Thursday 11 September 2014

Vacuum cleaner frenzy

I'm proud to announce that I didn't get swept up in the latest craze - I'm not talking about the ice-bucket challenge, although I did get nominated for that but chose instead to give a donation to the Air Ambulance.  No, I mean the craze for panic-buying vacuum cleaners.

The thought never even occurred to me.  I heard about it on the news, and at first assumed it was a joke, but they had photographic evidence of people loading the soon-to-be-banned high powered devices into the back of their cars in a frenzied fashion.

Now, I'm not a professional cleaner - I prefer to maintain my amateur status in case it ever becomes an Olympic sport - so perhaps I don't fully appreciate the complexity of the cleaning-power required.

In truth, I don't even know the wattage of my current machine - it was purchased from Clearance Bargains a few years ago, it does the job, and I'm not really bothered - it is not a status symbol.  It's a household appliance which lives in the garage or utility room and only makes an appearance when nobody else is present. 

Unless of course I'm missing something?  If you've got a high-powered, limited edition, fancy make, do you wheel it out in company so your friends can marvel at it?  Do people have parties where they bring along their vacuums and compare features?  Perhaps there's a whole other world of domestic appliance envy out there of which I have no knowledge and play no part!

Joking apart though, I guess if you've got family members with allergies a better quality machine becomes more important, but for the vast majority of us I'm sure the lower-powered versions we can still legally purchase are adequate.

But this discussion did lead me to consider the items I would perhaps consider panic buying should the EU decide to ban them.

Cadbury's chocolate heads the list, followed by tea bags and Marmite.  I'm fairly sure a ban on these items is highly unlikely, but should it ever occur don't be surprised if you see me on the news loading up my car, or a van, or perhaps a lorry, or even two lorries...

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