"I have lost the will to live."
I made the mistake of going to the nearby 24 hour Sainsbury's on the 23rd December. I usually eschew supermarkets and shop locally. Still, I was buying an unconscionable amount of food and booze (particularly for these straightened times) so I bit the bullet. It is one of these supermarkets which sells everything and it was the busiest shops I have ever been in; the aisles were clogged like a Mumbai rush hour. It was after watching some old lady bash her cart repeatedly, bumper car style, into a man's cart that was in the middle of the aisle, that another woman near to me said she had lost the will to live and abandoned her cart, strode purposefully out of the store, to presumably down a dozen whiskies at the nearest pub, while absently toying with the loaded pistol in her hands.
Forced to meander in a slow zombie stroll through the shop I witnessed heaps of shopping stress. A couple argued violently over the turkey or goose conundrum. 'No sprouts this year,' a man said defiantly, then started meekly filling a bag, cowed by his wife's thunderous face. The best was a middle aged man and his frail elderly mother, unsteady on her feet and seemingly barely in control of an overstuffed cart. 'Just keep going, Mum,' the man implored. 'Keep going?' she wailed, 'I can barely walk!'
Still, I had quite a fine Yuletide, chock full of my famous nut roast, a rather tipsy Christmas Day featuring a few spirited games of Cranium (the cheaters won), and the briefest of moments where I contemplated going to Midnight Mass. The five hour time difference between here and the States once again proved to be a Christmas Day minefield. I called home at about 9 pm GMT after drinking steadily since about 11 am. Sure I may have said a few injudicious things, but I have no regrets; my five year old cousin would have eventually found out that Santa isn't real.
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