Alec Sillifant

It’s in the Bag

 

Giving to charity, I do that. I really do. I’m far from a philanthropist but if I believe in the cause I’ll dump some shrapnel in the old collecting tin. It’s all on a voluntary basis mind, I must approach the collector and give freely under my own volition; I do not take kindly to being harangued by a full frontal demand. Charity muggers, or ‘chuggers’*, deliberately blocking my right of way on the street do not lighten my pocket by a single penny. And those subset of chuggers who want me to sign up for a life-long direct debit have no chance and are told so in those exact words. Lately I’ve encountered a few chuggers** who knock at my door uninvited and ask for a regular electronic donation for charity ‘x’ or ‘y’ but they get n’owt to swell their purse off me and that’s because they had the effrontery to ask for it on the very threshold of my sanctuary. I always smile when refusing, which is sometimes really hard to do considering the mouth shape required for some of the words I use to express my wish to decline their offer. You try sounding ‘ck’ and still hold a friendly, upturned mouth. It’s fuffing difficult.

Chuggers of both those varieties are very easy to swerve if you clock them early enough. A street can be crossed; a shop can be ducked into; a window can be sneakily looked through and a couch can be dived behind until the coast is clear. With a little quickness of foot you can keep the money in your pocket quite easily. However, there are specialists in the world of chugging, veritable masters of the art; ones who are impossible to dodge for the reasons I shall divulge momentarily. You may have come across this paramilitary wing of chugging yourself because their theatre of operation is in the bagging area of supermarket checkouts.

A sight to chill the reddest blooded of hearts, it breaks the mental fortitude of the usually iron-minded; you park your trolley at the loading end of the checkout conveyor belt and it is only half-way through unloading you take notice of the helpful bag packers waiting for you on the far side of the till. They’re like gargoyles made flesh waiting to pounce, grinning inanely at the prospect of enthusiastically stuffing your bags with consumables in exchange for a reasonable, charitable donation. How the fuck do you get out of this?!

Escape choices are limited as you could well have already placed a fair percentage of your shopping onto the conveyor belt, which is whisking it further from your grasp and control by the second. You could throw all social etiquette to the wind and run from the shop, abandoning the goods, not caring what people think of your mental health but this option comes with even more pressure to execute if some of your goods have already been scanned and are within reach of the eager charity gargoyles.*** And that is when they pipe up with a perfectly timed, sweetly toned: “Do you want a hand with your packing?”

The die is cast. It’s too late for fleeing. You’re fucked. You’ve made eye contact and clearly heard the request; you are condemned by social norms to agree to the transaction with a feeble nod and then further condemned to toss some money (usually pound coins in denomination) into a big red bucket upon its completion. There is no escaping. You are being channelled to your fate like sheep to a dip…or horses to that place where they become geldings. The bollockarium, I think it’s called.

As you continue to load your stuff onto the conveyor belt, your seething resentment growing, you begin to take more notice of the details of the situation that caught you so flat-footed only seconds ago. You observe the majority of charity packers**** swarming at the end of every checkout to the horizon are children, peppered with the odd adult minder, and you become cynical at their deployment; you wonder why they haven’t got anything better to do than pick your pocket. Like make training shoes in a sweat shop, for example.

Details of the cash-hungry bucket sat next to the till demands further investigation as you try to ascertain what deserving organisation it is your hard-earned is being syphoned off into. You hope it is some worthy cause like ‘Guide Dogs for the Blind’ or ‘Help for Heroes’ or the ‘Royal National Lifeboat Institution’ but a knot of deep foreboding in your gut knows better than your pathetic pipedream. It is almost certainly something you couldn’t give a toss about…no, a flying toss…a flying toss with a 10 yard run up. A shoddily home-printed label Sellotaped to the bucket demands funds for: ‘Sparkle Toes – an Interpretive Dance Troupe’ or the ‘More Lampposts for Dogs to Piss on Society’ or ‘Save the Garden Gnomes’ or ‘Smallpox for All’ or ‘Bail Out the Royal Bank of Scotland v2.0’ or some other bollocks that is always suffixed with twenty exclamation marks. Whoever is benefitting, you sure as hell wouldn’t have given cash to them normally or even possibly under threat of rendition.

Acceptance finally sets in as you realise without making a bit of a scene you can’t back out of the transaction but it is at that point you become aware of the quality of the service you are paying for. Snotty, spotty minors are handling your food and domestic supplies with sweaty, dirty digits you easily imagine carry e-coli…minimum. Bread is getting crushed into shapes completely at odds with good sandwich construction at a later date; you hear at least two eggs being cracked; bleach and soap powder are being dumped, and forcibly pressed, into the same bag as the fruit and veg. This egregious cross contamination is on a scale only previously witnessed when Taylor Swift sang ‘Pour Some Sugar on Me’ with Def Leppard.

You came fully prepared for this shopping trip, having packed plenty of bags to allow easy spreading of the predicted grocery load amongst their number, but the newly appointed professionals have decided on their preferred method of crushing everything from a fully loaded, large trolley into three medium sized bags, tossing the remaining dozen aside, shrugging indifferently as the seams of the selected trio of receptacles begin to split. Technically they are now unpacking bags and spilling produce back onto the counter but not to worry, some more forceful and violent repacking ensues to keep their end of the ‘helpful packing’ bargain up. Fucking disaster. And it’s a fucking disaster you’re getting billed for. One which you will pay with a cheery smile whilst congratulating the morons - who have just trashed over a hundred quid’s worth of gear - for their self-sacrifice in aid of such a good cause as: ‘The Socks for Kippers Foundation’.

All is not lost, be prepared to take heart. The other day I had a victory…half a victory to be honest; but it still left me feeling like a real man…okay, half a real man if I’m to be honest again. All of the above happened to me. The lack of seeing the charity bag packers until it was too late, the eye contact, the hesitant but agreeing nod, everything. Right up to the point of the packers shaking the bags open ready for loading and then suddenly I felt the rush of a testosterone boost, my spine solidify a little more than usual, as the fateful words were uttered.

“Can we help with the packing?” said the female adult minder of the two kids at her side.

“No thanks, I’m good.”

“Okay, if you just push your-” Realisation caught up with hearing, “I’m sorry, did you say no?”

“That’s right, I’ll do my own packing.”

“But…but…it’s for charity. The home for old snails, it’s a very good cause.”

“No it isn’t, it’s bullshit. Don’t worry though, I’m still going to donate.”

“Are you sure, we-”

“If you or any of your infected imps touch one item of my shopping you won’t get the money for the slugs.”

“Snails.”

“Whatever.”

And they retreated a respectful three paces away from the checkout and allowed me to do my own packing. They were of course exchanging ‘What a weirdo’ glances between themselves and whispering to all of the other passing chuggers about the ‘Unidentified nutter in the bagging area’. I didn’t care, my stuff was getting packed properly and undamaged and free from whatever bio-hazard lurked under their fingernails. With the job done, I chucked a deuce of pound coins into their bucket and turned to leave content with my heroic stand. Walking down the line of checkouts toward the exit I was greeted by two expressions from the people who had witnessed my fortitude. Those on the faces of the swarming chuggers clearly showed suspicion and disbelief at my brass neck non-conformity and those from the shoppers, which had hints of respect and envy; even a little hope that they too could be like me one day and take control of their destiny.

Perhaps next time I’ll have the balls to refuse to pay too and then maybe I’ll know what it feels like to be a whole man…though I think I will leave out expressing that verbally in case of confusion; that ‘w’ being so important for context. Or maybe I’ll start a ‘Save the Krill’ campaign and engage in a violent turf war with the whale hugger-chuggers. There are exciting times ahead for me and all because of a moment’s bravery in the checkout at the end of aisle 3.

 

*Wouldn’t ‘fuchuggers’ be a better mash-up? Not only more emotive due to the addition of another part-word but it sounds like an old steam train at full tilt if said repeatedly, which is fun. You know you’re going to try it.

**Does this property invasion tactic make them charity burglars or churglars or more accurately fuchurglars? (See ‘fuchuggers’.)

***Chargoyles…sounds like something to barbecue, which might not be a bad idea.

****Chackers. Like the bloke from Swap Shop…more Googling for you youngsters to do before you understand that weak-ass 1970s based pun.