I hate grocery shopping. I mean I really hate it. It’s up there with waiting in a three-hour line at the post office while the guy in back of me sneezes into my hair. For starters, going to the supermarket requires mixing with the fray, and you know how I feel about that. And it’s not just the fray, it’s a very large dose of them who are harried, hungry, and pushing large metal carts that hurt like hell when some idiot runs into you from the back and you’re wearing sandals.

Then there are the choices that one must make, and often by the time I get to the store, I am far too tired and the notion of making yet one more decision feels like pulling teeth. ‘Are you going to buy this brand, or that one? This is more expensive, but this tastes better; wait a minute, this contains that chemical stuff, and this one is good for the environment. Oh, stop the presses, this one is on offer two for one!’ Crap. You see, it is a surefire recipe to increase your blood pressure and drive you insane. And of course you can go with a list as most do, but don’t plan on sticking to it, especially when you wander down that aisle that you usually don’t go down and see four new brands of crackers that all promise to increase your wholegrain intake. Then there is the supermarket lighting system that always makes you feel like you are trapped in The Shining, and of course, like any good germ freak, there is the fact that you are touching things that every one and their brother has touched, drooled on, manhandled, and probably tampered with. Ah, joy. 

My partner always wants to go to the store on the weekend. In all fairness, it’s our only time to do it. [And as he is a kind man, he knows that sending me and the King during the week would mean I would most likely get arrested for battle ramming my cart in the produce aisle cause someone body checked me near the pineapple display]. So we go to this massive market in the more ‘interesting’ part of town, shall we say, and on a Saturday morning it basically feels like a stadium full of ornery football fans is there with us ready to mess your a** up if you steal the melon they had their eye on.

My partner dives in excitedly like he’s going into battle; on the contrary, I end up wandering around the aisles getting increasingly overwhelmed clutching one or two items like a panicked freak, while my partner moves through the aisles with uncanny precision with a price comparison excel spreadsheet on his phone to know that he’s truly getting the best bargain. Yes, this is serious business – for him anyway.

Funny enough, one of my funniest memories with my father was a time we went  grocery shopping in Las Vegas. Needless to say, my dad liked to shop at 3 a.m (which actually is much more palatable and amusing I must say) and this meant that the store was usually filled with individuals that either rode the pole for a living, or were incredibly eccentric at best. Not sure why this hour brings out the loons, but I suppose if one is heading to the store to buy a can of gasoline, some duct tape and a rope, 4 a.m. is the time to do it. I must clarify, that was NOT our shopping list that night, so put down the phone, you do not have to alert the authorities.

My Dad’s method of shopping is to go down the aisles and knock pretty much everything into the cart that looks sinful (thankfully since then, his tastes have become much healthier). That particular night I was gasping in awe (and horror) at some of the items he was choosing, asking who the heck was going to eat that? His stock reply was that his housekeeper, Emma, liked the triple stuffed chocolate ho-hos, not him of course. Apparently Emma liked absolutely everything –and had an appetite similar to Jabba the Hut. I have to admit, although my dad's zest for shopping far exceeds mine, I think he has the right idea about the hour. Perhaps I shall introduce the King to late night shopping, I have a feeling that I could leave him in the cereal aisle with an open box of cereal while I did the weekly shop and he'd be just fine. 

Do you ever eavesdrop on people whilst riding public transport? Oh go on, you know you do. That is one of the best reasons to take it, cause it is certainly not to ride in a claustrophobic tin can rife with germs, crowds and the inevitable delays. It is amazing what you can overhear as well: people fighting, egregious (and often nauseating) love talk (for lack of a better way to describe it), longwinded stories that tempt you to interrupt and give advice cause these people clearly need some guidance. It’s one of the main reasons I ride the tube aside from the fact that I have yet to buy a bike seat for the King as I fear he won’t fit into one, and/or I will harm us both in some crazy roundabout debacle.

For those of you that live in a city that means you are relegated to your cars, I’m telling you, public transport is like a bird’s-eye view into society [and you save on petrol]. And yes, sometimes this can be utterly terrifying. In short, on one journey you can see what people are wearing, eating (take note, anyone that brings hot food onto the tube should be arrested, it’s just rude) not to mention their handle on hygiene, or lack thereof. As you’re sandwiched in there like sardines you really get the full scope of people's grooming habits, like it or not. It never ceases to amaze me the amount of people that need to invest in a heavy supply of breath mints.

Riding the tube of course also seriously challenges my claustrophobia, and the only way I get through is to either read, play scrabble on my iphone or focus on who needs the biggest makeover. Petty I realize (and I’m sure it’s being done to me….look at her eye bags! When is the last time that woman cut her hair/slept/showered!) but it passes the time and can be very amusing. I try to find the worst case and then I deliberate on all the possibilities on how to transform them – change of hair, punishing workouts, diet overhaul, eyebrow plucking, you name it. Whilst I do this, I also peruse the cabin for the person that looks the most approachable in case the train gets stuck in a tunnel, and I need someone 'normal' to talk me down off the ceiling. Cause I'm anything but normal when panic sets in.

Using public transport also has (obvious) major detractors. The worst being the tube offenders as I call them; the ones that surpass my interesting sociological study and simply careen into the downright frightening. Like the grown man that I saw writing in a Hello Kitty journal, or the people who insist on praying on the trains. I’m all for religious freedom, but these days, anyway who busts out into prayer and rocks back and forth on a bus, plane or tube is going to start a serious sh*tstorm. There are also the space invaders that insist on standing an inch from your face or sit right next to you even when the car is empty. An easy fix for this one is to simply start sneezing and coughing like you have the plague. 

Believe it or not, I also use the tube or bus to catch up on my reading. Trust me, if you’re a Mother and you’ve managed to wrangle an hour off, sitting on a tube/bus with a book is almost as good as it gets. Sometimes I don’t even care if I get where I’m going; in fact, there are times where I figure if we did get held up, it would buy me a few more hours of relaxation. It is also a good opportunity to see what everyone else is reading. This takes skill of course, because sometimes simply reading the cover doesn’t give you enough information; you then have to be quite crafty and try to lean in and read the back of the book without looking like a freaky stalker.

I of course like any good city-going Mother broke the King in early. He was riding the tube at less than a week old. We figured we would get him exposed to those germs good and early…we are up for ‘Parents of the Year’ I’ve been told. He of course loves it, especially now that he is old enough to sit on my lap (or stand as he insists on doing, hollering “Bub Bub Bub!” at the top of his lungs). He stares at everyone, smiles relentlessly at the women until they smile back (we’ll have to work on that one as it might seem creepy when he’s 25) and talks like he is about to lose his tongue. The only problem is that he is fascinated with trying to lick the glass and poles (I'm talking about the handrails; not his relatives) on the tube. This sends me into an OCD breakdown as I try to explain to him that the tube is for watching, absolutely not for touching. We’ll have to work on that one too.