Arcticterntalk.org

The blog of a travelling psychiatrist and football lover. Who happens to be a halfway decent photographer. Takes a cynical view of the world

Archive for the tag “waitrose”

01 Apr 2014

Motorway Service Stations

Driving as I do around 20,000 miles/year sadly I am sometimes forced by circumstances to stop at these appalling places. My childhood recollections are of stopping late at night often on the way back from football games at wonderful places such as Barrow ( and I mean that, Barrow is a wonderful proper real football ground, the simple fact that it borders on Mordor and takes weeks to get there should not detract too much from that) and finding cold service stations, long queues and smelling vividly of fried food. Sadly not much has changed except two things. In the main they are all outlets, Burger King, Costa ,Waitrose etc, they are all incredibly expensive, but the queues have gone as no-one wants to or can afford the extraordinary prices.

Today typified things. Mug of tea 2£. Served as tea bag floating in mug. Go on a hunt to find milk, spoons etc. Served by the eternally damned or at least they look that way. No hello, no smiles, no thankyou’s. The atmosphere was dire. The tables looked like they had been sourced from a car boot sale selling ancient tables from a closed down club. Dirty. Smelly. It must have taken the last 20 years to extract every last ounce of atmosphere, pleasure, call it what you will. These places are devoid of anything resembling humanity.

Then the shops. Selling a selection of things that non-one in their right mind wants or needs. Buy a paper and one gets asked if one wants to buy two packets of chocolates for £4. The petrol station. Anywhere on this island diesel costs around 133.9-135.9 pence/litre. The more greedy local garages might ask for 137.9. The service station today was asking 144.9 pence/litre. This equates to an extra £7 a tank if I were to buy there.

Service stations are doomed. Only the desperate stop there in increasingly smaller amounts and the reasons above are why. Either charge a fortune but serve excellent stuff or charge reasonable prices in a reasonable atmosphere. Doomed unless you fancy buying one of these nice coats for sale in the shop. I am being serious…….

Posted in Uncategorized and tagged AA, barrow, barrow fc, burger king, children, children food, cost of diesel, cost of petrol, costa, dreadful food, expensive diesel, expensive food, expensive petrol, expensive service stations, football, football barrow, football games, holiday, M40, M40 services, mordor, motorway service station, motorway travel, odd clothes, quick food, real football ground, service station, service stations, services, shops, starbucks, waitrose, warwick services, warwickshire | Leave a comment

31 Dec 2013

Who Actually is Barry Waitrose? Does he know Vincent Tan?

I do not know nor have met Barry Waitrose. In fact none of you have. But Barry a suburb of Cardiff if I recall has a Waitrose so I am told. This story from the excellent Independent made me laugh. For the full details just click away here http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/waitrose-faces-middle-class-revolt-over-free-coffee-loyalty-card-9030195.html

But essentially Waitrose now invite folks to sign up for a free loyalty card enabling them to have a free cup of tea/coffee regardless of any purchase in the store. Great idea. I think the marketing term is loss leader. I think the card also allows some discounts on certain products, but in any case it is free, took 2 minutes to sign up for and may be helpful. Seemingly some Waitrose customers think otherwise and consider that the wrong types of customers are coming into their shops with ” tesco bags”. One such comment comes from Barry Waitrose.

Who are these clueless people? Do they really think that shopping in a specific shop makes them better people? Delusions of grandeur or simply delusions……. Is there something wrong with the air in Cardiff? Firstly Vincent Tan and now Barry Waitrose.

However who is Barry Waitrose and has anyone ever met him?

Posted in Uncategorized and tagged Barry, Barry waitrose, Barry wales, cardiff, cardiff fc, free coffee, free tea, free tea raynes park, loyalty cards, malky mackay, raynes park, tan, tesco, tesco clubcard, vincent Tan, waitrose, waitrose club card, waitrose customers, waitrose loyalty | Leave a comment

31 Mar 2013

Winkworth Arboretum

Winkworth Arboretum is a National trust property about 5 miles from Guildford in a quaint town called Godalming. The most striking thing about Godalming is that the houses are massive and the Waitrose in the centre of town even larger. The impression given is that a huge crater was created into which Waitrose slotted to fill the hole, and the road then re-built to bypass said Waitrose. But I digress. The Arboretum is a decent place to walk but sadly the extensed winter meant that few plants were visible today other than the occasional daffodil or snowdrop. No evidence of the Magnolias coming to life.

The walk is also not an easy one, many steps and slopes means that the walk might not be suitable for all. Can it be recommended? Maybe. One needs to return when spring has made an appearance to be decisive but I suspect it will become a nice place to walk. The Boathouse, is what it sounds, an old hut by the lake, but with chairs and old books in it gives the impression of a real old room. A sign on the door mentions that the NT have applied for permission essentially to have music and alcohol in here. Sounds good.