This strange saying was one of my grandmas, it means someone not easily taken advantage of.  As a consumer I wonder if manufacturers really think the money spending public is stupid.

Do they really think that we don’t realize that packaging seems to stay the same but the contents are shrinking?  Check out your cupboard and just see how many of the items we buy every week are rattling around inside the package, the space is taken up with air, but charged at the same rate.

Case in point, as a caterer, I used to get one large urn (80 cups) plus one small urn (30 cups) out of  a pound of coffee.  Now a “pound” can of coffee weighs 300grams and barely does one large urn..  Pound jars of jam have weighed 12 ozs for quite a while and the list goes on.

With most products the weight is honestly printed on the label, you just need glasses to read it, however one of the biggest rip-offs that has crept into use, in the last few years, is poultry.  How come it is perfectly legal to inject poultry with water or veggie stock?

For years I have worked by the rule of thumb of ½ pound of meat per person, however, a 25lb turkey can no longer feed 50 people.  There is enough for maybe 35 people but an awful lot of liquid for gravy.  The juices from a large turkey used to be about an inch in the bottom of the roaster, now you can guarantee three or four inches, this all came from liquid injected into the turkey.  Price per pound, no cheaper of course, so we are paying for all that water at over $1.50 per pound.

Why is this legal?  Why do they not have to abide by the trade descriptions act?  When did you ever see poultry labelled at “weight/meat 10kg,   weight/liquid 1.5kg.”

Another misleading factor is the picture on the outside of a package, how often do the contents look anything like the tasty photograph on the label?  With mouth watering you open a package of some treat but inside, instead of the fresh, bright contents displayed on the label there is a squished, colourless mess.

What is it with “faux”?  If it is artificial, then say so, we understand that, and it’s OK.  I do not want to wear fur.  I don’t believe in the idea and I think it looks better on the original owner.  I also can’t afford real pearls, I want to spend my money on something more functional, however, “faux” is such a pretentious word.  As a vegetarian, I do not eat faux meat.

I do not buy faux flowers and the miniature diamond in my engagement ring is real.  I may need to look through a magnifying glass to see it, but we were nineteen and all we could afford, it has however been on my finger since 1963 and represents over fifty years of marriage.  The diamond isn’t faux and neither is the marriage, it is real through and through.

My demands in life are not too great but I do want things to be real and true.  This goes for my husband, my surroundings and my friends.  I try to be upfront and honest and I expect others to be the same way.

No faux for this girl please.