To ask for a roundup of all the 'non-essentials'?

[SuckingDownDarjeeling]

I've seen some beautiful examples of things some commenters think are 'non-essential' and therefore people shouldn't be leaving their houses for... trawling through each thread to find them is so tiresome, will some kind MNers please share what they've seen that made them laugh?

I'll start... Newspaper, Bread, Milk

Not looking to name and shame anybody, I just want some insight into the state of things right now.

I'm just waiting for somebody to start listing off 'essential' medications. Maybe that will stop selfish people flocking off to the pharmacies to buy Germoloids finally! (That was a joke please don't kill me )

Wot? - a walk to the shop to buy biscuits isn't an approved form of exercise?

P'raps I'd better add a couple of cucumbers.

Any beverage that isn't water
But water can be got from a tap, so surely not essential to buy??
Personally I'd see wine as more of an essential

Somebody genuinely said the other day, that, while plants are nice to have, they are non-essential, you don't need plants to survive. I think you'll find we very much do...

Similarly, "why is everybody so bothered about flour, stop eating so many cakes" because the only thing you can make with flour is giant, non-essential cakes.

we have the internet but my husband wouldn't be without his daily Times

I’d bet my entire life savings that he could be without it

I used to work with a girl who always put a chunk of cheese into her coffee, she said that she loved it when she got to the bottom of the cup and it was all melty and she could could scoop it out with her fingers and eat it. I would heave when I saw the fat floating on the top. She was Hispanic and claimed it was a popular thing with folk from Puerto Rico to do
(slightly off topic sorry, but it came to mind when a PP mentioned substituting milk with cheese, which I guessed was tongue in cheek?)

Surely it’s all about context though

Not for many on MN. They frown on ANY sort of frivolous purchase, any shopping trip whatsoever. Because they have stockpiled a years worth of kidney beans and rice in the shed and they're bloody well going to eat it.

Agree with poster up thread who said we should be minimising trips, not what we buy when we're there. I am putting together a list for the weekly trip to the supermarket on Thursday and I have "frivolous" things like chocolate, hair dye and popcorn on the list.

Going by the threads on here; absolutely anything that isn't gruel.

You eat gruel and you be grateful for it!

@Spam88

Ffs .... people need to wind their necks in.... people really do have too much time in their hands ...

@ShirleyPhallus re the someone buying 2 Easter eggs.... I did that the other day ..... but what they might not have seen was that my post office counter is in the back of our Co-op.... I run what is deemed to be an essential business and had walked there with two carrier bags of items to post ( labels all ready printed - so just needed to drop off). So I was already inside the shop. I was picking up milk for elderly neighbour and whilst waiting in the queue there was a display of Easter eggs.

So I put two in my basket for my kids .... but to the uninitiated who didn’t realise I was posting essential items and helping out my neighbour, it might have looked like I was just buying Easter eggs

Oh yes,hair dye @PineappleDanish. I toughed it out until today but have now used my one box. I'm a new woman.

Am I allowed to buy any more? I won't be too fussed about the colour (apart from grey obv)

Hahahah the couple of cucumbers!!!

So if you walk down the bread aisle and pick up hot cross buns rather than a white loaf it’s a risk for spreading/catching Coronavirus is it?!?

It surprises me that shops are still accepting the tokens, but we are still trotting down for the Times, too.

I've been depressed to discover how many people I know who seem to genuinely think you can just get over Coeliac disease with a bit of willpower, or having a bad reaction to gluten is just being self indulgent.

@Thighmageddon that is completely unacceptable on the warming tablets, as a serious aside I do worry about the other public health problems that are going to come as a fallout from all this.

I agree with pp re the two solitary cucumbers.

That exact shopping list is the sole reason I had a weekly delivery slot prior to this kicking off.

I really wish I was the one from our house doing the shopping. I'd be picking up lots of 'non-essentials' and telling any tutters or busybodies to mind their own fucking business. I'm getting the rage just reading this thread! Tutting at a lady buying a bra?! Omg I think I would have punched them. Claimed insanity because of the lockdown or something. What a prize prick.

Surely though- if everyone shopped for the same narrow range of essential items then those items would soon be in short supply?

By different people having different ideas as to what they want or need we are helping not to drive the stocks of the same few items down to zero?

Ok so cous cous isn't essential, but if I buy it instead of pasta or rice then I'm doing everyone a favour- no?

But water can be got from a tap, so surely not essential to buy??
Personally I'd see wine as more of an essential

Surely the answer then to minimising trips out is to amend the taps to supply wine?

I bought a rotary clothes line. I'm sure we're supposed to just wear the same few outfits over & over & over until they go stiff, develop life, & escape from the house, & we are forced to buy more clothes. I also bought vegetable seeds, but we can't eat them now, so not essential. Screw planning for the future.

@delphicoracle DH did the same, he used the post office at the back of a shop and returned with mini eggs for me. Would be mortified if anyone started a thread about him

I made a separate shop to just buy milk, when DH went to asda for the weekly shop in the evening they had non left so I went to a corner shop for some. To my family its an essential, last week we used 22 pints that would be very expensive in cheese.
I have seen the paper delivery boy in our street most mornings so some people must be getting daily papers delivered which I would think would be better than them all going separately to the shop.

Holidays abroad.

Oh yes,hair dye @PineappleDanish. I toughed it out until today but have now used my one box. I'm a new woman.

@campion it's not for me, it's for my 14 year old DD who is desperate to dye her hair pink. As she's not going to be at school for some considerable time, I don't see the harm in letting her experiment.

Thank you @SignOnTheWindow I'm not doing too bad! Crying at the smallest thing & almost lost it at buying my DSs new car seat yesterday
I always feel really bad about 'popping to the shop' when I've run out of one of the things I'm tolerating at the moment (sprite, plain or prawn cocktail crisps, eggs). DH tried to tell me last night that eggs didn't warrant a trip to the shop and I burst into tears so this morning on his way home from work he picked some up for me