Hold the champers - Sutton funnyman's in no mood to queue

I mean, have you seen the queue?

After months where the only shops open were the ones that sold essential items, we have finally got the non-essential shops back.

Some stores reported queues of up to a mile.

I would have been more impressed with that if the people in the queue weren’t forced to keep two metres apart.

Most of those queue were empty space. It’s like hearing that there’s a seven-mile queue on the M1 then realising most of that is made up of cars that don’t move forwards when there’s a gap.

Isn’t it fascinating that people are more exited about buying things they don’t need than the items they can’t get by without?

The food shops have seen a normal level of demand but as soon as you could buy more clothes down Primark we all went crazy for it.

I’m not sure why because, even if you get a nice new outfit, it’s not like you’re going anywhere to wear it.

If there is one thing I have learned during lockdown, while I’ve been at home doing comedy shows over Skype, it’s that tinned food is essential but clothing items for the lower half really are not.

If you follow the logic you’d think that the way to make loads of money is to sell things that people will never use.

That’s why I’m opening a shop selling things like fingerless latex gloves, distressed face masks and the most useless item of all, indicator bulbs for BMWs.

I had thought that the weeks of only buying the things we need might have helped us break the shopping habit.

I’m not saying you should only spend money on the bare essentials – if I did that I’d never sell any tickets to those streaming comedy shows I’m doing – but I’d hoped our priorities had changed.

I thought we’d learn to value the joy of a walk in the park, being out in nature, rather than sifting through piles of clothes.

Maybe we have learned to value spending time with our loved ones, but you can have too much of a good thing.

At least a mile long queue gets you out of the house for a while.

Hold my space, I’ll be there just as soon as I’ve found where I left my trousers in April.

Steve N Allen is a comedian and broadcaster who was raised in Sutton-in-Ashfield. He stars in The Mash Report on BBC2.