• LAVA Moderator: Shinji Ikari

Pet Peeves v. u mad?

the other day, i said to a woman in the store - as she did exactly that - "would you like some help bagging your groceries?". she looked at me as if i had called her the c-word, said "no", and continued to just stand there and watch the cashier ring up her stuff...

alasdair
 
Cashiers here just pull the bag open, scan item and place it in the bag. Doesn't seem to really add any more time than them placing it at the end of the counter. Obviously it makes it easier if you group your items together that you want to go into the same bag (cold items, heavy items etc)
 
^ not for big grocery hauls. I spend over $200 every other week (granite it is all organic and gluten free so thats really only about the size of a $75 normal food haul, but I digress) and you have to put certain box things with other boxed things and it lines up down the belt.

I go and bag my groceries if there isn't some youth standing there doing it at the end of the belt, usually there isn't. And you can't just put in ground beef with a box of detergent. So that's why the cashier doesn't just bag them at once.

Rock and a hard place: There are no bags at the end of the belt, do you ask for more, which will be more work for the cashier, or do you look busy/stare at her.
 
i just grab an extra from the next line over, they are usually closed anyway. If a grocery store has 20 lanes, why is only 2 of them open during rush hour?
 
i have a pet peeve. it's people in grocery stores who stand and watch the cashier ring up their groceries, watching them as they pile up at the end of the check-out, then stand there and watch the same cashier bag their groceries, thus doubling the amount of time it takes them to get through the checkout.

i have an idea. how about you (at least help) bag your own groceries?

alasdair
I agree, especially when the person wants their stuff bagged in a certain way(it's unbelievable how picky people are about this shit).
I usually shop at a grocery store that actually has a cashier and a bagger at each checkout. Even so, 90% of the time(unless I only have a handful of items that can fit in a single bag) I help bag my own stuff.
 
Unless I have a CRAP TON of groceries I have given up on ever having a bagger. I know grocery stores basically work on razor-thin margins but it sucks having to bag your own groceries when the fucking self check-out won't let you put your cloth or paper bags on the weight to fill because of shrinkage. 8( If you're not going to hire baggers you should take the goddamned risk of us stealing your greek yogurt.
 
^ we buy the fage pots with the fruit stuff in the compartment on the side. it's kind of fiddly but the yoghurt is delicious.

in my experience, all greek yoghurt tastes pretty much the same so i'm not super brand loyal - stir a teaspoon of honey into it and its heaven...

I usually shop at a grocery store that actually has a cashier and a bagger at each checkout.
when i moved here (from the UK) it blew my mind that stores had somebody to bag my groceries for me...

alasdair
 
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People that use the words "team building exercise"

LOL Yes. I usually suggest that "team building" exercises should be in the form of things outside of the office. I have to admit, AT&T funds the globe at Disney, and they have "team building" exercises at Disney. Now THAT is a team building exercise. They also fund one of the rides at Universal. We had one of those too, but I can't for the life of me remember which ride they sponsor.

Other sayings that drive me up a wall:

niche: Your website isn't "niche." It's fucking payday loans or some shit like that. STFU about your website being in a micro "niche."
linkbuilding: It's fucking spam, you moron.
I'm an SEO: AKA Guy who has no idea what he's doing and creates a career around an algorithm that he hardly knows and spams the site right out of the index.
blogosphere: annoying, overused term
blogger: just because you have something to say doesn't mean anyone wants it in their SERPs
 
Having been a cashier in a grocery store for three years now, I can sympathize with all of your requests. Indeed, all of our margins are razor thin, as budget cuts and falling prices have forced us to cut hours and cashiers and, indirectly, increase stress on the front end.

Ali, I'm very surprised your grocer hasn't switched to the scan-and-bag method. It really cuts time down as the bags are right beneath where the scanner is.

As for the self checkout, I can safely say that is a very bad idea. One person cashing out six people at once? It's impossible to keep check on everyone. There are many, MANY people who will take items that are expensive and use a PLU code for oats or cheap candy. They can get away with it because as long as the weight is correct, the computers cannot tell the difference. Yes, I can notice some of the perpetrators that come through the Evil Scan, but I simply cannot catch everyone, leading to loss.

Guess that's the power in numbers, though. The more people we have on this planet, the more that a select number of people can get away with having done. It's like taking candy from a baby. The system we've implemented is helpless to theft, ignorance and a passing of potentially precious life instead running rampant.
 
I agree Ali - here in Australia there simply are no baggers. You either go through one of the cashier check outs - they scan and bag your stuff - and (most of the time) know what to put with what. If i use this line, I always sort out my groceries anyway, i'm pretty anal about it. There are also self-check outs. The supermarket we use now is great, using green bags doesn't bugger up their system at all - there are no weight issues with bags/groceries, etc. In Melbourne, our old supermarket's self use checkout was crap - the green bag would set off the assistance alarm if you didn't put it on and press the 'own bag' button in a perfectly-timed sequence :\

As for the system flaws, we've had self-checkouts here for a few years now, in all major supermarkets - i'm guessing that if they felt the system was failed, they'd simply close them down? I've always wondered how much more the big supermarkets lose now that they've implemented this system.
 
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^ Because even with the loss, it's still cheaper than hiring and paying five more cashiers.

I have to agree with this - the supermarkets, like a lot of workplaces, would prefer less people working for them; it means less problems, sick leave, injuries etc.

I've heard all sorts of things about self checking - people blatantly saying they steal stuff, although I think most people are probably honest. Me, I hate self checkout - at our local supermarket it never works for me and I have to call the cashier over to sort things out. The scanner seems overly touchy for some reason or won't scan properly at other times.

I'd prefer to go through the manned checkouts - it's nicer dealing with a person and I don't want people to lose their jobs. Also, it's a right of passage to work the checkouts in school, at least I did!

I'm sort of a sentimental person I guess, and really dislike technology like this.
 
Actually, can someone please explain the thought process whereby one marks common nouns as plural with an "'s"? I just plain don't see why it would be intuitive...maybe when someone thinks that part of the noun is being truncated, but why is it done otherwise?

ebola
 
Actually, can someone please explain the thought process whereby one marks common nouns as plural with an "'s"? I just plain don't see why it would be intuitive...maybe when someone thinks that part of the noun is being truncated, but why is it done otherwise?

ebola

ESL. The ESLs who learn English from bloggers have horrible grammar.

contents
informations

Can't think of more off the top of my head, but it's all a sign of an ESL. Bloggers stunt learning growth for people trying to learn English. They also have a very bad habit of overusing the "ly" words, and being extremely wordy. Whenever an ESL asks how they can learn better English skills, I always tell them to avoid blogs.
 
Right, but why is it employed by such bloggers in the first place? I want to know that phenomenology of overuse of apostrophes among native speakers.

ebola
 
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