Do we have to???
Impulse buying for me, has this ability to evoke certain blood thumping emotions. It must be a man thing – one of them that easily defines an exercise in futility if you try to understand it. There are certain conversations that trigger such emotions – say, like “let’s just pop into the supermarket for a sec and grab some things” or “I’m thinking of grabbing a few bits before we get home”. They have a similar effect to the male psyche when we hear statements like “we have to talk” or “sweetie, I missed my period” or “babes, you remember when I told you that…” – yeah! That kind of feeling.
So when a pit stop at a Tesco petrol station this week turned into a shopping expedition in the supermarket next door, my body defaulted to the “I don’t really wanna be hear” mode. There’s just something about shopping that repels my DNA, and while I accept that it’s a necessity in life, there’s a very big difference between picking a few bits and bobs and going out for “shopping”. I never really get to know how much drama is involved until that humongous trolley is pulled from the trolley parking zone and before I can even utter the words “do we really need this giant thing for a few bits”, there’s that almost dismissive “we’re here anyway, I think we should just do all the shopping now” response, served straight with her ‘“what you gon do’ face.
Well, one option is to go back to the car, roll the chair down and just sink off into the music, but once you’ve reached the stage of being at the supermarket door and seeing that ‘what you gon do’ face, you’ll swiftly rule out this option with a quick reminder not to get out of the car next time. Call it the pragmatism of maintaining world peace and harmony. But even then, world peace has its own casualties, and for me, its that nightmare of being in a mega store that I really don’t want to be in.
I don’t know what it is, I’ve just never liked long shopping trips. Even in my bachelor days, I wrote up a list and either made a painful trip with a very short and specific mission of getting only what was on the list, or I sweet talked a shopaholic friend to do the honours for me. I don’t remember taking many supermarket trips during college as I was broke most of the time anyway. In fact, I spent more time in the store cafeteria having a meal because of their unbelievable bargains than I did while shopping.
Online shopping was God sent. Whoever thought that folks can just sit at home, browse what they need on the web, click a few buttons and lo and behold, a chap would appear at your door with your groceries is a saint. I became a sucker for typing what I needed in the search box, ticking the check box and adding it to my shopping basket.
I guess my laziness in anything shopping doesn’t prepare me well for the sights and sounds of the modern supermarket. At least with a shopping list, you can make a quick bee line for what you need and you’re out of the place in a short time. Most supermarkets even allow you to check out your own groceries with this hand held thingybob so that you don’t waste time smiling with folks in the queue for the till and for nosy people to peer into your trolley to examine your habits.
So this time, I resolved that I should indulge in the spirit – you never know, I might like it and its better than precipitating an atmosphere that could easily land me on the sofa. I’d already lost the battle of staying in the car.
‘Er indoors however, enjoys going through the whole supermarket, aisle by aisle. I’m made to understand that this is a normal state of affairs. I never even knew that a supermarket could have a whole aisle of bread and bready like products. I think actually what surprised me more is that we spent more than 15 minutes in this bread aisle looking for cheap, good quality bread. You see, where I come from, bread is either cheap or it’s good quality but it’s not both. So this is a totally new concept for me. It also occurred to me that I didn’t know the price of a loaf of bread…Is this normal? Actually, forget I asked….
Let’s just say that the trip to grab a few bits and bobs ended us with a huge trolley that I could easily sit comfortably in being full with stuff that I didn’t even realise we needed in the house. Just set aside the fact that we were meant to do this shopping anyway, it’s just that we moved from “let’s just pick a few bits and bobs” to a full blown shopping trip under duress.
There was a bonus though – I got to understand those figures in my bank statement better. Like I said before, the price that I thought bread was apparently was the price in 1996. Go figure.
Next time, I’m carrying my 12 point guide to shopping for men who have to do it under duress. Guys, this was sent to me a few years back by a friend and it works if you’re dragged kicking and screaming for them shopping trips. I should have had it with me. Health warning though: You might end up in the doghouse, or worse still, the only hanky panky you’ll be getting for a while is from late night adult TV subscription.
My fellow brethren, if you’re dragged into a shopping trip under duress, this is what you should do to get out of it next time:
- Take boxes of condoms and randomly put them into people’s trolleys when they aren’t looking.
- Walk up to an employee, tap them on the shoulder and say in an official sounding voice “code 3 in house ware” and then watch what happens.
- Move the ‘CAUTION: Wet floor’ sign to a carpeted area.
- Make a trail of tomato juice on the floor leading to the feminine products aisle.
- Set off all the alarms in house ware to go off in 5 minute intervals.
- Set up a tent in the outdoors clothes department and tell the customers that you’ll only invite them in if they bring sausages and a gas stove.
- When the manager asks if they can help you, just burst out crying and scream “why can’t you people just leave me alone?”
- While picking and choosing kitchen knives in the housewares area, approach a member of staff with the knives in hand and ask them where the anti depressants are.
- Hide in the clothing rack and when people are browsing, yell “pick me, pick me”
- Run around the supermarket suspiciously humming loudly to the theme tune of Mission Impossible
- When an announcement comes over the loud speakers, coil down in a foetal position and scream “No, no, no – it’s those voices again”
- Walk into a changing room and lock yourself in, and after a while, shout loudly “there’s no toilet paper in here”
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Tags: Shopping
July 24th, 2009 at 6:20 pm
LOL! I’m yet to meet a man who enjoys shopping.
That ’shopping guide’ has just killed me! *dead*
July 24th, 2009 at 6:34 pm
Sibbie.
Men who love shopping are indeed a very rare breed..we’re not just wired that way.
Believe, that guide will get you out of any shopping jam…
July 24th, 2009 at 8:38 pm
LOL,LOOOOOOOOOOOOOL, how do I write “constantly smiling” in LOL language?
So did you find the cheap,good quality bread? And you are still riding on 1996 prices? Dude? You need to watch “spendaholics”- BBC3 or something.
As for your shopping guide- deadly. Too funny. But I promise you I am trying out number 7 at the next person who says ” can I help you.”
Number 11 will be tried out in Marks and Spencer.
I think I might get arrested if I try number 2.
July 25th, 2009 at 8:49 am
ati your wife is called “Er Indoors”… i like. I will admit, I used to drag him shopping sometimes and that face of “do we have to” used to kill me till I stopped dragging him. And what is this thing of thinking ati you can just buy exactly what is on the list.. doesn’t work like that! lol
July 25th, 2009 at 8:50 am
oh and why is it all guys seem shocked at the price of stuff.. same reaction from hubby on some things and I am like.. ala! what did you think??
July 25th, 2009 at 10:09 am
@3, conventional wisdom suggests that cheap and good quality are a mutually exclusive state of affairs. White sliced bread does it for me – the kind that doesn’t fall apart when you try to butter the little bugger.
As for the price of bread, I guess I have to compound the retail price index since 1996…LOL! Honestly, its not everyday that I wake up and think “Hmm! I wonder how much bread costs these days”…Even if I surmized that it’s too expensive, what choice do I really have?
@Mrembo, LOL – the term ‘er indoors was coined some time back by a British comedian in a sitcom to describe the missus when he was talking about her. I guess it’s now common cockney (London area) slang to describe the wife or girlfriend.
As for prices of stuff, around the house, I probably know the price of a six pack of beer better than I would washing up liquid. I rationalize this by accepting that I don’t hold the monopoly of having absolutely no clue about what different types of groceries cost week by week. I mean – they change them all the time, right??? I’ve just accepted that the entry in the bank statement that’s attributed to shopping is beyond my sphere of influence – kinda like birth control.
July 25th, 2009 at 11:16 am
Har har har! Interesting strategies right there… Its my mum who used to drag me along in those shopping safaris of hers and I more than once thought of vanishing in between a few mattresses!
July 25th, 2009 at 11:32 am
Jakamo yawa. I have surrendered that vibe! Its just shopping! its supposed to liberate you and make you feel better when you are low. you should try it more often it actually works miracles in stress relief. You just need to drop the attitude that it will be emotionally distressing and enjoy the moment while it lasts.
July 25th, 2009 at 8:44 pm
er indoors …seriously! I also don’t know any man who enjoys shopping. In fact just yesterday my bro reminded me a shopping trip in 2000/1 that he will never forget. He promised he’ll never go shopping with us (the wife and I) again! That’s a really long time ago and he remembers so yeah I hear you! We wired that way so the best thing is to have a sixth sense of when we want to shop.
But you’re too funny dude.
As for that list..lmao
July 26th, 2009 at 9:51 pm
Lmao!!
Nice one,how about a guide for chics who dont like the supermarket trips :p
July 26th, 2009 at 10:42 pm
@Willpress. The jury’s still out as to whether its less painful to shop with a mother as opposed to a wife/girlfriend. Your worst case scenario is if they both shop together and they force you to accompany them. At least with your mother, you can tell her you’re not going and your busy doing somethin, and as much as she can be pissed at you, it’ll pass – believe me that a wife/girlfriend wields so much more power than your mother by virtue of the silent punishments she can unleash onyou…she won’t starve you…LOL!, that’s inhuman, but believe you me, there’s some things you won’t see for a long time…
@Mystic my dear – retail therapy has never worked for most men I know. Believe that venus mars thing – we’re just wired differently and shopping (usually under duress) just induces that stress…LOL! What’s with just walking around looking at stuff that I don’t want to buy?
Farmgal – please tell your bro I want to buy him a beer…LOL! Regarding having a 6th sense, I think we get to a stage where we have to choose exactly what we second guess from your actions. Women expect men to read all these signs instead of starting from the position that folks aren’t necessarily sharp and are not adept at reading code. So when you ask us to read the code that says “shopping time is here” – I kid you not, that signal is way past the end of the peckign order of things to think about right between ‘dish washers don’t load themselves’ and ‘you have to take out the trash, that equal opps thing doesn’t work for trash’…
@Gladys – I think with chic’s, it would be more useful to write up a strategy for avoiding watching football matches. There’s nothing as annoying as hanging out with a chic who clearly has no clue what’s cutting during a match and is trying to keep up appearances to please her mano. The alternative is to get hitched to a chic who loves and knows her football. At least my wife is a diehard Chelsea fan (yeah – folks ask me how an Arsenal fanatic like me lives with a Chav supporter, but stranger things have happened I tell you). She’s the type who shouts down the dodgy referee and curses out at the telly when things are not working for her team – you’d be proud of her if you see her in action.
July 27th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
darius i am a woman but somehow this shopping thing doesnt do it for me too
July 28th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
I believe I’m wired a bit differently, I love impulse buying. I love walking down the aisles at the supermarkets looking at various products. I could spend just as much time in the juices aisle as in the electronics aisle. That said, I don’t quite like it when I’m dragged along into other people’s version of the above. I believe the term I’m looking for is ’selfish’.
p.s. I hate to be a pedant but there’s a typo in the 1st sentence of the 2nd paragraph.
p.p.s. I’m a bit of an amateur psychology buff. Specifically, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator model (http://momaalim.blogspot.com/2008/10/its-m-to-b-to-t-to-iiii.html). Does this sound like you? – http://www.typelogic.com/intj.html , http://www.bestfittype.com/intj.html
July 28th, 2009 at 3:04 pm
Mo.
You are most definitely a patient fella – if I stood that long at the juice aisle, they’ll probably call security to check if I need any help…LOL
Very intriguing about your psych analysis of the Stone Cold gentleman. I’ve regularly undertaken MBTi analysis either for job interviews or during team building exercises and INTJ is a familair state of affairs for me…LOL. Anyone who knows me well will not argue about an INTJ profile with my name on it. See if my Confessions of the Stone Kind (a bit of a window into the life of Stone) agrees with your psych analysis.
July 28th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
“See if my Confessions of the Stone Kind (a bit of a window into the life of Stone) agrees with your psych analysis.”
It certainly does. I came to the INTJ conclusion a long while from several of your posts but hesitated to mention it as some people either think it’s an absurd pseudoscience or don’t quite enjoy being ‘boxed’ into 4 letters. Something a previous post of mine taught me all too well – http://momaalim.blogspot.com/2008/10/buuut-arent-we-all-same.html
July 28th, 2009 at 4:21 pm
@Mo. I’m picturing you lurking on all the blogs of KBW and psycho analysing folks for a project or something…LOL! You should get paid for it – apply for a job as a spook for NSIS. They need smart spooks instead of their Nyati house gun wielding types.
Actually forget it…LOL! I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re already a spook.
July 28th, 2009 at 8:23 pm
I’m a bit like Mo, love to wander about aimlessly checking out shoes, plates, electronics etc but hate to be dragged along to other people’s shopping trips. I hate clothes shopping (gasp), love notebook shopping.
I like to condoms bit. Just might try it at Nakumatt, then follow the person to the till
July 28th, 2009 at 8:38 pm
@Kellie, what if they are on the phone or something at the till, and the cashier swipes the box of condoms and he eventually goes home with it…LOL! And that’s how drama starts.
July 29th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
i’m thinking of number five. i’m thinking, wouldn’t it take a while to programme the thing to go off at five-minute intervals? & i’m thinking, wouldn’t somebody be suspicious of some guy tinkering with the alarms for that long? **grin** The guide killed me though
I’m one of the ‘going-slowly-thru-every-aisle’ persuasion. **double grin**
August 28th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
Why, why, why? Why would anyone hate to shop? Shopping is the reason God placed us on this earth!! Ok so I exaggerate but really!! But LOL that list is a killer!