Competition is terrible

I was doing the usual milk-and-bread supermarket run the other day. Turned a corner to head to the long fridge with the dairy products. To be met by the sight of like 4 chics milling about the very spot I was heading for. This is the stuff nightmares are made of. The number of times I've changed direction [run] at the sight of a group of women. Too painful to remember.

Anyway. I knew these ones. Not acquaintance like. But I knew them. Those folks who stand by supermarket shelves, ostensibly waiting for you to show interest in a rival product to that of their employer, and then pounce on you with all sorts of emotional blackmail. Another lot that causes my blood pressure to wobble, and put my avoidance skills to use.

On this day, I couldn't not buy milk. So I steadied myself, put on one of the stern faces from my repertoire, and headed into the apparent den of sales executives. Or business development managers. To my surprise, they didn't pay much attention to me. My ears told me that one of them was probably working while the others were her pals. My mind told me they probably weren't paid enough. To pay much attention. Get over yourself. I did, and went ahead with my ritual. After filling my basket, the probably working gal hands an extra packet of milk to me. This one's on the house. I'm always suspicious of free things. Ever since I came across machine learning algorithms, and discovered that there is no such thing as free lunch. And I've never heard of a buy two get one offer for milk.

Two things came to mind. There may be something to this milk glut thing. Why do I not like this word, glut. The other thing that came to mind was commoditization. Now this is something I exclusively associated with software categories where open source applications have become pervasive. But it seems it can plague all sorts of other things as well. I bought my monthly 500 bob credit at the checkout counter. Loaded it and checked my balance. What am I supposed to do with this 250 bob bonus credit. And I don't know anyone on yu. Terrible.