I just compiled my “Just-Want-It-Done” List and subtracted all the stuff I actually did get done since the beginning of the month…
The remaining list still covers about four acres. 
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And it seems like that happens with everything…took me two extra weeks to get my car oil change because of lines, closures, and reschedules. 
You get one thing done, two more pop up. I had to stop doing to-do lists because they just depressed me at the lack of progress. 
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There’s a fortune waiting for some modern-day Ron Popeil who wants to market some fusion of a small, erasable white-board and a Moebius strip-style cloth towel hand-dryer-- like you still see occasionally in small restaurants .
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Last minute checks before hitting the road for our cruise and discovered the fan that I have constantly circulating air over my server is not working so I had to shut it down until I get back and find another small fan to replace it. 
Definitely don’t want the server crashing from overheating while I’m away this week…
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I have successfully… though VERY reluctantly… used the self-checkout at the grocery store before. Now, however, someone apparently decided it wasn’t annoying enough and the tinny computer voice should obsess over me “placing my item in the bag.”
It won’t let me continue scanning until I have “placed my item in the bag,” even though it has no idea where my bag is or even whether I have one. Is my bag supposed to be in a specific place? If so, there is no indication.
So, after pushing the “call employee” button three times without any response I just left it there in the middle of a checkout and went to stand behind the lady with 100 items at the ONE human cashier, even though the place was full of customers.
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Kroger?
I actually enjoy the self-checkouts. I can get in and out quickly, things are bagged the way I want them and much less hassle. Except for the stupid computer at Kroger/King Soopers. My god she is annoying. “Place your tomatoes in the bag. Place your milk in the bag.” I can get through the self-checkout at a Target in under five minutes. Kroger? At least ten sometimes fifteen if she is feeling particularly picky that day.
I asked the human watching the self-checkout one day why she was so over-sensitive, the woman told me they have a ridiculously huge theft problem.
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I still don’t know how the computer knows whether I’ve put my item in the bag or not. I’m not comfortable with a machine ordering me around anyway.
I hate technology. I really, really do. I didn’t used to, but in recent years I have become a militant luddite.
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“Please place your extra strength yeast infection cream in the bag!”
I like self-checkouts, but going through one of those feels like an industrial-strength dare.
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Weight? RFIDs?
Getting Austin Power flashbacks: “That sort of thing’s not my bag, baby!”
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One of the grocery stores here had self-checkouts that as you scanned each thing would say very loudly “XX Item, Y dollars and Z cents”.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, when I scanned the Doritos, it kept alternating between “put the item in the bagging area” and “unexpected item in bagging area, please remove” as I kept putting the chips in the bag and then taking them out trying to appease the machine. I believe those bagging sensors rely on weight, and the chips were right at that threshold weight.
Needless to say, we’ll never do self-checkout at that store again.
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That’s why the universe gave us ear buds 
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Yep… the CVS I go to does that.
I’ll stand in line for an hour before I’ll use it. I don’t want the whole store hearing what I’m spending, and I can’t believe customers are OK with that.
What really gets me is when employees suggest that I use the self checkout. I want to say, “You DO realize the purpose of that thing is to take your job away, right?”
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I assume there is some sort of scale in the carousel for the bags. We usually mute the computer (there is a button on the screen) so we don’t have to listen to her.
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Automated checkouts make me sound like that doormat of a wife from the “Marriage Is A Partnership” short as improved by Lady Rifftrax. She tries to speak clearly about her intrusive mother-in-law but all that comes out is, “Hate… hate… HATE…”
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I tried to ignore it but it wouldn’t scan any more items and just kept telling me to put stuff in the bag. And there is no “Cancel” option, either.
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So for the last, uh, month now there’s been various sicknesses sweeping through my house, from covid to other unidentified infections. Starting last week I had a bad headache that lasted for three days straight, which is very unusual for me. That headache turned into a whole body ache and marked fatigue and tiredness. For those reasons I got two covid tests, but both were negative. But it doesn’t feel the same as the ache you get when you have a viral infection. It felt sort of like that for about a day, but for the last few days it’s been joint pain. Back, shoulders, hips, feet. Can’t sit in one position too long before something starts to hurt and I have to shift. Caught myself going down the stairs the way my grandma with hip problems used to do 
Today I thought I was feeling a lot better, but everything still hurts, and now that it’s night it feels even worse. It hasn’t even been a week but I am already so done feeling like this, and I can’t even figure out what caused it. On top of it all, I go back to work tomorrow where I’m on my feet all day; I expect to come home feeling like I’ve been beaten with a baseball bat. 
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It’s almost like when you make customers do the job of the cashiers for free, they feel entitled to stuff.
And I do mean make. I went to CVS recently and there were no cashiers at any register. So I found and employee and I asked him if anyone was available and he – I am not exaggerating here – grunted “THERE” at me and waved in the direction of the self check-out machines. So I guess the answer was “no”
Normally I’m a big fan of things that reduce my need to interact with other humans, but making me do a s#!tty minimum wage job for free, while taking jobs away from people who need them, is not giving me the warm fuzzies.
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I don’t mind interacting with other humans as long as no small talk is expected, no long awkward silences are likely and I get to go away after a couple of minutes.
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I know it’s childish but there are times when I’ve just walked out of the store without making the small, nonessential purchase I came in for. Those damn robo-checkers hate me and I hate them right back. Not worth it to risk a misdemeanor over stealing a single-serve bag of Cheezy-Spheres. But I still get mad.
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