So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[LizzieMaine]

When I lived out west, thirty-odd years ago, one of the things that annoyed me the most was that Western people moved, on the whole, much more slowly than Eastern people. This was true wherever I went out there, and it drove me nuts. I think it's something in the air.

As for placement of card-readers on the grocery line, all the stores here do it that way -- the scanner is at the very end of the line, forcing you to step to the very end to check out. You're expected to do so, briskly, while your order is being scanned. If you don't, the clerk will make a motion with her head gesturing you to move in that direction.

I've never been asked how I intend to pay. I either hand the clerk my cash or step to the side to use the scanner. Club cards are extinct here.

 

[Fading Fast]

When I lived out west, thirty-odd years ago, one of the things that annoyed me the most was that Western people moved, on the whole, much more slowly than Eastern people. This was true wherever I went out there, and it drove me nuts. I think it's something in the air.

As for placement of card-readers on the grocery line, all the stores here do it that way -- the scanner is at the very end of the line, forcing you to step to the very end to check out. You're expected to do so, briskly, while your order is being scanned. If you don't, the clerk will make a motion with her head gesturing you to move in that direction.

I've never been asked how I intend to pay. I either hand the clerk my cash or step to the side to use the scanner. Club cards are extinct here.

New York City has a speed all unto itself. When I first started working here, I'll admit this, I was intimidated at how fast you had to have your order ready in a deli or coffee shop (when they ask, you better be ready to go), how quickly they want to hear it (fire the words out) and how quickly they'll have it done (sandwiches are made at warp speed) and, then, the entire rapid-fire event takes place again at the register.

After years of living like this, one loses one's perspective and I clearly remember the first time I went to Maine on vacation: after a long drive, I walked into a deli, looked at the board (prepared my and my girlfriend's order in my head as one does in NYC) and, then, walked up to the counter and when the girl asked what I would like, I fired out two full sandwich orders, plus sodas and nearly scared her half to death.

The same thing used to happen to me when I visited my parents in NJ (before Dad died and Mom moved to Phoenix). And when I've been to Charlotte NC and other places in the South, I'd say the tempo at similar places is even slower.

This is not some arrogant New Yorker looking down on others - since (1) I'm just a kid from NJ who happens lives in New York now and (2) I don't believe the accepted speed / tempo of ordering sandwiches, etc. of a region reflect on the smarts, etc. of the people of the area - period, full stop. All it does is reflect the broader culture, business needs (NY is so expensive, it is almost always about volume and speed) and other society forces.

I don't travel a lot, but when I do, it is fun to see and feel these and other regional differences.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I much prefer fast, myself, and I teach the kids at work to move fast. There's a time and a place for leisurely chit-chat, but a ticket line is not such a place. Hellohowmanyseventeendollarsyourchangeisthreeenjoytheshow. Nextupplease!"

 

[Hercule]

I much prefer fast, myself, and I teach the kids at work to move fast.

Bless you! If there's anything can't stand the most is people who don't move with purpose.

 

[Fading Fast]

I much prefer fast, myself, and I teach the kids at work to move fast. There's a time and a place for leisurely chit-chat, but a ticket line is not such a place. Hellohowmanyseventeendollarsyourchangeisthreeenjoytheshow. Nextupplease!"

My first experience in NYC was my first day of work. I walked out of the World Trade Center (the Path trains from NJ let off in the basement), walked into a Coffee Shop and was stunned at what I saw. No exaggeration, the customers gave orders like "butteredcornmuffincoffeenosugar," or "twoeggsanwichcheesebacononaKaiserroll" the guys (all guys, all Greek in those days) were taking orders without looking up, making the food and wrapping it at warp speed and, then, literally throwing it down to the "catcher" at the register who lined up the orders as people queued up to pay.
The cashiers (all women in those days from kids to grandmothers - all Greek) would pound on the register keys, spit out a number, take your money (no credit card paying in those days) and count out your change and move on to the next in line all in one motion (and I would trust their count both ringing up and the change without question). It took me a week to really figure out the rhythm and how to fit in without breaking the ballet up.

 

[MisterCairo]

I have never been a fan of drive-through service, and always park and enter, regardless of how small my order. I'm increasingly frustrated by the half-dozen staff busily serving the drive through (two cars at a time max, usually just the one window), while I stand in the shop, with NO ONE in front of me in the queue, waiting. I've left after five minutes more than once.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

I've noticed that too. It seems that drive through gets priority at fast food places.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I've noticed that too. It seems that drive through gets priority at fast food places.

It's that matter of volume again -- they can serve more drive-thru customers with less overhead in terms of paper products, in-store cleanup, soda refills, etc., and thus more profit. Everything that happens in a fast-food environment is meticulously calculated to maximize customer turnover, and drive-thru is the most efficient turnover method of all.

 

[sheeplady]

Another thing that annoys me: newspapers behind a paywall that you need a full subscription to. Someone posted to Facebook a picture of a newspaper article. I wanted to see the actual text of to verify that it actually had the racist content the picture suggested. I wasn't able to get past the paywall because it wants me to be a regular subscriber; I can't pay $1 or $.50 for a single article.

I have never been a fan of drive-through service, and always park and enter, regardless of how small my order. I'm increasingly frustrated by the half-dozen staff busily serving the drive through (two cars at a time max, usually just the one window), while I stand in the shop, with NO ONE in front of me in the queue, waiting. I've left after five minutes more than once.

Once, I actually had them empty out the frier to new car orders AFTER I had ordered my food and was waiting right there in front of them. As in, I was person B to get fries, but cars C and D got them even though they ordered *after* me. I could tell because I could hear the woman doing the orders repeating them back, and sure enough those fry orders went into bags that were not mine. I had to wait for new fries to go in and come out of the frier. Oh, well, I got fresh fries.

I feel really bad for fast food employees. They get a lot of flack and the pressures to work fast are intense. But still, I was *right there* and they *had my money* already.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

How about being the unlucky person that the new hire is being trained on? :doh:

[video=youtube;sVe9zjO6-O8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVe9zjO6-O8[/video]

 

[Stearmen]

I am a little bit surprised so many here would like a faster paced life. I for one, think it is too fast, and out here it is much slower then back East.

 

[Stearmen]

Why are Pay Phones disappearing?

 

[jamespowers]

I am a little bit surprised so many here would like a faster paced life. I for one, think it is too fast, and out here it is much slower then back East.

I don't like faster either. They can keep it. As my mother used to say about her childhood "it was a simpler time and a less fast paced life. You didn't expect everything this instant. You just lived."

 

[GHT]

I am a little bit surprised so many here would like a faster paced life. I for one, think it is too fast, and out here it is much slower then back East.

Does faster equate to better? For most of my working life, I have been involved in logistics. The movement of goods, from the seller to the customer. There was a time, up to the early 1980's, when the term 'Express' meant three working days, Saturdays & Sundays were excluded from the definition: "working." If you received your delivery within 48 hours you thought you had a result. But three days or two days, everyone was happy.

By the early 1980's, the construction of most of our major highways, that we call motorways, had been completed. At that point someone in the logistics industry realised that if a large sortation hub was built in the centre of the country, with easy access to the motorway network, all the distribution centres could send their trucks to the hub, where the goods were sorted and then the trucks would return, with enough time to be unloaded, sorted into local deliveries, and despatched to the customer, all within 24 hours, and the driving time of those commercial vehicles, came within the legal framework of our driving laws. A system that has become known as: J.I.T. Or, just in time.

At a stroke, the need for warehouses, or storage space became irrelevant. Industries with large truck fleets became prolific, movement of goods grew rapidly, an new acronym appeared in the lexicon of our language: F.M.C.G. Or fast moving consumer goods. Add into this mix, the invention of the fax machine, it gave customers, for the first time, a way of getting a same day proof of delivery, the fax was quickly followed by the cell phone, then the cheap use of the internet, then email and then every sort of gizmo ever conceived, all to make life quicker, faster, 'better.'

Better, really? What has happened is that a lot of local jobs disappeared, our roads are unbelievably congested and the proliferation of a phenomenon we colloquially call: White Van Man. Delivery vans the length and breadth of the country, millions of them, replacing those previous static jobs probably. To me it seems that all this traffic has created a sort of road anarchy. Nobody has time any more, nobody will give way to let a motorist out onto a busy road, there's tension everywhere, stress levels are intolerable.

Let me give you two examples. A hat that I bought from The Village Hat Shop in San Diego, took just five days, including custom checks, to reach me in London. I was given a consignment number, and, using that number, I could track that consignment every inch of the way. Previously it would have taken much longer. I would have had to find the sender in a magazine advert, pre-internet. Then it would have been a snail mail order by post, pre-email. Then a series of carriage from one carrier to another, before it finally reached me. And if the sender wanted a proof of delivery, it would have been a photocopy of the consignment note, posted back, by snail mail, pre-handhold courier computers.

The second example was for some rubber sealing around the doors of my vintage MG. The order was given by phone, payment by credit card. The shipment was collected on a Wednesday and delivered by nine am the following Friday, it came that early because the carrier had guaranteed next day delivery, meaning it should have arrived during business hours on Thursday. The demand for the immediate has become the norm, created by the industry itself, but is it really necessary? Would you really want to go back to a slower pace of life? Is it just, a rose tinted spectacles, fantasy, or would you prefer it a reality? Whatever, it's not going to happen, the genie is out of the bottle.

 

[LizzieMaine]

In my case, it's simply a matter of having lived my entire life riveted to the clock. When we had the gas station, the amount of money earned was based on how quickly you got the work done. On a factory production line, the line set your pace -- and you had no choice but to move in rhythm with the time it set. In radio, every single thing that happened was governed by time -- time was, literally, money. If you weren't ready to go on the air at 5:30 am sharp, too damn bad, you were on the air anyway. And in the theatre business, when you advertise that a show begins at 7, that doesn't mean it begins at 7:25. You do what you do within the time alloted, not however long you feel like taking.

When you live a life like that moving fast isn't about impatience, it's about necessity. I've never known any other kind of life, and I don't understand people who just stand there on the sidewalk with their tongues hanging out when there's places they ought to be.

 

[pawineguy]

I am a little bit surprised so many here would like a faster paced life. I for one, think it is too fast, and out here it is much slower then back East.

As a Northeasterner who's lived 95% of his life in the NYC / Philly Corridor, allow me to clarify what I like in terms of "fast", which may apply to some of the others here. I like fast service; I don't want to stand in line for an extra 10 minutes so each person can discuss the weather with the cashier; when I'm done eating I want my check on the table so I can decide how long I'll linger over coffee. In other words, allow me to set my own pace, don't tell me to slow down to smell the roses, there may be roses somewhere else that I'm trying to get to... It's not that I want to live my whole life at that pace, I just don't want to be slowed down on the way to relaxation.

 

[Stearmen]

[video=youtube;6AiGNL0LYN0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AiGNL0LYN0[/video]

 

[HudsonHawk]

As a Northeasterner who's lived 95% of his life in the NYC / Philly Corridor, allow me to clarify what I like in terms of "fast", which may apply to some of the others here. I like fast service; I don't want to stand in line for an extra 10 minutes so each person can discuss the weather with the cashier; when I'm done eating I want my check on the table so I can decide how long I'll linger over coffee. In other words, allow me to set my own pace, don't tell me to slow down to smell the roses, there may be roses somewhere else that I'm trying to get to... It's not that I want to live my whole life at that pace, I just don't want to be slowed down on the way to relaxation.

This is decidedly different than the Southern philosophy. We've always been of the opinion that your interaction with people is more important than your interaction with your coffee or your electronic gadgets or even the roses. That's really the definition of "Southern Hospitality". People are genuinely glad you're there and they want to show it. Quite different than the idea that other people only only get in your way.

 

[jamespowers]

This is decidedly different than the Southern philosophy. We've always been of the opinion that your interaction with people is more important than your interaction with your coffee or your electronic gadgets or even the roses. That's really the definition of "Southern Hospitality". People are genuinely glad you're there and they want to show it. Quite different than the idea that other people only only get in your way.

Much as I hate to say it, that is the way it is out here. It may be to many dope smoking flower children are the reason though.

 

[HudsonHawk]

Much as I hate to say it, that is the way it is out here. It may be to many dope smoking flower children are the reason though.

Btw, been in your backyard this last week. Went to the ball game yesterday, in to SF to the cigar bar...scotch, cigars...meatballs next door. It was a good day.