Sick of Xmas now following a bust up in an marks queue

[daisydee43]

Hey

Feel really sad, normally love Xmas but today has made me really annoyed. Don't normally leave Xmas shop this late but dh has conveniently broke his wrist so I had to drive him round to do his last min bits.

1. Had bust up with dh as he hates my driving
2. Went into m&s - couldn't believe my eyes! Food hall was gridlock (had to get out so quick dd lost her toy :( people were going nuts it was so un-festive. Had to cut through a queue to get out and some woman rammed her trolley into the back of me thinking I was cutting in (told her where to go)

I know this sounds very normal but what the hell happened to joy - there was none out today

Feck me did I.

I went all hoity toity posh and told her her fortune.

i think M&S is the worst for this. i planned to call in to our Simply Food yesterday, for a few nice nibbly extras. Saw the heaving masses squabbling and spilling out of the door, and walked back home again without bothering.

we went to Sainsburys instead, where it was all very civilised.

Going to morrisons at 7am tomorrow! ! Gonna be prepared for the worst - might get there half hr early to park? Bring on Xmas day when no one can shop (although a few off licences my way opened last Xmas day )

Considering that the average M&S customer is supposed to be a civilised human being I'm often surprised at the rudeness and behaviour of some of them.

I once saw 2 women almost come to blows over a Hello Kitty T-shirt that was marked down in the sale in our local one.

the pick up from Waitrose (jl click and collect order) went well, only two other people at the collection point, even managed to get a nice pasta salad for my lunch. Now have 6 boxes of milk tray going spare as found nicer boxes of chocolates or my staff at Waitrose. Fingers crossed m&s is the same in three hours time.

good luck everyone

My ocado delivery is coming tomorrow.
If there is stuff missing we will either do without or go to the local co op.
People really do go loopy don't they?
The shops are open again on Boxing Day!

Have to pick up turkey from M&S tomorrow morning. Am quaking in my boots ...

Can I please plead - if you have anyone AT ALL that can look after them - please please leave your children at home..... Taking your partner, baby in a pram, screaming 5 year old is just madness. One women had a double buggy and her partner was carrying a 3 year old who was crying their eyes out. Why!!

Westfield's on Sat was like that, clogging up the aisles and having a good old chat about sprouts. The people I really feel sorry for are the older women (they all seem to be women btw) who are wandering around with a trolley and very little in it. Is it because they havent realised its the Sat from hell or that they are lonely? Dont have an issue with them at all but do with the families en masse....

Still, last year M&S Simply Food was closed around here because someone pulled a knife over a parking space.

Blimey! Madness! I have to say that our local M&S staff were brilliant yesterday morning. They'd planned the checkouts like a military campaign and had stationed managers along the queues so no one could barge in - they used walkie talkies to communicate with each other to keep the queues moving quickly.

It was all very civilised - even me and I usually get very agitated in crowds.

Knives in the M&S car park? Truly terrified about tomorrow now . . . Should I wear body armour?

Well, our smallish Sainsburys was lovely, yesterday. People waited their turn for stuff, staff were dressed up and there was a huge chorus of We Wish You a Merry Christmas, at one point!

And DH collected our order from M&S, this morning, at 7:30, before going to work. They'd set up a service desk close to the entrance, so he didn't even have to go to the food hall. He had to park outside Homebase, though, as the spaces outside M&S were already full.

Local m&s that has been virtually empty since opening a month ago was carnage. Lulled into false sense of security after pleasant trip to waitrose at lunch time set off after work and thought gosh the traffic is bad well it was all for m&s! Luckily I know the area well as live 15 minutes walk away do parked in a local street and walked but was worse in the store. Customer services where you collect from was chaos. Trollies and people everywhere. Was glad to make it out unscathed I didn't bother looking for fire roasted chilli tortilla chips I've got salted ones they will do with my dips on Christmas and boxing nights.

I decided to go to M&S at 8 in the morning on Sunday. It felt like hell waiting in the dark at a cold and wet bus stop (with a cold and wet nose) but Marks was nearly empty when I arrived.

I'm glad I went then.

Hope you're feeling more cheerful, OP.

I think people do such a big shop because most people hate food shopping and just don't want to go near a supermarket more than once over Xmas. Daft really - would save a lot of hassle if people just bought for their actual Xmas dinner and then went back for other stuff on Boxing Day or the 27th.

Do people not have freezers?

Did all of mine bar cream and veg ages ago.

Why would you put yourself though it?

I do mine earlier and earlier each year. Sooooo going to fall flat on my face and have a power cut one year,was sweating a bit last night.

I did my Xmas shop on the 22nd and Tesco was hideous. I had a surreal moment when I stopped and looked around me at people shovelling boxes of cheese bites and battered prawn canapes in to their trolleys like it was the day before the apocalypse. Made me laugh.

Steering well clear of shops / town centre today. Xmas Eve is for booze chilling out.

Retropear - we've had constant power cuts over the past few months, so definitely wouldn't have risked anything expensive in the freezer!

At least it's bloody cold, if today's wind takes out our power again, so we can just shove all the chilled stuff in the garage, if needs be.

Blimey Our where do you live?

In a rather exposed village on a high hill in Co Durham. All our power is carried on poles, so lots to go wrong. We had daily 1 second cuts all summer - just enough to have to reset all the clocks every time, then lost it for 8 hours after a storm in September. They must have fixed something after that, as it went off the following Saturday morning for a few minutes and then was a bit more stable. It was on and off all day during the storm on the 5th and we've had flickery lights and occasional brown outs and surges all month.

If there's a drawer in a room, it has a torch in it!

Re: M&S ........some friends of ours pre-ordered their turkey from M&S and went to pick it up yesterday.

They had to queue for 1 hour in the queue to pick it up and then a further 45 mins in another queue to pay for it.

As they rightly pointed out, they could have just walked into the shop and picked one up out of the fridges and paid for that, cutting out the 1 hour queue.

No wonder people are feeling stabby.

...think I'll just suck up the price and shop local.

I do this every year and I bet I spend and waste less than a lot of other people. My Christmas shopping mainly consists of mooching down our high street. It tends to become a bit of a social occasion, as I generally bump into friends doing the same thing.

I am lucky enough to live in a small town with great food and gift shops though (one street of independent shops, a farm shop and a very nice regional supermarket).

I'm full of a cold, but I might pop down to the wine shop for a bottle (or two) of something for tomorrow's table... it's only 200 yards away and they're serving nibbles .

DH went straight in and out, yesterday, Norbert, all before work. Last year, we ordered from a town centre store on Christmas eve afternoon. Straight in and out, again.

Something must have gone wrong inside that store for them to be so disorganised.

Just been to morrisons and was pleasantly impressed - got a mother and toddler parking space! And tbh it was no more busy than normal except you don't normally shop with dh so people having domestics - I'm all done now (dd in quarantine with s&d) so it's just a sofa day for us

I went to M&S last year and had a panic attack after people were shoving me with their trollies and bumping in to me and I couldn't get anything I wanted for people pushing past to get to the same item.

This year I pre ordered, was very civilised going to collect it, got a free bottle of Buck's Fizz, a mince pie while I waited all of 5 minutes for my order to be found and a very nice man served me. No panic attack.