Supermarket Mishaps

Well, I am not going to lie, I felt pretty crap today; although I have done my upmost best to avoid it I finally succumbed to the dry, coughing throat thing that inevitably occurs at the end of every cold. So, I decided to head off to Tesco to buy myself some nice honey and a few lemons to try and make the old ‘lemony hot water honey’ concoction to soothe my glands. Supermarkets are funny places don’t you think; not only is everything not in the place you would expect it to be, you always have some kind of awkward problem like, the scales for the self-service counter not working, or rogue trolleys rolling away from you (or in my case, with me) at a speed that would rival that of the cars in the Grand Prix. Anyway, I arrived at the local Tesco and after having grabbed some lemons (and a couple of avocadoes for good measure), I set about searching for the honey. But being a complete supermarket retard, I had no idea where to start. So I thought… if I were a pot of honey where would I be… I started in the jams and conserves section; no luck. Went over to sauces and dressings; no further discoveries there. I began to feel a lot like Winnie-the-Pooh. I passed by all sorts of rows of interesting foodstuffs like spreadable (ha) butter and Scottish smoked salmon which is in fact grown in Chile, smoked in Spain and merely packeted in Scotland, until I finally encountered the honey section, which turned out to be next to the eggs (who’d have thought.)

I chose a good old orange blossom out of countless exotic variations, and it was at that precise moment, just as I had reached up and lifted up the heavy glass jar of sweet, liquid amber when I saw them: stacked right on the top of the very top shelf of the honey section, were boxes upon boxes of the most delicious looking, sumptuous cakes. Why any supermarket would put its goods far higher up than any human could possibly reach beats me. I tried to be a true Catholic, resist temptation, not be a glutton and all that jazz, but I must confess that my inner cake-monster got the better of me. (Father, I have sinned: I ate cake.) My ‘must have food at any cost’ motive immediately kicked in, and aided by my wiry frame, I began to use my bizarre climbing abilities to scale the skyscrapers of honey jars. No-one could stop me, no-one would pull-me down, no-one could stand between me and MY cake; no-one except perhaps gravity. With each lurch I could see my goal coming ever closer, and although I could feel the distinct wobble of jars and eggs on either side of me, I ventured upwards. Meanwhile various members of the public were taking much interest in my crazy acrobatic antics that were terrorizing the honey shelves of the Amersham Tesco, and I was surprised at how many people were actually willing to take time out of their busy schedules to stand and watch an aspiring Indiana Jones in action. Mainly with their eyebrows raised.

I am pleased to announce that I got my cake and returned to earth safely without any further incident nor with the need to call the fire-brigade. However I subsequently ran into an old friend who I’d known when I was…  about 5 years old. What are you supposed to do when you run into somebody who you knew a long time ago, but have completely lost contact with? Especially in a place like a supermarket?  You used to be too well acquainted to completely ignore them and not say hello, but at the same time you haven’t seen them for so long that there are too many things that have changed and occurred for you to update them in a one-off conversation. So instead, you just stand there making small talk, and talking about… the most irrelevant thing you can think of.

“Hi there!”

“Oh wow hi! Haven’t seen you in a long time!”

“Yes, how are you?”

“I’m OK thanks… you know, just normal. How about you?”

“Oh right, that’s good... yes I’m fine… getting on with life…”

“Yes I see… so ummm… why are you here?”

“Uhhh… doing the shopping… you know…”

“Um yes of course… I’m just buying a pizza…”

“Oh cool… yeh, I once bought a pizza… it was yummy.”

“Oh right… I’m so glad.”

“…”

“…”

“Right, well, it was really nice seeing you.”

“Yeh you too… give my regards to the family.”

“Likewise. Byeeeeee.’

Completely pointless, but nevertheless, completely necessary. So I waddled over to pay for my commodities and joined the shortest queue available, which naturally, took the longest to recede. After 20 minutes of queuing and paying I left the Tesco. A labrador tottered past me with a banana in its mouth as a hysterical young child ran after it.

Whilst you’re fishing for your salmon listen to ‘Blood Bank’ by Bon Iver, and to get you through the supermarket queues, listen to ‘Dancing With Myself’ by Billy Idol.