On Friday while doing the week's grocery shopping at the supermarket I frequent, I watched at the dairy counter while another shopper pried off the top of a yogurt container. Noticing my curiosity, she smiled apologetically and explained that the week before she had bought the same brand and discovered when she took the top off the container that the inner security seal had been tampered with. She wanted to make certain the same thing wouldn't occur again, and was taking precautionary measures to avoid bringing home a food item that might have been contaminated.

The week before, I had mentioned to the young cashier at the check-out that the two melons she was putting through the cash were actually melons and not spaghetti squash. The melons being half the price of the squash, I wasn't eager to be over-charged yet again, as happened on two previous occasions. It's a downright pain to return cash register slips for reimbursement.

She turned to me in surprise and said she always puts those items through the scanner to ensure they're correctly identified by the seals slapped on them; they're instructed to do so, she said. I explained that some of her colleagues might not be as aware as she, and perhaps feeling the strain of time-pressure when they're busy just swiftly eyeball the item and input it as they identify it, and wrongly. She smiled, repeated they're not supposed to do that, and she would never think of it. And I believe her.

But, even though I had brought this ongoing problem to the attention of the store's manager, suggesting he might want to remind his cashiers to practise due diligence in identifying produce, to identify a canary melon for what it is, not a squash, and he agreed it might be time to refresh memories, this week I found, on going through the cash receipt that the same thing had happened again. The mature cashiers would never make such an error. But I love the bright smiling faces and eagerness of the young girls who appear to have taken their place.

I was less than pleased yesterday, when I opened the plastic clam containing the cocktail tomatoes that I tend to favour for salads, to discover that the tomatoes were in a state of decomposition. I couldn't believe it; as usual I had examined the tomatoes closely, peering at the fruit from top and from the bottom through the plastic. Henceforth, I'll take the time and trouble to do as the woman with the yogurt had done; I'll open the clamshell and look more carefully at what's inside.

These are the little irritations that life throws at us.

Last night we watched a film titled Ajami. It took place in the Middle East, a film by Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani, nominated in the best foreign language film category for the Academy Awards a few years back. The film was a gripping look at life in the West Bank and in Israel. For the Palestinians it sketched a background of tribal culture and violence, where hard-working Palestinians are drawn into danger by those among them working at extortion and threats to survival, of outward courtesy through traditional Muslim greetings of kind regard overlaying the honour code of retribution by killings of those who are seen to have outraged the tribe by seeking to protect themselves from predation by shooting the predator, thereby bringing down upon themselves the violent, vengeful wrath of the offended tribe.

On the Israeli side, it was the brutalization of civil behaviour by the incessant need to survive a hostile atmosphere of being surrounded by a threatening, violent population whose hatred for the perceived intrusive presence of a dominating power comprised of Jews motivates Palestinians to attack those Jews, exacting their own kind of honour-by-martyrdom for their alleged victimization by their occupying presence. It is always easier to blame the perceived outsider for the misery people live within, rather than those who are responsible for their oppression; namely those who claim to represent their best interests.

Eliciting thoughts of how absurd it is to be irritated by such minor occurrences as rotting fruit and incorrect pricing, when human nature conspires elsewhere to lead to tragic consequences for a large proportion of the human race incapable of rising above their medieval-era preoccupations of honour and survival.