Mister Bump UK

How to Shop?

I had this post in my Drafts folder anyhow and was thinking of publishing it today, but it also kinda fits in to today’s (3 September) Fandango’s One Word Challenge (FOWC) prompt of odd, because one of us (most likely me) probably falls into that category.

I was inspired to think about this topic when AngloSwiss posted the other day about completing an online shop. Probably one of the few things to have become bigger and better during the pandemic is online grocery shopping, so I thought I’d share a little disagreement I have with my wife.

She does it – well, I’m not quite sure how she does it – let’s just say voodoo, and stick with how I do it.

I close my eyes. I imagine I’m going into the shop, walking down the first aisle. Toiletries. Do we need anything this week? No? Let’s continue.

Next aisle. Milk and spread. Oh yes, we always need milk. Let’s put 2l in the virtual shopping cart.

Next aisle, cheese. Then yoghurt, and so on.

The point is, I’m sitting there with my eyes closed, adding things into my online, virtual shopping cart in exactly the same order as I would add them to a real shopping cart, if I were walking around the real shop.

Every week, my wife will ask “do we need anything else?”, and, true to form, I’ll say “No”. Not a question mark “no?”, but a firm, definite “no”. Because at that point, I have reached the end of my virtual store. We have been everywhere and there are no more aisles to trawl.

I figure at least this way, I’m not gonna forget anything.

My wife thinks I am crazy, because when she wants to add something from, like, ten aisles ago (which she does frequently, including when we go to the real shop) it really puts me out of my stride.

We’ve evolved to this uneasy truce where one of us adds all the things they want, then the other then adds all the things that they want, including checking for dups.

Come on, which of us is mad?

28 comments

    • I speak weekly to an aunt in Adelaide, I don’t think she ever talked about online shopping. She still goes out to her bricks-and-mortar supermarket every week. She’s in Adelaid, though, and I don’t think it was ever as severe as it was here. We’re still only really going out when we have to, although people are becom ing more active. I think it’s good sometimes just to get out for some air.
      I’m surprised he trusts you to do the shopping on your own – I never did. She would always forget the things I wanted most 🤣

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  4. I do the closed eyes thing too, together with Pierre. We add what we need and then we cross check with what we actually have in the house. Meaning me sitting at the computer and we yell back and forth to make sure nothing is forgotten.
    I think that both of you are right in your own way, as long as everything is in the cart. Isn’t that the most important thing?

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  5. My wife and I “brainstorm” about what we need and I create a list on my iPhone. If I go to the grocery store in person, I organize my list around the store’s layout, similar to what you do, but if I’m ordering for online, I just go through my list in the order the items occurred to us until I’ve checked off everything.

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  7. I am convinced that your wife does her online shopping perfectly according to what makes it easy for her and coping with her Bumpy husband. We all have our own routines and so in reply to your blog, I wrote the following answer. Online shopping is the best thing that has been invented since cut bread I suppose, although I never really buy cut bread, only for toasting 🙂
    Anyhow here is my reply
    Online Shopping is not odd, it is a way of life

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    • Ah, I saw your post before I saw this 🤣. There used to be a big drawback here when the store would supply short-dated goods to online shoppers. But there was a big fuss, and the bottom line is that they will usually guarantee freshness for so many days. Consequently, we have no problem buying bread online 🤣. But I have to be very careful with bread, and wife does not eat it at all, so we are very conservative. Just a factory-made wholemeal. I visit that aisle specially 🤣,

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  8. uh…. you have your way and she has hers. Neither is right or wrong. My husband does the shopping (online). He knows what we need. And he fills the cart as the week rolls along. If I run out of something, I let him know. Sometimes, (not often) I add things to the cart. We inevitably miss something, just like actually shopping. 🙂

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  9. Ugh! I hate online grocery shopping. We’re still going to the ‘real’ supermarket – it’s at the end of our street, like 300 metres away, and Hubster heads there daily (we’re allowed out for one hour each day for exercise and essential shopping) because I despise going to the supermarket anyway…it’s where souls go to die.
    Now, other online shopping, that’s another story. Yesterday I went a bit mad. Bought a new couch (we need one), then…here’s where i really went silly…new cushions for couch, ottoman, artificial plant, bedside tables (in 17 years of married life, we’ve never had them, always made do with some weird piece of antique-y furniture that Hubster brought with him), bedside lamps, and a cheap but nice art on canvass for above the bed. Perhaps I should’ve worked on my manuscript yesterday 🙂

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