receipt. She was satisfied by the number of items matching the number on the ticket and we were wished a happy holiday by the greeter and went to the car with our purchases. The thing that bothered me the most was that man. He obviously was told that I had been walking all over the Walmart for the past hour or more and saw me go out to my car a few times and figured I was shoplifting. I was not. I was getting things I needed and it takes time to find anything in such a huge store full of millions of items in a football field of space. I was looking for my wife most of that time, in between I was also trying to get a glimpse of things I might actually buy. It is next to impossible to use a cell phone in a Walmart to call the other party while they are possibly on the opposite end of the store and their cell phone is off so you always get voice mail. Well, What other factors might have contributed to my looking suspicious? Perhaps it was because: 1. I walked all over the Walmart looking for my wife and that looked like I was trying to take things? I wonder if that is the case. 2. I wear dark sunglasses because it's bright outdoors and I don't want them to fall off if I take them off and put them on my shirt collar they sometimes fall off so I just wear them in the store. 3. I have long hair so maybe they think I am trouble just by the way I look. In any event. I am not a shop lifter. I am an honest person. I like shopping for things I need and if I have to walk 5 miles in a Walmart to do it while also trying to keep track of my wife in the store, I can't help it that the people in the Walmart store think I am doing something wrong. I think it's possible they went over the top by having me tailed. I am not paranoid. I used to work in a retail store, many different types of retail stores over the years and I know how undercover security behaves. One day in another Walmart I was happy and joked around with a store associate because he made a comment on my Dallas Cowboys hat. I was in a good mood but perhaps he thought that was because I was intoxicated but I don't drink any more these days and have not for a long time and my wife overheard two other people who also work for the Walmart store saying to the other one to keep an eye on that guy cause he looks like he might be a shop lifter. This is one reason I hate shopping at Walmart not because they don't have good merchandise but that they are flat paranoid and suspicious of everyone who walks in and out of their store and don't even bat an eye when a dishonest acting store associate lollygags around and talks on their cell phone to a friend or takes things for themselves thinking they deserve things just because they work there and think it's easy pickins. Not all store associates are dishonest but then again not everybody who shops in their stores are either. I am one of the honest ones. They would be hard pressed to find one as honest as I am . I am no thief or shop lifter. It's just that some stores teach the associates to try to profile you and that is in my opinion a pretty bad thing and makes one not want to shop there ever again. If I had some place to shop where I was not treated like a criminal by having a security officer lag behind me at times just because I spend longer than some other people shopping because my wife likes to look a lot at things and I have to hang around to make sure she is okay as she has a hard time walking and often she has bad pains and she can't walk fast. Maybe if I went into the store with my ventrillogist dummy and let it do my talking back at them like, "Hey there funny looking? You seem to be following my friend. Is he in some kind of trouble or are you just too shy to ask for the directions to the nearest register?" or better yet, "Hey, if you keep following me I will have to call security and have you up on stalking charges."