Monday, September 06, 2004

It's genetic

It's true that as you get older you start to resemble you parents more and more. Well, that's my excuse for recently becoming a shopaholic and I'm sticking to it.

Yesterday I took my mum out for her weekly shopping trip; at the morning market she bought enough vegetables and frozen chicken to feed a houseful of flatting students for a week (though of course, students live on beer rather than meat and veges); later, at the supermarket, she bought FIFTEEN 500g packets of frozen beans and the same number of packets of pasta.

Sometimes, she buys TEN frozen chickens at a time, and returns for more in a fortnight.

She used to buy toilet paper in monster-sized 72-roll cartons, and laundry detergent in similarly-sized boxes. Mum has enough packets of Thai rice noodles for more than a year's worth of her churches pot-luck lunches.

Mind you, her rationale for this super-stocking-up behaviour is something along the lines of saving money by buying in bulk, and the security of knowing she isn't going to run out any time soon. She was, after all, a child of the turbulent decades when China was first invaded by the Japanese and then taken over by the Communist Party.

I don't have those excuses. For me it's probably just a self-rebellion against my normally sensible spending habits.

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