yellow sticker.

I get weird in supermarkets.

The only time I actively look for one of those self-serve tills in Tesco, is when I have a yellow sticker thing in my trolley.

If I go to a checkout with an actual person on it, the stress of worrying about the human till person missing my yellow sticker, swiping the original barcode instead, is just too much.

If I go to a checkout with an actual person on it, I have to load one item from my trolley onto the conveyor, then glance up and stare – frozen like a statue – right at the till person for, say, a second. I have to do this over and over as the yellow sticker thing gets closer to them. As discretely as I can. Bread… turn, freeze and stare. Potatoes… turn, freeze and stare. Cheese… turn, freeze and stare.

And Izobel is chattering to me at the same time. Distracting me. So I shush her. I’m concentrating. And our dad/daughter shopping mood gets icy.

After all that I still miss seeing the till person swiping the yellow sticker thing. The yellow sticker thing gets swiped in the split second I’m reaching into my trolley for peanut butter rather than freezing and staring.

Do I want a receipt? Yes! Yes, of course I want a receipt! I have to check if you swiped the yellow sticker barcode or the original barcode by mistake.

Somehow, a pound in the supermarket today is different to a pound in the bar at the weekend. Yes, I paid six pounds for one pint last weekend. But in this supermarket, today, one pound seems like so much more. ‘Probably why I’d wrestle someone for the one pound I put in my trolley coin lock release thing, too.

Like I say.

Weird.