What the F!@# is Taking You So Long?

Q-Tip – Move by tesszechuan

Over the last couple of months, I started to really take notice of something; especially in the last few weeks as the populous of the city swells with relatively un-intelligible, chain-restaurant grubing, slow-walking tourists trying to get a taste of the big city during the holiday season. The observation? Well, and again, this is just my opinion, but it seems to me that people are taking fucking light-years to get money out of the ATM, fare for the subway, or a ticket on a Metro-North train. I just got back from the bank a little bit ago, and had to wait almost ten minutes to use an ATM. Ten minutes for an ATM, and I bank with Chase! They have more goddamn money machines in New York than literally any other bank with an office in the city, yet, for some reason, getting cash is rarely a painless errand.

Maybe Pat Bateman can help me solve this problem... (feed-me-a-stray-cat.deviantart.com)

I do not understand this at all. When you go to the ATM, there are, truly, a finite number of tasks that a person can undertake (withdrawal, deposit, balance inquiry, etc), and it’s not like people go to the ATM without one of those particular actions in mind (I’m sure there are some idiots out there who do, but they are, I think, the exception and not the rule). Now, maybe it’s the case that I’m getting stuck in-line behind the rare-breed of non-task-oriented-ATM-goer, but I have a hard time believing that this is the case and here is why: I view everyone in the ATM lobby as a potential saboteur to expedient banking, and so I watch them like a hawk…still, I cannot figure out what is causing the delay.  Why does it take me thirty to forty-five seconds at the ATM when everyone else is spending two or three minutes?

(jesseanneo.blogspot.com)

The same can be said of Metro-North ticketing machines, and, to a lesser extent, the MTA vending machines for subway fare.  Now, there is the rare case when one encounters a faulty machine (this seems to happen most-consistently with Metro-North ticketing) and this can be an obstacle. I know I’ve encountered my fair share of Metro-North machines that are exceedingly dysfunctional. The most common hiccup I’ve come across is that, well, the screens are complete pieces of shit. I cannot tell you how many times I have had to stand in front of the glowing machine, repeatedly pressing the “proceed to next screen” button like one of Pavlov’s canine specimens. This happens frequently enough that I think it’s fair to say the only people to blame are the MTA (the MTA runs Metro-North). The MTA really, really, REALLY sucks. They might be the worst public transportation company in America. The organization is an abominable failure, but that’s another post for another time…

I have seen, on probably six or seven occasions, people standing in front of the screen, apparently staring blankly into the deep sea of blue before them. Can you not read? Are you blind? Why aren’t you pressing a fucking button, numb nuts? Did you forget where you’re going? This is, truly, an amazing failure of the human brain and one of the rarest examples of what I’ll call PTT (Public Transportation Technophobia). To the people who stand in front of the machine, brain-dead and endlessly perplexed by the simplicity of the system…go buy a ticket from the fucking window and leave the machines for us technocrats! To the person at the ATM who stands there for five minutes, talking on the phone, messaging their other non-task-oriented-ATM friends on Facebook…well, a.) you’re an embodiment of some version of stupidity, b.) you’re inconveniencing not only myself, but potentially others and finally, c.) I don’t want to be your friend.

(boostquotes.blogspot.com)

For the sake of this blogger’s sanity, and that of others who are less-vocal, please folks…take your time and hurry the fuck up!