Those bleepin' bleeps!

Hi there
If there's one thing that makes me get  1)  embarrassed;   and 2) so angry I'm spitting tacks,  it's when I walk between  a store's anti-theft bleepers ... and they bleep loud enough, and long enough to wake the dead, and everybody in the store turns and stares.

The first time it happened I walked into a Rebel store with a Kathmandu purchase under my arm.  Bleeeeep!

"It happens all the time with Kathmandu goods," said the Rebel sales guy.  "They always forget to anti-bleep the bleepin' machine". 

I made another purchase at Kathmandu a few weeks later - and my purchase again bleeped  as I was entering a store.  Next it happened with a Warehouse shoulder bag .

I bought a Donna Karen bag at an outlet store in Las Vegas.   I was mortified when security staff came running after me everywhere I went in Lower Hutt's Westfield Mall.  I vowed never to take that bag out again.  And I haven't.  Sorry, Donna.

Today, I walked between the bleepers at Countdown Supermarket in Kilbirnie. The bleeps were unrelenting.  I slammed my bag down on the counter, furiously emptied my pockets, and before the assistant had even got halfway across the floor to deal with me, I had screeched out a string of  naughty words which roughly translated into decent language came across as, "Oh, for the love of little bunnies!"

"It's alright.  It's okay.  It doesn't matter," the assistant stuttered.  Obviously I'd scared the hell out of the woman.

Talk about feeling like a thief.   I yearned to throw every piece of clothing off me, just to prove I didn't have umpteen gold bars from Michael Hill hidden in my knickers.

I stomped over the road into the bleeping foyer of Farmers Department Store  "Yesterday, I bought this hoodie that I'm wearing," I hollered.  "Take the bleepity-bleep-bleep bleeper off it." 

Turned out it wasn't the hoodie. 

This morning I'd run out of a print cartridge for my printer.  I'd grabbed the old empty packet to take that down to the store with me to show the assistant what I was after.  The empty packet was the cause of the bleeps at both Countdown and Farmers.  Would you believe it?

 Thanks, Farmers, for narrowing the culprit down with your bleeper gun.  But bleepity-bleepity-bleep-bleep to all you annoying  shops that don't anti-bleep your customers' purchases...

xxx

Oh, here's a nice soothing photo of Coco, my Wednesday dog.

Swimming today at Hataitai Beach

What a nice day.  26c, which is terrific for Wellington in December.  I went out to Westfield Mall in Lower Hutt, had a lovely time trying on loads of summer clothes.  A great Christmas atmosphere everywhere, however, very hard to find a parking place, even though I got to the Mall at 9.30 a.m.

Then I stopped off at Hataitai Beach and had a  leisurely swim.  Three of the summer regulars were there.  It's great to see my beach friends for the first time this summer.

It's my third swim at Hataitai for the month.  Even though I swam dozens of times when I was on holiday fhe first two weeks in December , J and I have agreed to only count Hataitai Beach and all points south of Wellington  in our "head count".  Northern beaches are warmer and if they were counted, it would be an unfair advantage to me, (darn!).  So, two more swims and we're both home and hosed - we will have done a minimum of 5 swims every month this year.  This obviously doesn't mean much in the summer but, oh boy - brrrhhhh - in the winter, I figure it's  sure something to be proud of.

Here's a couple of pix I took today at Hataitai Beach.  Schools knocked off today for the long summer holidays.