No Shopping Today Please

Since it seems that only the consumer-tax-payer can save the world from the mess that the MBAs have gotten us into, I thought I would do my bit for the local economy today and go and buy a new laptop.

There is nothing particularly wrong with Sparkly Aph's laptop, it's just that, well, it hurts my lap. It weighs more than the underexercised hairy one, and since I don't have thighs like a Turkish weight-lifter, it can get very uncomfortable. Occasionally, while perhaps pondering a particularly thought-provoking, philosophical post from Daddy Papersurfer, I can drift off into my own little world, only to wake up with a start and find that I have lost the use of both legs for the rest of the day.

However, I then remembered that where I live they still refuse to open the shops on a Sunday. Modern day sausageland is so scared of offending anyone that when it comes to the choice between a blatantly obvious opportunity to kick-start their economy and the sensitivities of the 'keep Sonntag sacred' lobby, they'll go with the Follow MY Moral Compass Brigade every time.

When I first arrived in the Farterland, one of the first things I went to do was buy a car. I ran some errands on my first Saturday, ate a sausage, and then went to hand over a large wadge of the hard-earned, only to learn that car showrooms close at midday on Saturdays, and then do not reopen until the working week has really got into full swing. All of them. I considered this briefly, and it occurred to me that every car I have ever bought was on a Saturday afternoon (not including the clapped-out old deathtrap that Daddy Papersurfer wisely made me and Tiggz take back :-)).

Actually to clarify, the showrooms are open on a Sunday. I can, and sometimes do, pop over the Rhein to have a reminiscent/wishful wander round the huge Porsche centre if the church bells get too irksome. BUT they are absolutely, categorically not allowed to sell me anything. In fact Salespeople are forbidden by law from speaking to me, and therefore the only people on site are terminably bored receptionists who would rather be wandering down the local Champs-Elysees-equivalent peering into shop windows wondering what they would try on if any of them were actually open.

The counter-arguments for kick-starting the economy are so full of holes that they are barely worth mentioning. "Sunday should be a family day." My family wants to go shopping, feel free to do whatever you like with yours. "Shop assistants don't want to work on a Sunday." Let's run a poll amongst the gazillion unemployed and find if anyone would be interested in doing a few hours. At overtime rates. (My favourite) "There's only so much money that people will spend, you won't create any more by opening on Sunday." I, like millions of others are more than willing to spend cash. I would just like the opportunity, since I'm busy quite a lot of the time earning it.

If the global markets wouldn't mind just taking a break from implosion one lunchtime next week I might pop out and make a consumer electrical goods purchase, if that doesn't hurt anybody's feelings.