169. Stuck at home again

 They're back. One by one they arrived on Friday afternoon. Home for the easter weekend, but actually home for 4 long weeks ... 

Right away my husband offers to do the shopping. This is very weird because he does not offer to do the shopping out of his own accord. I nag, moan, drop hints, promise to cook a curry, etc ... and then he does the shopping. This is also worrying because it reminds me of lockdown 1 and we do not want a repeat. Goodness knows what he'd come up with this time.

As often when the going gets tough, my first reaction is to bury my head - not in the sand - but in a book. Actually if I am honest it is about the same as burying my head in the sand. It just does not help. In fact it is worse; at least in the sand it would not last so long. With a book I can be gone for hours ... meanwhile the problem settles itself into our routine.

'I know the problem won't go away.' I explain to my husband. 'I just want you to make the problem go away.'

I use my whinging tone of voice. I use my exhausted working mother with kids at home tone of voice. It has little effect I find. He must be used to it. Or else he is exhausted too, and I might be a factor of exhaustion. 

'Come on! It's only for four weeks.'

I look around me to see if there is anything - apart from the book I have in hand - that I could chuck at him. 

'OK. He says. I'll do the shopping. Like last time. How about that?'

I try to recall how on earth we survived with him doing the shopping last time ... 

'You always buy the wrong stuff! For example pink toilet paper!' I say, my voice full of reproach. 'We've still got some of that ghastly stuff at the bottom of the basket.' 

'Be reasonable. Some people, as we speak, would kill for toilet paper. even pink.'

'Should we put it on e-bay?'

I can see his patience is running out. 

'Just give me a very precise highly specific list!'

OK. You want specific. I do specific. I grab an A4 pad and start.

• 24 organic eggs, brown shell, as local as possible, from HENS
• the biggest pack of WHITE toilet paper there is in that shop
• pasta: fusilli, normal as in not-wholemeal, not the 3 mn stuff
• coffee, 100% Arabica, grounded, not beans, Carte Noire, pack of 3
• Champagne, Nicolas Feuillate, Brut, 75 cl MINIMUM
• Flour T45, FRENCH, organic, NOT self-raising
• ...

And the list goes on. This is a pain. I may as well go online and do a click-and-pick up. On top of that, he will probably not read it all, thinking he knows, and pick up stuff he wants but that is not on the list (beer) and he might not buy the Champagne. This is a test, will he pass I wonder. I hand it to him. 

'Is that precise enough?'

'Too much so! I can't cope with so much information.' 

He smiles at me and shouts at the bottom of the stairs.

'Baby! Want to come shopping with me?' 

She comes rattling down the stairs and jumps over the last three steps to land right by her father.

'We'll get all the junk breakfast cereals you want if you come along and help me with that list your mother gave me.'