Absolute Proof…
Actual conversation I overheard today in a convenience store while trying to pay for a cup of coffee. The young woman cashier was enmeshed in what sounded like a quiet, defensive argument with an olive-skinned gentleman, who I took to be her supervisor. The subject had something to do with an earlier transaction by a woman who was paying for lottery tickets with a $100 bill. As the clerk waved her hands side to side, from the lottery ticket cabinet to the cash register, back and forth, explaining the details of those proceedings, she made a statement in a somewhat higher volume and pitch than she had previously used. This certainly persuaded me…
I know I did it, because I don’t remember not doing it.
The prosecution rests…
16 Comments so far
Wow.
And here I thought one couldn’t prove the negative.
Hi, Winston
Thanks for stopping by my page. I appreciated your kind comment.
Well, hey, man - thanks for the link. I loved your intro writing. Made me smile. My own roomie is an electrical engineer and quite out of his mind; and fortunately for us, so am I.
I look forward to reading more here and don’t mind if I link you back!
Pagan
Oh, this is hilarious. Going to reprint it on my blog with due credit to you, if you have no objection.
This kind of thing all goes back to our failed education system in this country. Ever known a Wendy’s cashier to be able to make change without the computer telling her how much it is?
I don’t think anyone under 35 knows how to give back change without the computer telling them. And the less competent ones sometimes can’t even count it out when the amount is staring at them from the screen.
And they do teach about money in the second grade, I know because I’m a teacher. The thing is, you should start teaching kids about money as soon as they are interested and therefore want to learn about it in a real-world context. Learning is way too compartmentalized. Also it’s not just the educational system, it’s also parents not seeing themselves as teachers. You see yourself as a teacher if you once learned yourself. So those kids who get nothing at home and not enough at school, are really doomed in the U.S.
It could be a ‘He’ too, though.
Doesn’t it so suck?
No, my wife was a teacher. Kindergarten. She had a lot of good impact on her kids. Thirty years later she has evidence of that.
My wife had a little girl in 2nd grade who had problems. She told the school system about the problems and no one took heed. Two years ago this girl killed two Tennessee police officers with her stolen car. She is now in prison for life.
So much for the school system….
That is hilarious. Sad, but hilarious.
In 1st grade I used to beat my schoolmates and walk on desks. My parents had to take me away from that school.
Now I am a lecturer. A part of me is still aggressive but you could never tell, even if you knew me well. I can easily keep it under control (except, perhaps, when I am driving and someone gets my nerves on).
When I help my honey out in her little store, I do the change in my head because I never can remember which buttons to push to get the machine to tell me how much change to give.
So, which is dumber, there’s the question: to not be able to calculate change in the head, or to not be able to get the machine to do it?
Sigh.
Some of the elementary school kids with learning disabilities do well with the computer. For those who have difficulty handling that stupid pencil that makes your fingers hurt when you hold it too hard, pecking on the keyboard gives them a chance to communicate easily in writing.
Sometimes when I’m showing a kid how to do something on the computer, they’ve got me beat. They have better vision than I and quicker reflexes, in most cases. The fact that the computer can be self-correcting is a real plus for the kids - a mininum of adult interference. Good on them, I say. Adults among children can be such arses.
It makes sense to me.
Actually, having heard people testify in court for many years. Thousands of people, actually. I’d say many of them employ a method of reinforcing their own statements with methods not dissimilar to the comment you overheard.
What’s really fun is to give cashiers, even some of their managers, a mixture of coins i.e. pennies plus a nickle or dime depending on the total bill, but the point is to end up getting back in change nothing smaller than a quarter (since no one uses half dollars any more) along with whatever additional greenbacks are required. I’ve seen a lot of puzzled looks before they finally just add it up, then ring it up to let the machine figure it out.
I can’t see anything wrong with that …
I used to sell cokes at the rodeo, and it’s simple to count up from the amount of the purchase to the amount tendered. Very quick and foolproof. problem is, when you work at a fast-food joint, they won’t let you do it that way; you have to make the machine do it. Confuses the hell out of people who actually know how to make change, so they wind up cleaning the dining area during lunch rush.