Crikey

Nearly a week's passed since my last blog and I just don't know where it's gone. Well, I do, actually, gruelling twelve hour shifts Saturday and Sunday, add in a couple of late nights, two sets of visitors, a state funeral and mid week wake, my community work and a sprinkling of disorganization is enough to consume a week.

I haven't even made the promised Jamaican Spice Cake yet for Hubby's birthday, but he did get a banana cake, so he's not too hard done by.

So I have Easter to look forward to this weekend, and as usual I've not done a thing. I really need to get some Easter things sorted out for our family and friends children - I guess it'll be another last minute rush. No one could ever say that leading an ethical life is easy.

So, I was thinking the other day about supermarkets. Whether we like it or not, there are some things that we all have to use supermarkets for as there is no where else to buy it from. Also, more people work these days, longer hours, so they don't have the luxury of being able to nip to a fruit and veg shop.

So when we have to buy from supermarkets, it's cost effective to be a bit clever. Think outside the box. Some products are available in multiple departments and by not using the most obvious department, we can save money.

For example, everyone knows I like a home made cake. If I was going to make a chocolate cake, I would need the wondrous brown stuff for topping if not for the cake itself. I could go to the baking isle and pick up some cooking chocolate, or, I could go to the sweets section and pick up some supermarket own brand actual chocolate, which is really pretty nice, (I, of course, would rather we all purchased a bit of Green and Black's Organic, but, let's be realistic - not many of us are going to cook with organic chocolate) and it's an awful lot cheaper, usually around 27p for 250g bar.

We all use cotton wool and cotton wool pads. You buy them from the cosmetic section you're going to be paying adult prices, but them in the Baby section, you're paying less. AND sometimes you get the option of organic cotton too.

So, the big ethical debate. Supermarkets are bad, we all know that. Profit does not stay locally, they destroy high streets the country wide. However, you sometimes get options to buy organic and Fairtrade products you wouldn't be able to pick up on the high street. So which it the right thing to do? In the long term, my thinking is that if you support your local producer/seller enough, he'll be able to stock Fairtrade oranges in his high street shop. But would that really happen? And how long would it take? The debate goes on, but I think as long as we make ethical choices of some description, that's the main thing.