Zero Situational Awareness

Self service is a God's send at the supermarkets.

I can avoid all the slow stupid people.

Still get muppets standing there like fish out of water and they nearly have to have the red carpet rolled out to them by the staff member for them to proactively move to the next free available machine.

As Irish society ages we're definitely going to need slow lanes. I'm a list shopper, i rarely dawdle when I have to get groceries so I generally stick to a list and get it all done quickly in Lidl and Aldi in the last hour before closing when they seem to be least busy; at least my local ones are like that but I can imagine more urban ones will have more last minute walk-ins and drunks.

I generally find that when I do have to go to a shop Supervalu's seems to be the most plagued with coin fumblers and counter chatterers. My local Supervalu only recently installed a couple of self service card only machine so I do drop in more frequently now.

I absolutely hate self service tills. Items that won't scan properly, some items that don't have a barcode and you cant find them in the list so have to call someone over, alcohol that needs to be approved before you can continue, touching a manky screen, scan scan scan. Too many items to fit in the bagging area. Eugh.

They've people there to do all the scanning shite for you, might as well let them. That's my take on it anyway 😁

I'm not one for passive-aggressive tutting and sighing around selfish people. While driving, make eye-contact and mouth the words "oh, for fúck sake". In supermarkets, a very clipped "Excuse me, please." usually does the trick. Failing that, find out where they live and send them a bullet in the post.

Too busy pondering over what someone said to them on a cold Tuesday morning after breakfast back in 2013.

I read they have more accidents, but less serious: scratches and dents whereas men have less accidents but more serious. 🤷‍♂️

It's definitely true that the biggest accidents are caused by people who are less risk averse. Although based on what I see on the roads, that gender gap could be narrowing.

Theres a charity shop that I go to fairly often and sometimes there's this woman aprox in her 60s working/volunteering there.

Youll know that she's on as soon as you walk in the door because she always has Country N Irish music playing on cd player and its always up very loud.

I can live with that, but this woman sings along to the choruses of the songs and she has an awful high pitched voice.

She obviously has some sort of ADHD because she is obsessively arranging, pricing, going in and out of the storeroom etc. I know that's her job but she's often literally singing into people's faces while plonking a big pile of books right down on the table where you're browsing through stuff. There were a few times where she's been more or less singing into my ear while shoving past, she's fairly large too and there isn't an awful lot of space.

I let people out ALL the time, and I'm a woman. Not only that but I'm a woman in a big 4x4 which seems to give both men and women irrational rage. I have to collect my daughter to school and turning right off our regional road onto the main road is a nightmare. Most people turning onto it will come right up and leave no chance for you to get out to turn right before them, the odd few do, and I wave, smile and blink my hazards to thank them once out. Anytime I'm turning onto the road I let about 5 cars out in the hope that one day they might do it for me. Sometimes the quicker option is to drive an extra 1.5km to go through a maze of country roads and come out to turn left on a different road.

If you see somebody with a few items and leave them in ahead of you that is grand but it is an awful cheek to ask somebody can I go ahead of you. 🙄

Whilst some may be opportunist, others are Lidl and Aldi pros with great situational awareness who will hover in close proximity to the tills in anticipation of another till opening rather than joining a massive Q with the rest of the sheep.

Doesn't always work, particularly at extremely busy times where they won't have enough staff to open any more, but most of the time it's easily judged.

Extra credit points for those who pay attention to the till opening and closing announcements while going around doing the shopping so they know which till will be opened and can hover in front of it in a sort of pre-Q.