Puppy fur bog rolls anyone?

Supermarkets are like...

I'll just apologise in advance that this post isn't as profound as the previous one. Sorry, but I just can't profund very often. It makes my head hurt.

This week, I really covered myself in glory in the supermarket. As my regular reader may have noticed, I'm not fond of supermarkets, but this time it really took the cake. As usual, I was prowling around the aisles, snatching at tins of catfood and bottles of Diet Coke and thinking murderous thoughts about my fellow shoppers. Then I did something that even I, with my Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award in the Art of Unco, have never managed to do before, but which is often seen in movies: I knocked down a precariously-balanced display. Some sort of bloody breakfast-muesli-shredded-cardboard bar, if you must know. What sort of brain surgeon puts a tower of blanking boxes in the middle of a blanking aisle in front of a blanking frequently-desired blanking item such as blanking milk? Really? And yes, pretty much the whole damned thing went down with one tap of my crab-wheeled trolley. Needless to say, the aura bubble surrounding me turned a violent blue due to all the filthy words filling it. And yes, I picked them up and restacked them, even though I wanted to hide in the tea bag aisle. Damn my sense of responsibility.

Speaking of supermarkets, Foodland stocks a product that is so wrong I don't even know where to start. It's a multi-pack of ready-to-go hotdogs. Yes, it's the red sausagy bit all ready to go in a roll. I didn't look closely, but I suspect there were six of them, all put on a nice styrofoam tray and covered in plastic wrap. Why? Why would anyone do this? Don't they understand you need to boil the hotdog and toast the roll separately? That's just skin-crawly wrong! What if someone boiled the bun? Or worse, put the whole thing in the microwave? Oh, I feel faint...

And while I'm on the subject of supermarket wrongness, is anyone finding the new Coles home brand marketing as chucklesome as I bave been? Between ramming aisle-cloggers with my trolley, swatting screaming children with random things like packets of stockings and legs of lamb, and throwing my own little tantrums at the check-outs, I'm reading these things with increasing hilarity. In fact, their utter fatuousness is the only thing that makes a visit to the Tenth Circle of Hell vaguely bearable. I'm finding myself picking up stuff I have no intention of buying just to read the ridiculous little personal endorsements on the packaging.

Look, this is Emma. Emma is six and cute as a button and she's hugging India, her adorable little husky pup, while telling the nation how soft and creamy Coles bumfodder is.

As an aside, can anyone tell me why toilet rolls are always marketed using fluffy puppies? Sharpeis, labradors, huskies - what's going on? I know all ad people are inherently evil (and yes, newspaper ad reps, I'm looking very hard at YOU), but are they really so morally bankrupt as to secretly wish that they could buy rolls of puppies to keep beside their thrones? It makes me think of that classic episode of The Goodies where the Minister of Health had a box of disposable Sooties and alternated between talking to them and using them to blow his honker. Or could it be even worse than this? Do ad people secretly want puppy fur toilet paper? Oh, it's just too awful to contemplate. Imagine what it could do to the country's sewerage system! However, there is another variety of Coles loo paper that flouts tradition and sports no puppies. This one has two little girls cuddling fluffy bunnies. Naturally this one made me remember the old joke about the bear and the rabbit walking in the woods together. Hmm, maybe ad people do have a sense of humour... No! No! They're evil!

But it's not just the bog rolls. You'll have to forgive me if the names aren't quite right - if I'd started taking notes (a) I would have had to have spent longer in the supermarket and (b) the Coles security Nazis would probably have dragged me away for questioning and an internal exam. These are harsh times. As another aside, when someone says over the loud speaker, "Security to Section C", am I the only one who immediately thinks that I'm standing in the middle of Section C and looking shifty? I know this is just an anti-shoplifting ploy and there is no Section C, but still...

So, canned tomatoes? Yep, here's Rosa, the Family Menu Planner telling us how rich they make her pasta sauce. Frozen beans? Rob the Farmer is gagging to share his feelings on fresh produce. Hi, Rob! Need a hose fitting? Probably not, since we don't have any water, but just in case, here's Jessica to tell everyone how easy "this quality garden product" makes her life among the patch of dust, desiccated snail shells and tumbleweed that was once her garden. Cornflakes? Alistair, who never, ever skips breakfast, is your man there. Crisps? I think it's some chick who said she loved to party. Does that mean she has loose morals as well as liking crisps? It's not entirely clear from the packaging. But don't worry about that, because now we've got some potato royales (whatever the hell they are), which are great fun to share with the family. They look suspiciously high in animal fats to me and I wouldn't mind guessing that they're only fun if you use them to start a food fight in a nursing home. They're just the right size to fit in a sling-shot. Oh, and oven fries are fun to share with the family too, but while you're watching a video! Hurrah! Best get me some a dem fer vidyo-wartchin'.

What about soda water? Here's one I do actually buy. All soda water tastes the same - it's not like all those myriad versions of Nasty Cola that all seem to taste like melted Icy-Poles because they don't have the magic ingredient that Coke guards so jealously. Ninety-nine cent soda water tastes just like the $1.60 gear. "But who's on the front?" I hear you ask. (Hang on, I'll grab a bottle. Just talk amongst yourself for a second.) It's Bill! Bill, whose raison d'etre (or his reason for being on the soda bottle, at least) is that he "loves to entertain". He has a rather fishy smile on his mug and appears to be skulling a tumbler of soda water that I'm fairly certain has a nice shot of vodka or rum and some fresh lime juice in it. Why, you ask? Because Bill reckons it makes him "feel refreshed and relaxed, ready for the weekend". Soda on its own does not do that for me, Bill, so I don't think I'm far off the mark in guessing you have something harder in that frosty, frosty glass.

There are morons on the milk, eejits on the eggs, twats on the tuna and beyatches on the body wash. It's all assuming a level of intimacy that I'm not really interested in, to tell the truth.

And I just realised something even worse. The ice-cream is more than a little wrong. Vanilla has a nice little white-bread girl banging on about how soft and creamy it is (wait, wasn't that the husky-fur toilet paper?) but right next to it in the freezer is the Neapolitan ice-cream, which - oh, look! - has a little girl who looks like she might have a Mediterranean background, saying that she likes the strawberry best. Yes, I like the strawberry too, but why isn't the cute little Italian girl enthusing about the vanilla ice-cream and the little white-bread girl telling everyone how great the Neapolitan is? Is it because Coles thinks Neapolitan is un-Australian?

Now that I've given this proper thought, I'm a lot less amused. Why haven't I noticed any Asian people carrying on about any of these products? Admittedly, I haven't looked in the Asian foods aisle for the You'll Love Coles Brand (TM) rice noodles, sambal oelek or natto, but that shouldn't be the point. I don't think Coles stocks wattle seeds or bush tomatoes either, but I'm sure the Evil Ad People will find a lovely, clean, smiley Aboriginal person to tell everyone just how great it is when they do.

I've got a radical idea. What about Coles uses someone who isn't (as the police reports say) "of Caucasian appearance" to market one of its perfectly normal product that everyone uses? You know, mix things up and use an Indian person on the canned tomatoes and an Asian person on the meat pies? Wouldn't that be nice?

C'mon, Coles, I'm waiting!

PS By the way, I'm off to the Bland Canyon tomorrow to continue blogsitting for the lovely Petstarr while she is off galivanting, so if you're Idol-inclined, do come and visit me there.

Aisle go mad!

If they'd had supermarkets in 13th century Italy, I feel sure Dante would have used one as a model for one of the lower Circles of Hell. On my pet hate list, supermarket visits rank below John Howard, above pairing socks and roughly equal with de-turding the kitty litter tray.

I don't really mind a hit and run on the local, where you park out the front, dash in, buy chocolate and a magazine and leave three minutes later via the 10 items or less queue. It's the full scale, we're-out-of-everything-and-I-have-to-make-a-goddamned-list shopping trip that I really hate.

It has to be done, though. You just can't buy loo paper or Omo at the Central Market. And if I run out of the type of canned kitty fodder Mr Furpants likes, he turns our lives into a mewing, whining, ankle-clawing hell. So I go to the supermarket.

I interviewed a spritualist once who told me that one of the reasons people feel so grouchy and out of sorts in supermarkets is that you have to walk through the auras of so many other people. You know that nasty shudder you get sometimes when you pass someone? You've just walked through their aura and it was poo-brown. I don't belive in auras (though if I did, mine would obviously be gold with spangles, the shade reserved for crabby bitches). She did have a point: it's the other shoppers that make supermarkets truly nasty. I can cope better if there's hardly anyone there, but a packed Coles makes me want to peel off my own skin.

So, to make a supermarket visit complete, you need at least one of several types of shopper:

The Demon Child, who has a borderline personality disorder, is mainlining red food colouring and has the lungs of Luciano Pavarotti. This child will not be happy.

The Frazzled Parent of Demon Child, who appears not to notice the fact that their offspring's screeches have shattered jars of mayonnaise in aisle five. Invaribaly, the Frazzled Parent will suddenly lose his or her wick with a Godzilla-worthy roar while you have your back turned, scaring six months' growth out of you. For maximum points, this will happen when you are comparing the sugar content on different brands of cranberry juice. While wearing something white.

The Morbidly Obese Aisle Clogger should preferably riding a Gopher. He may appear to be slow-moving, but somehow he is still everywhere you turn, sitting in the middle of the aisle comparing brands of lard. If this person is next to you in the check-out queue or at the deli counter, he will fart and the result will be eyewatering. He will also be cunning enough to shift the blame by giving you a disgusted look.

The Tightarse is so enamoured of saving 20 cents on their total bill that they have to share the secret of their success and will offer you advice on cheaper versions of things you have in your trolley. "Those Savings meat pies are much cheaper, you know. They're all pies! Don't you want to save money?" Sure, but not if it means I have to eat a minced mouse and cockcroach crap pie. I prefer steak and mushroom.

The Dairy Cabinet Reunion. (Admittedly this is a group, but I'll count it as one, large, annoying shopper.) Supermarkets are for buying things and getting the hell out. They are not for chatting. Meet for a beer later if you like, or even have dinner, but for Ford's sake move your arses from in front of the damned milk!

The Squeezer, as the name implies, squeezes the bread, fondles the fruit and handles the pick'n'mix lollies. Closely related is The Sneezer, who coughs or sneezes on something you were thinking about buying. He or she may also sneeze wetly into a hand and then put it back on the trolley handle, causing you to examine your own trolley handle for bogies.

The Lost Boy is more tragic than annoying. It's clear that his partner has sent him out to buy a number of items which may or may not include tampons. He will be looking traumatised and talking urgenly into his mobile phone, saying things like, "Super or regular?" or "But there are fourteen types of butter! Which one do you want?" I stopped taking The Bloke shopping because he was prone to climbing onto the trolley and scooting down aisles. When people were looking.

There are probably others, but these seem to be the ones that piss me off on a regular basis. Anyway, now I've set the scene, I'll tell you about this morning's supermarket run. I was resigned to it, psyched up, but I never imaged the horror that was waiting for me: a check-out log jam of Biblical proportions.

What could have happened? Was everyone stocking up to ride out a nuclear winter? It's Christmas and I forgot? Had the government announced supermarkets were going to be abolished? No. It was far more banal: football. One of the hometown teams was playing in the national semi-finals and every bastard was getting the shopping done early to leave time to watch the game, drink beer and yell drunkely.

I have no use for Aussie rules at the best of times, apart from liking to ogle Matthew Primus' chest and arm muscles occasionally. (I'm only human, after all.) And no, I neither know nor care who won. But thanks for getting into the finals, boys. You really put the roasted vomit sprinkles on my crapcream sundae.