plastic bags

Like in most of Europe, in Dublin if you want a plastic bag to put your purchases in, you have to pay a government fee of 15 cents. Paper bags are free. So when people go grocery shopping, they usually bring their own bags. It makes sense to bring your own because the bags at the grocery store are small and not very strong. My Lands End canvas bags work very well to carry my groceries in. I usually only take one, though, because if I manage to fill it full, it gets really heavy and that is all I can carry home from the grocery store.

Today John and I bought 2 picture frames to frame a collage of our pictures from various vacations. Since the frames were too big to fit in the store's paper bags, the saleslady asked if we wanted a plastic bag but reminded us that she would have to charge the government levy. Now, these bags were the size of big target bags. They cost 15 cents each. She also only charged me for one but used two. The little grocery bags at the grocery store are also 15 cents and are about 1/3 the size. I wonder why they are the same price. The huge bags are a far better value than the grocery store bags. However, the big bags ripped as we continued shopping. Pesky sharp corners on picture frames.