Anarchy in the Whole Foods

Actually, before I get to the anarchy (or rather, lack thereof) at the Whole Foods, I would like to say that I am watching the news and, of course, they keep throwing to various muckymucks at Scotland Yard to weigh in, and, I'm so so so sorry, but whenever I think of the Scotland Yard, all I can think is:

Yes. Scotland Yard, to me, is a veddy British mouse.

Anyway. So I went to Whole Foods today to stock up on various forms of soy protein (soy cajun chicken! soy kielbasa! but it's all for the texture, because I don't know what real cajun chicken or real kielbasa would taste like) and I filled my basket, as I'm wont to do, with butternutsquash soup and faux-basa and spinach and a papaya, and when I got to the check-out queue --

Oh, wait, I should explain. See, they totally maximized their space by keeping shoppers in long, amusement-park esque lines as they wait to file into the check-out holding chamber. It's very space effective, and you totally wait on line for ages, but it's worth it because there is mint soy chocolate soy cream waiting for you when you're all done with the spending. And besides, it feels like you're on line for Space Mountain. So usually there's a dude (or sometimes a lady) who tells the line-waiters which cashier is open, and they direct the traffic flow from the three queues into the check-out holding area. They say, "Register 3. You, register 9. And ... register 15" and you docily go wherever they tell you to.

But... now the check-out system talks! A robot announces which register to which you should go, and there's no longer a dude (or sometimes a lady) directing traffic! And I thought: "Surely this will be anarchic."

And then I chided myself for such pessimistic thoughts, but then the guys behind me said, "How is this going to work? Oh no!"

But when I got to the front of the line, people were listening to the check-out robot and trotting docily, in order, to their desiignated cashiers. No shoving, no attitude, no survival of the fittest. Baa baa baa.

I secretly had hoped it might turn us all into cro-magnons, bashing each over the heads with our frozen tofu pups and grunting and painting with our own feces. But, alas. Baa baa baa.

Because wouldn't that be matter vs. anti-matter? A violent riot in Whole Foods?

I mean, not that I would advocate such a thing. It was just entertaining while I was stuck on line and my soy mint soy chocolate soy cream was melting.