“what is the deal?”

That title is meant to be read in a Jerry Seinfeld voice. I just wanted to share a few observations that have been plaguing my already busy mind.

First off, gas pump technology has advanced since I started driving. The case used to be, before the days of prepay, that you’d pump your gas, and if you wanted to hit an even dollar amount, you’d have to slow down before you hit that dollar amount and stop it. Sometimes you’d be at $19.99 and you’d give it one tiny squeeze and end up at $20.01. This is where you get the Jerry Seinfeld “perfect pump” commercial. Nowadays, you always have to prepay, so you give the cashier $20, and the computer tells the gas pump to stop when you get to 20. In addition to this convenience, the pump also slows down to a drip at about $19.60. This bothers me. First of all, that’s way too long of slow gas pump. If it’s really necessary to slow down the pump, do it at $19.90 or $19.95. I don’t need to take 3 minutes to pump the last 40 cents worth. But more importantly, we don’t need both the slow approach and the automatic stop. We just need one. We needed the slow approach in the days before the automatic stop to keep us from going to $20.01. But now that the automatic stop is here, the slow approach is completely unnecessary, and I hate it and think it should die.

Now onto another phenomenon of the 21st century, the touchless public restroom. You know what I’m talking about. Urinals and toilets where you just walk away and they flush automatically. Sinks, soap dispenser, and hand dryers that have a censor that makes them turn on when your hands are in the proper position. This is all very good technology for a quasi-germophobe like myself or Jerry Seinfeld. But here’s my problem with the touchless bathroom. If one thing is not touchless, then it ruins the whole idea. I used a bathroom recently, I can’t remember where, that had touchless urinals, soap dispensers, and hand dryers. So you wash your hands but then after you’re done, you have to touch the faucet if you don’t want to flood the place, thus contaminating your germ free hands, because people put their hands on the faucet before they wash their hands. Also, these restrooms should also have an automatic door, because everyone touches the door handle, so touching that as you leave also undoes your meticulous hand washing.

So a note to the powerful people who make these types of decisions: regarding gas pumps, eliminate the slow approach, as it is superfluous. Regarding public restrooms, let’s go all or nothing with the touchless idea. And automatic doors. I don’t care if the restrooms are closed for installation of the automatic doors for awhile, let’s get it done.

May mercy, peace, and love be yours in abundance.

~ by matt on Tue, 24 Mar 2009.