Alarming Personality

• GROVE CITY.


• I knew the minute I tried on the pretty, gray, tailored, wool coat with a monk hood that it was "the one". But OK, I'll wait until I go to the other stores and I'd come back to it if nothing else beats it.


• A dozen stores and as many "try-ons" later and with two bags of Jelly Bellys, I returned to London Fog just before closing.


• That's the one, I told my husband who gave me approval for a good selection. We took it up to the counter and I asked the clerk to please remove the tags so I could wear it home.


• We left the store and I felt so stylish and warm and pleased with my new coat. I actually had a bounce in my step as my husband told me the coat was very flattering.


• On returning to Erie we stopped at Target. As I walked through the doors I heard an alarm go off but didn't think anything of it except I thought what a coincidence that it went off as soon as I passed through the door.


• On leaving, the alarm went off again. Of course I stopped, looked around for the "door police" to arrive and check my bags but no one came and I left but not without feeling all the people around me thought I was a thief. That can be traumatic.


• How could I keep wearing this coat if it sets the alarms off at stores? We joked that I could have a good time setting alarms off at the mall if I had that kind of personality, which I don't.
  


• At home I went over that coat several times trying to figure out where there may be an alarm trigger. There just wasn't any and I was going to have to call the London Fog store to find out what to do. As I hung up the coat I noticed a tag sewn into the lining next to the care tag that had a tiny picture of a scissors on it. After closer inspection I found my alarm.


• What a dumb thing to do, make it look just like a care tag and sew it into the lining. You have to cut it off and take a chance of ruining the lining. It had a thin piece of metallic-coated paper inside and you have to cut it really close to get it all. I guess it isn't one of those things you deactivate at the store because it says to remove it by cutting it off after purchase.


• The funny thing is, it didn't set off the alarm at the London Fog store when I wore it out. Shouldn't the clerk tell you these things?