A few years ago in the UK, war was declared on waste in the form of excessive wrapping and packaging whenever you buy things, guess what, it never reached as far as Tenerife. It struck me again today when the supermarket down the road started to share my meagre bit of shopping around 4 plastic carrier bags, I tried to protest as always but they seemed quite offended, as if I was questioning their professional packing skills.

 It’s a similar tale with food, I ordered a cheese bocadillo (roll) in a bar, out it came on a plate with 3 napkins, and all the bar/cafe tables have a plastic cube full of little tissues anyway. Order a take away and it gets even more like pass the parcel, a paper bag with at least 3 napkins, then a bocadillo wrapped in tin foil, tap it and unwrap it and yes, there are 2 more napkins around the roll.

First prize though for waste goes to El Corte Ingles, the multi storey department store in Santa Cruz. I often pop into their food hall to drool at the cream cakes (not on them you will be glad to know) and might get a slice of pizza or a filled roll to chomp on the way into the city centre. They swathe my food in napkins as if they are the make up ladies on the latest Mummy film, and then for good measure they stick the package in a full size plastic carrier bag, I have to send a search team in to find it. I try to stop them but they insist on the full routine.

Some countries have limited or even banned new carrier bags, but anything illegal would soon become hot property over here. People would siddle up to you in a seedy nightclub and try to sell imported white, blue or even top of the range M & S bags. As you can tell, life is pretty good here if this is the worst thing I can think of to moan about. I can report though that the worlds financial problems have really affected me this week. My morning coffee in town normally arrives with 2 biscuits, but this week they have cut back to just the one, damm you banks, it’s hello credit crunch, goodbye Abbey Crunch.