low-key saturday shopping

beach santa
Normally on the Saturday before I go down to Ma's to put up the Christmas tree and commence the "srs bsns" of seasonal prep.

But things just haven't worked out that way this year, which is fine, it's not like I don't have spare time on my hands just presently.

So today was pretty much a normal Saturday...

Although this is definitely the last Saturday before Christmas that I want to have anything to do with shops other than supermarkets.

I was up and organised fairly early this morning, although there did come a point where I was pretty much wandering from one room to another and made myself go and take a shower instead of dithering around.

After Ma got here we headed off to the supermarket as per usual.

We ended up hitting all three supermarkets... we did the majority of the shopping at the usual place, but the two major chains had specific things on special so we did a quick visit to both.

Once we'd finished the supermarket portion of the morning we headed back here for the unpacking portion. Neither of us had any particularly urgent need for more shopping, but we decided to head down to West Lakes for some general wandering and a couple of last minute odds and sods.

And we hadn't been down there since they opened the new section so it was interesting to take a look at the new stores, particularly the Target which looks really bright, open and airy (not that Target stores are generally dark and oppressive, but within the frame of reference it seemed especially bright).

One thing I did notice, and not really for the first time, is that Westfields (and to a lesser extent all shopping centres) are becoming incredibly interchangeable, right down to the exterior shop designs... it's all wood veneers and open latticework and dark shiny surfaces with asymmetrical designs and the occasional faux brickwork. Not that I'm overly complaining, I tend to like the designs... it's just a little bit cookie cutter.

While we were in Target Ma spotted these really cheap (as in $5 cheap) but very cute and reasonably sized teddy bears... and on the spot I just suggested we buy a couple and put them under the charity/gift tree thing at the front. I sometimes wonder with those particular charity things if young guys in the 13-17 range get overlooked... it's easy to buy things for little kids of both genders, and older girls... but yeah, I wonder if they struggle for things for young guys.

Anyway... I've also been half on the lookout for a clear bauble to make Ma a "melted snowman" ornament... but unfortunately, unlike the US, there don't seem to be the same kind of cheap plastic baubles... but I did end up finding an actual glass one at one of those "we'll decorate the bauble of your choice with ugly glitter glue stuff" stalls in the middle of the centre, so now I just need a couple of other bits and pieces and I'm good to go.

Speaking of ornaments, I do so hate it when somewhere like David Jones don't have price tickets on all of their Christmas decorations... so we ended up standing around while the woman behind the counter was trying to find the particular ornament Ma wanted in their book of Christmas products. Turned out if she'd paid more attention to the book she would have worked it out... urgh.

That was pretty much it though, so we grabbed some lunch and then called it a day.

But yeah, I really want to stay away from shopping centres for the next couple of weekends.

Current Mood:

No comments: