The Waitrose Walk of Shame

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I'm not used to being a social pariah: I've never smoked, and I've always been very dutiful about things like drink-driving (easy when you don't like the stuff to start with) and not talking on my mobile when driving.

So, it took me aback a bit when I realised I was getting funny glances from the other people at the checkout when I cheerfully announced that yet again I'd forgotten my collection of bags for life. THEY all had them - some of them even had those even more green jute efforts. And I, wasteful mis-user of the planet's resources, did not.

Today I heard that Marks and Spencer are going to be asking people to pay 5p per carrier bag. The Radio 4 interviewer asked if using plastic carrier bags would soon be seen as anti-social a thing as smoking. No soon about it in Waitrose.

I don't think the down on using plastic bags is a bad thing (though I do wonder how I'd ever have managed to move house as a student, which seemed to involve shifting a thousand International Supermarket carrier bags). It's dreadful seeing them fluttering in their hundreds from the trees opposite Tescos, and frankly if I was more organised it wouldn't be a problem. When I heard the M&S story I did wonder briefly if there would be a sort of reverse chic - that plastic bag users would proudly announce that their 5p was going to improve parks and THAT IS A GOOD THING. But I think not.

The forgetful (me) and disorganised (me again) will soon slink from the supermarket aisles in shame, or else end up with the world's largest collection of bags-for-life. I had better clear out another cupboard.

Comments

Unknown said…
I have a smallish rucksack that I use for things like small shops - veg from the local greengrocers etc and oddments around town, and carry a folded study carrier in my smaller shoulderbag. Earlier this year I got two of Tesco's Bags For Life, which fold up neatly and fasten with a press stud. I generally remember to take these when doing a big shop by car.

I usually end up getting a couple of regular carrier bags too, on the big shop, which is fine by me. I use them doubled for dirty cat litter, and also as bin liners. So I do reuse supermarket bags before they get thrown out. I also like the small bags you get in Boots, which are ideal for lining the little bin in the bathroom.
29 February 2008 at 01:14
Fiona said…
I've got loads of the "green" bags but guess what...I nearly always forget them.

In the Manchester suburb where I live the local councillors tried to impose a ban on plastic bag use but some of the shop keepers wouldn't sign up to it.
I feel guilty with....plastic!
29 February 2008 at 17:41
Jane Badger said…
I'm not so bad in the village, as I usually go to the post office first with all my parcels, in a large green laundry bag and I use that for my local shopping - it's the more major things I'm not good at.

Generally plastic bags get re-used, either in bins, or when friends have plant sales we use them then. And I have found, from the nibbled ones in the deep depths of the cupboard, that they apparently make very good mouse beds.
1 March 2008 at 10:51
Mutterings and Meanderings said…
Sod the sanctimonious sods!!

I am collecting plastic bags as I use them for so many other things.
1 March 2008 at 19:55
Jane Badger said…
M&M - that is the thing, isn't it? I also use them for dog poo, lining bins, standing muddy boots in so they dont' go mouldy outside, storing odd bits of daughter's dance gear......... and if I don't use them to line the bin, I then have to go out and buy more plastic bags, albeit recyclable. I remember in the dim and distant past that Sainsbury's used to do very large brown paper carrier bags. What's to stop them doing them again, I wonder?
3 March 2008 at 10:00
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