So, it was a bad day. Not terrible, but bad. Stupid people with stupid ideas demanding stupid things. A bad day.
I got home, dealt with some horrible bureaucracy by phone, and decided to go get dinner. It wouldn’t be ready for an hour, so there was time to stop at the drugstore on the way. Jim needed some aspirin, I wanted to get some tweezers – nothing major or complicated.
I stopped at the drugstore with plenty of time to get these small items and still be at the restaurant to pick up food on time. This is very important to me.
I found the aspirin and the tweezers and also decided on a bottle of soda and a candy bar. I had a bad day, as I may have mentioned.
I get in line and there’s a guy ahead of me and a woman at the cash register about to pay. Her cart is full of bagged items and the cashier announces the total – $114.27
The woman then opens her purse and pulls out a card to use.
Up to this point, everything is fine. We all know our place in the universe and what is expected of us. My job is to wait a few moments, hers is to pay for her purchases.
And then…
“I’m not sure this card will work,” she says, “I don’t think it’s activated,”
And then she tries the card anyway.
Now, it’s 2022 in Akron, Ohio. There is no earthly way someone can know how to use a credit card, know that they have to be activated, know that it’s not activated, and STILL think trying the card will work. It is simply and utterly impossible.
The card, unsurprisingly, fails.
Now it’s back to the purse to look for another form of payment. I don’t know if she’s trying to run some “confused little old lady” scam thinking they’ll just let roll out with a free cart of items if she’s just a silly-billy long enough – or if she’s bored and is “playing” at not knowing how things work, but no one was going along with it.
No one.
While she digs through her purse and I stand there feeling myself age, the cashier shows us mercy and calls for backup. She also tells us that we can use the self-checkout if we want.
The guy in front of me hesitates .000437 nano-seconds and I assume that he’s going to wait for back up. I make a beeline for the self-checkout and scan my first item – the bottle of aspirin – and toss it in the waiting bag. 25% done already.
Except, the bag is hung-up and not fully deployed. The bottle isn’t heavy enough to pull down far enough to trip the “thing is in the bag” sensor and I get an error:
“Please place the item in the bagging area,”
I remove the bottle, adjust the bag, and hurl the bottle in again. This time, the bottle hits the bottom sensor and registers.
The bottle of soda follows easily as does the candy bar. Heavy enough to not require hurling.
I scan the tweezers and toss them in the bag. Not heavy enough.
“Please place the item in the bagging area, dumbass,”
I try again, with more force. Nothing.
There’s a button on the screen that suggests I can skip bagging. Perfect! I mean, why does it care where I put the item once I’ve scanned it? Bagging area, up my sleeve, up my nose, whatever, right?
I hit that button with triumph – which turns to ashes.
“Help is on the way!” the screen tells me.
I make the following sound, recreated and saved here for posterity.
The backup cashier, finally having made her way to the front of the store, sees my plight and takes pity on my poor and wretched soul.
She sidles up to the self-checkout, swipes her badge on the scanner like a benediction, and the screen clears.
Card.
Buttons.
Receipt.
Out the door.
I assume the woman is still at the register, perhaps having shifted into some Dante-esque purgatory where she digs out card after card only to be declined over and over.
Forever.
I, though, have acquired my food. And her fate is no longer my concern.