When I was a child, I was fascinated by supermarket check-outs.

Well they weren't really "supermarkets" in those days, they were still on the high street for a start and they only sold groceries. Each item was individually priced up with a little sticker and the check-out girls, for they invariably were girls then, tip-tapped the prices in to the glorified adding machines that passed for tills.

Then came bar codes and scanning and a succession of "beep, beep, beep, beeps" and my fascination deepened.

I can't begin to explain this. I never aspired to be a check-out girl and it wasn't the job itself. There was just something in the tip-tapping and the rhythmic sweeping of items past the till that just caught hold of something in my brain. I'm not sure if I thought these were "very important people" but it always struck my five year old mind that it was a position of great responsibilty and, well, it looked like fun. And I always wanted to at leas try it

Life moved on but I have never entirely lost that fascination, or rather, I have never entirely lost the memory of that fascination. So imagine my delight when my local supermarket installed self-service check-outs, complete with your own bleeping scanner.

And now I've tried it, I know it's not actually that much fun. In fact, it's rather tedious and I now always make a beeline for a manned till. I can't imagine what my five-year old self was so enthralled by. Which is rather sad really, I always used to smile at that memory and it feels sort of dashed by reality now.

Some things really should be left alone.