As usual, we went to Sainsbury’s in Liverpool Road for our Sunday shopping run. The weather had taken a turn for the better (but for how long?): the sun was shining and, according to the Met Office, the ambient temperature had reached a heady 9°C.

Sunny Baron Street

This photo of Baron Street shows the sunshine which, even if its warming power is still attenuated, at least makes us feel more cheerful!

A good turnout at Chapel Market?

We crossed Chapel Market into White Conduit Street and a quick glance at the market itself suggested a good turnout: stalls all the way up to the middle. Appearances can be deceptive, though, as we shall see.

Why do we take the apparently eccentric route through White Conduit Street into Tolpuddle Street and from there go round the corner into Liverpool Road instead of going straight down Chapel Market and simply turning left? In a word: the queue!

Queueing for Sainsbury’s

On Sunday just as they opened was previously a good time to shop at Sainsbury’s as there were relatively few customers at that time. Since the onset of the pandemic, though, that has changed and many more people turn up at opening time, perhaps under the illusion that there will be fewer shoppers then. The result is that, before the opening at 11 am, a queue begins to form and stretches along Sainsbury’s façade in Liverpool Road and round the corner into Tolpuddle Road and so we join it there. Today it was already long and immediately after we arrived, several more people took up station behind us.

At 11 am, as though someone has fired a starting pistol, the queue begins to advance and surprisingly fast! When we arrive at the entrance we see an security employee with an electronic pad counting us in. At the exit are matching security employees counting the people who leave. By this means, Sainsbury’s limits the number of customers in the store to what it considers safe.

Tolpuddle Street and an aeroplane

While waiting, I took this photo looking along Tolpuddle Street. You might be able to see an aeroplane in the sky just to the right of the street lamp. Shining in the sun, it somehow emphasised the cheerfulness of the scene.

We knew exactly what items we needed and sped round Sainsbury’s in record time, despite ending with a well stocked trolley. We reached a checkout just as the previous customer was leaving.

Have you noticed how checkout staff never push your items far enough down the chute so that you have to reach for them? So I give each item an extra push, roughly dividing them into groups while Tigger stows them in the shopping trolley.

Not so many stalls, after all

On the way back we do go through the market, so I was able to see that my initial impression was faulty: there were not that many stalls today after all, despite it being Sunday and the weather fine. They were all grouped in the middle, making it seem that they were more numerous than in fact they were.

I of course paid a visit to Mercer’s to buy coffee and I remembered to hand them our loyalty card and retrieve it duly stamped: free coffee next time!

A glance at the time showed that the whole trip, from home and back again, had taken just 40 minutes. Not bad going.

Did Ari miss us while we were gone? No, I don’t think so, either!

First thing this morning, as I was preparing my breakfast, I looked around the room, visually seeking a familiar form, but nothing caught my gaze: our house guest, Ari the Spider, was nowhere to be seen.

Imagine my amused surprise, then, when Tigger emerged and said “Oh, look!”

Ari reappears
Photo by Tigger

I looked and on the wall, virtually above my head, was Ari! Where she had been and how she had reappeared so suddenly seemed mysterious.

Our rooms have high ceilings and there’s not much light at the top so that photographing a small creature in the shadows presents difficulties. It seemed only reasonable to use flash as we did on a previous occasion. However, both then and this time, Ari’s reaction suggests that the flash incommodes her. We will therefore refrain from using it in future.

Ari is still here – for now

Our method of choice now is to use the torch app on our phones to provide enough illumination for the photo. That’s how I took the photo above. The light is far less intense than that of the flash and Ari doesn’t seem to mind it.

In the time interval between the two photos, we had been out to do our shopping and so I was a little surprised on our return to find Ari much where we had left her. However, she did start to move and in a generally downwards direction. By the time I had written this, she had disappeared again.

This, then, provides a clue to where she spends her periods of invisibility: behind the books on the bookshelves! I could, of course, move the books and take a look but I really don’t want to disturb her if she believes she has found a safe place to wait out the winter. I am happy to see her when she puts in an appearance and to leave her in peace in between.

Note: In my original post I said I would always include the word “spider” in the title of posts about Ari so that arachnophobes can skip them if they wish.