I'm starting to lose the will to live with food/health/environment scare stories. This month I've read that not only can I no longer enjoy a bacon butty or indeed any cured meat, I'm also to be visited by some kind of 'travel interrogator' who's going to shine a light in my eyes to find out how often I use my car and why I don't cycle everywhere.
On one website I read a piece poking fun at Victoria Beckham for her skinny frame, while a mere click away was another story claiming that if we cut our calorie intake by 40% we could all live much longer. An experiment proved rats did live longer on a highly restricted diet, but translated into human terms we'd have to consume no more than 1,200 to 1,500 calories a day. Right!
Next, Which? magazine is sounding off again about TV advertising to children and the fact that the ban on foods high in salt, sugar or fat isn't working because more children watch The X Factor (ads allowed) than The Simpsons (ads banned).
Has no one stopped to think that these chubby kids are the offspring of chubby parents who do the shopping? Banning crisps ads certainly helps to stop already harassed parents being pestered for the latest confectionery, but it's not going to stop them feeding kids stodge or allowing them to sit in front of the TV for hours at a time.
All these stories are starting to make food shopping really stressful. I feel guilty every time I put anything indulgent in my trolley. I feel like a bad mother if I buy pizza or orange squash - never mind ready-meals. I wonder if I'm rotting my kids' teeth with fruit juice and I just know I'm killing my liver with my evening glass of wine. Aside from plain salad and vegetables, grilled fish or skinless chicken, there's basically very little left to eat.
My husband put some chocolate buttons into Oliver's school lunch box the other day - anyone would think we'd packed him off with a packet of Marlboro Lights. The shame of allowing our active nine-year-old to eat chocolate - did I mention he also had tuna sandwiches and tomatoes?
Talking to friends and relatives, there's every sign that people are switching off to it all and just getting on with it. We're all fed up with busybodies with nothing better to do than prescribing how we should live our lives. What next - food police patrolling the aisles of the local supermarket?
Has the number of customer complaints about the price of goods increased recently?
