Woolworths has gone into receivership. The news shocked me slightly. It had always been there. It was a fixture of the British high street. Not that I'm sorry- except for the staff, for whom its a bummer- because I never loved it. I had my reasons. One reason is I'm a snob, another is I don't like my shops brassy, ugly and fluorescent and a third is that in 1959 one of their shop assistants grabbed me, told me I looked a mess, straightened my collar and rolled my sleeves up neatly- and if there's one thing I hate it's being fussed over by mother hens. Ailz's pa says it's her fault for doing all her shopping online and- while we've never ever done our real-life shopping at Woolies so can't be accused of deserting it- he does have a sort of a point. Woolies is the lazy store, the one that that refused to move with the times. It was the prototype of both the budget shop and the supermarket, but stayed exactly where it was- continuing to offer the mid-century shopping experience- cheap, cheaper, cheapest- whilst the fully-evolved budget shops and supermarkets under-cut and outstripped it. When you think about it ,"The wonder of Woolies" (remember that slogan?) is that it lasted as long as it did .
