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The other day I was wandering down the Calle Pablo Picasso in La Zubia when I chanced upon a strange sight. The Coviran was open. Unusual during opening hours on an ordinary week day. The ridiculous supermarket is usually shut and, like one of those rare enormous exotic orchids they have in Kew Gardens that only bloom for just micro seconds once every 12 years (and emit horrible odours in the process), you have to be luckier than Lucky Luke McLuck, winner of the Luckiest Man in the World competition 1992 (even though he never even entered that year - so lucky was he) to find the thing open. I went in to have a look see. Having just gone up the hill to the SuperSol (always open, come rain, shine, holiday, fiesta, siesta, blah-di-blah) I was anxious to see if stuff was any cheaper in the Covvy.

Problem was I have no idea how much stuff costs in the SuperSol. I just put the usual 5 or 6 items in a basket and hand in a massive bank note, never look at my receipt, and frankly wouldn't stop shopping there anyway even if I found out I was being ripped off because I'm not one for changing routines that have become 'safe'.

I've always wanted to shop at the Covvy. They sponsor Granada FC so I'd feel I was doing my bit for the * Blancorojos by shelling out some of my diminishing cash reserves but the powers that be don't make it easy for anyone to actually get in. I did see it open once, not long after I arrived in La Zubia and I went in and and bought some stuff. I thought nothing of it. I never realised at the time it had only opened because of a rare (and largely unheralded outside of the astronomical world) alignment of the heavenly bodies, that had seen Orion's Belt shoot right into Uranus resulting in a rising full moon. So unremarkable did it all seem at the time I took it as de-rigeour when the fruit and veg girl heaped scorn on my custom and gave me a bag of unsalted cashew nuts instead the half a pound of grapes I'd carefully pointed at. Fair enough, I thought, but it occurs to me now that should the Covvy only open to a rarified timetable the staff probably don't get much practice.

Tomorrow, I'll go the SuperSol. They know me in there and now ensure they have ludicrous amounts of change in the till at all times. I checked Old Moore's Almanack and the Covvy's not due to open again til 9:17 on Friday October 7th 2019 when a particularly auspicious conjoinment of Saturn's rings, the Paps of Jordan and Simon Cowell's teeth comes into being. They'll be having a sale though so best get there early. Be quick about it too because they'll close again at 9:23.

* It might be Rojoblancos. I can't be bothered looking it up.

Disclaimer: Some of this is made up stuff.