I've discovered something here

[FishFishRevolution]

This is very interesting: By law, if a store has a "15 Items or Less" or any other type of "Express" lane, one of the following things must be abided by at all times. (Note, the amount in which these laws apply is inversely related to how many items you need to buy, and how much time you have to spare waiting in a grociery story)

1 - The credit card swiper must be broken. Unfortunately, this is the only method of payment the three people in front of you have.

2 - The cashier must be new. We're talking brand new, like, just started today. Maybe they even just walked off the street 10 minutes ago, it doesn't matter. The important part is, even if YOU only have 1 item, the people in front of you have about 17 average (I can't tell you how many times I've seen people walk in a 15 or less lane with 20+ items), and at least one of those items is going to be difficult for this new guy to ring up.

3 - The cashier must be the only sentient person currently on the job. If a problem arises anywhere in the store, you can count on your cashier to be the only one who can solve it. Even if all he had to do was give you your change, it doesn't matter--the spill on isle 7 must be cleaned up.

4 - Someone in front of you has to argue about a price/sale. The woman directly before you in line has in her basket 10 items which were on sale last week. She thinks she can slide under the radar, but if she can't, you can bet she's going to make more a of a deal than $2.00 is worth to a new cashier.

No matter what the circumstances, the express line is always the slowest, but no matter how many times I'm running late and just need to pick up one thing, I don't learn.