Pet hates ..

Some time back in by blog, I had professed the pure hatred I have to all the folks who pay through Sodexho / Ticket restaurant coupons.

Well, I have a new category of people to add to the hate list : The nit-pickers.

The very same category of people who insist on picking up any fruit or vegetable one by one. They seem to be incapable of counting in anything more than one unit at a time. By all means you should pick up certain things in units of one --> Coconuts, Apples, Mangoes, Pineapples, Tomatoes .. I have no problems there.

But WHY would you want to pick up 1/4 kg of green chillies one at a time ? Or beans ? Or leaves like curry leaves , mint or coriander. 

I guess India is a free country and they can do whatever they want…………………. As long as they don’t do it front of me, I’m ok too !! :-D

I have the same policy for vehicles with L board, driving slowly in the middle of the road and blocking traffic. I tend to honk the daylights out of them. Couple of friends suggested that I should go gentle on these poor souls.

I have the same answer, You wanna learn driving ? Fine , do it . BUT NOT IN FRONT OF ME !!

It simply does not add up

Incident-1: One of the all under one roof home furnishing stores.

The conversation goes something like this

I like this chair, I will take it , how much is it ?
940 sir
Here you are, I have a Rs.1000 note
Sir can you pay me 60 more ? I can then return 100 to you 
Errr …. Why do you say you want 60 ? Are you planning to pay me back 120 ?
No, sir I will give you back 100. See the chair is 940, you paid me 1000, so if you give me 60 more, i can give you 100
If I give you 40, you need to pay me back 100. If I give you 60, you need to give me back 120 !!

Total confusion, 2-3 minutes of patient explaining on how addition works, finally she gets my point. Well it is late in the evening and she must be getting tired, I think

Incident-2: A famous retail store

How much is the total bill ?
309 Sir
Here is 1000
Do you have 9 Rs change ?
Nope, but here is a 10
Here is your balance, 601
601 ??? Haven’t you missed a hundred ????
No sir it is correct. The bill is for 309, I gave you 601
And if you add the two what will you get ?

System crash. Cashier just froze. She calls her manager to figure out this tough math problem. Manager thankfully is an older guy who can still add 2 numbers in his head, so I get my 100 without too much hassle.
Surely this must be a coincidence, I think. Our math skills have not gone so bad, have they ?

 Incident-3: Yet another famous retail store

Your bill is 240 sir
Ok cool, take this 500 note
Your change sir, 160
What the …., aren’t you making a mistake, I should get back 260 !!

Again 2 minutes of confusion, but finally I get my additional 100. Man , surely something is stinking, and this time it has got nothing to do with the food in my refrigerator !!
------------------------------------------------------------------Common trend between all three stores
(a) The cashiers did not enter the amount I paid to their billing machine and did the math on their own.
(b) All cashiers are kids in the 18-21 age group

Question I have is this. Has the proliferation of Cell-phone calculators and computers affected our basic math skills so much ??? 

One thing is for sure, gone are days when I used to take my change and blindly shove into the purse without counting !! I am counting every note from now on !!

Patience testers

Let me describe the following situation to you. I am with my family and after a long day of work and shopping we are finally at the BigBazaar checkout counter. I wiggle into a queue with only one couple in front of me. He has a cart full of items, should take no more than 3-4 minutes to check out. The cashier tallies the amount, it comes to Rs.4000 odd . So far so good.

Out come couple of BigBazaar gift vouchers. After counting it is figured out that still around 3000 Rs is to be paid.

Then comes the dreaded Ticket Restaurant Meal vouchers. Slow and methodical counting in progress and I am tapping my feet impatiently. [ I can never for the world figure out why folks cannot start counting once the cashier is tallying up the items ]. Well guess what, even after like 5 minutes of counting, still around 1500 is owed in balance.

Here comes a credit card now. Phew, finally the end seems near !! But no, looks like there is no easy getaway today

Cashier : “Sir, since you have shopped for 4000, you can get a crockery set for 150. Would you be interested ?”

Of course he would be interested, his whole purpose on earth seems to be to torture people behind in the queue. Off goes his wife to check out the crockery.

Another 5 mins pass. And the cashier won’t bill , because the guy won’t swipe till his wife comes back and tell him if to buy the crockery or not. I am already fantasizing on what I would do with a set of crockery on this guy’s head !!

Finally the wife come back and happily informs him that there is no need to buy the crockery set. Happily he checks out and leaves. Not a word of apology or acknowledgement to the people behind.

I am not a violent man, but boy if I do turn to violence I know exactly the kind of people to go after !!

And I do have a pathological hatred for anyone who pays by Ticket Restaurant vouchers.

Hallucinations

Looks like my sleep problem is getting worse. I am doing things that I can’t even recollect now

How else can you explain the following screenshot from my  Indiaplaza account ?

Wonder how long I must have been online to shop for 16 Million odd items.

Somebody help !!!! I am morphing into a WAG …

I need a therapist !!!!