Selfridges, Oxford Street

First stop was a new coat for Matthew. For the amount of money it cost he didn’t actually take that long on deciding which one he wanted.

Which was a shame as we were sat on a very comfy leather sofa.

The only evidence of which is this accompanying footrest.

Also, at this price, you do not seem to get many customers in the queue.

But then again, this could be because everyone else had bought their three quarter length last month when it started getting cold.

If you wish to avoid long queues you must purchase items at the wrong time of year.

For example, now would be a bad time to buy Christmas decorations from the Christmas department.

Which is of course what we did.

There’s nothing quite like a department store at Christmas. They push festive spirit onto the customer with the same persistance as a crack dealer.

With such cheer in the air, a 30% promotional discount on selected lines and Would you like a basket Madam?, Claire was quickly hooked.

After about an hour she had carefully selected six hanging baubles, and so then off to the queue we went.

We originally made a small faux pas by queuing behind the person being served at the till. But were quickly informed by the queue monitor that there was indeed a queue on the other side of the store where other people were also waiting.

After such grand efforts around the rest of the store, I thought that the queue signage was a bit of a let down. What about a black background with some gold, swirly typeface? I mean really, I’ve seen Woolworths try harder than this.

Rather sturdy queue enforcers.

Once you were in that was it. No turning back.

And you could see why they needed them. It was all starting to take a horribly long time and, without the barriers in place, it would have been quite easy to have put the basket down and called it a day for Christmas shopping.

With such a long length of time to consider your pending purchases, previous queuers had, quite rightly, lightened their baskets of some of their ill chosen Christmas decorations. Which were then left willy nilly in the displays along the queue’s edge.

Butterflies and Christmas do not go.

Once we had reached the front of the queue, we were again in the hands of the queue monitor.

She was an extremely attentive queue monitor, and directed us to the first available till (there were only two tills) with such eagerness and with such gusto, that I was instantly awakened from my momentary boredom and almost started to shriek with panic.

But luckily, I did not.

And we waited patiently by the almost free till, and were then served.

At the end of the transaction Matthew showed us a £24.oo bauble that he wanted to buy.

He was firmly told to put it back.

HSBC, UK

Uh oh.

Today I have learnt of a new opportunity to queue in the UK. Although this should make me pleased, it has left me feeling a little angry.

I have just found out that HSBC wish to introduce “drive thru” banks in the UK as a way to modernise its branch network.

When I lived in the States I found these structures rather funny. Especially the large concrete bollards in front of the machines and their multi coloured stripes of paint, left from customers who’d used them after one visit too many to the drive thru liquor store.

But that was funny because it was in the US. Besides, if you used a cashpoint on the street there, there was the risk of being shot (luckily it was only a paint bullet, although I was informed that it still rather hurt).

I don’t mind customers being lazy, and I don’t mind banks trying to make our life easier, but I do object to queues of traffic just to use a hole in the wall.

Not only is there not room for queuing traffic in our cities, but when all other companies are attempting to make themselves look ‘green’, why is HSBC going the other way to encourage slow moving, CO2 producing queues of cars?

I rather like the US, but I think that this is an unwelcome part of their culture.

Or am I alone in this?

Post Office, Edinburgh

Not a story, but a sign.

Gary Wood sent me this for my own private collection of queue pictures, but I wanted to share.

Cashpoint, South of the River, London

Saturday night.

Exact location, I’m afraid, is unknown.

I cannot remember if it was before or after the taxi ride, and so the best I can do is suggest that it was somewhere between Brixton and Bermondsey.

I was not a queue partaker, but merely an observer. Inside the queue we have Claire with the white looking bag, Matthew to the left, his face somewhat obscured by another fellow of our party, whose name, for the time being, I am unable to remember.

Notice the positioning of Miss Lake, not one to turn her back on her friends or the cashpoint, she has chosen to stand sideways in the queue. This makes it impossible for any would be queue jumper to adopt a place between the group of friends and the cashpoint.

You may not believe such a thing would happen but the risk here in London, especially South of the river, is quite high.

In the above picture, such an opportunist exists in the form of a young lady standing by the wall. Waiting for a gap to open up in the queue, she is kept at bay by Miss Lake’s challenging stance.

Although I do start to worry somewhat when Miss Lake momentarily forgets herself and turns her back completely on the cashpoint.

The queue becomes quite vulnerable, and lo and behold a gentleman appears in the gap.

But panic not. Luckily the young sir is only after some change for a quid, and is soon off on his way.

The previous young lady also ventures off into the night, and so it is time for Miss Lake to take her position at the head of the queue.

After fighting off adversaries, rising to new challenges and keeping the conversation flowing with her companions, Miss Lake, mission accomplished, joins the waiting crowd.

Which is really a good time to stop taking photographs.

Before I draw too much attention to myself.

Crikey. Lets run for it.

The Gabba, Brisbane

As promised, here is our second post from Laurence of Australia. This time he reports on the queues at the Ashes:

Here’s another queue in Brisbane outside the Gabba. To confirm the relaxed attitude to orderly queuing in Australia the authorities have had to erect steel fencing to keep them in a tidy line. By-the-way, this is the queue for the gents toilet not for the Ashes tickets. We drink a lot of beer in Australia.

Now that I am “queue aware” I will search out more. There’s an interesting one at Coles supermarket where no-one forms a queue, more of a small crowd, but all take their turn to be served in order of arrival. Strange but true.

Bunnings DIY, Thornleigh, NSW Australia

There’s nothing better than a cheery start to the week, and for this I am thankful to Laurence of Australia who has provided our first antipodean queue story. In fact, although it is only Laurence of Australia’s first entry he does in fact have two queue stories, the second of which I’ll post later on today, and so I have decided to already give him his own category.

Not to keep you waiting any longer, here is Laurence:

G’day Standinaqueue

This is my first and a small contribution from the colonies. I think I have the right to make a contribution since the Queen Lizzy is still officially in charge here. Unofficially, no-one here cares a toss. Besides, we are going to beat you at cricket…

Location is one of those DIY warehouses at a place called Thornleigh in NSW, Australia. It’s on the Northern outskirts of Sydney, the largest city in Australia. (Do NOT be fooled by any claims that Melbourne is the largest city. They are deluded.)

BUNNINGS DIY

It is difficult in Australia to find a respectable queue. There are many ex-Brits here, including me, but the largest element of the population in the cities are mainland European and Asian. Thankfully the Australian government no longer considers it a requirement to have a stiff upper lip. Consequently queues are now rather relaxed and casual, as is the Australian lifestyle. Notice the prevalance of thongs (flip-flops) and shorts.

You can tell by the body language that everyone is fully relaxed and enjoying their queues. This was taken at around 10.00 on a Sunday morning when all have a high expectation of finishing that DIY project before lunch.

The unique thing about this place is that there are no shopping baskets and they refuse to give you a plastic bag when you’ve bought your stuff. Something to do with saving the planet. So if you buy 42 widgets and 12 sprocket grommets you have to crowd them into your pockets once you’ve paid. Needless to say that you have to empty your pockets again because the car keys are at the bottom.

Notice the lady in blue. She is thoughtfully checking the exact location of her keys.

Walmart, Connecticut US of A

An international queue story from the United States. I’m afraid I’m a few days late with this story, but I feel as though it deserves a mention.

A 21-year-old gentleman from Massachusetts was shot early in the morning of the 17th when stood in a queue for a Playstation 3.

The queue was outside a Wal*Mart in Putnam, Connecticut.

The two gunman confronted 15 to 20 people standing outside a Wal-Mart store shortly after 3 a.m. and demanded money, said State Police Lt. J. Paul Vance.

“One of the patrons resisted. That patron was shot.”

Tate Modern, London

Another trip to Tate Modern. Although this time I was not interested in the slides, not even a little bit, and it seemed that they had fallen out of favour with the general public too.

The queue was miminal. Which made it easier to buy tickets for the other exhibitions, of which I was terribly interested in seeing the Fischli and Weiss.

And so the queue I joined.

Within the queue area there was a Tate employee who was verbally giving information on the next slide times and ticket availability. I can see how this would have been useful a couple of weeks ago, but really today I thought he would have been put to better use in the cloakroom.

He informed us on the exact details of how long the wait would be for each slide, and it was somewhere between an hour and two, with two being the slide from the fifth floor. But he also went on to say that there was no one up there at present, so as long as you had a ticket, you could probably slide straight away.

I was tempted, but today the slides seemed very much out of context inside this big space. After watching the faces of those who had reached the bottom, which would quickly change from mild amusement to sudden London dead eye boredom, I decided that there was little joy to be had from these slides.

But I am allowing myself to digress. Before venturing round the Fischli and Weiss, which was very good by the way, actually it was terribly good, and I laughed lots as I went around. Definately a lot more fun than the slides.

Where was I?

Ah yes, the cloakroom.

Bag deposit to the left, bag collection to the right.

I joined the left queue, which doesn’t look very long but it did however take an awfully long time.

There were only two employees who would switch from queue to queue, not really paying attention to whom had been waiting the longest. There was a voluntary cloakroom fee of £2.00 but after waiting at least ten minutes, I exaggerate not, I decided that the time I spent in the queue would not bother me at all if the cloakroom fee was indeed free.

With the money saved I bought myself a coffee, which actually tasted pretty awful.

But the view was okay.

Derricks Takeaway, Leith

We have a guest entry today on Standinaqueue, from Gary Wood. Go give him a visit at his blog and learn all about Edinburgh:

I have worked in Leith for a month now, but only recently discovered Derrick.

Derricks takeaway has everything I want from a sandwich shop – low prices and sandwiches. The low prices attract many people who then form an orderly queue. Without any signs people automatically queue to the right, which enables browsing of drinks whilst waiting and also allows space for people to leave down the left.

I was at the end of the queue, but nobody stays at the end for long in Derricks. Soon a man in red queued behind me, but he turned away once he realised I was documenting the whole adventure.

Once in the middle of the queue, time was running out and so I had to try and decide what sandwich to buy. Whilst thinking of my filling I decided to document how I stand in a queue:

I took about 20 photos, but few of them were worth keeping. People were becoming suspicious of my actions. I put my phone away, ordered my two sandwiches (£1.60) and walked away with one plan – remove the cucumber.

I took a photo of my sandwiches, but it has vanished – perhaps my phone ate it.

Marks and Spencers, Covent Garden

There was a time when Marks and Spencers was a bastion of British Society. In the early 90s, when supermarkets were trying to steal customers away from town centres, you could always rely on good old Marks and Sparks to still be there on the local High Street.

You would be welcomed into the shop with a quick blast of warm air from above, and then on into the inner sanctum of ladies underwear and worn carpets, which would be your home for at least the next two hours.

Not anymore. This recent media dahling has become nothing but a corporate monster hidden behind a matt black facade. With a chain of glorified service stations under its belt, M&S (RIP Marks & Sparks) has become a brutally efficient machine churning out profits of millions by the nano-second.

The amount of fruit juices for sale was astounding, but I chose a simple orange juice and a banana, and then it was off to find the queue.

Much to my dismay however, M&S had managed to build a barrier of Berlin wall proportions between where I stood and the end of the queue.

After negotiating my way through the maze of cold fridges, I was pleased to see that I did not have to walk along the entire length of the proposed queuing area as some good egg had made it possible to pass along the top.

And so I was able to take my place at the back of a very long queue.

There were so many sweet snacky things along the queue’s edge that I started to feel a little nauseated. So instead I kept my attention on the woman in front’s dandruff and by using this method I managed to make it to the end of the queue.

As you can see in the above picture, from the ceiling hung a machine which visually and verbally informed you of which till was available for your use.

If I remember correctly, I was directed to till four.