Stepping out of line

There was a long queue for the two counters at the post office when I got in. You joined that one queue to be served at either counter when you reached the top of the queue. But the post office had a new policy -- if you were only buying postage stamps, you could cut the queue and go up to the one counter that was dedicated to that. Presumably, it took less time to serve a customer who was only buying stamps than someone who was paying bills (which must be the post office's main transaction these days -- who buys stamps any more let alone send snail mail?)

But the guy at the top of the queue who should have been served next didn't realise that, and asked the fellow who jumped queue to join the end of the line. The counter staff politely explained that he could cut the queue as he was only buying stamps, and it wouldn't take a minute to serve him. So Top Guy gave up, went back to the top of the queue and waited.

Which I suppose was very bad timing for me to pipe up from at the end of the queue to the staff: "I'm buying stamps AND paying for a bill -- so where do I queue?"

So they waved me to jump queue since I fulfilled the buying stamps requirement. Which meant that Top Guy got eclipsed by two people already. But he had the good humour to sigh and say maybe they should create a new queue policy just for people like me.

I knew it, I'm special.