Don't blame me when there are polar bears drowning in the duck pond
I ONCE got trapped in the ‘Green Checkout’ at Waitrose. I had a hundred quid’s worth of shopping on the conveyor belt and when I asked for some carrier bags I was told that they didn’t have any - this was the checkout for people who had their own Bags For Life.
“OK”, I said. “Can you ask the next checkout girl to pass you some bags so I have something to put my shopping in?”
Err, no, they couldn’t. This was the Green Checkout, and therefore I couldn’t have any carrier bags. So I did what any normal person would do and walked off, leaving a pile of shopping for them to clear while the queue of smarmy, self-satisfied, middle class yoghurt-knitters tutted into their hessian tote bags.
For some reason (I believe it might be an attempt to regulate my Chardonnay consumption) Mrs Beelzebub this week decided to order online and have the shopping delivered, rather than trek the 10 miles to the supermarket. So the Waitrose van turned up this morning, as promised, and decanted £70 worth of shopping in an astonishing TEN bags – three of them heavy-duty affairs and the other seven fancy plastic efforts. One bag had a single bottle of wine in it (see what I mean?); another contained just a small box of tea bags.
Ten bags. Ten effing bags. I asked the driver if he wanted to hang on a minute while I unpacked the shopping so he could have them back. Not allowed, apparently. I had to keep them.
Well thank you, Waitrose, with your shiny green credentials. I shall now have to fire up the 4x4 and take this excess baggage to the tip, so don’t come crying to me when there are polar bears drowning in the duck pond.
posted by BarryBeelzebub @ 4:34 AM
5 Comments:
In the SandLands, we still have bag-packers to load our groceries into plastic bags for us.
But try to prevent excessive bag use at your peril! I found a bag of bread rolls in its own carrier bag yesterday, and that inside a larger bag like a set of polythene Russian dolls. And the eggs, again in their own carrier bag inside a bigger bag.
I suspect Mr Baggins is on commission, based on how many tonnes of yellow plastic end up blowing around the streets.
BTW Baz, after remonstrating with Frodo, I got £70-worth into three bags total - but this is rather more to do with the cost of basic foodstuffs than saving polar-bears. No booze in my local supermarket :-(
This sums up most of the green propaganda we are subjected to every day. Few people would deny that we should act in a way that is best for our environment, but many of the "green" measures that are imposed upon us do little, if any, good when you think it through. Most are money making schemes (carrier bags) or tax raising (car taxes, low emission zones) and some are just born out of ignorance (the campaign against 4x4s). Few of these ideas stand up to any serious consideration, if you actually check the facts and think it thought properly.
Did anyone hear about the initiative a few weeks ago when we were all urged to switch off all our lights for an hour one Saturday evening? One idiot where I work was going to invite friends around to sit in the dark for an hour, no doubt holding hands and humming. You could probably have tasted the smugness at the end of that hour. But what would it all achieve, as a one off gesture, even it hadn't been such a badly-supported flop?
Oh, in case you are wondering, I didn't take part. I was driving on the M25 (in the dark) during the hour in question so I didn't think it was a good idea to switch my lights off.
Tesco has the option of ordering without bags - they come in crates which the driver will unload at your kitchen table. Trouble is I live up 3 flights of stairs so I need the bags as most of the old boys they send have dodgy knees.
Tea bags? I thought you had more class than that. Get yourself a teapot and tea strainer and do the job properly, man.
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