Harry Paterson

For the Ploff Meister

I like supermarkets. I like ‘Superstore’ supermarkets best of all. I like the anonymity their huge ebbing and flowing tides of humanity provide, their vastness and the space afforded by said vastness. You can lose yourself in them. Metaphorically speaking, of course, although small children, I’ve heard, often achieve a literal state of lostness in those towering monuments to consumerism. Sadly, I’ve never lost any of The Spawn in one but I digress. I like the convenience of having pretty much all I’m likely to need under one roof.

Also, as a man, entirely uninterested, by virtue of my maleness, in such trivia as lists of Things We Need and Things The Kids Need, I welcome the opportunity to give in to my inner nihilist, my inner anarchist and let the clench-fisted retail rebel loose. The Authorities, represented by SheWhoIsNeverWrong, may well proffer The List with the gravity and solemnity usually reserved for US Chiefs of Staff issuing Presidents with key codes for first strike nuclear attacks, but I care not. Lists are ignored and, instead, the euphoria and sense of liberation that accompany my guerrilla shopping sprees is embraced.

Witness the reckless abandonment with which I scorn ‘something for tea on Tuesday’ and settle, instead, on a tempting caramel cheesecake. Gasp at my audacity as I contemptuously disregard ‘bathroom cleaner’ and in its place secure a discounted six-pack of Caffrey’s excellent Irish ale.

Insofar as one can be said to swagger while pushing a trolley, one with the ubiquitous sticky back wheel, I swagger. I am a buccaneer, a swashbuckling pirate, sailing my trolley-ship across the Asda Seas in search of the treasure, booty and plunder to be found on Frozen Food Island and around the Magazines Peninsula. Me hearties.

As always, though, one’s conscience irritatingly makes its sanctimonious presence felt. Albeit, in my case, in the guise of a loved one.

The Auld Yin, by virtue of being both my Dad and a cantankerous and argumentative auld sod, enthusiastically embraces any opportunity to dismantle my “limp-wristed, bleeding-heart, do-gooder, namby-pamby liberalism”. With a glee that can only be described as vigorous, he usually assumes the role of said conscience.

“Some socialist you are! Giving your money to the big chain stores and you know who owns Asda, don’t you? Aye, that’s right; Wal-Mart. The Yanks! That’s why high streets and small retailers are dying out. You and people like you are killing them. Support your local businesses, that’s what I always say”

And so, reluctantly, and with a measure of dread, I decided, one day, to avoid driving blithely by our corner shop, en route to retail heaven, and instead afford the smaller outlet the benefit of my patronage.

The fun started the moment I tried to access the premises where my local retailer plied his trade. First, there was the assortment of sullen, pasty-faced and track-suited youths loitering in the middle of the entrance. A forest of bobbing baseball caps and jerky hand gestures punctuated a conversation sprinkled with “innit” ‘Bled” and “safe” as they, oblivious or simply unconcerned by my plight, continued their impenetrable discourse. The clutter of ridiculously tiny bicycles scattered at their feet added an additional obstacle to my endeavours.

I coughed. Politely, I thought. One choice specimen, with the cold dead eyes of a shark and a forehead oddly resembling a Victorian wash basin, stared challengingly at me.

“ ‘scuse me, pal” I offered.
“Eh?”
“I said ‘excuse me’. You’re blocking the entrance”
The urban ritual of staring someone down continued for a few seconds before he grudgingly, slowly and with attitude, made way.

Already my mood had turned foul and black and my altruistic efforts to ‘support local businesses’ had barely commenced. I feared that contemplating how quickly I could have disabled him with an elbow jab to the Adam’s apple, while guarding my back from the retaliatory efforts of his ‘crew’, were not conducive to the bonhomie required to interact with local retailers.

The first thing that hit me on entry was the smell. No, not the enticing aroma of breads freshly baked by some grey-haired motherly type. Nor was it the exotic pull of herbs and spices found in Asian establishments. It was B.O. Yes, body odour. A rankly unappealing combo of sweaty feet, sour sweat and something vaguely faecal-like. Delightful.

Breathing shallowly through my mouth, I inched forward a few paces and stared around. There appeared to be no order or pattern to the displays of goods. It was as if everything had been dropped in through the roof and left to rot where it fell. Worse still, marauding bands of snot-encrusted infant-demons roamed the aisles like black-hatted gunslingers taking in some R &R in a lawless border town. I fought a Dante-like compulsion to immediately proclaim the discovery of a tenth circle.

But eventually, painfully and with a new misanthropy informing my world view, I secured the items from the list of Things We Need, supplied, of course, by SheWhoIsNeverWrong and joined the queue. Ah, yes. The queue…

That great British institution that civilises and democratises so much in our lives. What could possibly be wrong with that? Well, there are the whip-thin teenage mums ramming their offspring’s conveyances into one’s ankles. There’s that. There’s the absolutely hammered, and possibly psychotic, drunk, tottering shakily in place, having a heated debate with himself. And, of course, that staple of the corner shop experience; the gossipy shrew who takes twenty minutes to buy a packet of fags and a further ten purchasing an assortment of scratch cards, all the while taking the opportunity to exchange utter inanities with her mate behind the check out. Don’t mind me, love. I’m quite happy just standing here actually seeing myself age.

All pain, though, ends eventually and so it was my turn. With a shuddering sigh of relief I hoisted my basket into place and awaited the ministrations of the hatchet-faced bingo-winged harpy whose pleasure it so clearly was to serve the public.

“No cards” she barked.
“Er, OK. I don’t actually want any cards so that’s fine”
“No. I meant we’re not taking any cards. Cash only. Right?”
“I see. Considering I, and all these people behind me, have stood here for twenty minutes while you chatted away to your mate, with all the urgency of a Gecko basking on a rock, did it not occur to you that it might have been helpful, not to mention polite, to maybe mention that fact, prior to us all wasting our time?”
“You what?”
“OK, let me put it simply. I’ve spent twenty minutes queuing, trying to avoid passing out by not breathing in that vile smell and…”
“You bleeding what, mate? You saying I smell?”
“No! I was…”
“Right, that’s it. I’m calling security. You can’t abuse me like that!”

I’ll spare you the rest. You can guess anyway. Support local businesses? Aye, right. Next time I feel the inclination to do any such supporting, I’ll be doing it with a noose and gallows.

Bastards…