2400 grams of chopped tomato.


i make a lot of mistakes.

recently i was shopping in Sainsbury's (my local grocery store) and i bought a 4-can pack of tuna fish.  the tuna cans were stacked on an end cap with a giant "SALE" sign indicating that John West tuna chunks were on sale for £2.59.  a pretty good price, i thought, and so i put one 4-pack in my basket.  at checkout i watched the register display and saw my tuna ring up at £3.99.  i asked the cashier about the sale price and she said i'd have to pay, and then go talk to the help desk about it.  which i did.  at the help desk they weren't sure of the sale.  i thought this was odd considering the large size of the display, but whatever.  when a stockboy came up and saw the tuna he immediately said:  "Ahh, only the tuna in BRINE is on sale -- you've got the tuna in SPRING WATER." 

i was frustrated by this because i'm a savvy shopper.  i stared at the frigging sale sign (and at the tuna display) before i picked up my purchase, and the end cap was FULL of 4-packs of "tuna in water" all mixed in with the "tuna in brine."  had i been in America i would have pointed out that the store is falsely advertising a sale by loading the sale display with cans that are not on sale, and by not specifying the type of tuna on sale ON the sale sign.  but i am not in America.  i am in London, England, and i've learned already that people are different here.  they don't give a shit about the customer and they certainly don't give a shit about truth in sale signage.  my comments would have fallen on deaf ears in this case -- and possibly have drawn unwanted attention to me -- so i just said "i'll keep the tuna in water" and walked away. 

who the hell wants tuna packed in BRINE anyway?  could they come up with a more disgusting way to say that the tuna's packed in salt-saturated preservative water?  in America tuna is packed either in fish oil or spring water.  and to me, that sounds a lot...  well...  a lot more like something you EAT.

a day or two after the tuna mistake i was in the local convenience store (a large BP gas -- or "petrol" -- station).  this is very close to my front door and i use it for random stuff like candy bars, chips or beer.  on the occasion i'm referring to here, i was there for beer.  Stella Artois to be specific.  i had bought Stella in this store several times and knew where it was and how much it cost.  when i got to the beer section i saw a big "SALE" sign with the Stella Artois logo on it -- £8.00 for two packs (in England a lot of beer is sold in packs of four cans).  this was a very good sale.  so i grabbed two four-packs (what's with me and the four-packs?) and headed for the line -- or the "cue," as they call it here. 

when i got to the counter the register man said i owed £13.  i pointed toward the big sale sign and said:  "oh, the sign there says Stella's two for £8."  and he said:  "no, not this size -- has to be the other size."  and i thought:  "i didn't even SEE two sizes of Stella over there.  it was just one big pile of beer."  but, being in London (and knowing there were people waiting behind me), i uncharacteristically said:  "OK," and paid the man his £13.  inside it really burned me up that i had just been tricked by sale tactics for the second time in two days, but then, i suppose you have to be shady if you want to be as huge as BP or Sainsbury's.

last night i made my first grocery store DELIVERY order online. 

now, normally i am not the type of person to use such a service, but when you don't own a car and the walk to the grocery store means you can only carry two bags of stuff, you start looking for alternative methods of getting things home.  the food selection online was excellent but i ran into a problem:  everything was listed in METRIC SYSTEM units, so i couldn't tell from the listing just how big that chunk of cheddar cheese was, or how small the bag of cashew nuts was (250 grams, for the record).  being given 60 minutes to complete my order, i rushed to try and do conversions on my computer.  quick:  how many 500 kilogram packs of minced beef do i need to equal two pounds?  it was frustrating, but i got it done.

today, the order arrived.  and well, i made some slight mis-calculations.  for example, i now have enough chopped tomato to have my own personal chili cook-off.  i also have enough fusilli pasta, sauce and ground beef to feed the Brady Bunch.  twice.

but that's OK.  it's only food.

and while i'm on the subject of food, can ANYONE out there explain to me why i can't find decent RANCH DRESSING in England? 

i need to know.


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