FRIDAY 9 JANUARY 2007 - BERNARD MATTHEWS TURKEYS 'THEY'RE FLUTIFUL ...'

Spooky. First I say I'm going to buy some Sainsbury's shares (still not done) and the share price jumps. Then, I give Bernard Matthews a bit of a hard time and ... well you know what's happened. Whatever next? These kind of things come in threes so as sure as eggs is eggs something or someone I mention will have good or bad news within a week or so! Well, what about Bernard Matthews then? The latest news is that he lied about bringing in birds from his 'processing plant' (whatever is that?) in flu ridden Hungary. If that's true (that he lied) then I'm afraid that he deserves whatever dire consequences comes his way as a result. It sounds very much like foot & mouth which as I recall was spread by one trader who trucked infected sheep around the country (is it really necessary to cart animals round the country like this?). And it looks like its happening again - bird flu being spread by one trader trucking turkeys around Europe. When will we ever learn? Not 'boooootiful' but 'floooootiful'! Anyway, enough of that and on to the much more interesting tale of my weekly shop, which actually was pretty dull. In at lunchtime and very quiet - probably because it's f****** freezing outside. First, the duvets (you'll remember these have taken over from the wooden boxes which have gone to the great sawmill in the sky). Well, they're still here and it looks like very few, if any, have sold as the pile is still pretty impressive. The down has not gone down! I can't see them still being there next week, I'm afraid. Next, pains. Pains? Yes, 'petit pains' which I think is French for small rolls (this reminds me, I once heard a French girl try to say 'wholemeal rolls' - great sport, if you know a Frenchie give it a go). Anyway Sainsbury's bake them in store and sell them in 2s and 4s. They look very nice and the French name on the label gives them a little more je ne sais quoi but the problem is they always seem to be stale! I have bought them in the past to find the next day, even though still in date, they have turned into 'petit rochers' and have to be fed to my brown friend outside the back door. So, tempting as they were I bought some rolls with poppy seeds on instead. Are they really poppy seeds I wonder or is this just shopspeak for black bits? OK, on to my prawns which this week were 'Caught in the North West or North East Atalntic Ocean'. I think Sainsbury's are warming to my advice to just label them as 'From anywhere other than the UK' and being done with it! Something that warmed my heart today happened during my lamb chops purchasing decision-making process. As I was thrusting aside the New Zealand lamb (God only knows the food miles involved in bringing lamb all the way from New Zealand) I came across some Welsh lamb chops. OK, nothing too unusual in that but on the pack there was a photograph of one of Sainsbury's lamb suppliers, in this case David Williams from Powys. He looks like a decent, honest and hardworking individual and the Welsh name, ruddy face, 5 bar gate and grassy slope behind all added to the heartwarmingness of it all. Great! At the check out I felt like a real regular customer as I now recognise and am on monosyllabic speaking terms with a few of the cashiers. I haven't progressed beyond 'I'll manage' when asked if I want help packing but in another few weeks the queue behind me will be miles long as I chat to Danuta, Mikela, Bronsk, Stronk etc about the weather, Nectar points, Basics and the like. But this was tempered by the fact that 'The Big 5 Drive' is no more! It only lasted from 10 January until 6 February and not having won I never got the chance to find out what happened to the lucky winners. How very disappointing. If any of my reader (sic) did win please e-mail me and let me know what happened! Maybe I'll buy a lottery ticket instead to cheer myself up, but then again perhaps not as, having mentiond it here, Camelot will no doubt suffer a major disaster before I've collected my jackpot (£10) win.

Items bought 31

Cost £43.86

Average cost per item £1.41

Checkout number 17

Nectar Points balance 332