This past week a new survey (pdf) took our high streets to task. The "identikit" high streets, where every town looks the same because the same "major multiples" - the ubiquitous high street formula shops - have driven any sense of character from the fabric of our shopping experience, shall henceforward be known as "clone towns". Wimbledon, our local high street area, is the prime offender in London. So it's not just me...
Some time earlier this year I stood waiting to board a train at a metro London station. The doors of the train opened, and out of the blue a teenaged boy smacked me straight in the face. It wasn't until I was reading an article in this weekend's Guardian that I found out this was more than an isolated incident. I can only conclude I have been "happy slapped".
What a disgusting idea. Smacking an unsuspecting person while someone else takes a picture with a mobile phone. Then they text it around to their mates with some suitable caption. But apparently the phenomenon is on the increase. It's a London thing, coming your way soon.
As the food-recall scare widens through Britain's schools and hospitals, the Guardian's Joanna Blythman takes aim at the supermarket culture that leads to the astonishing breadth of products on the now-expanded recall list:
This overlap is not accidental. It shows the dreary similarity of supermarket food and exposes how supermarkets all use the same manufacturers. While consumers give their allegiance to one supermarket chain, often in the mistaken belief that its representatives are sourcing products and devising recipes that are distinctive, the reality is that the products we buy are more likely to have emerged from one of a small number of factories where a handful of companies churn out essentially the same range of products to several chains, packaged differently to give the illusion of diversity.
I've just come back from a few days in Romania to yet another UK food nightmare.
Britain's largest food recall was under way last night after an illegal dye known to cause cancer was found to have contaminated millions of ready meals and cooking sauces.
More than 350 product lines, ranging from prawn salad to Pot Noodles, were being withdrawn by supermarkets and retailers after the Food Standards Agency (FSA) warned they were contaminated by Sudan I - a red colouring normally used in products such as shoe polish and petrol.
The very long list of recalled products is available (wry smile at the Tesco "Healthy Living" products), and it's amazing to see how this kind of a thing snowballs (the vector was Worcestershire sauce made with a contaminated batch of this chilli powder). I'm amazed at the large number of "own-brand" products made with the same ingredient.
I didn't think we'd have any worry here, but I can report we have none of these products in our home. We're just back from an expensive but productive trip to the Farmers Market, feeling better for what's not in our food. Another solid argument against buying prepared foods. Schadenfreude, anyone?
I can't think of one positive thing to say about the crush chaos at London's new Ikea.
Okay, no one died.
I'm just left in a state of disbelief. 4000 people were at Ikea at midnight. They left their cars abandoned on the road so they wouldn't miss out on the bargains. Five people had to be hospitalised and more than 20 suffered from heat exhaustion in the crush. It reads like something out of DeLillo.