BRENDAN O’CONNOR

Excitement of the Big Shop is running low

THE elder daughter comes on the weekly shop with me. She is now allowed to actually come into the shop rather than just sit in the car. I can tell this week she thinks it’s not as fun as it used to be. I suppose it was more exotic before, when it was the only place we went all week, and the roads were deserted, and you might get stopped by the guards. We added a stop in Aldi a few weeks ago, which injected some novelty into the proceedings. But it doesn’t feel as adventurous anymore.

In the early days, it was me and her heading off for a little look around, going a little bit outside our 2km, having the random chats, getting away from the other two. Now it’s more like just a chore, messages to be got, but with the added pressure of trying to buy everything we need for the week. This involves checking dates on everything, looking in at the back for better dates, often being unable to get what we are supposed to get, because either it’s not there or the date isn’t good enough on something that we aren’t scheduled to eat until, say, Friday.

It also means somehow buying too much food. I suppose the reality is that, in normal life, we wouldn’t have seven dinners in a week. Some evenings we’d just graze or do something with a couple of eggs. But now we panic-buy dinners for every evening because there is absolutely no way we are going to the shop again until next week. I don’t even know if that’s rational anymore, to avoid the shops so much. There are never any big queues anymore, and the supermarket doesn’t feel as uncomfortable and dangerous as it used to. But the Big Shop is part of our pandemic pathology now. It’s one of those things that gets us through the week.

And maybe with me and her, neither of us wants to suggest we stop, or that she doesn’t come. We don’t want to hurt each other right now.

It’ll have to stop soon, though. Or I will explode.

I had decided not to pay any attention to weight right now, figuring it was one of those things that I would deal with if and when ‘normal’ resumes. But when you’re down to just two pairs of pants that fit you, and when you get reminded every morning that you can’t fit into the clothes you want to wear, then it’s hard to ignore it.

I know why I am expanding. One thing is the lunches. I was never a lunch person really. Back in the previous life, when I worked in an office, I might have soup or whatever. But lunch wasn’t a major meal for me. Now that we cling to any bit of joy we can find, lunch has become something of an event.

Part of it is that I keep seeing these things in the supermarket that I feel we should try because I deserve it right now, and because it might help get us through an hour or a day. So I end up picking up the tub of chicken-and-stuffing sandwich mix in Aldi, or packets of fancy cold meat in Marks. And then of course you need bread.

And then, of course, for what you might laughingly call exercise, some days we cycle to Bread 41 on Pearse Street, and while you’re there you might as well buy some cruffins (it’s a croissant crossed with a muffin — you can imagine), or whatever else they have, because we deserve it, and it might help.

And the bread is amazing, but you need to eat it within three days (toast the third day). This means that despite having got everything we need and more on the weekly shop, there are these little top-ups of bread and treats. And that’s before our own in-house bakery kicks in with maybe some brookies (a brownie crossed with a cookie — you can imagine).

When we get home from the supermarket, and the other two unpack the shopping, because that is their designated bit of weekly excitement, I start getting anxious, because I realise I have bought too much food.

So then it becomes my mission to finish things off. To get the relief and satisfaction of seeing empty containers go in the bin, and to see the fridge empty by the following week, so that there’s no waste, and I can convince myself as I head off again that I didn’t buy too much the last time.

For example, today I had a chicken-and-stuffing sandwich for lunch, which in itself is not something I should be doing. Then I noticed that the loaf of bread was nearly gone and the chicken-and-stuffing mix was near the end as well. And I already had a chickenand-stuffing sandwich yesterday, so I’m not going to have one again tomorrow.

So the only answer was to toast the last of the bread and put the last of the chicken-and-stuffing mix in it, and have a second chicken-and-stuffing sandwich. I wolfed it down so I could get the joy of putting the chicken-and-stuffing container in the bin. You see how this is working. I feel like one of those geese they forcefeed to make fois gras, except I need my expanding organs to still work.

I’ve made a start on copping on. I am trying to progress the unlocking of my trousers. I didn’t buy my weekly supply of biscuits this week. The child imitated me to her mother later on. Picking them up, and then looking at them, and then reluctantly, sadly, putting them back. I’ll see how that goes for now, and I might try and cut out the bread next week.

No wonder she thinks the shopping isn’t as much fun.