I had a rather nasty confrontation in my local supermarket this morning, just at a time when I didn't need one. It was a full-blown argument over a packet of paracetamol. Being middle-aged, I was convinced that I had the right to purchase. But the checkout assistant thought otherwise, and everything came to a grinding halt. I sought help. But in true supermarket tradition, their out-of-normal working hours trading habits - 24 hours a day opening or not - do not transcend to having help freely available before 8.30am or after 7pm. The assistant kept infuriatingly telling me "I needed authorisation". With only a decade to my old aged pension, I felt I did not “need authorisation”. Sadly, these self-service check-out machines don't listen. They're the things that supermarkets seem to insist replace the grumpy teenagers otherwise subsidising their huge student loans and who normally sit at the end of the conveyor belt and have perfected that stance so bel...
On my soapbox again!