[nilesfunnies] Fw: Bank People

These days it's just one fucking queue after anothet. You go to the
Doctor, and you sit/stand for hours amongst an assortment of malingerers
and coffin-dodgers hawking up their phlegn for comparison with the
stranger in the next seat. You go to the supermarket, and satnd in the
queue watching that long list of already identified social misfits
alternately getting out their coupons, or obsessively reconstructing the
layout of their household cupboards in a blizzard of plastic carrier bags
and sorted shopping. Then you go to the bank. Yesterday, I was stood in
the queue for forty fucking minutes, behind a swathe of zoids who have no
business being allowed into the notion of social money transactions in the
first place, and certainly barred from entering banking premises in the
second. Courtesy of the layout of the managed queuing snake, one passes
along behind the fuckjaws stood at the windows, already stinking up the
gaff with their humdrum business. This is what I saw;

Lonely Old Person
"it's so different to my day, can you help me" is their opening gambit as
they settle in for the longest social dialogue they'll have today, before
turning up again tomorrow to do it all over. Some come prepared with
photographs of 'our Sandra + kids', or go off on pen-pictures of exactly
what they had for breakfst, which bus they came on, etc, etc. Changed
since your day ? Of course it's fucking changed since your day, but jaysus
it was much better when you kept your pension rolled up in a sock under
the bed so the bogus Water Board man knew exactly where to find it whilst
you were busy downstairs turning the tap on and off for him. Six hours
later, they roll off satisfied clutching their newly withdrawn sixpence,
heading for the slice-of-dry-toast-and-cup-of-weak-tea Cafe.

Customer Looking For Trouble
"Look, I know there's procedure, but it doesn't apply to me. Just give me
what I want. What do you mean you can't ? yes, I know I was in yesterday
and the procedure was explained to me. But I'm a stupid fuckjaw with no
memory capacity for responsible social behaviour. I get no respect at home
or at work, and I must have at least one outlet where I can browbeat a
minion. I repeat; get all the money out of ny account, and lay it out in
pennies on the counter here. What ? Why ? I think I'll know the reason for
that, thank you"

Loose Change Merchant
Like some kind of latter-day pack mule, has bags of coin slung round his
neck, but carefully underneath the coat to avoid being punched and stoned
in the queue. "Could you just (just ?) cash this up for me please" they
say, starting to get one lumpy bag after another out from everywhere until
the counter is full, like Paul Daniels with that Dove trick. Proceeds from
selling fags to kids for a penny probably. And the cashier has the fucking
temerity to /chat/ with them as they snide up the window for hours at a
go.

The Apologist
Takes great delight in sending the cashier off on some fools errand, then
turning to the rest of us every couple of minutes with a little "Sorry",
to which we respond with a little surly smile and that voice in the head
which whispers "Sorry is it ? You would be fucking sorry if there was any
justice, or I thought I could get away with it"

The Pen Relay
Either too important, lazy or stupid to do their paperwork before joining
the queue. Like some kind of sordid ink-junkie seeking a hit, they slide
along the queuing station from chained-pen to chained-pen, filling in
their slips a bit at a time, and all the while sticking their arses out to
stop you, legitimately, moving past them as the gaps appear in front. And
then of course it's all for fucking nought, because when they get to the
cashier they've filled it in wrong, like the fucking nincompoops they
shurely are, and nany behind the counter laboriously fills it in for them
anyway.

I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that it should be possible for some
important and busy people like me to pay for Priority Passes that would
allow us to go straight to the head of any queue we encounter. Fuck the
roads and pay-per-mile. Isn't it time we recognised that there's a case
for 2-tier legislation in the High Street ?

--
Niles, Nottingham | Off round France til July
ICQ UIN 12724766 |
| www.niles.org.uk/blog
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