As the minute hand clicks onto 12 and the clock outside strikes six times, indicating that it is now 18:00 hours on Tuesday 25 March, my excitement reaches unhealthy levels and my risk of heart attack increases approximately threefold. For at 18:00 hours, I have been told, it is possible that a nice man, or perhaps a nice woman, will arrive in a Tesco's van with a large quantity of extremely heavy and essential groceries for my eating pleasure. Of course, I tell myself at 18:05, they probably won't arrive on the dot of six. Mentally, I prepare myself for the possibility that they may not even arrive until the end of my window, at 8pm. This will be a disappointing outcome as it will delay my dinner further - I am already knee-deep in anticipation about my first home-cooked meal in my new flat and the kitchen is not presently full of options, containing two pots of out-of-date milk, some spreadable butter, some leftover smoked mackerel pate that is crawling with invisible food poisoning and a Twix.
19:00 hours. My excitement has dropped to a simmer but I am still poised and ready to leap the moment the door buzzer sounds.
19:45. Anger has set in. I try to stop myself from working into a psychopathic rage, reminding myself that they are not actually late until 20:01.
20:01. Psychopathic rage culminates in terse, barely civil phonecall to Tesco's. Unaware of the levels of my fury, a blameless young man unwittingly tells me that my order has been cancelled and that I 'should have been informed'. No shit. He puts me on hold while he checks what happened. Apparently my card didn't work - which is ridiculous as I entered all the details correctly and have no shortage of funds - and instead of phoning me to verify it, they cancelled the order. At this point, pins and needles start shooting through both of my legs and I start to exaggerate. "This is my only free night until next Tuesday [true]. I cancelled several plans to make sure I was in tonight [false]. Plus I am having people over for the next three nights [false] and people staying this weekend [false] and now have no food for them [would be true if the last two claims hadn't been false]. I will complain about this online [true] - my blog is read by thousands of people [white lie] all over the world [true] and I hope that this will deter them from using your service in future [false: I'm not that bothered]."
After I requested compensation, the man emailed me a £10 discount on my next online shop. It's interesting to me that, in the eyes of the Tesco's system, waiting in all evening for shopping that never arrives is half as irritating as almost (but not actually) breaking a tooth while eating sultanas, for which we were paid £20. I wonder who calculates these things...
Perhaps the people at my local branch of Tesco read my blog yesterday, decided that I'd been too smug about my lovely Easter minibreak and saw an opportunity to sabotage my happiness. Their efforts were in vain, however - after my early stumble into irritation brought on by being stood up by a supermarket, the evening ended well as I ordered a Thai meal (which did actually arrive) and began to seal my birch kitchen counters with Danish wood oil. This is a process more satisfying than I could ever have dreamed, like rubbing really good moisturiser into dry, scaly legs, only without the accompanying feeling of self-revulsion. The instructions advise giving untreated wood three or four initial coats with at least five hours between applications. I did one before bed and then surprised myself by getting up fifteen minutes earlier than I had to this morning and putting on another layer at around 7.10am. I always knew my priorities would change when I had my own home but given that spring cleaning has not been high on my agenda this side of the Millennium, it's a bit of a surprise to be waking up early to rub oil into a kitchen counter with a lint-free cloth wearing a nightie and slippers. Wonders will never cease.
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