She didn’t say it, I only thought she said it. So really it was my thought, my words, and not hers. How could I confuse “I love you” with “May I take your order?

She was the kind of shopkeeper who finishes the paragraph she is reading before waiting on the customer.

Lots of stores have self-checkout lanes now. That’s clever. They get us to buy their goods—and do their work too. Instead of paying cashiers to check us out, it’s like they’ve enticed us to pay...