I'm not a person who travels light. I've always wanted to but never have and never will, I suppose.

When I was a teenager, friends nicknamed me BB and I imagined it might be because I bore some resemblance to Brigitte Bardot, who was a Big Sexy Star at the time.

Well, I had long blonde hair and no shortage of illusions in those days.

Yet, just when I'd perfected my pout, I was told what the initials BB really stood for - Beast of Burden, a creature always encumbered with shopping and packages and excess luggage.

And I've continued to be a Beast of Burden ever since.

I remember reading once, that in the north, where I come from, it used to be considered a great compliment for a female to be described as a, 'two-bucket woman'.

It meant she was a sturdy lass who could easily carry two full buckets of coal, one in each hand, from the coal cellar to the fireplace.

I think I would have qualified as a two-bucket woman. In fact I'm sure of it. Not that I ever did of course. By the time I came to bucket-carrying maturity our house had electric fires.

But I continued the tradition by always carrying home heavy bagfuls of groceries in each hand and going on holiday with two family-sized suitcases, even when there was only me and a good book taking a weekend break.

Let's move on a few years ... to Monday, in fact, and only a week to go until Christmas.

For those of us without cars, or obliging male partners to help us grab the goodies, there's only one thing for it during the festive season. Yep, we flex those muscles and off we go, several times a week, like foraging rodents.

Now The Mother may well be a northern lass but in no way could she be called a two-bucket woman.

Once upon a time, maybe, but now, at 81, she's barely a half-cupful woman.

So there I was in central Brighton, all by myself, assorted bags of groceries in each hand and slung across my shoulders was a bulging backpack filled with newly-selected library books for The Mother.

As I walked past a doorway a scruffy youth jumped out in front of me, clutching a bedraggled, but very large, fir tree.

"How about a Christmas tree, love?" he asked, obviously sensing he was in the presence of a woman who was used to being lumbered.

I wonder where he imagines I possibly could, or should, put that tree? I thought.

I was tempted to give him a few words of advice but hey, this was Christmas and the season of goodwill towards all men.

So I ignored him instead.

He called me something along the lines of stupid, old and bovine. Simply another way of describing a beast of burden I thought, forgiving his vulgar impetuosity.

Maybe he put a hex on me, I don't know, but as I got on the bus a few minutes later, one of my bags split and 2lbs of sprouts rolled under the seats.

When I got home The Mother was enjoying an egg-nog and some Marks and Spencer shortbread she'd discovered from one of the beast of burden's previous shopping forays.

She looked alarmed: "You really shouldn't carry so much," she warned. "Go on like this and there won't be any room."

"Any room for what?" I asked.

She smirked: "For that chip on your shoulder, of course," she said.