I drove out to the future of grocery stores yesterday, but when I stopped for gas, I ended up on a detour to the past.
There wasn't anywhere on the gas pump to stick my credit card, so I just started filling up, marveling that there was still a place where they trusted you to pay after rather than before. But then - cue the Twilight Zone music - a ghost appeared.
Well, not a real ghost, but what seems like one these days: an actual human asking if he could help me.
Turns out I had driven into what must be one of the last full-service stations around here. The attendant - maybe it was Charlie himself, since I was at Charlie's Service Station on Liberty Road in Randallstown - was such a pro, he got it to exactly $48, which served to jolt me back to the present.
Anyway, I was soon back on the road to the future, or rather, Martin's Food Market in Sykesville. Martin's already uses the hand-scanner technology that the Giant grocery chain is going to start installing in its stores as part of a massive effort to regain its once-dominant position in the market, The Sun's Andrea K. Walker reported yesterday.
The scanners keep a running total as you laser the bar codes on items as you put them in your cart, and then, with one last zap at a self-service checkout lane, you're out of there - without, theoretically at least, a single human interaction.
I'm of two minds when it comes to such devices. It's a chicken-egg thing: I wonder if they're great because they allow us to bypass a potentially rude salesperson, or if salespersons - and shoppers, for that matter - are rude because they get less and less practice interacting with other human beings.
I guess it doesn't really matter at this point, since human-bypassing technology is everywhere. I can't think of the last time I went to a bank teller rather than the ATM, or spoke to an actual customer service representative rather than pressing number after number on the phone. Once I figure out my GPS, I'm sure that will replace my current method of waving to the driver in the next lane, doing that universal roll-your-window down signal and just asking for directions.
I think I'll miss that, because I love being asked for directions myself. Who doesn't like to show off? Or maybe I just like chance encounters and random exchanges. I've been pondering this one since Sunday: I had stopped at a small nonchain grocery to pick up a couple of things, and the bagger noted that the red onion I bought was the same color as my lipstick.
