I stop off at the bank to deposit a check on the way into work. Go up to the ATM, swipe my card, enter my pin, indicate that I want to make a deposit, enter the amount. ATM asks me to confirm that yes I really do want to make a deposit for 417.26 or whatever it was. I click the “yes” button and…
Slot opens up, motor whirrs, instrux on screen says “PLEASE PLACE YOUR ENDORSED CHECK(S) ALONG WITH YOUR DEPOSIT TICKET IN THE ENVELOPE, SEAL IT, AND INSERT IT INTO THE SLOT”. OK, look, if I had not already endorsed my check, filled out my deposit ticket, stuck them in the envelope, and held it out like so, ready to poke it into the slot when it opens, it would not make it into the envelope-eater. Wouldn’t it make more sense to provide those instructions on the PREVIOUS SCREEN? But no, its already trying to suck the envelope out of my hands before the machine makes the suggestion that I put all that into the envelope and seal it.
So then I finish my transit. Go into the subway system. Lots of people on the platform, and then the train arrives and a large throng emerges and a similarly dense cluster of passengers, me included, tries to get on. “There’s another train directly behind this one” the PA system tells us. Yeah I know. It’s a train track. Of COURSE there’s another train directly behind this one. It can’t be indirectly behind this one, you know. It may be 11 miles behind, but it’s most certainly directly behind this one, and there’s definitely one back there, it’s not like there’s normally ever going to be deserted track all the way back to the terminus out in Wakefield or Far Rockaway or Flushing or wherever.
Have you ever noticed that ATM is MTA spelled backwards?