Watch out for queue conspirators – make sure you are armed

Have you noticed how much busier Dundee is these days? And it is not only Christmas when the town suddenly seems to swell like a Giant (Im) Peach (ment).
Month ends are pretty chaotic and the shopping aisles in supermarkets often resemble a Springbok training camp as shoppers scrum and maul each other to reach out for the cheese.
You have to duck and dive like a dodgem car in Durban and ensure that you wear shin pads – but behind your shins – as shoppers have a habit of ramming the person in front of them.
The ramming is not really intentional – they are probably victims of a chain reaction themselves.
A cricketer’s box may also prove vital especially when large women are charging about with new brooms they have just bought.
You have to be a clever queuer (that is now a word) and make sure you keep an eye on any authority that may be preparing to fire up an erstwhile idle cash register.
Once he gives the green light, the adjacent line makes a joint surge towards the new till and you can easily be flattened.
Good thing you are wearing that American football style helmet.
Now, watch out for queue dodgers. There is an old trick… suddenly, after you have been waiting for what seems like 45 hours tightly clutching your basket that contains a humble cucumber, pasta, rolls and a litre of milk, someone calmly jumps in front of you and says ‘no, the guy in front of me was holding this place for me’.
This is poor queue ethics.
If everyone did that, the laws of science would dictate that your chances of getting to the front of the queue are lower than that of Pres. Zuma being voted in as US president.
Queuing at ATMs can also be tricky… there is a sort of unwritten law that states that the guy in front of the line must be a respectable distance away from the person using the ATM.
Probably for safety and the fact that you really do not want anyone to see that you have forgotten your PIN number and are frantically looking for it on that faded piece of paper that you wrote it on and stuck in your wallet.
There is another trick too… sometimes exceedingly well dressed people suddenly call out from the ATM and demand that someone comes and helps them.
There is always someone who is willing to assist.
But be cautious… now that the helper is at the ATM, another unwritten rule suggests that in terms of some kind of code, he should now get the right to be next user of the ATM even if he was way back in the line when he jumped out and volunteered to assist.
Queue conspiracies abound. And then there are those who stand there with headphones in their ears oblivious to any inane conversation you may want to strike up or calls to tell that ‘yes, it is your turn now’.