New Supermarket Excitement

Look, I know it's quite hard to get excited about a supermarket but our local Sainsbury's has had a rebuild and a refit. I have tested it thoroughly, so you don't have to.

I have found some problems with it and here they are for your edification and enjoyment for I am certain you long to know more about it this Christmastide.

Firstly, in the cafe they have provided some sweet little tubular plastic chairs for teeny tots to sit in, made in very, very bright colours. The teeny tots love them because when they kick their cute little feet they make a very, very loud noise akin to the noise made by a kind of drum called a Floor Tom. Imagine how appealing that is when there are three or four of the little ones in the cafe.

Secondly, in the toilets adjacent to the cafe there is a special little sink for the tinies to wash the blood off themselves when they have been hit repeatedly by customers unable to stand the drumming. Good idea, little sink for tiny tots. Bad idea to put it on the end of the row of sinks, just where the door opens. One little child standing in front of the sink - fine. But if a mother is so unlucky as to have two children with her, one stands in front of the sink and one at the side so when the next person opens the door to the toilets, the one at the side is swept off its feet and hurled to the other side of the room, as I witnessed today.

Thirdly, and perhaps most interestingly, is the Smelly Aisle. Huge new supermarket, all shiny and clean - but as the customers approach one end of it, they may be observed wrinkling their noses and, soon afterwards, fleeing that aisle and the aisles adjacent to it. For in that aisle lurks the terrible stench of decay. If, for example, you were to split up with your boyfriend or girlfriend, and leave them on very bad terms, and desire revenge, and unpick the hems of all the curtains on all the windows in their house, and place cooked prawns in the hems, and sew them up again, and leave them for three weeks - - well, that's the smell of the Smelly Aisle.

The smell has been there since the place opened about a month ago, and has shown no sign of decreasing. Sainsbury's, who were so keen to supply us with helpful notices when they were rebuilding the place ("There'll soon be a new supermarket for you to try" etc) are not so keen on this notice idea now, are they? For where are the signs saying "We apologise for the Putrid Stench and hope that this does not impair the pleasure of your Sainsbury's shopping experience".

Or perhaps "Welcome to the Retch-Inducing Stink Aisle. We hope that the rest of our produce will smell better, in contrast. Why not try some of the lovely perfumes from our Pharmacy department?"

Where can the smell come from? Has one of the builders been accidentally walled in? More to the point, why on earth has nobody seen fit to investigate?

Perhaps I'll have to write to the manager - particularly since the position of the children's sink is actually really dangerous. I am turning into the kind of person who writes to supermarkets. Sigh. Next it'll be the beige cardigans.