Here's something you might be interested in.
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed
Big Screen — Movie commentary
Blurt — Music's inside track
Booze News — San Diego spirits
Classical Music — Immortal beauty
Classifieds — Free and easy
Cover Stories — Front-page features
Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes
Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts
Feast! — Food & drink reviews
Feature Stories — Local news & stories
Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore
From the Archives — Spotlight on the past
Golden Dreams — Talk of the town
The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it
Letters — Our inbox
Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites
Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans
Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists
Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news
News Ticker — News & politics
Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated
Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna
Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated
Poetry — The old and the new
Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers
Reading — The hunt for intellectuals
Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails
San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds
SD on the QT — Almost factual news
Sheep and Goats — Places of worship
Special Issues — The best of
Street Style — San Diego streets have style
Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves
Theater — On stage in San Diego this week
Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative
Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work
Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego
Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads
Your Week — Daily event picks
No checks, please
Matt:
Can you tell me why people get into the 10-item-or-less line in the grocery store, right under the big sign, the one that says "No Checks," then put their 15 items on the counter and start writing a check? How can they not know it's an express lane? We cash people are beside ourselves with angst!
-- B., San Diego
And if we are beside ourselves, does that mean we can go through that express line with 20 items? Is angst one item or several? Suppose we're buying a dozen cans of chateaubriand cat food; is that one item because they're all the same price? And if the large lady with the four tubby children in front of us is buying Twinkies, rocky road ice cream, Spaghetti-Os, and Lucky Charms, do we have the right to feel superior as we carefully arrange our broccoli, turkeyburger, and bottled water? No; strike that. The real question is, exactly how superior can we feel-- Slightly? Extremely? On the other hand, is there any way we can stack our Cheerios and canned corn to hide that box of Depends? Do the people in line behind us really need to know that much about our personal lives? Will the checker make some kind of wisecrack? I think, B., that a supermarket line raises so many important life questions that nobody pays much attention to little things like "No Checks, Please."
Here's something you might be interested in.
No checks, please
No checks, please
Matt:
Can you tell me why people get into the 10-item-or-less line in the grocery store, right under the big sign, the one that says "No Checks," then put their 15 items on the counter and start writing a check? How can they not know it's an express lane? We cash people are beside ourselves with angst!
-- B., San Diego
And if we are beside ourselves, does that mean we can go through that express line with 20 items? Is angst one item or several? Suppose we're buying a dozen cans of chateaubriand cat food; is that one item because they're all the same price? And if the large lady with the four tubby children in front of us is buying Twinkies, rocky road ice cream, Spaghetti-Os, and Lucky Charms, do we have the right to feel superior as we carefully arrange our broccoli, turkeyburger, and bottled water? No; strike that. The real question is, exactly how superior can we feel-- Slightly? Extremely? On the other hand, is there any way we can stack our Cheerios and canned corn to hide that box of Depends? Do the people in line behind us really need to know that much about our personal lives? Will the checker make some kind of wisecrack? I think, B., that a supermarket line raises so many important life questions that nobody pays much attention to little things like "No Checks, Please."
Comments