Page 44 of Rookie Recovery

But my victory was short-lived. Very short-lived. Given that once you’d seen one shopping cart, you’d pretty much seen them all. And given that this museum was spread out over a once-abandoned megamart (nothing like British supermarkets) with its ramshackle repairs and displays. And given that the owner of the museum, and our personal and super diligent tour guide, was stark raving bonkers.

“This beautiful specimen,” our tour guide went on, “was used on the set of Supermarket Sweep Brazil. Note the dodgy front wheel that controversially cost the reigning champions their win. Couldn’t reach the dairy aisle in time. Another pair snatched the victory right from under their noses.”

“Fascinating,” I said, while Jamie hid behind his palm. His shoulders shook with silent mirth.

“And this one here, well—You boys seen the movie E.T.?”

“Yes, was it used in the film?” I said, trying to convey at least a modicum of enthusiasm while Jamie fully checked out.

“No. It’s from the Walgreens opposite the Universal lot they filmed E.T. in.”

At this, Jamie bent double, raking in his breaths, sounding as though he’d swallowed a harmonica.

Our host was a Brit, because of course he was. Went by the name of Phineas Robertson. And like every old, eccentric Brit, he had long, grey wizard hair, a handlebar moustache, a dusty, moth-eaten tailcoat, a technicolour waistcoat, pinstriped brown trousers, and Air Jordans.

Red Air Jordans. As though black ones would have thrown him firmly into the too-basic camp.

He’d welcomed us fondly. In hindsight, perhaps too fondly.

But the look on Jamie’s face had me ignoring all the red flags. His eyes were like saucers, his brows pulled up into his hairline, his arms outstretched, asking the silent question we were both thinking.

What the actual fuck?

Phineas had taken Jamie and me through the main part of the market/museum, and had given us a not-at-all-brief introduction to the history of the shopping trolley, despite his earlier assurances that it would be very brief indeed.

I listened to everything he’d said. Guided by my innate British manners and a deep-seated instinct for social cohesion. And frankly, it would have been rude not to.

Unlike my companion, who spent the entire introduction elbowing me in the ribs, muttering, “What the hell is this place?” and “Good lord, this stopped being ironically funny thirty minutes ago.”

“It’s almost as though you don’t respect Sylvan Goldman’s legacy, the inventor of the first ever shopping cart,” I said, nudging him back, but really using any old excuse to touch him.

“I’d suggest making a run for it, but he’s watching us like a beady-eyed hawk.”

It was when Phineas guided us to an area earmarked for “famous” shopping carts, deceptively named Hollywood Wheels, that Jamie totally lost his shit.

“He’s playing it fast and loose with the term famous, don’t you think?” he asked, as Phineas took us down an aisle displaying trolleys allegedly used by Channel 6 News stars while filming a piece on the ever increasing cost of groceries.

“He’s just passionate,” I countered. “Everyone has to have that one thing they crave more than anything. That thing that consumes your every waking thought. That thing that, if you didn’t get, or get to do, you’d spiral into a deep, bottomless pit of despair. For example, for me, that’s hockey. And for you, that’s sucking all the joy out of any situation.”

Jamie laughed. And I figured perhaps the trolley museum wasn’t such a bad idea after all. Any time I got to hear that elusive Dr James Sullivan laugh was worth it. Even if it did feel like we were trapped on the set of Dawn of the Dead.

As we walked down the narrow faux supermarket aisles, Jamie’s knuckles would occasionally brush mine, sending perfect little sparks of electricity up my arm.

Jamie paused. “He’s … wait, what was that phrase again? You know, the one I used when I was trying to say how drunk you were before?”

“Don’t say it,” I said. “I kind of feel bad for him.”

But that was before the fifteen minute Ted Talk on how baskets were an infinitely inferior vessel for transporting groceries, and the twenty-eight minute grilling on the trolleys I was accustomed to at my local Bruton Willesbury shopping centres.

“Well, there’s a Co-op, for milk and bread and whatnot,” I offered. “But if you want to do a big shop, everyone uses the Waitrose in Upper Willesbury Highstreet.”

“Mmhmm,” Phineas said, gripping the handlebar of a nearby cart so hard his knuckles turned white. “And describe the trolleys for me. Plastic or metal. What special features do they have?”

“Metal …” I side-eyed Jamie, whose face had gone red trying to hold back his laughter. “Um … they have these little metal rings where you can put your baguettes in …”

“Jesus H. Christ, you’re gonna make him come,” Jamie whispered.

After a few moments of veeeeerrrry awkward silence, Phineas perked up. “That about wraps up the famous trolleys part of the tour. After this, we have shopping trolleys of the world, arranged alphabetically by country and chronologically within those groups. Including a very interesting take on how trolleys were used to aid Britain’s efforts during the second world war. Then we move onto my favourite display, an interactive look at the science and technologies of trolleys. Followed by a brief”—there was that word again—“but delightful, 4D movie exploring the future of shopping trolleys.”

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