Eftpos minimums make for traumatic shopping experiences.

I just went to my local corner store for a bottle of milk (I go with Dairy Farmers because no bastard has Norco in Sydney. Yes, I buy brand name milk, as well as brand name butter and yoghurt. Obviously this is not because I’m a fancy person – I’m currently having “things I don’t need cutlery for dipped into my one kilo bucket of hummus” for dinner on my bed with no pants on – but because I care about our dairy farmers. I mean, that’s very on-brand for me as a paradoxical Akubra-owner inner city leftie from the country) and didn’t have any cash. So I went to purchase my essential dairy using my debit card.

As it turns out, this joint has a $10 Eftpos minimum.

A bit steep, I reckon.

But it’s not so much the money that gets up my proverbial goat, it’s the pressure this puts on you to make a decision.

You’ve got an extra $7.50 to spend and only a few moments to do so. So do you go with a practical route or do you skip merrily down Treat Yo Self Lane? Do you go with your old favourites or use this unusual free pass to buy $7.50 worth of unnecessary items as a sign you should try something new? Or should you just say “the heck with this”, go home empty handed and start your week off with an empty, milk-less tea?

These are the questions you have to ask yourself under pressure. You have to think about moderately priced grocery items fast. It’s like an extremely underwhelming appearance on The Price Is Right, except you don’t get the consolation prize of having met Larry Emdur and a slick Parker pen to take home. The only person you meet is a surly shopkeeper and the only thing you take home is what’s left of your pride in a moist, dripping clump stinking up your pocket like an old fish wrapped in newspaper.

The worst part about this all is that the whole time, you’re being watched by the shopkeeper, who always seems to have something better to do than to keep their shop. They’re impatient, unimpressed and just want you to pay your money and get the heck out of there.

And look, I get that. I’d want me to get the heck out of my personal space too.

But I couldn’t go until I’d purchased something more than $10.

I panicked.

The first product I went for was a Bundaberg ginger beer.

I never usually buy soft drink, however I did yesterday because I was left in an extremely fragile state after hitting the beers with Dad (I haven’t decided if that will be a column or not yet, but expect more details at some point) and needed a little ginger fizz to settle my tummy.

I’m heading to Europe soon and my goal is to be “hot as fuck” for it, so I’m trying to watch what I put in my mouth. And I’m well aware that ginger beer is one of the worst soft drinks out there, but by golly are they tasty. And I guess after having one yesterday, my resolve was weakened. So with the building pressure to purchase something while under the influence of the beverage still being metabolised in my body, I caved and bought the sugary death syrup.

The second item I bought was a tin of tomatoes. In a vain attempt to make up for my sugary purchase, I decided I would someday make a rich, hearty pasta sauce and only use it on the low GI barley I am always banging on about. It could be a healthy triumph and turn everything around… but it will probably sit on my pantry shelf for seven months until I tell my housemate to use it.

I thought that, being in a corner store, this would put me well over $10. You usually pay through the nose for everyday groceries in places like this. And this was the one time I was hoping to be overcharged for a simple can of vegetables.

But no. I was still $1 short.

At this point the shopkeeper started throwing out suggestions, like bread or toilet paper. And it was most uncomfortable.

This guy doesn’t know me. He has no idea what I’ve been through. There’s no way he could understand my needs.

I mean, I already have plenty of much better bread at home and my housemates subscribe to the Who Gives a Crap toilet paper service, meaning I have an almost endless supply of loo paper.

I wanted to shout “you don’t know me, don’t tell me how to live my life” and “yeah, you’d like me to have more carbs in my house, wouldn’t you?!”, but I decided that berating a complete stranger for trying to help me make logical decisions at a corner store checkout probably wasn’t the best way to start the third week of FABuary.

So I meekly picked up a Whittaker’s Coconut Slab, paid for my groceries and got out of there.

And while I could use this opportunity to deeply examine how truly inept I am at making decisions under pressure, unpack what this means for my self esteem and determine ways I could address my issues, I’ve decided that avoidance is the moral of the story.

There’s no need to work on your issues if you can put it off, right?

So the conclusion I leave you with at the end of this rant is this: always carry cash.