Daily Stretches

I've become quite comfortable banking at drive up ATMs. But it strikes me that many of you are not.

I cannot tell you how often I'll be sitting in my new old van behind someone who can't seem to grasp the concept of proximity. For myself, I creep close enough to the machine that I can work it without difficulty. Indeed, I typically don't even need to anywhere near fully extend my arm to insert my card, checks, or retrieve cash. I situate myself where I can work comfortably. But others apparently have this strong, strange desire to get in a workout at the ATM.

They certainly get their stretching in. They have to stretch because they've parked in the next county trying to use the machine. And stretch they do. I wonder if it's a game, a hip new fad that I'm missing, to be exactly far enough from the ATM that you must extend your arm fully, and possibly even dislocate your shoulder, to use the very tips of your fingers to put your debit card in the slot. Then they actually - I am not making this up - bounce in their car seat at the last instant to give their fingers that last little jolt necessary to slide the card all the way in so that the unit can read it. Their PIN numbers must be combinations of 1, 2, and 3 because I don't think they can reach the higher numbers on the keypad.

Sometimes drivers give up on that and climb half out of their cars, their waistline supported by the bottom of the window frame as they reach towards the ATM, just so that they can transact their banking. It's silly. It's stupid. You may as well as have walked up to it.

But what do I know? And it can be kind of funny.