At the supermarket, waiting for an endless check-out process (I’m so impatient) I took advantage of the time to pop over to the next unused lane, where there was a perfect opportunity to take a self-portrait in the reflections of the fancy bar code reader.  Love the many reflections that this device provides, including those of its own interior.  Nice metaphor there 🙂

Remember when supermarket checkers had to read a price off your item, and then enter the amount in a cash register with little buttons?  And someone had to use a sticker gun to label each can of creamed corn or baking powder in the entire store.  Perhaps people bought less food in those days? Because it seems as though it would take about 20 minutes to get one cart of groceries checked out, not even including all the time arguing about whether or not the customer was overcharged for the maple syrup.

All in all, I’m satisfied that we are better off in this day and age, thanks to the miracles of precision optics, like the above device.