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check this
By heather | June 25, 2008
A few weeks ago I found myself at Lowe’s searching for a rubber thingy to fix a tilting vanity mirror.
My severe inability to express myself in describing what I needed hampered me from finding the rubber thingy and resulted in purchase of several might-work-if-you-can’t-find-me-a-rubber-thingy things. Even after I MacGuyver all these things together I’m pretty sure they will not work, and the thing I need is so simple I could draw it. I just can’t ask for it.
I described it to the helpful Lowe’s weekend part time old guy, who probably works as a Wal-Mart greeter during the week.
“What you need is a rubber washer,” he said, showing me a rubber washer.
“No, that’s too flat. Do you have anything like a rubber washer but squishier and fatter?”
He ran a hand over his buzz cut and gave me an odd look.
I dug deeper. “It needs to go between the mirror and the frame and when I tighten the screw it will keep the mirror from tilting back and hitting the wall.”
He stared at me, so I just kept talking because you know, that’s what I do.
“Because you know we have this vanity and we just had the walls painted and I don’t want the mirror on the vanity leaning back against the wall and marking up the new paint job.”
“You need a rubber washer,” he repeated.
Okay.
What could I say? It was .92 cents. I bought a rubber washer. And also some non-skid feet in hopes of sticking them to the rubber washer to make it squishier and fatter. Which is not going to work because the feet are square and the washer is like a tiny doughnut.
Defeat Number 1.
Now let’s talk about paying for the .92 thing that was destined never to work anyway. In fact the whole point of this post is really to rant about the crappiness that is the SELF CHECKOUT LANE.
When I went to check out, I found ONE regular check out lane open, but FOUR self checkout lanes open.
There were 5 people in line at the regular check out.
Around the self checkout was a mob of confused looking shoppers wandering and bumping into each other like atoms, helplessly looking sheepish as they tried to figure out why they were having such a hard time performing a minimum wage job.
Have we strayed so far away from politeness and customer service - a time when employees were there to actually help customers - that we now think it’s a fun little novelty to scan your own goods?
It’s not. It sucks. The same way that ATM fees suck. It’s cheaper for the store to NOT have to help you in any way whatsoever. I’ll repeat - it is not a novelty, it’s a TOTAL SCAM.
A scam made worse by the bored, bitchy cashier who is there to “help” you if you get stuck with self-checkout, but whose help consists of looking at you like you’re a moron because you can’t get the digital voice to stop saying “Place your item in the bagging area…place your item in the bagging area” even though IT ALREADY IS.
And also helping by yelling from her perch across the aisle that you need to re-enter your credit card number three times and not give up after typing in 16 digits only twice. Obviously, it isn’t her fault that the machine won’t scan your card.
So when you get pissed off at the lack of help, and lack of air conditioning (or maybe you are just pregnant and hot all the damn time) and decide to loudly say screw it (except starting with an “F”) and walk away leaving your transaction open and unfinished and your items in the bagging area, so that she has to get off her now outraged lazy ass and actually walk over to the register to cancel your transaction, feel a tiny bit better knowing that you stood up to the man.
And then turn around to those open mouthed customers behind you and yell, “Wake up lemmings! The reason you are having a hard time is because IT’S NOT YOUR JOB TO CHECK YOURSELF OUT.”
And only then will you avoid Defeat Number 2.
Topics: home improvement, shopping capers, this is why |
June 25th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
You’re my hero.
June 25th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
No you didn’t! Did you really say that!?! Ooh, why am I never there for these things?
I am actually a self-checkout luvah. I’d much rather bag my own stuff. Because I’m usually the only one wanting to do it. It all started with not wanting to have to pay someone at the commissary to bag 10 things while Du was deployed. I can do that myself and pay myself.
We’ll see what it’s like in AL…
Vicki’s last blog post..Whose Blog Am I Visiting?
June 26th, 2008 at 9:04 am
For future reference, they are called rubber bumpers or feet… you should be able to find them at any department store or maybe a craft store…
June 28th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
I hate the self check out line. It’s total bs. If I’m using that line then I want a discount because the cost of that item includes someone to ring it up for me, mkay? Clearly this marks the fall of western civilization.
skiplovey’s last blog post..You know that place
June 28th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
I totally would have put the washer down on a random shelf and taken off.
Alice’s last blog post..Do or do not, there is no try.