I've been working as a cashier since the end of July at our local grocerystore, Giant.

Oh the stories I could tell, the rude people I could point out, and the foodstamp fraud I could also report ("I just bought and sold 2 houses for cash." said one man as he pulled out his access card to pay by foodstamps. Lovely. Keep sponging off the rest of us who work for a living).

There are a lot of annoying people out there, and many who have no manners or don't care if my express lane is 15 items or less. Or the people who hand me bags of carrots, or cookies or whatever and say "We don't want this, it's already opened." What they lack to say is that THEY were the ones who have opened it and already eaten from it and don't feel like paying for it.

I don't care if they are writing a check, or paying by credit or debit, but if you know you only have so much cash on you, remember the amount, or write it on the shopping list so that I don't have to void 20+ items when you can't pay for them.

There is one major peeve I have about shoppers in my checkout line. It's the ones on cell phones. Can you get off the phone so that I can talk to you and tell you what you owe, that your card was declined, or that your kid just ate a candy bar and you need to pay for it?? Heaven forbid I actually interrupt your conversation to speak to you while you're checking out.

One thing to keep in mind as you are checking out is that many of the cashiers today in foodstores are TIMED with the amount of items they pass across the scanner. They get yelled at when they go below a certain number. Our store is supposed to be aiming for 24 items a minute. That's anything that has to be hand keyed in, or weighed, or whatever. It includes when you are paying, swiping your card, writing your check, everything. It's annoying when they also track not only how many items you scan per minute, but then the items you have to key by hand (you get reprimanded for that, even if it's not your fault the barcode is faulty), for the number of voids (even if it is the person who bought 20 more things that what they could pay for).

The list goes on and on. Sometimes I just want to know why we are supposed to go so fast, and then you make mistakes going so fast, and the mistakes are counted against you. What happened to going at a reasonable rate and being consistent???

I could also tell you about some of the nicer people I encounter at my job. The elderly men and women who greet me by name, who ask me how my day was, and if my line is empty "were you waiting just for me?!" I run into friends I haven't seen in ages, or people who I had grad classes with and haven't seen me for years, but they still remember me. Kids who are sweet and cute and behaving, and are polite and say "Hi lady!" It's working with other cashiers that I get along with, and that make me laugh and keep things upbeat. It's these things that make me smile, and lately, that's what keeps me going.

Sure, there are annoying people, and I'd bet we're all on someone else's annoying list somewhere out there, lol.