Tag Archives: supermarket

The Bits in Between

I’ve often wondered what happens to people in between the bits they write about in their blogs.

I’m assuming, like me, that people only write about the best, most interesting and positive bits of their lives. So today I’m going to write about all the bits in between – the bits that make me appear lazy, small-minded and xenophobic. This might be news to those of you who already see me as lazy, small-minded and xenophobic, but there are, I promise, further depths to explore.

This morning, for instance, whilst eating a piece of toast and marmalade Julia had made me I pondered the question of whether or not she does it on purpose. She knows I’m trying to cut down on carbs and sugar, and that I’m life-threateningly obese. I’m not sure whether she’s merely absent-minded or whether the toast and marmalade is part of a cunning long-term plan to kill me.

That’s why I watch a lot of crime dramas, it’s research for foolproof ways to murder your spouse. I’m not sure why Julia watches them, but I have my suspicions.

There is an alternative, but that involves getting up earlier and making my own breakfast.

While I was eating the potentially fatal dose of calories I watched TV and muttered about European politics. Just before the EU referendum I was broadly in favour of Europe, but since the vote, with all the posturing of the negotiators, I’ve moved to a position where I’m not.

This mirrors the experience of two of my uncles who had trouble getting out of Europe in the summer of 1940.

Anyway, enough of my growing anti-European bigotry.

After dropping Julia off at work I shouted abuse at a couple of drivers and went back to sleep. I woke up and went back to sleep again. And again. Finally, feeling sluggish, and having wasted an entire morning, I got up.

The launderette was deserted. I’ve stopped going early in the morning as it always seems to be crammed with people trying to avoid the rush. The machine was faulty again and I disobeyed the instruction taped to it by changing programmes mid-wash. This seemed to work and it started washing again.

When I went to the supermarket it all went well until it came time to pay. I had my cards out ready to claim my points and pay when the till operator was asked to help with a problem at the till next door. I don’t know about you, but if it had been me I’d have completed my own sale before doing something else.

I smiled through it, despite being late for picking Julia up from work, even when the machine messed up my contactless payment three times. I find that smiling and being pleasant is character forming, and is good practice for dealing with customers in the shop.

This evening, armed with a list of jobs I’d written in the launderette, I made a start on turning my life round with efficiency.

I’ve done one of them, which was to load eight items onto eBay. I prepared them yesterday at work but put them on tonight as Sunday night is supposedly the night where people pay the most.

Sadly, that’s the only one of eleven items that I’ve done. The fault is obviously with the list, rather than me. If I’d listed Go to the chip shop, Watch crap TV and Potter about on the internet I’d have been able to tick four jobs off instead of just one.

Part of my pottering involved looking at the site 32 Inspirational Sunday Quotes, but by the time I’d reached Number 19 the forced jollity was inspiring me to kick a puppy. This was probably not what they were meaning to do.

With that thought, I will leave you.

 

A Very Average Day (Part 2)

This is the second part of a post about Sunday, written on Tuesday.

I was finally able to load the clean laundry into the car a couple of minutes before 10.00 and decided to go directly to the supermarket, rather than go home first.

If I go home between errands I tend to brew up, sit down and turn to WordPress. It can take quite an effort to get up and go out again.

Since our new Sunday opening laws Sunday has become a strange day. (Note that “our” refers to England and Wales – Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own regulations, and “new” means 1994 – I take time to get used to change). It’s always been a strange day, to be honest. Even before the 1994 Act it was legal for shops to sell some things on Sundays, but not others. Even if a shop was open you couldn’t guarantee being able to buy everything on the shelves.

This law was partly to safeguard shop workers from exploitation. Farm workers didn’t count. We were allowed to work Sundays, and when the shops are closed on Easter Sunday and Christmas Day, we are still allowed to work. The law is quite keen on farm animals being fed and inspected every day.

And I was, quite honestly, happy to reduce Christmas Day to work, food and presents. It’s what people really want – I’m not sure how many people really enjoy the Queen’s Speech, Monopoly and arguments.

I remember being in a Motorway Service Station one Sunday before the changes came in. A man was reading the paper and talking to his wife.

“They won’t get me working Sundays.” he said. “It’s not right. I won’t do it.”

He seemed totally oblivious to the fact that people were working to allow him to travel, eat and read papers on a Sunday.

Anyway, let us leave 1994 and return to the present.

I missed the customary chariot race opening but, arriving at 10.07, was still amazed by the number of people who were already there, and by the speed at which they were moving. What is it about Sunday opening that turns the average shopper into a crazed looter?

There’s plenty of food in the shops, so why do we need all the wheel-to-wheel Ben Hur impersonations?

Later, I noted a new tactic from a particular couple – one of them stood looking at a shelf, whilst ensuring that their trolley stuck out into the aisle. The other stood looking at the opposite shelf, making sure that nobody could get past. It’s a new one for my anthropological survey of irritating shoppers.

On leaving, I passed a woman in a four-wheel-drive discussing shopping with her teenage son. He was clearly failing to live up to her expectations. In several different ways. It took me right back to the time when I used to do similar things with my kids. It never made them change and it often made me feel guilty afterwards. Kids are like that.

If I could, I would have told her she was wasting her time, but I don’t think she’d have listened. Anyway, I’m not exactly an expert. I did, however, manage to coerce Number Two Son into making brunch when I got home. I may be bad at parenting, but I’m good at psychology. Once I got his mouth watering he was putty in my hands…