A giggle from today's Guardian

[Marion]

I was reading about the ban on legal highs this morning when I spotted this striking piece of advice from the Home Office:



"The term psychoactive covers such a wide range of substances that the legislation comes with an extensive list of exemptions including food, medicines, alcohol, nicotine and tobacco products, and coffee and tea.

New Home Office guidance to shops and other retailers appears to recognise that drawing a line between some household goods and banned substances is not always going to be easy.

It suggests that someone over 25 who tries to buy several whipped cream canisters, which contain nitrous oxide, and nothing else at 11pm should be asked why they are buying them: “The customer hesitates in replying and when they do they seem intoxicated, slurring their words. In this scenario the cashier should consider not selling the goods,” the Home Office advises."



OK sploshers, start preparing and practicing your excuses in the space below.

Oooh! Or perhaps we could get some little cards printed: 'I need all this whipped cream because I'm a dirty fucker' cards. I want one.


Marion

[iainecgunge]

Hehe, well just buy custard and pastry cases with your squirty cream!

[messyalan]

When shopping for food or clothes I have always wanted to be asked what I was buying them for. I wanted to see if I had the nerve to tell them the truth. Now I might have to!

[messyalan]

When shopping for food or clothes I have always wanted to be asked what I was buying them for. I wanted to see if I had the nerve to tell them the truth. Now I might have to!

[Lizzie_Claymore]

I suspect there's a slight misunderstanding here.

The canisters to which they refer (but none too accurately) are the little gas canisters that commercial caterers use for foaming the cream, not the actual cream products themselves or the domestic cans which produce whipped cream but without any access to the gas, separately.

(It's the gas canisters that people have been using for (now illegal) purposes.)

[Marion]

Ah-ha! Thanks Lizzie. Well now I wonder where the Home Office thinks you can shop for small relatively small quantities of catering grade ingredients late at night.

Amusingly, I think the confusing advice came from the official press release to retailers. So I'm still imagining little chats in supermarkets like the one below. On Iain's advice, I added a few essential camouflage items.

And Alan: trust you.

Marion

[Squelch]

I'll just go with the squirty cream canister theory....much more fun

Your cartoon character has fantastic curly hair Marion. Perfect for flattening

[Marion]

Oh you’d think it’s perfect for flattening, but those curls fight back. A proper slick of treacle would work for a minute or two, then she’d be deafened by popping air bubbles as the curls re-assert themselves. Alternatively you might think a bucket of kitchen scraps would be devastatingly effective… and it is … but I would be pushed to call the results ‘flat’. That hair can eat lasagne and potato peelings the way a tsunami eats beach furniture.