The Columnist Manifesto

For the second week in a row, Felicity wins my informal (and secret) contest for "best line of the day" during my Saturday grocery-bagging shift at our neighborhood food co-op. She said this to another cashier in reference to the co-op itself.

Meanwhile, it was a slow day for bagging groceries. Very few "celebrity sightings" (seeing people I know go through the checkout line), and I estimate that more than half the customers today insisted on bagging their own groceries. The usual 10-12 customers seemed momentarily paralyzed with indecision when I asked, "would you like me to bag your groceries?" A surprising number of people respond to this question with an offended look, as if I were trying to take their fun from them, and an "I can do it!" Far more react that way than say "no thanks."

During a particularly slow time, I was chatting with Emily, who started as a checker yesterday. I asked her where she worked at her previous job, and she told me Pancho's Restaurant. I've never eaten at Pancho's because I'm highly suspicious of the quality of Mexican food in My Home Town, particularly this restaurant which has a permanent neon sign saying "Immediate Seating." What kind of advertizing is that, to announce to the world that your restaurant will never be good enough to be crowded?

"Pancho's?" I said to Emily. "The 'Immediate Seating' place?"
"Yes," she said. "You know, this one time before I started working there, I went there and they didn't seat me right away."

Emily might have edged out felicity for today's Best Line with that one, except she offered the comment as a serious complaint about Pancho's. That one line story struck me as very funny -- like something you'd hear from comedian Steven Wright -- but Emily showed no sign that she saw the humor in it. I had to disqualify her from the contest.

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