Generally, I fill this blog with posts overflowing with praise for my family members. This is because they deserve it, naturally. Well, and also, they actually read the blog and I have to live with them, so....
However, I feel I have to make an exception in one particular case. You see, my wife is the worst line-picker, ever. There is irrefutable scientific evidence to back this up. I'd share the data with you, honestly, but it is enormous and would probably cause me to exceed my bandwidth allowance.
Let's just say that if we were at the grocery store, and there were 9 lines with 5 people in each line, carts full, and then there was a single express lane with someone purchasing one container of tic tacs, my wife would (seemingly naturally) pick the line with the one person purchasing tic tacs.
For most people, this would clearly be the wise choice. For my wife, this would prove to be a mistake.
You see, with my wife now joining the line, all kinds of problems could occur. The problems are really only limited by your imagination. For example, the person buying the tic tacs could decide to pay with the change in her purse. This change would then just be bouncing around in the purse and the person would have to rummage around looking for the change. The change would also probably turn out to be comprised of a nickel and 75 pennies. She would be 6 cents short, yet insist the correct change must be in there somewhere.
Those people in the other 9 lines, even though they were stocking up for a nuclear winter, would have long ago left the building and already be safe at home in their fallout shelters.
Even knowing all of this, I never knew how powerful my wife's ability to pick the wrong line was, though I suspected, of course. I'm naturally perceptive. Plus there is the evidence I mentioned earlier.
Last Friday night, I found out first-hand that she is not only bad at picking lines, she may actually be a direct CAUSE of bad line! We had stopped, briefly, at Walgreens to pick up some snacks for Rachel and me to munch on for our night of video game playing. My wife and my oldest daughter were heading to a youth function at church and needed a bit of cash, so I was going to take advantage of the "cash back" feature at the store.
Rachel and I had gone into the store to pick out our snacks while Dianne and Rebecca stayed in the car. Minutes later, we were in the checkout line. I'm a guy, so I can accomplish most shopping trips (not counting checkout lines) in 60 seconds or less...even including the time it takes to chase Rachel around the store with a pose-able Halloween spider. It's a gift.
Two lines were in operation on this day. One line had a single family in it, while the second had about three individuals ready to checkout. I chose line two, because line one just seemed like they were having problems in deciding which combination of things to actually buy. There was discussion. Discussion in the checkout line is usually not good. Also, at Walgreens, they generally only open up a second line if there is a problem in the first.
I was confident in my choice.
My line, the LONG one, was moving quickly. The person in front of me was up already at the register, when it happened. My wife walked in the door of Walgreens. Oh no. "What are you doing in here?" I asked, just a bit nervous. "I was bored in the car", said Dianne. See, when someone else is doing the shopping, the rest of my family gets bored in about 60 seconds...which also helps encourage me to trim my shopping time down. Dianne stood next to me in line. Oh no.
I was horrified. I had no idea what this was going to do to my wait time.
"Don't you have something else you could be doing?" I asked.
"Nope", she replied. She stayed put. Oh no.
It was at this moment that the guy in line in front of me whipped out a $100 bill to pay for his $8.00 or so purchase. Just great. I knew they weren't going to have change for that.
I turned to my wife, "this is your fault" I said. "Things were going great until you stood in the line. You know how you are with lines!" She looked blankly at me. For a second it looked liked she was going to protest, or say something snarky back to me. "I know", she finally said, "I'll wait outside."
She knows how she is with lines. I just observe it, she has to live with it.
Dianne left the store. Not more than 5 seconds after she left, the store manager hurried right over, seemingly out of nowhere, with the change for the $100. When I checked out, the cashier apologized for the wait. "That's OK," I told him, "It's not your fault."
Line one? They were scrounging for change in their collective pockets and purses.
Order was restored in the universe.
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