I know, I know it has been a minute since my last post. It's this whole working full time thing that kind of gets in the way. However, I do have something I want to write about. Something that has been simmering under the surface for some time now and I finally have a free morning to tell you about. I wrote that last statement as if; 1. Someone is going to read this and 2. As if anyone really cares what I have to say. Despite the unknown of my actual readership, I push on. I have to push on you see, because in our society it is becoming abundantly clear that no one will do it for me. Our society is rapidly changing and I am not a huge fan of the changes I see. Bearing witness to what I consider the decline of our society can be heartbreaking. I have seen the strongest of relationships crumble when one person chooses one side and their partner is diametrically opposed. Our country has become so divisive lately and unfortunately we are forced to pick a side. I have picked my side and I dare any of you to convince me otherwise; SELF CHECKOUT LANES ARE WRONG! Hear me out on this one folks;
The takeover has been gradual; first it was self-serve gas stations. Yeah at first it seemed like a good idea, you jump out fill your tank and you are off. I was a lot younger when this petroleum revolution took place. I was driving a Chevette and could hop in and out of the car with ease. Most stations had a self serve lane and a lane with an attendant. When it was raining or when the frigid New England winters were just too much I could go to the manned side. He would fill the tank, check the oil and wash the windows, remember that? Seriously, they would check the oil and wash your windows while your tank was filling. I swear to Christ I can't remember the last time I cleaned my car windows, I'm sure Chuck has done it from time to time when he borrows my car. It was gradual but full service gas stations are pretty much non existent, though we do have a few in our town but I have had issues at both-one the guy filled it when I clearly said $20 so I had to pay for a full tank and the other one I have been a victim of attempted proselytizing, neither of which I want to fall prey to again so I am forced to purchase my gasoline elsewhere. The majority of stations in proximity to where I live and work are all self-serve. Now that I am a woman of a certain age, I can no longer hop in and out of my car with ease, it takes some effort these days, forget about it when I was pregnant, there is no longer an option of staying in a nice warm car when a Nor'easter is raging or snow is piled high. It's all on me now. In addition to being a wife, mother, daughter, friend, Child Care Director I am also a part time gas station attendant.
Next up in the revolution came online shopping. Not a fan, yes it comes in handy when I need to purchase items for work, and I was bitten by the Walmart Grocery Pick-Up bug for a while but I am not in the online shopping camp. I like to go into a store and see, feel and try on what I am buying. Yeah, I know free shipping can be enticing, but I find it all impersonal. Plus real people are losing jobs, real brick and mortar stores are closing down and people's online shopping has become so pervasive in their everyday lives that it can now be classified as an addiction. I just read an article about it in Psychology Today. I may or may not know someone who purchased a family members birthday card through Amazon. I have since broken up with the Walmart Grocery Pick-up and went back to my weekly trips to the Basket and all is right in my world again. Which brings me to my next point-self checkouts in stores.
Yup, we have all seen them. Walmart was the first one I ever encountered. I get why people like them, you just have a few items and you want to get in and out. You feel like you can scan the items quicker than the cashiers. I will admit there are a few cashiers I have come across that look at each individual item, ask about it and take time to bag it with like items. Yes, that can be frustrating- just scan and bag please, scan and bag, no need for conversation-a few pleasantries absolutely-no one is above a "Hi, how are you", a comment on the weather or local sports team sure but when you scan garlic, tomato paste, meatball mix and a box of spaghetti no need to ask what I'm making. Tuna Casserole obviously. Just scan and bag. Shaws, Price Chopper and most of the other grocery stores have self-checkout too. So far my local Market Basket hasn't sold out to the man, but I honestly think I will succumb to broken heart syndrome the day I walk in to the Basket and have to check out my veggie sausage myself. Stop & Shop makes you scan your groceries as you add them to your shopping cart. The f*ck is that about? They want you in and out so fast they don't even want you wasting their time by loitering around their self- check out. Here is something to think about, a way to stick it to the man, if you are so inclined, I am not because I don't like to break the law. If you put your grapes on the self checkout scale who's to say you have to hit the picture of the $.69/pound bananas versus the $2.99/pound green seedless grapes? Or tap regular apples when you in fact are weighing your organic apples? Hmm, just like Ed Sheeran I'm thinking out loud. Oh, so along the lines of me not liking to break the law here is a semi-short digression; on the way to and from work I drive 12 miles down a long, winding somewhat rural road. 9 days out of 10 there is a police car somewhere along those 12 miles watching for speeders. 9 days out of 10 there is always someone who flashes their lights at me to warn me of said police car. The light flasher is making some pretty broad assumptions about me; 1. That I am a scofflaw and I am speeding to my destination, now my kinfolk may be from Southie but I am no means a descendant of the Winter Hill gang and 2. I want to be part of their criminal enterprise. I know most people would love to get the universal police are ahead signal but I do not. If I am speeding that's on me. I should take ownership of my actions, whether right or wrong. Do I look at the speedometer and adjust accordingly when I get flashed. You bet your ass I do, but I am against it on principle.
Back to my original post. I went to our local CVS recently. I hadn't been for a while and sure as shit they have self checkout now too. Our CVS is on the smaller side and the checkout area is already heavily congested so it makes absolute sense to add a few self-checkouts right in the most obnoxious spot possible. It was like a scene out of Black Friday; a mob of people pushing to get ahead of the others. One more store I can't go to now. Our McDonald's was closed for renovations. Was it to upgrade the 70's looking facade or interior? Nope, it was to add self serve kiosks. McDonald's is a fast food place, do we really need to speed up the ordering? Plus, our McDonalds is the meeting place for every octogenarian within the Blackstone Valley. I wouldn't want to be in line behind them on a Saturday morning. I would be there until the dinner rush.
The final straw for me happened over Christmas vacation. We took the girls to see Frozen 2. Now, granted it had been a while since we have been to the theater, all 5 of us going to the movies is pretty much the equivalent to a car payment so we don't go often. This may have been in place for a while but it was the first time I saw it. You now are responsible for getting your own drinks. They have a few of those huge Coke kiosks. If you have ever seen one of these behemoths you know there are at least 16 different screens with each screen having at least 20 different drink choices. You now need to add an extra 45 minutes before the movie starts to get your concessions. You have the elderly who don't understand the concept of touch screens, you have young children taking 27 minutes to look through each screen (sometimes more than once) to pick what they want and then the ever annoying teenagers trying to come up with the most ironic drink combos to impress their friends. So yeah, there's that.
But what really got a hair across my ass and made me come out against these machines is the buttered popcorn situation. I ordered my popcorn the way I always do, and really the only way a civilized person should, with butter throughout. So back in the day they would fill your popcorn bag half way, drizzle the golden nectar over it, add the rest of the popcorn and give it another drizzle. Well my friends, those days are gone! You now have to add your own butter. So I had to get the full bag of popcorn and take it over to a disgustingly dirty table and add my own butter. I am not employed there, I have not been trained on what popcorn to butter ratio is appropriate and to top it off they would not give me an extra bag to dump some out so I could properly butter my popcorn throughout. Oh the humanity! So I had to butter just the top and take a small plastic condiment cup, without a cover, and fill it with the melted butter to add as I ate. Now 2 things wrong with this, 1. If I am paying almost $10 for a bag of popcorn there should be a butler that comes with it to feed me, short of that I should be able to get my goddamned butter throughout and 2. the condiment cup had no cover so I had to precariously balance it on my armrest and spent the whole time making sure it didn't spill, thereby missing the whole movie. Oh and another thing, so I guess that make 3 things. The "butter" never solidified in any way. Now I am not so naive to think it was real butter but science would lead me to believe that when a warmed liquid cools down it would solidify in some way, shape or form. There wasn't even a skin on top of it. So not sure what kind of scientific voodoo they use to create that stuff but I don't believe there is any edible components to it. That being said, I will still use it to butter my popcorn throughout on the rare occasions I go to the theater. And for the record, I did teach my girls the proper way to eat movie theater popcorn.
Why am I taking the side I am? That question deserves a multifaceted answer. These machines are supposed to simplify life for us. How many times have you been in a self check out line behind an old person who is figuring out how to scan their hard candy? Or where they can insert their check they just spent 10 minutes writing out? Or the incompetent teenager that is trying to discreetly buy condoms and is so nervous they end up scanning the box so fast it throughs the machine into overdrive. Then we must wait for the pimply faced teenage manager to come over with their key, only to type in 792 buttons to no avail. Or have to wait in the self checkout line for 20 minutes because no real lines are open just to ring up my $.89 roll of paper towels. My favorite is the overly permissive parent that lets their snowflake scan in all of the items in their basket. Drives me nuts! I am all for teachable moments and if there is no one else in line I let my kids do it, but the instant someone else enters the line I take over. I refuse to be that person someone will snarkily blog about later. My biggest reason is due to our hurried lifestyle we are putting real people out of jobs. Walmart used to have multiple lanes open at a time, now you are lucky to see one lane open and an employee or 2 at the self checkouts. What happened to all the others that used to work there? McDonalds used to be a great place for teens to enter the workforce and earn spending money. Those jobs are all being phased out and we are losing out on human connections. There was a cashier at Walmart that used to ring me up when I was buying stuff for my Girl Scout troops, she would give me great activity ideas from when she was a troop leader now I have no idea where she is or what happened to her. Dora from our local McDonalds would always tell me how to order things separately instead of combos so I would get more bang for my buck. Now with my math skills and those computers I am almost certain I will overpay everytime. Take a minute and think back to the way things used to be; I am sure you will realize there was someone along the way that you would connect with on a regular basis and over time they just disappeared and you never even noticed. Do you wonder where they are? Do you think they are happy self checkouts took over so many facets of our daily life? So there is my argument, no convincing me otherwise.
