Yesterday we ran a couple of errands in Ormskirk, which, if run with the children, generally entails buying gingerbread men.

The shop we tend to go to, which represents a strong triumph of location over quality because I end up coming out of the shop peeved more times than not, is Sayer’s, which is one shop along from Ormskirk’s revered clock tower junction righ tin the heart of town.

I enter, and ask for 2 ginger bread men.

Turns out, I can get 3 ginger bread men for 99p, encased in a plastic-fronted package, or 2 at 55p each with no wrapper.

“But that’s wasteful. I only have 2 children, and I don’t want a gingerbread man.” was the most erudite response I could make come out of my mouth. The shop assistant insisted she was merely giving me the information, and I could still just get two of them if I wanted to.

I’m ashamed to say I went for the 3-for-99p offer (J&L polished off the 3rd one amicably between them shortly after we got home, BTW, so not wasted) and was really quite pissed off for a good half an hour.

Why? How does it make sense to pay for additional packaging, throw in another biscuit and charge less??!? I can see how it would make sense if they charged between £1.10 & £1.65, but less than £1.10? It just offends me. And that’s before I even get to the plastic packaging – they already think I’m a nutter in there because I won’t take a paper bag PER GINGERBREAD MAN on the grounds that they just get thrown in the bin outside the door. I’ve beaten them down to a single bag, but they’re clearly so uncomfortable with even that, that I haven’t tried the reckless NO BAG AT ALL.

The women in Waterfields by Home & Bargain are generally fine with all of the above, Remind me, that we should go there instead AND if we did we’d get that little bit more exercise…

Off to go chew my own arm off now, while I try to articulate in my own head just why this troubled me so much.