The grocery shopping choices were limited when we were kids, not that it mattered, as we didn’t know any better.
Our only option was that of ‘Eversheds’ who, surprisingly, like Boots don’t sell boots, Eversheds didn’t sell sheds.
The game was ramped up in my teens with the opening in Hastings of a huge Tesco which, to garner publicity, as it they needed it, started offering ‘nude shopping’ once a month I believe (and no, I didn’t).
In the meantime, like most Evershed aficionados, I would go most nights round to my gran and granddad’s for tea and a chat with some local random on the CB, a time which, despite its normality and simplicity were, looking back, among the happiest times of my life.
The choice for tea with the war generation and the experience of rationing was stark, but they made do, with bacon, eggs and liver sausage being go-to favourites as I would sit and 10-4 breaker with my gramps in his workshop, covered in sawdust and the smell of pipe tobacco as we both chewed the liver sausagey goodness. Great days.
There are some improvements with choice and change, however. Although I would not class myself as ‘lazy’ per se, if I’m after a few crates of Diet Coke (why do teenagers take a sip and then go back for another can?) I would rather pay Amazon to deliver it to my doorstep to save the unedifying sight of me trying to load them into the back of a Ford Fiesta EcoBoost.
I have so far, and it's only 11am as I write on Saturday, received two deliveries this morning: one from Huel who, my brother claims was the instigator for him losing three and a half stones in seven weeks and an AeroPress from Amazon (in which to make my morning brew).
The curious thing about this delivery process however is the ‘after sales’ service.
No doubt you, as fellow purveyors of the lazy man's online purchase have, within moments of the item being dumped on your doorstep and the driver scarpering whilst not even bothering to ring the doorbell to, I surmise, save time, have been inundated with emails asking ‘how was your delivery’?
Still, feedback is a small price to pay when compared to the yesteryear alternative of an hour round trip in a DAF being driven by mother to Eversheds with the level of choice you could write on one side of a cigarette paper.
That said, I'd go back in a heartbeat to enjoy some liver sausage as what you know feels right as a comfort blanket as opposed to a dizzying choice which creates ongoing confusion and the start of a never-ending migraine.
- Brett Ellis is a teacher.
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