Village Squire, 1976-05, Page 21BY IRENE McBRIDE.
In pre -inflation days we had always
shopped full speed ahead but, as the business
of suiting purchases to pocket grew more
distasteful, we found it easy to break the four
minute mile with little, or no, effort.
If spending thirty dollars took half an hour
two years ago and only takes five minutes
now it becomes obvious what the experts
mean when they say people have more leisure
time.
Of course they do; two pounds of sugar,
seven chicken legs, and ten tea bags don't
take a lot of time in the gathering and there's
the food money shot for another week.
As the race against rising prices grew more
intense, without warning, 1 found I was
stricken by a strange malady. I would wake on
the morning of shopping day with the
premonition of impending disaster. My
lack -lustre eyes would stare back at me from
the bathroom mirror while I slowly
disappeared from view as my knees grew
weak and buckled beneath me.
Later, summoning all my' resources, I
would take a bus down to the supermarket
without digging too deep into the food money
but, all the way down town, I would be fidgety
and wishing I was home.
After the shopping had been completed I
would feel an awful sensation of distress; my
knees too weak to climb the bus steps. There
was only one answer - the expense of a taxi.
Next would come a worrying ride home;
perhaps the driver would get my groceries
mixed up with the others in the trunk. The
cab had to be shared with four other
shoppers; nu meter. Where had this awful,
Just the thought
of shopping
drove her crazy
dithering anxiety come from?
No sooner was the last cupboard door
closed and the last paper sack put away than I
would experience a feeling of imminent
martyrdom invade my nervous system. Just
seven more short days, and seeming shorter
all the time, then this whole shopping fiasco
would be on me again.
It hit me with the force of a hurricane; 1'd
got them - the dreaded Shopping Shakes!
This disease is characterized by malnutri-
tion, wild mutterings and shaking anxiety.
Some of the most severely stricken have been
observed turning upside-down their open,
and empty, purses and wallets, shaking them
violently and making lost mewing sounds.
The Shopping Shakes are Nforld wide; they
are in epidemic proportions; a universal
calamity that attacks women severely. No
doctor seems to have sounded the alarm bell;
could it be that doctors don't want mass
hysteria?
So it seems that the female population of
the world must be condemned to suffer the
Shopping Shakes to he end of their days.
The awareness of what I was suffering from
struck me with sudden force but the affliction
must have been creeping up, insidiously, for
months.
One side effect of the Shopping Shakes can
be very dangerous to meandering pedestri-
ans. It hal been observed that women,
driving home from supermarkets are very
erratic. You can recognize them when they
ask for fifty -cents worth of regular at the gas
station. If you absolutely must cross between
intersections just be sure that the car hurtling
towards you.. is driven by a man. A woman,
fresh from the stores and in the throes of the
Shopping Shakes, sees you as just so many
steaks or calories, depending on her girth.
She is not to be blamed; her vision is 'Iuric"i
as she drives on the outside and weeps on the
inside.
I .had various ideas on how to combat my
problem. Why be bothered with fabric
softener, I asked myself. Mother always got
by without it. Aug, but mother didn't have an
electric dryer. I found I was dragging a long
string of bristly, sparking and stabbing
unmentionables from the dratted thing.
Not daunted, 1 turned my attention to
starch. Spray starch was the most expensive
so back to the powdered kind. Then I
•remembered corn starch and was delighted
that we could eat and stiffen up out of the
same box. This brought a little joy to my day
but, alas, the Shopping Shakes were still with
me.
So, without much luck in my efforts to bring
my shopping bills down, I tried to put some
pleasure into my shopping trips by treating
myself to a little party. A few forays into
snack bars soon had me convinced that the
cash registers in those places were only
adding to my already acute symptoms and the
snacks were undoubtedly adding to my girth.
There seems to be no cure for the Shopping
Shakes but I have hit upon a plan to postpone
attacks and it will work for you if you can give
it the old might and main.
Skimp just a little every day and shop one
day later every week. If you can make seven
days groceries last for eight days you will find
that in seven weeks you will have a full weeks
food money to spare.
This plan necessitates buying the odd little
extra to spin out the weeks food; perhaps a
dozen eggs for omelettes on that additional
day.
At the end of the seventh week you will be
so pleased with yourself you'll feel like a
millionaire. With your windfall you can have a
good meal out without falling prey to cash
register tremors or you can buy yourself a
present; that way, for an hour or so, you will
be able to pretend that the Shopping Shakes
went away.
VILLAGE SQUIRE/MAY 1976, 19