Sunday, March 8, 2009

The perils of shopping in WHSmith

A long silence from me, thanks to the very sad and unexpected death of my father-in-law, which kind of wiped us out for a month. 

He lived in South Wales, and for the last three weeks so was I.  Abergavenny is a beautiful place and I'm really missing it since being back.  

Anyway, one day last week I had to go from Wales up to Leicester for a meeting, and changed at Birmingham New Street.  It was the day after the funeral and I was hungover, and went into Smith's to buy a bottle of water.  As I walked up to the counter, before I got there, the assistant scanned a copy of the Daily Telegraph, ringing it up on the till, and held it out to me.

Me: I don't want a Daily Telegraph.

Her: You get the water free with the paper.

Me: But I don't want the paper.  I just want the water.

Her: But you'll save 60p!

Me: No, the paper's 90p, so it would cost me 30p more.

Her: But you get the water for free!

Me: I don't want a copy of the Daily Telegraph.  I just want to buy a bottle of water.

Her: But I've already rung it through the till now. 

Me: Well, I didn't ask you to.

There was a queue by this time.  Clearly thinking I was insane, she cancelled the Daily Telegraph and rang up the water.  Then:

Her: Big bar of Aero for just a pound with any purchase?

And off we went again...

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