How to beat the Gas price hikes

I went to get my ink cartridge re-filled last week in a shop which happens to be beside a garden centre, I wandered in next door while waiting for my new budget solution to printing (why is a new cartridge of black powder €25?). I admired all the chic plant pots you could buy if you had 250 euro handy. Then I came across the gleaming barbecues. We’ve had the summer of all summers, I smell charcoal steaks on the breeze most evenings and wish I hadn’t given away the crock of a bbq years ago, but then it rained every summer up til now. And I had to do all the cooking because the cost centres were too small.

The gas barbecues were on special offer, which is the only time to buy anything as far as I’m concerned. The German lady with the raspberry red hair wouldn’t leave my side as I pondered and dithered, acutely aware I’d come out to spend 15 euro on ink and no more, but she had a Teutonic will and a fool-proof sales pitch ‘zere is no more of dis model in all of Ireland’. I feared I might not enjoy burnt animal before the end of the Indian summer, as our new Mediterranean brown nation snapped up every last bbq. So I slapped down a deposit and went away to dither some more.

The cost centres and I pored over the catalogue back home and decided it was too small for the price; the next one up made more sense, what with it being an outdoor cooker when Bord Gais decide to cut me off, and the fact that boys like big toys. So we agreed we’d pool our cash and take joint ownership, there was only the small matter of them assembling it. 

Cost centre no. 2 came with me next morning, to ensure we were making the right decision; neither he nor I had ever taken so long to evaluate a purchase. We are truly in the zone of every cent counts.

I had to get a gas cylinder too and prevailed on my extended family to find an empty one in their sheds so I could save 35 euro.

Was it worth it? No more kitchen smells or scrubbing the grill, boys who actually make their own burgers with herbs and onions, an acceptance of herby sausages as an actual dinner. And the discovery of Lawlor’s Lamb Burgers as a top favourite (thanks to Racquel for that tip). Yes, but then all Dec Decklanders knew that already.

A dear friend who often offers to barbecue for me had a birthday recently, a man who has everything, so what to buy this time? Only so many paintings and books you can give.

So, happy birthday MGMT, I look forward to charcoal rib eye one of these days.