Stockpile

Today

Went shopping at the supermarket today. It was a mixture of the usual essential top-up and getting in food for tonight's dinner with my brother and wife.

"Karen likes her G&Ts," I said to Paul "We're alright for tonic, aren't we?" "Well, I opened one during the week," he said "so I'm not sure". I said that I thought I'd seen some bottles lined up in the utility room, but decided not to interfere.

Later, in the pharmacy aisle I saw Paul clutching a pack of Paracetamol. "You are joking, aren't you?" I said "we've enough packets in the bathroom to sink the proverbial." Again I didn't argue and they were duly bought.

The fact is, I should know by now, that when Paul tells me we're a bit short on something, I'll return home to discover a bulging cupboard of this particular item. We even have a name for it "The glass cleaner syndrome" relating to a time when Paul seemed to find it necessary to top on this item until we had approximately ten bottles of the stuff.

Paul says that his anxiety dates back to the great toilet roll shortage of 1974-5, but I think that's just an excuse.

In My Day

I do like a nice full store cupboard, it's true. When I was a child, nearly all of the shopping was done locally, with Mamma walking up to the shops about a mile away and walking back with three or four laden carrier bags. These bags were made of paper with string handles and I can remember Mamma showing us the weals on her hands from the weight of the bags when she got home. Greengroceries were delivered, I believe. Sometimes we'd go on the bus to Crystal Palace to buy items or to the Surrey Street market in Croydon (I remember the cabbage leaves lying in the gutters).

So it must have been quite hard to set up and maintain a store cupboard. However, we did, with things like flour, cocoa, dried and crystallised fruit, packet soup mix, tinned fruit, salad cream and luncheon meat. I often wonder how it differs from mine, with its sun dried tomatoes, tins of dolmades, olive oils and balsamic vinegars, packets of pasta, several types of rice and a full range of Indian spices.

Somethings are truly not the same today as they were then; the crystallised fruits that Mamma bought were great slices of citrus peel with lumps of faintly orangey sugar stuck to them (which we'd eat if we could get our hands on them). I only ever see ready-chopped peel these days and it looks so unappetisingly mingy that I often avoid it in recipes altogether.

After we got home with the shopping I checked and told Paul that we have enough Paracetamol in the bathroom, not counting what we'd bought today or what might be in other rooms or handbags, to cure 28 headaches or level one hangovers.