h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Do you have freezers in the UK?

S'where we keep the bodies.

The News has had our wasteful piggery all over it for the past few days. I like the way they say *WE* throw away x number of tons of perfectly good food every year and *WE* waste y number of pounds on stuff we buy only to throw away. The little voice in my head says "speak for yourself matey. I don't throw anything away". My mother had a small grocery shop so our family practically lived on things that were past their sell-by date. It didn't kill any of us.

It's not really fair to blame the bogof deals. I use them whenever they're available and if I get, say, twice as many carrots as I intended, I decide not to buy the parsnips or turnips that were on my shopping list.

People often make the mistake of shopping when they're feeling hungry. It's one of those well known psychology things that people tend to buy more (even inedibles like clothes etc) when they're hungry.

It's easier for people like me, who don't have to contend with other people living in the house, to use things up in strict date order. I'd never dream of opening a packet of chocolate digestive biscuits, say, if there was a packet of some other type of biscuit already open.

Also, it helps to have a dog or two about the house if you tend to cook more than you can eat and are clueless about using leftovers

I'm amused by the number of you who are frightened of the check-out assistants. I had a craving for coffee maltesers the other day, but actually put the packet back when I was offered two -I'm diabetic and shouldn't really have been contemplating the first packet on the spur of the moment

It is weird, isn't it?

I use opportunites like "do you want a bag?" to make my point about not using up resources etc. I do the same with BOGOFs.

Mind you, since they don't have them here, when I make a point about BOGOFs it's somewhere I don't live. Maybe that frees me up to be a bit more assertive?

"Do you have freezers in the UK?"

I was talking to my diabetic specialist a couple of months back about my dream of post-retirement volunteering back in Africa.
"Of course," I said, "I'd have to be in a biggish town to keep the insulin refrigerated." He was very surprised by the idea that African villages might not have fridges.

I agree with the sentiment novo; I often think "I don't want two why can't I get one at half price?"

The main problem is that choice is almost imposible without waste. People want a choice and supermrkets (perhaps not through BOGOFs, I admit) supply a choice of products. The difficulty is in predicting what choices the customers will make so, inevitably, there is more supply than demand. This applies more to perishable products than grocery items but it is the nature of choice.

Overproduction may be a major factor of BOGOFs but that is also partly to do with choice, ie a choice of supermarkets (though I appreciate ther are other factors that contribute to overproduction, such as the CAP).

I have no qualm with not accepting the free product in a BOGOF situation but I'll often take it and give it to someone else. Makes me wonder if schools still give the shoeboxes of food to the elderly at harvest festival? With BOGOF they could give away some decent stuff!

Van

Hi Van,

The idea of schools collecting BOGOF's to pass on to the elderly is a great one. In fact I'll sugggest it to the schools my grandchildren attend.

Makes me realise that my feelings were perhaps a tad selfish - thoug we do share our BOGOFS' in the family, and I was thinking too of pensioners never needing the second bag of carrots ( or whatever ).

Novo