Shopophobe


I've never been much of a one for shopping. Security staff scrutinise me as I stand immobilised by apathy near store exits while companions contentedly browse. The vicarage laundry basket brims because I lose the power of motion before reaching detergents at the far end of the supermarket.

In the past I surmounted this deficiency by wearing clothes till they shredded and rinsing the vicarage smalls in Head & Shoulders. Now, however, I have children and my children persist in growing and currently scarcely a month goes by without an emergency dash round shoe shops to replace essential footwear. And on these occasions I marvel that I used to deem shopping a hardship for high streets with two kids in tow are like this:

11yo: Oh my gosh, Mum, I need this pore eraser.
Me: You don't need it; you want it.
11yo: Mum, you're so medieval. Make up is my life!
9yo: What are 18 nines?
Me: Um…
11yo: I've got to get it!
Me: What is pore eraser?
9yo: MUM, 18 nines?
Me: Um ...
11yo: You don't even know what instant pore eraser is!
9yo: What are seven 14s?
Me: Um...is this homework?
9yo: I'm counting the lightbulbs in the ceiling.
11yo: Mum, I cannot live without these heels. Can you lend me the money?
9yo: Did you know there are 329 lightbulbs in the Asda in Kingston?
Me: You are not having heels like that.
9yo: There are 98 lightbulbs in this store.
11yo: Get with it, Mum! Just 'cos you wear fashion like Henry VIII in the 18th century...
Me: 16th century.
11yo: What's the point of knowing when some old king died when you don't know what instant pore eraser is!
9yo: MUM, I've just made the biggest mistake of my life!
Me: Heck, what?
11yo: Tell him not to interrupt!
9yo: MUM!
Me: Goodness, what's wrong?
9yo: I've just realised - it's not 98 lightbulbs, it's 72!

What's shopping like with your young 'uns?

Comments

  1. Michelloui | The American Resident9 February 2014 at 13:05

    Hahahaha! *puts kettle on* That was exhausting! My daughter has always been a very relucatnt shopper. Even now that she is 16 and more interested in clothes and accessories than when she was younger she is much more about going in to town for one specific thing then leaving as quickly as possible, unless of course we're going to stop for a mozzarella panini, then her day is complete. I am more of a browser, contemplating possibilities as I move through the racks of clothes. Our styles clash at times, then at other times we see the benefits of each others' method. The panini after wards is usually a reward to each other for a compromise well made!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Adventures of a Middle-aged Matron9 February 2014 at 14:22

      Your daughter would be my ideal shopping companion. Although, for a panini I'd browse with you for as long as it took!

      Delete
  2. Iota 9 February 2014 at 15:26

    "I know these trainers are £95, but that's because they've got special built-in in-step support. Think how often you spend £95 on yourself, or Dad does. You know how important sport is to me. And I've been injured. This is a health issue, and you always say it's important to look after ourselves. You say that, and then you won't EVEN buy some trainers which will REALLY help me with my injury. Why do you say things, and then not even mean them?"

    Perhaps that isn't entirely typical, but it was yesterday's experience.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Iota 9 February 2014 at 15:27

    And it carried on for ages once we'd got home (without trainers).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Adventures of a Middle-aged Matron9 February 2014 at 16:46

      Goodness, our daughters must have been separated at birth!

      Delete
    2. Iota 9 February 2014 at 17:42

      Son... The Imelda Marcos of sports shoes.

      Delete
  4. Older Mum12 February 2014 at 17:37

    Brilliant.... I nearly had to reach for the drugs after that. Can't imagine where your head was at :o). Fortunately Little A likes shopping with me, unfortunately she wants everything we walk past, 'mummy, can I have a treat.' (it's only going to get worse). X

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Adventures of a Middle-aged Matron13 February 2014 at 09:56

      I found pocket money stopped that. Once they twigged they could only have what they could afford with their weekly quid they learnt the art of saving and stopped pestering for presents. Now, five years on, they assume that if they want something they have to pay for it - including instant pore eraser!

      Delete
  5. Flossing the Cat13 February 2014 at 10:52

    Food shopping with the little uns is no fun either. If you ever happen to be shopping in a Grotesco Extra in north west Cardiff, please feel free to say hello. I will be the one in the crisps and treats aisle, staring catatonically into space, as three small children chant and dance ritualistically around me, clutching produce.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Daily Mail Columnists Should Wear Burkas

Daily Mail columnist Liz Jones has provoked the ire of Twitter with by declaring that mummy bloggers are blinkered dimwits whose lives are spiced by Napisan. I'm afraid I have to sympathise with her, for all of her prejudices echo my own: Writing about my life has pretty much ruined it. Supper last night was an elderly carrot glued to the fridge shelf by a pool of brown mucus and the floor was flooded when I left the bath taps running because Blogger has diverted me from domestic essentials. I've had to shut the children in front of the television when a new post has assailed me and some family members no longer speak to me because Twitter interactions leave me no time to reach the telephone. But there is a big part of me that thinks writing should be hard: you should cringe whenever you press that 'publish' button. Artists – and I'm sorry, I do consider myself an artist – have to wrench the dirtiest, most disgusting part of their inner soul and show it t...
Read more

The Various Uses of Rubber

I have ordered a new pair of wellies from Amazon for the daily walk to school. My current hardly-at-all-old pair has developed a fissure along one toe. I only noticed this when I was wading along the stream that flows brownly past bobbing Argos bags en route to the afternoon pick up, and I was not pleased. They are a glamorous pair with pink spots and white swirls, bought to ease my daughter's pain in ackowledging a wellie-wearing, stream-paddling mother in public. I now distrust wellies with spots and swirls, so order a safe-looking green pair. Better to be waterproof than glamorous. Royal Mail gets them as far as my door, thrusts through a 'Sorry you were out' card, and promptly loses them. Amazon is sympathetic and dispatches a replacement pair. This also makes it to my door and again a card is left. This time I decide to pick them up in person from the Royal Mail depot. The man behind the glass screen makes off with my delivery card and probably has a cup of tea and...
Read more

A DIY Guide to the Middle-Classes

I wonder sometimes what I am. I have lived the last decade on an inner city council estate, amid Oxford academia, in a remote country town and in London suburbia. In the first we were, with our relentless consonants and sagging bookshelves, regarded as aristocrats. In the second, as the 'squeezed middle'. In the third, as city sophisticates and now, sometimes, isolated in my tweed amid the Ralph Lauren and the hoodies, I feel myself a bumpkin. Class should no longer matter. Nowadays, for most of us, it's more a question of perception than birth. But the perception matters. My daughter battles to adjust speech, habits and dress to blend in with each new environment; the political parties compete to woo the amorphous throng they deem Middle England and Melvyn Bragg has started a television series on class and culture. The British, he decides, no longer define themselves by class, but by the music they listen to, the books they read. I listen to Dolly Parton and Beethoven....
Read more