Culture

This Twitter Account Catalogues All The Deeply Bizarre Crap You Can Buy From Aldi

Shopping list: milk, apples, sleazy inflatable remote control Minion.

by Meg Watson  8 March 2016

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When I was eight years old, my family and I suspected my great grandfather was getting dementia as he insisted he’d bought an ornate antique clock from the corner store. No longer with his driver’s license, he maintained that he’d shuffled up the road for some milk, taken a cursory glance around this small, family-owned dispensary of bread and lollies and come out with a heavy, wooden wall-mounted clock from the 1960s.

As the clock hung ominously above his mantle, my grandparents and father talked in hushed tones about retirement homes. Best case scenario, he’d found it on the street or splashed out at a homewares store and forgotten; worst case, he’d forcibly taken it from someone’s house. Then he heard us. Though he would go to a home a year or so later, on that day he marched us all up the street and confirmed his story with the store’s owner. Yes, he bought it. Yes, it was strange. But the family just had a random clock to sell, so what? Every time he looked at that clock in his final years, it felt like total vindication.

All this is to say that discount supermarket chain Aldi is a great grandparent’s dream. Not only is it stocked with worryingly cheap off-brand Russian pre-packaged mashed potato, dark chocolate, and chicken nuggets, it also has Australia’s finest selection of completely random shit.

Now, Twitter account ‘Aldi of the Week’ is documenting all these wholly unnecessary, sometimes delightful items in the store’s catalogue for your pleasure. Conveniently it can also function as story confirmation the next time an elderly family member comes home from grocery shopping with apples, muesli bars, and $500 3D printer.

Enjoy:

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h/t Mashable.