9th May:

It is the long-held belief of your humble commentator that standards of customer service in the UK are, generally speaking, a bit shit. This view was reinforced recently when Tesco (the ubiquitous supermarket chain that currently sucks up 70 pence of every 1 Pound we spend on the High Street) changed the way their checkout staff handle, or don't handle to be more precise, our debit and credit cards. In the good old days, you handed your card to the checkout assistant who swiped this card and then invited you to enter your PIN number using the keypad in front of you. Now, however, the cashier simply indicates to the keypad and the onus is on the customer to insert their card and complete the transaction.

There may well be legitimate reasons for this subtle change in operation. I'm sure some consultancy firm somewhere was paid a handsome fee for the Critical Path analysis that concluded the time taken for cashiers to swipe cards was a major checkout bottleneck. Or perhaps Tesco are terrified that they will be swamped in the future by compensation claims as an entire generation of checkout ladies is laid to waste by card-swiping-induced RSI. Either way, the message this change conveys does little to alter my opinion that the mechanics of shopping (for anything) increasingly depend on the customer being active rather than being served, this being presented under the guise of "convenience" or "efficiency". Which is, apparently, a good thing. And not in the slightest bit sad or dehumanising. Like those self-service checkouts, for example. Wonderful.

I accept that supermarket shopping is, for the most part, a necessary evil, and there is little about the experience that you would class as 'pleasurable', but why make it any more obviously about profitability that it already is? Generally speaking, we patronise a store because we like what it sells and we like the experience of buying things in that environment. Maybe we think the staff have great product knowledge, maybe we think they are attentive and friendly. Hell, maybe we just think they have great tits. Either way, we make a conscious decision to reward what that store does do with our time and overdraft. Funny how it's not the same when it comes to baguettes and baked beans, though, isn't it?

If the current trend continues, expect to walk up to your local Hypermarket soon and see the greeter at the front door wearing a t-shirt bearing the legend "We love your money. Buy your food and fuck off. Preferably within 20 minutes".

In other news, a headline on today's BBC News web site reads 'Great tits cope well with warming'.

Too many options.