Talking to the supermarket clerk in the line for old people
Not a bad idea, but how sad that it’s come to this:
Jumbo, a Netherlands-based grocery chain has decided to use the checkout aisle as a means to help the elderly stay incorporated into the community. The over 700-store chain introduced Kletskassa in 2019. The word translates to “chat checkout,” a special lane for customers who are not in a rush and want to have a conversation with their cashier.
Then again, I sometimes joke that about 50% of my social life these days consists of excursions to the supermarket. During the COVID lockdowns of yesteryear, it was 100%.
I remember that, back then, they also had old people hours, usually at something like 6 AM or 7 AM. Not my hours of operation at all. Where has it been decreed that older people are all early-birds?
Although I am a shade younger than you are Boss…I don’t need a special “chat lane.” If I’m in the line and you are running the register…we are going to chat. Ask my kids. It’s the way I roll.
Check out, teller, barber, DMV… we’re going to chat. Absolute stranger? If I can dream up a reason… I’ll get a word or four in somehow. ?
My husband jokingly (I think) says I could talk to a fireplug. It’s not unusual for me, an introvert, to make a comment to a cashier and get into a casual conversation while he or she drags the products over the scanner. I’m similar to John Guilfoyle that I’ll talk to just about anyone, anywhere.
I do, however, keep it short and don’t let it drag on, because that really does drive me crazy when both the customer and the cashier keep gabbing after the transaction is complete and there are 5+ people in line.
I’m definitely NOT the early riser type of older person (66 IS older, right?). I like staying up late instead, but sure wouldn’t be grocery shopping late into the evening.
Although I am a shade younger than you are Boss…I don’t need a special “chat lane.” If I’m in the line and you are running the register…we are going to chat. Ask my kids. It’s the way I roll.
Check out, teller, barber, DMV… we’re going to chat. Absolute stranger? If I can dream up a reason… I’ll get a word or four in somehow. 😉
Can’t help but to be reminded of an old Python skit: https://youtu.be/ohDB5gbtaEQ
Sorry..fat fingers on the phone double posted.
Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.
See… I’ll chat even accidentally.
Don’t forget about medical appointments for old people social interaction opportunities. You usually have to talk with at least 3 people at every visit.
I much prefer checking out at the supermarket with a human cashier to the ordeal of a self-checkout line. My local supermarket installed a self-checkout section two years ago with six of these abominable contraptions, and I sometimes had to use one if I went early in the morning and the store decided to save money by not having a line with a human cashier at that early “old people” hour. The self-checkout machines rarely worked well, plus the metallic bitch-voice that barked orders at the hapless customer (“Place each item over the scanner . . . do NOT place any item back in the cart . . . if you are done scanning, please press the type of payment . . .”). The most dreaded command is “Wait! Stop what you are doing! Help is on the way!”– upon which a tired human worker showed up with an electronic card to unfreeze the machine so that the customer could finish self-checking out and vamoose from the store.
Add the COVID masking nonsense to the self-checkout ordeal, and you can understand why I finally opted to have the store deliver my groceries. Yes, there’s a (very reasonable) delivery charge, but it’s no higher than the cost of the Biden-era gasoline I’d need to drive to the store each week, and it’s worth it to me to be free of the hassle of in-store self-checkout and other “innovations.”
My SiL house/dog sat for us while we were in Hawaii in October. She’s a true New Yorker and lives in CT. She was shocked that the grocery cashiers here in Florida would start a conversation with her. My favorite quote from her was, “I don’t understand, everyone is friendly here and talks to you.” We were amused.
From CFP, “Jim is 95 and has a war story…” (actual grocery store stuff, this): https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/thank-a-veteran-today-awesome-clip/
The ‘elderly hours’ were eleminated in FL, at least near me, pretty quickly as the elderly were not only the most vulnerable but also most likely to be a source of viral infection, and not just of Covid. Thankfully ‘flu’ disappeared that whole first year. Amazing!
Ranging from mild annoyance to a pet peeve is people chatting away with the grocery cashier, along with only breaking out their checkbook after the clerk has rung up the sale.
physicsguy:
My experience of New Yorkers – at least, the spots where I hang out – is that they are quite friendly and often strike up conversations, often humorous ones.
Our Safeway has a shortage of employees.
They have a big sign at the entrance advertising for new employees.
They have brought back or trained some elderly women to do checkout. They’ve also hired some very young new checkers. It’s quite a contrast.
The young ones are very fast and there’s no chat, just the necessities.
Yesterday the checkout lady was probably in her 60s and the lady bagging the groceries looked a bit older. A slow pace, with friendly conversation. Very nice ladies who seem to be working because they need the money, and the store is paying them well.
Where are the middle-aged checkers? It’s a mystery to me, but I know many businesses seem to be having problems filling open positions.
My wife doesn’t go to the grocery store with me anymore. Mostly because she’s bored with grocery shopping. She’s been doing it for over 66 years. I started doing it alone when Covid began, and now it’s my job. 🙂 She’s a conversation magnet. Many times, I have seen strangers waiting in grocery lines tell her their life story. She has an openness to her that attracts people.
On the other hand, no stranger ever starts up a conversation, much less tells me their life story. My vibe is “leave me alone.”
At a grocery store near my residence in Texas, the supermarket clerk had a Christmas-themed sweatshirt that also named a town-but not the state- near my CT hometown. I asked if she were from that CT town. Yes, she was, and had also lived in my CT hometown for a while. Her husband was the uncle of one of my elementary and high school classmates, and of one of my sister’s classmates (the respective classmates were cousins, not siblings). Over the years, we exchanged info on our respective visits back to CT.
Unfortunately, the store where she worked closed, so I lost track of her.
Ironic that this chat line is showing up when many grocery stores now have self-checkout.
I find that the array of tabloids and magazines in the check out line are great “straight lines” for kicking off a conversation. The Mrs often asks, “Who was that?” as we clear the line; 30 years ago she would ask, “Did you know him? Why didn’t you introduce me?” Only to have me answer along the line of, “Just met him in line, we didn’t exchange names.” She took in the knowledge and adapted. I’ve also have interesting discussions with people as we dug through jumbled refrigerator cases in search of something.
@gwynmir: just wait about a dozen years and you can stay up late into the night and also awaken to make the 0600 formation. Ahhh, to be 66 again….
Ahhh, to be 66 again….
Another Mike:
I’m reminded of:
________________________
It’s been a long time since I stood on a stage in London… I was 60 years old, just a kid with a crazy dream.
–Leonard Cohen, “Live in London” concert
________________________
I’m 70 years-old, still a kid with a crazy dream.
Here’s two suggestions for old people (I’m an old person) to get non-old people to talk to you: 1. Don’t bring up your last doctor’s visit 2. Don’t bring up your grandchildren.
jvermeer:
I ask the young folk if they know Pomme, a recent, magnificent, *lesbian* French singer-songwriter.
–Pomme, “Sans toi (Paroles – English Lyrics)” (2016)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BANetE-zYx4
That holds them for a bit.
“Any crazy customers today?”
“You’re the first”
I am an introvert and I do not like going to parties. Being around a lot of people for long wears me out. Yet I find that I like talking to people at the checkout aisle. I try to avoid much if people are waiting in line or the cashier is busy. But I enjoy the short conversation. Just right for introverts who get worn out by long group interactions at parties. And I am only in my 50s.
I’m a Tony Robbins guy and once upon a time Tony allied himself with Cloe Madanes, an Argentinian therapist trained by Milton Erickson (a big deal if you know that world).
Their alliance doesn’t seem to have come to much. But I recall her advice circa 2000 to shy young men hoping to connect with women:
Stand at the bottom of a mall escalator and invite every woman coming down for a cup of coffee.
That might have worked in 2000 for getting a coffee date or at least getting over shyness.
Today it would require an encounter with a mall security person.
My wife and I deliver Meals on Wheels. For some of the folks, a two-minute chat with Aubrey is as good as it gets.
I suspect they really wish they could get out and have occasion to say hello to a grocery clerk.
The more the checkers yap, the more mistakes on your receipt.
There’s a time for yappin’ and a time for shuttin’ it.
Just move to the South, where conversations can spring up anywhere and most people are gracious enough to work around them.
“She’s a conversation magnet. Many times, I have seen strangers waiting in grocery lines tell her their life story. She has an openness to her that attracts people.”
Oh, my heavens, JJ, this describes my life to a T. I don’t get it either because I’m an introvert and completely uninterested in strangers’ life stories. But apparently I too have an openness. The other variation on this is that people ask me for directions. I can be in a strange city, totally lost and people still ask me for directions. I cannot imagine what they see in my face that makes them think I’d know.
I had a coworker who gave off the same vibe and we discussed the phenomenon several times. (One day the two of us were in the parking lot next to our building and, sure enough, someone came up to us and asked us for directions.) She was also an introvert, so maybe there’s something to that pattern.
This may sound curmudgeonly, but I do not go shopping in search of conversation. Other than ‘hello’ I’m not interested in talking with strangers. This is true in the grocery store, on airplanes, and any other public setting. Thus for me the self-service checkout line is a godsend. All you chatterboxes can queue up in the traditional checkout – will allow me to get in and get out as quickly as possible.
🙂
Where has it been decreed that older people are all early-birds?
You sleep less and less well as you age.
Funny story about standing in line – back when the pandemic shutdown first started, I was in the line outside a BJs when an employee approached me “excuse me sir!”
I thought for sure she was going to reprehend me for not having my mask on. I was ready to say, “but we are outside and six feet apart.”
It was 8:35 AM and I thought they opened at 8 AM; nope, they opened at 9:00 for “regular folks” – the 8:00 AM opening was for older or at risk customers and she was letting me know that I could go through the other door so as to not wait in line.
Thank goodness I look old! LOL
1. Don’t bring up your last doctor’s visit 2. Don’t bring up your grandchildren.
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Discussing doctor visits except to retail a funny story should be eschewed. A capable Jewish grandmother knows how to use a colonoscopy for story fodder; you are likely not as good as it. Go ahead an bring up your grandchildren. Family life is great conversational fodder. Just be mindful of the privacy and dignity of the young; discretion is advised (and something mothers are bad at but grandparents not as bad at).
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While we’re at it, remember you’re teaching and observing the young. They’re not teaching you and what they want to talk about is cr!p.
Art. There are more administrative tasks to be performed by the elderly getting ready for the day.
Art. There are more administrative tasks to be performed by the elderly getting ready for the day.
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You’ve got one of those pill dispensers too?
Like some others, my wife has never met a check-out clerk that she didn’t befriend.
Since the Gruesome Newsom lockdown initiation, that is her primary social contact other than backyard dinners with daughter and grandchildren; so I try to be patient as they exchange life stories.
“Art. There are more administrative tasks to be performed by the elderly getting ready for the day.
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You’ve got one of those pill dispensers too?”
Ha. It takes 3. Morning, dinner, pre-bed.
I do not complain about “Big Pharma”
I’m in the same boat–I look forward to my clerk chats in the grocery store. It probably says more about me, that my interactions are so paltry.
“You sleep less and less well as you age.”
Art Deco: not me! I sleep a full 8+ hours per night. Fall asleep right away, only wake up occasionally in the middle. I’m very thankful for this!
I talk to everyone–at least a friendly greeting. But conversation, yes, if the bid is taken. As for checkout, I always keep it short if there is a line. I find it annoying if there is an extended conversation continuing past transaction if I am in a queue. When my youngest son was in high school he was on a train with fellow students and parent attendees. The Mom of his friend engaged a conversation with a stranger and his friend expressed his disapproval to my son. My son advised him to just accept it, as he had to with me years ago.
When I lived in Manhattan, is always chat with the cabbies when I took a taxi. Great conversations. I’d remark on something on the cab.
One time it was how immaculately clean the cab was. The guy who owned it (and the medallion) was very proud of that. He told me he lived in Maryland but would come up Monday though Thursday to drive. He talked about his place in Maryland. Great conversation.
Another time, the driver had a photo of the temple at Amritsar and I asked him if that is what it was, and remarked that I had heard it was beautiful. So, he started talking about it.
Great conversation.
Another time, the driver had a lot of soccer photos on his car, one of whom was an alumnus of my alma mater — and was there at the same time I was. I pointed him out and mentioned I went to college with him, though I didn’t know him. The driver knew exactly where I went to school and talked about how he was applying for graduate school there! He asked me a bunch of questions about the campus, etc.
Art Deco:
Sleeping less well does not necessarily mean getting up early. It can mean that you have a lot of trouble falling asleep and therefore your sleeping hours are shifted later rather than earlier.