the science of shopping

the "hurry up" hand

This gesture looks sweet but this is the  hurry up hand. It's what hubby gives me when I am walking too slow. With the hurry up hand I am able to move twice as fast because his legs are two times longer than mine and he acts like a tug boat. I like to take my time and meander. See the sights. Think my thoughts--like Gob Bluth. With the hurry-up hand firmly in place, we cruise along at a moderate pace and enjoy the sights together. Not as fast as he'd go on his own (dear me, no) but at a mediocre trot we get around the streets of Dublin.

Today we went to the Temple Bar Food Market. It was gorgeous. I have never seen such lovely looking food. We bought fresh ciabbatta bred and soft cow's cheese to make sweet potato sandwiches tonight for dinner. I also discovered a Mexican--hooray! A very nice Mexican man has a stand at the food market and he makes...wait for it...HOMEMADE HOT SAUCE! He has a habanero salsa and although he was sold out today, I am most definitely going back to buy some next week. I promised. He also makes fresh tacos and other things that looked delicious so we are going hungry on Saturday morning.

Temple Bar food market

beautiful cheese. duh.

see my polka-dot shopping bag?

Here you will notice I am carrying a lovely nylon shopping bag. This is my re-usable shopping bag that I bought at the €2 Euro Shop (AKA the Dollar Store). I have a plain black one too. Here in Ireland you have to carry your own shopping bags around. They are light years ahead of the U.S. "green" movement in that respect--they actually charge money for shopping bags at the grocery store. Bags at Tesco are made of plastic and cost €0.23 apiece.

I bought some fancy-pants bags made out of hay at Fallon & Byrne, the organic/import grocery store. They are adorable with giant painted avocados and tomatoes on the hay. Also they are horrible because they are sturdy; they are so high-quality that they dont fold up. It's sort of odd to go into other stores carrying large, empty bags. They made me feel like a shoplifter so I threw them out. Now with my cheap-o nylon bags that smoosh into a tiny ball at the bottom of my purse, I am free to roam.