Beep. That’s the sound of a half-gallon of two-percent milk. Beep. That’s a pint of blueberries. Beep. There goes a can of mosquito repellent. Beep, beep, beep. A pack of Big Red chewing gum, some shaving soap, a liter of Diet Coke.
Beep. Red, flashing light. Robot voice: APPROVAL NEEDED! APPROVAL NEEDED! Several minutes spent waiting for one of the three girls lounging around the “master register” to finish explaining to the other two exactly why Shawna is no longer speaking to Darnell.
Beep. Boop, beep, boop. Click. Beep. Boop, boop, boop, boop. Bing. Etc. The sound of the two-hundred keystrokes it takes for the store girl to let the robot know that I am at least 21 and won’t hurt myself if it allows me to buy a six pack of Sam Adams.
Boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-BING! The sound of me trying to get the robot to give me the price of two apricots.
Beep. Beep. Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep. The sound of me telling the robot that I would like to pay with a credit card.
Beep. Beep. Boop-boop-boop-bing. PLEASE WAIT FOR ASSISTANCE. Red, flashing light. Several minutes spent waiting for the three girls lounging around the “master register” to finish discussing a recent “big win” one of them had at the casino near St. Ignace.
Boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-boop-BING! The sound of the store girl manually punching in the numbers from my credit card.
“Something’s wrong with the reader,” she tells me, handing back my card. “It hasn’t been working all day.”
“Why should it be different?” I ask. The store girl doesn’t get it, but rightly interprets my comment as rude and stalks away. She and her friends near the master register give me the ol’ stink-eye as I wait for my receipt to print.
THANK YOU FOR SHOPPING AT ----- says the robot. I, like the thousands of people who have come through this repellent gauntlet of a checkout before me, tell the robot to get bent. The robot does not care. The robot is not insulted. The robot does not require a paycheck, medical insurance, sick days, or holiday pay.
The store’s stockholders love the robot. The eight humans whose jobs were lost when the robot was brought in do not, I’m guessing. I don’t love it, either, in large part because the robot is an idiot with no more common sense than a pocket calculator. And yet it’s being asked to perform the job of eight humans. Well, it’s not, exactly; I’m being asked to perform the duties formerly handled by a check-out girl, a bag boy and the kid who pushed the cart to your car and loaded your groceries into it. (Yes, such exotic services were once commonplace, kiddies! Google it if you don’t believe me.)
But that’s OK, I can adjust. It’s a bad situation, but I can live with it, since I have no choice. My concern is for future generations. How bad will it be by the time my grandson is my age? Will he have to trudge out to a field, till the soil, plant some corn seeds, water them daily for months, harvest the corn, deliver it to the store, price it, then take it to the checkout, ring it up, bag it, and finally, pay for it? It’s the ultimate in self-service and I can’t believe the store’s stockholders haven’t been considering ways to achieve exactly this sort of business model.
Beep. Beep. Beep-beep-boop-beep-flush. That, folks, is the sound of civilization slowly circling the drain.
Mike Taylor’s book, Looking at the Pint Half Full is available online at mtrealitycheck.com. E-mail Mike at mtaylor325@gmail.com.
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