Plastic rant . . .

I have to have these from time to time, and THIS really warrants one.

We all (or most of us) now realise that endlessly producing billions of plastic containers every day is totally unsustainable and polluting - to say the very least.

We all use plastic  - this keyboard I'm typing on, the car bumper I tied back on with wire this morning (rather proud of that), train seats, plane seats, televisions, audio-equipment, fridges, washing machines, guttering, drains, food containers, the everywhere water bottles and just about everything else. Should we not be cutting back on unnecessary products rather than producing more and more CHOICES, to thus use plastic for essentials like medical equipment?
Yes, there is an argument re jobs in such sectors as body-care products but maybe there just isn't a choice any longer. Hair = a shampoo product, and it's now possible to buy solid shampoo in a cellophane wrapper. We have some and it's great. Clothes = a need to wash them. Get a refill at your local eco store. It's less expensive and does the job.
And we move on to the subject of this particular rant. Fabric conditioner - with a big CON. This must be one of the cleaning companies most heralded products. An extra substance to dunk clothes in for really no reason. Meadow Sweet, Island Oasis, Snuggle, Final Touch - quite an appropriate name, perhaps - Downy, Fluffy, Fleecy, Comfort, Lix (ugh), Purex, and of course the massive Lenor range.
One or two products might suffice? Nope. A whole new range in even more shiny thick plastic bottles has appeared in our local supermarket.
I only went in to get a cube of yeast and some dog chews but stopped transfixed by the in-your-face and will-be-in-your-bag display featuring (bizarrely) a wolf and an erotic version of Little Red Riding Hood - I think.
Imagine the meetings, the trays of Danish pastries, the gallons of coffee consumed while ad-execs agonised over the names and colours of these useless and planet-knackering products.



The perfume of secrets - whaaat? Covering up some old poo stain on a toddler's trousers? Séduisant - seducing fabric softener? I Suppose they are trying to move away from cosy, soft and comforting?

                           

                                                                            Kiss.
              This really should being in Ann Summers shop and be called Sweat Liqueur

                                          

                                                             Charm and mystery.
Come on . . . you could have been a little more imaginative, surely? Alien-craft sex-chamber; the lost jewels of the Queen of the great oceans?

                                          

                                                                           Blush
                                                And you should, Proctor and Gamble.

Governments should ban this water-polluting, land-fill garbage. Iron clothes if you want them soft, and if they smell a bit unlike a spring meadow, a woman dressed in a red cloak or a wolf (?) so what.

I've just found an old Lenor ad I recall from way back featuring a housewife wracked with guilt over her daughters' prickly nightdresses. Will post for a comparison . . .

Bucolic car boot sale

Or as we say here: Vide Grenier - emptying one's attic.
Compared to the boot sales I remember from the UK days, most V.Gs are set in small villages, usually on sunny days, where you can wander, perusing the usual glut of hastily bought and subsequently dumped Get Fit equipment, clothes, shoes, fois gras funnels, records, video cassettes that nobody wants, terrible paintings, plants, kittens, jam, fondu sets, etc, etc.
The last V.G I went to before departing back to the UK for a few days (where I didn't go to a car boot sale - not for the want of trying) was in the grounds of a local church edifice: the Basilique Notre Dame de Marceille    
I paused before walking across the grass, stunned at the tranquility of the sight before me; each stall of utter crap transformed momentarily in the morning sun to a lost scene of pastoral beauty as happy peasants traded their goods for a few rustic coins, and the purchasers wandered contentedly back to their donkeys, (large 4x4s).

Clothes logo meeting.

OK, what can we put on this one . . . I know, drop the dictionary and wherever it falls open at, we'll use the first word, third line down, left hand side. Go.
Lawnmower . . . mm, perhaps not.
Try again: Long intestine. Nope.
Oh, let me try . . . skunk.
My turn: sock-stretcher.
You're not doing it right. Drop it higher, off the top of that filing cabinet. OK.
Scrotum.
Eccles cake.
Transvestite.
Culvert.
Minnow.
Wart.
Bastard.
Marsh warbler.
Wardrobe.
Taxidermy.
Scrag end of lamb.
Flying buttress.
Narcissist.
Flange.
Look it's five o'clock. The next three things and that's it.
OK.
Joy ride. Victorian. Times.
Silence.
That's rubbish.
I know, but I need to get to the shops . . . anyway Victorian times – that's alright . . .
Yeah, but, Joy ride?
Footsteps.
Did you turn the coffee machine off?
Yep.