Unfortunately the toilet seat has broken. For some time, the two fixings that are supposed to hold the seat in place have been so loose that the seat won't stay on. A trip to B&Q was in order, and my starting point was the aisle with the plumbing supplies. I have no idea what a "toliet" is, but B&Q sell accessories, as demonstrated by the picture above. I took this as a signal that I was going to be disappointed in my endeavours to obtain the necessary components. A look along the pegs revealed nothing suitable, so I moved on to the bathroom section.
Mrs MWSC had chosen are rather unusual style of WC when the bathroom was installed, and I was not expecting to see the same one for sale after eight years. However, there it was, on display in a 'mock bathroom', complete with seat, for £200. I thought for a billionth of a second and moved on to the toilet seats in a nearby aisle, because buying a new loo was out of the question; that would be like buying a new car because the ashtray was full.
Toilet seats are fucking expensive. Forty fucking quid to sit and shit is a lot of money. How can manufacturers and retailers justify that money for a plastic seat? The fixing method of out loo seat is not standard, just as the seat itself is not standard, being rather square. The seats on display seemed similar, but the display models were affixed to the shelves (which resembled Meccano) in a bespoke fashion, so I was not able to make a proper comparison with how I needed to configure our seat.
Back in the plumbing aisle, I found one plastic pack containing two brackets and some threaded steel. It was so dubiously in line with my requirements that I decided not to bother. So, I will attend to the matter in due course, with some checking of my own supplies in the shed, as I am actually quite likely to have , in one of the numerous tins accumulated over the years, a couple of fixings that might do the job.
Before leaving the store, I notice some odds and sods at the end of the aisle allocated to items electrical in nature. Specifically, some junction boxes and a small contraption that converts a car cassette player to something compatible with a CD player or MP3. I therefore decided to make a purchase. The orange cardboard display held a lot of stuff, and the price per item was £2. There was a printed offer saying 3 for 2 and my brain sent me on a faulty path. For some reason, I took this as "two for three pounds", which made sense because the £2 per item would drop to £1.50 per item. In my stupor ( for I was clearly addled) I picked up a pack of junction boxes and the cassette contraption.
Self-service is almost compulsory these days. Passing the redundant checkouts, I arrived at the four self-service tills and scanned my two items: the display brought up £2 and £2, with a total of £4. I was not surprised at all, because offers are always prone to failure. A cheerful woman waddled over after I'd caught her eye. I explained that the offer was not showing, and that it should be £3. I was of course wrong, but at that stage she acknowledged there could be a problem, that the items were indeed on offer, and used her phone to call someone. She confirmed the nature of the goods to the person on the phone and confirmed with me that I'd got them from the orange boxes. She ended the call and advised that I had to buy another one to make the offer work. I realised I'd been in a world of my own; "3 for 2" was not £3 for two, of course.
I walked 1.72 miles on the round trip to the electrical goods in aisle 97, and returned to the self-service area with some more junction boxes. Wanda the Willing was in attendance once more, as I pointed to the display that had recorded on three separate lines, £2, £2 and £2, with a total of £6. She acknowledged it was still not working, and I received no useful answer when I enquired as to why programmers never get things right. In the next two minutes, I was bamboozled by Wanda quite unexpectedly. I'd made the first mistake through misinterpreting the "3 for 2" offer, but the machine had now managed its own mistake, deciding to ignore the fact that I'd hiked back and forth to obtain the necessary third item, leading to a third scan. Wanda was perturbed, but willing of course, and so clarified with me the offer, and I said: "Three for two". I've no idea what planet she was on, and maybe she was away with the fairies, dancing in the clouds to a 3-4-2 pattern (whatever that is) because she leaned towards the screen and started tampering.
The override facility that the store manager had given her was not, I fear, given with any accompanying sense of duty or responsibility not to misuse it. Wanda made a mistake not a million miles in nature from my own, because she deducted £1.50 from two of the items, and £1.00 from the other, and the final bill was £2.00. As she was doing this, I stood there baffled as fuck.
I weighed up my options, and decided that rather than re-confuse Wanda, and try to agree with her what the offer is/was/should be, I'd simply put my note into the machine and accept the reduction with good grace. The truth of the matter was I'd only actually wanted the cassette thingy for £2.00 and had picked up the pack of junction boxes because I thought it would in effect be only another quid. When I'd learned of the necessity to choose a third item and had considered the resultant £4 bill, I had questioned myself as to the real need for junction boxes, especially as I now had to purchase two double packs. In the end, I'd paid £2 and got the junction boxes free, perhaps in payment for all my searching and walking.
I decided that if retailers actually stopped pissing about with stupid offers, useless tills and self service facilities, there might be a better environment for all. They should just sell products individually, at a decent price, and keep things fucking simple. If you want something, you could then buy just the one without having your mind played with through encouragement to buy a second or even a third. Just to finish, then - What would you want to buy more than one three for two for? 1-3-4-2-4 Wanda! Help!
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