Even if you lined up after E, what's probably going to happen is that you'll get to the ordering spot, be prompted to order, tell them that you just want to buy a gift card, and then the employee will instruct you to jump the line.

El D,
$10 each for 3 coaches.

Spider,

That feels a little light, bro!

El D,
Maybe, but I don't think it's obviously light. This wasn't a collective gift from all the families on the team, and there are maybe 60-100 kids on the swim team, so it's not like my kids were getting super individualized attention.

But it certainly felt like a lot of effort to go through for just 3 $10 gift cards. And just getting a gift card that small is like, "Great, thanks. Can't wait to go out of my way to get a double scoop of ice cream. Gamechanger."

There's an argument that literally everyone (including 2+2) would have been better off if this trip hadn't happened.

There is a very popular set of ice cream shops in my city. They also have freezers off to the side, away from the serving line, where you can grab pints or ice cream sandwiches for purchase. Same principle applies, just line up at the cashier.

Spider,

At least now you know how to buy a gift card!

Apparently not. The only way to buy a gift card is online.

Usually there is a toppings service area for the employees to top ice creams in the single-line version of this (as pictured), and a lower barrier to facilitate actually handing over the ice cream when finished.

So, the flow is generally:

- In front of ice creams: communicate flavors with ice cream valet (possibly including sampling) and desired ice cream conveyance method (shake/sundae/cone/etc). Ice cream valet scoops/etc.

- In front of "pass": communicate toppings/modifications you'd like made by your ice cream valet (hot fudge, sprinkles, cherries and the like) as appropriate. Ice cream valet handles these modifications and hands you your iced treat.

- At the register: communicate any register needs (gift cards, truffles, etc). Ice cream valet handles those, informs you of total bill, and handles transaction.

In some places there are dedicated valets for each of these tasks. In some places there are crossover valets. In either case if you do not need access to some part of the line you skip it and move to the relevant next queue.

Like at Subway? Would you like red peppers on that?

Like at Chipotle or Potbelly. I don't know how Subway functions but I'd guess so?

If you told person E that you were there to buy a gift card you'd be told to go straight to the cashier unless they're social misfits. Also, just do what wifey says, imo.

answer to everything (if keeping wife)

Spider,

While you were of course totally wrong here, I do think you should double down on one point of the argument with your wife tonight...

Honey, I was just wondering about something... If you skip the ice cream line and buy the gift card at the register, then WHY DID YOU CARE HOW LONG THE LINE WAS AT THE FIRST PLACE?

No matter what she says, DO NOT STOP HAMMERING IN YOUR POINT until she concedes defeat.

You can still win this one, buddy!

Biggest mistake was going to the ice cream shop and not ordering any ice cream. What is that nonsense?

During Pielebration week, no less!

Ehh it would have been a big fail not to get the organic ice cream for a la mode pie.

WTF? Is this even a question? I don't even...

You're doing life wrong. You went to an ice cream shop, picked the one out of two that clearly sells worse ice cream, and left with no ice cream and an angry wife?

Go to the back of the line you monsters

The cashier line or the ice cream line?

When you are at a place like this -
And someone is ordering something that takes a while to be served, do you stand there and wait or do you just go around them and pay?

I was pretty full. We had just gone to dinner where I had eaten a really big sandwich:

and had 2 delicious beers (coconut double IPAs)

Ok, this is where it gets interesting. Because when I originally brought that up, my wife kind of disregarded it. But then last night (prior to seeing your post), I DID double down. We were at a swim meet with a couple of other wives, and I told my wife that I had posted the scenario and had gotten absolutely crushed. She greatly enjoyed that. But then I said, "What I still don't understand is why, if that's your view, we left the first place." At this point, my wife had 2 options:

a) Admit that, in hindsight, the choice was silly. But still feel good about being on the right side of the larger argument (according to 2+2).

b) Make up some nonsense argument. (My wife, although a SAHM now, used to be a lawyer, and does not like to admit being wrong.)

She chose b.

Here's the argument she presented (in concert with one of the other wives):

The layout of ice cream place #1 is different, and it's much more difficult to jump the line directly to the cashier. For your convenience, here's the layout of place #1:



Because of the line separators (which I can't remember if they're permanent metal things or just the temporary stanchions you see at an airport), there's no good way to skip to the cashier, and so (they claimed last night) a customer buying a gift card would have to wait in the full line (which, again, was stretching well outside the building).

At that point, I just stopped talking to everyone because I no longer believed they were arguing in good faith.

Wife is right again.


ETA: I like the workers' hats.

+2, this is pretty much exactly what I anticipated when the 1st shop was mentioned ITT. Its a different setup. In fact, the amount of effort that shop 1 put into making sure everyone was in the same line could even tell us something about how to behave when such an effort isn't made (shop 2).

For the record, shop #2 is a newly-opened place, and the cashier setup might be temporary.

So it sounds like people are saying to wait in line for the gift card in shop #1, but hop to the cashier in shop #2, based on the differences in configuration? That would make me feel better about my original position.