11yo won't look for stuff properly - driving me crazy

[cornflakegirl]

My 11yo is really rubbish at looking for stuff. I will ask him to find something that he needs - a jumper that is in his drawer, a book that is on a particular bookshelf - and he will have a cursory look before declaring that it is not there. I will then end up looking and finding it within 20 seconds, which makes me really cross.

How do I deal with this? He doesn't care if he finds the thing because the negative consequence (eg possibly being cold later in the day) is too far removed. I don't want to enable him to become an adult who expects someone else to find stuff for him. I want to stop getting so cross about it. I've seen suggestions on here before about a fine system if the parent find something straight away, but he responds really badly to that kind of sanction - he'd just pay the fine with a smug "don't care" look that enrages me even more... (He is basically a good kid, but thinks that he knows everything, and argues the toss about it. Traits he may possibly have got from me.)