As I was finally reaching the end of a queue to order food,the woman in front of me made a phone call and,suddenly,she was joined by six other people from a table outside. When I questioned her,she said,“I’m holding the place for the table.” Is this okay?
N.C.,Oatley,NSW
Simon Letch
We’ve all been there. We’re standing in a food queue,a movie queue,an airport queue,and we’re waiting patiently,doing the right thing,plodding along like livestock,then,at the last moment,the person in front of us makes a strange beckoning gesture or fires off a mysterious text and a whole bunch of people join the queue ahead of us. Sinister,shady types I like to call Queue-Anon.
These Queue-Anons are a scourge on society. They haven’t earned their rightful place in the queue:they haven’t endured the shuffling,the boredom,the tiredness,the odours,the hunger and the small,hard thing that keeps nudging you in the back of the thigh that may be an umbrella but you’re too scared to turn around and check. Of course,there are exceptions:we’ve all queue-repped for the elderly,the young,the incapacitated,the toilet-emergencied (diarrhoea only,full bladders can hold). I’ll admit that I’ve even queue-repped for jerky friends who were running late,and a romantic date who was too lazy to stand and who I was hoping to sleep with at some point in the near future.
But six people is unacceptable and these Queue-Anons should be sent to the back of the line. You cannot reap the benefits of a queue unless you’ve been made to feel like dumb,helpless livestock heading off to an abattoir. And even dumb,helpless livestock would never let in six of their mates,right at the abattoir door.
To read more from Good Weekendmagazine,visit our page at, and.
