Tripping (Cereal Serials)

Inside Liverpool St Station. Being part of the crowd, taking in all these people, all their different looks feels like being on holiday. It's then when I realize: tonight I'll be tripping in the Supermarket.

I haven't had any sensory perception. I've stared at code for nine hours straight. Products in the supermarket will be the only things I've seen before I fall asleep. These products will get to me. I desperately have to take something in, and they'll stress me out.

Enter the full-feature experience: my Stamford Hill Morrison's. Brief confusion to id the right/wrong automatic door to get in. Encounter security guard. Stern looks. Fragments of a second: "Oh god, he's going to beat me up." - Course not. Brief flashback on yesterday's brilliant and sad serial killer movie, "Salinui chueok". Re-focusing the guard. Recapitulating stories of men working as security guards in young age so they'll be able to finance their studies later. My escape from uniform discomfort: "Cool you, you'll have a great thing going, once you're out of that thing..."

Start the parcour. The impossible products. Things rendering you helpless. Olive oil out of the spraycan. Evaporated milk. The meat aisle. That's my maelstroem. I spend more and more time in front of the meat shelf, trying to buy meat. I don't manage. I'm hung up on revulsion.

I'm hung up on pop culture, too. Simon and Garfunkel doodle "Hey, Mrs Robinson" in the background, while Soccer Tigers, Gromits, Bunnies, Beavers beam at me. There's a "Pet Grooming Glove" dangling from the center of cereal heaven, suggesting with full confidence: buy the cornflakes, buy the glove, and you can pet the bunny on the package. I've had enough.

Talking to Customers

From blogspeak to corporate speak: "No-No-No-I-won't-say-'tall'!" That's me in a Starbucks, ordering small coffee. Quite pathetic. I've become obsessed with them - I am trying to find at least ONE employee who won't correct my verbal mis-order. I already feel like I was employed with Starbucks as well - like an internal quality revisor, I am placing my order, waiting: will he/she perform, or not?

Maybe this guy has found me the one: "Starbucking is a documentary film now in production. Follow the bizarre story of Winter, a man who has dedicated his life to visiting every Starbucks in the world."

Fair choice?

One of my flatmates is in fairtrade. He finds it hard to accept that fairtrade products are expected to taste better? Rush of surprise, but his irritation makes sense, the longer you think about it.

Please choose one life & style only: the culture of (smug and overpriced hence utterly boycottable) health food stores / the politics of fairtrade / the pleasures of good food...

Tesco Readings

left: Milk contains Milk! (oh yeah that's because it's organic, hmmm) right: Oh my god it looks like Tampax! Women's sweets, these must be. Tempting Raspberry Yoghurt Swirls...