FRIDAY 13 OCTOBER - "AND THE WINNER IS..."

Have just realised it’s Friday the Thirteenth. Well, nothing’s happened yet, so far so good. Anyway, I had a pleasant surprise when I arrived at Sainsbury’s just before lunch (no lunch again so I had to go then) - there was a big banner up saying ‘Supermarket of the Year 2006’. How exciting is that! But what on earth does it mean? Did they enter or was there a team of sleuths who went round Sainsbury’s, Waitrose, Tesco etc looking for ‘a pleasurable customer experience’, ‘quality with value’ and ‘a partnering exemplar’ and all those other phrases that mean very little to the average shopper. I will find out and report back! I wonder who came second but, more important, who came last?! Despite the bannered plaudit…… it happened. I got a wonky trolley! Doesn’t Wonky Trolley sound like a disease in Theme Hospital, almost as serious as Bloaty Head and Invisibility. Anyway, this thing had a violent twist to the left, which, although it made pushing it tough going, as my prevailing route is anti-clockwise it worked out really rather well. Had a big debate with myself about which green vegetable to buy. I know there is a well known phrase or saying, something like ‘A green a day keeps your spleen at bay’, and broccoli is just about as green a vegetable as there is. But it did seem expensive considering most of it is stalk. I have heard that people take in knives and cut off the stalk before buying broccoli because of this. I suspect this is a crime – theft, fraud, grievous broccoli harm? Anyway I settled on a baby cabbage which is just right for one. I bought another chicken this week. Oh, I took advice from an agricultural nourishment consultant (farmer) friend this week who said I needed to take off the cling film type wrapping before putting in the fridge. Why doesn’t it say this on the packaging? It was only by chance I mentioned it in passing so this problem could have persisted week in, week out and Sainsbury’s would owe me considerably more than £2.79. Talking of £2.79, I noticed that all the small chickens weighed exactly 1.3 kilograms and cost £2.79. How can this possibly be? It sounds like the humans in the film Logan’s Run who are programmed to die at 25 – perhaps these chickens are ‘managed’ (not ‘modified’ note) to die when they are a shade over 1.3 kilograms (to allow for feathers, head etc to be removed). Or maybe they are cleverly cut up but I could see no sign of any signs of this – they all had 2 legs, a breast, no beak etc. I do find this a bit unnerving but I’m not sure how I can investigate it further. You remember that I bought a bottle of Chilean wine that had 25% off, well today it’s 50% off. Needless to say I bought a bottle. I tried to buy some baked beans but could I find them? I did eventually, under ……. ‘pulses’. Whatever is a pulse? Well, the answer is ‘seeds of leguminous plants as food collectively’. So now you know! I asked about my Nectar points at the checkout again. The young man said I still had £7.50, but wasn’t sure whether this was before after today’s purchases, although he did say when I asked him why it was exactly £7.50 that he thought you get £2.50 for every 500 points. If this is true, then my balance will stay at £7.50 until I get 2000 points and then will go up to £10.00. I clearly need some tactics here – how silly it would be to cash them in now when I have 1944 points! I need to resist the temptation and wait until I have just over 2000 before taking this rash step. Clearly, I’ve not bottomed this out yet, so more on it in due course. At the checkout I noticed all sorts of leaflets for cheap loans, pet insurance and so on. I picked up the car insurance one – Little Bill says I can save up to £126 so it must be worth a try, but only if I can do it on line as I hate answering all those questions when you ring up for a quote. I asked at the enquiry desk to see the ‘Published Terms and Conditions’, as I said I would. The lady there was very helpful although thought I was completely insane (probably true). She undertook to find out and let me know in 2 weeks when she’s back from her holiday. Good for her. Both car park barriers are broken this week and the tyre squeal is getting worse – it sounds like a scene from Miami Vice now! Will have a drink of my wine tonight and toast Sainsbury’s success in becoming Supermarket of the Year 2006. Chilean wine at half price? They get my vote! I've just noticed that doughnuts on my bill cost 12p but are marked at 13p in the bakery area. For once in my life I’m ahead …

Items bought 31

Cost £50.61

Cost per item £1.63

Checkout number 23

Nectar Points balance 1944