A cashless society down the Co-op? What a con!

THE local Co-op supermarket has been at it again. You turn up ready to spend, spend, spend on your card, but there’s a warning sign saying the system’s down and you can only pay with cash.

So you join the queue at the autobank and take out too much, as you don’t want to be humiliated at the checkout if you haven’t got enough. Then you get inside and, as last time, find there isn’t a problem at all.

But did they take down the sign outside saying you could only pay with cash? Nope. For what would that take, readers?

Correct: initiative. Bonus point if you also put common sense, or even consideration.

So, at the till, I find myself left with all this physical money. Aargh! Cash! What am I supposed to do with that? In this case, it’s nine of your Earth pounds. At the till, there were dark mutterings about the outage being nationwide and something to do with that Putin. But when I got home and checked the news, there was nothing. It was just another daft Co-op thing.

I was fuming. Earlier in the day, I’d been chuffed to find I’d any money in the bank at all at this time of the month. And now I’d none, except this daft £9 in my pocket. It was like £9 lost, thrown down the drain.

You say: “It’s still nine quid you can spend in a shop, ken?” Unhand me, madam! What can you get for nine quid?

It’s too much to buy a Mars Bar with and not enough for a car. It’s a rubbish sum.

And, as with the tenner I take out every Christmas to give our diligent binmen, I know this daft physical cash will just lie in my wallet for months (I never get a chance to see the binmen so they never get it).

Apart from anything else, this time, I had four pounds in change jiggling about in my pocket, spoiling the cut of my anorak. It didn’t feel natural either, like carrying your financial intestines in your pocket.

In the end, I went down to the village DIY shop and spent the money like a voucher, selecting two executive-style sponges and another small vat of WD40 – nothing I needed – to bring it to the £9.

Now, I know there’s a case against the cashless society. In 2015, an estimated two million adults in the UK didn’t have bank accounts.

And, on the breadline, it’s more reassuring to have the physical cash, so it’s your choice how and when to disburse it, rather than having direct debits, interest payments and other scams depleting your tiny largesse.

I recall from experience, too, how rubbish it is when the autobank makes you take out ten pounds, but you’ve only got eight and need it urgently. However, today, a cashless card lets you use that.

Also on the plus side, cashless has

had a deleterious effect on chuggers and muggers (not including the banks). And it’s more hygienic and quicker at the checkout (when working).

I get too that you can feel a man of substance when holding the folding in your wallet. But we’re people of the ether now. We live in the cloud.

Soon, nothing will be real. Not the pound in your pocket. Not the penny for your thoughts, which can be paid with the swipe of a card.

Long life? Forget it

A GOOD social life is essential to avoid dementia, according to new research. I have a question: why is everything essential to avoiding bad outcomes something that I don’t have or do?

In my more paranoid moments, I think they say: “What else does Rab lack? Let’s rush out a study saying that’s really bad for you, ken?”

It’s not just dementia. It’s all the major diseases. I’m a stick-on for the lot, just because I spend most of my evenings alone and blotto.

A social life. Did you ever hear the like? If I have read this right, it means I’m supposed to go oot more. I raise the back of my hand to my forehead in anguish, as I stand before the fireplace in my dressing gown and cravat, crying out in horror: “Must I mingle?”

The thought is dispiriting. And, as we know, being dispirited kills you. Cards are stacked against me here too. As usual. That’s why I get dispirited.

Why can they not do research showing that avoiding one’s fellow humans is a surefire way to good health in both body and wotsname? Lots of people who become recluses live long, mentally healthy lives.

Think Doris Day and, er, one or two others.

I’m not a recluse, of course. As usual, I’m over-egging the pudding. I’ve got far more friends than youse. And I do have a social life, one week a year when I return to the city (though I never had one when I lived there; weird, isn’t it?).

But, mostly, I spend my evenings rattling around my house, dry martini in hand, as I forget why I have come into this room.