that this ISN'T pushing in?

[FlowerSour]

So I went to a local café today with a friend (in Tesco after an hour long shop for some time to myself ) and I only wanted one single bloody coffee. And that's important to note for the next bit of the story.

Anyway, this café has a long serving hatch and you push your tray down from right to left. It goes cakes, hot food, drinks.

I only wanted the bloody coffee. No cake or hot food. And it's just me and two old ladies in the queue, who- for about five minutes- have been standing next to the hot meals bit umming and ahhing over the hot meals. As they hadn't even chosen yet, I sidled past them, got my coffee AND paid for it before they'd even chosen their hot food.

See poorly executed diagram below.

TILL --DRINKS-- HOT FOOD---- CAKES
x ME (after moving) X OLD LADIES X MY OLD POSITION

After I'd done this and paid, one of the old ladies decided to visit my table and announce in a hoity toity voice, "We had manners back when I was your age! How dare you push in front of us!"

She then swore at me, by this point other people are staring, then went back to her friend and continued to glare at me for the rest of my coffee.

Now, who in this situation is unreasonable?

I genuinely don't think I was. They were not queuing to pay... they hadn't even chosen.

So was I being unreasonable for sidling round them to get to the till when they had no intention of paying at that moment in time and were a good five metres away from the till?

Surely I was not expected to wait behind them whilst they spent another five minutes deciding what to have?

And yes, this is a trivial AIBU. I am aware and apologise in advance.

I hate bad manners, and find myself complaining about lack of manners in society over and over. You were not in the wrong here op, that lady was outrageously rude and vile.

In my experience, a lot of older people seem to have double standards when it comes to manners. It's as if they think they are in the right about everything, and will completely contradict themselves by talking about lack of manners whilst swearing, shouting or being physically aggressive.

I know that for some, they may have dementia, and are liable to react in unpredictable ways, but not every old rude person has this.

I think it's very important to remember that lots of people are arseholes when they're young, and they'll still be arseholes when they're old.

Of course yanbu - assuming from your description that they were not delayed at all as the person at the till was someone different than the person(s) they needed to get food from and you didn't delay them.

I've done similarly the other way around when I am buying hot food and don't want any tea or coffee. So many places you get your food and then queue up to get your tea while your food cools down to room temperature - no thanks. I like hot food and will regularly leapfrog the hot drinks section to pay for my food. Of course it isn't queue jumping to skip any section that is irrelevant, unless the place us so crowded that the queues for each section effectively overlap one another.

If there is a huge queue filling the whole serving area and it's impossible to know who is waiting for what, everyone should wait in line.

In the situation you were in, ywnbu at all. You didn't jump the queue. There was no queue.
Idiots.

What planks they are. OF course YANBU, why on earth should you wait on their convenience? It's not like you inconvenienced them in any way, is it - they didn't have to wait for you to pay for your drink, did they.

I do loathe this idea that older people have all the dibs on "manners" - they certainly don't seem to!

Pengggwn. The old lady started the age thing off. My mother is a total bitch to me. Thinks she is always in the right and me in the wrong. Says awful things to me and when I get angry or challenges her behaviour, she makes me out to be a horrible, sweaty, shouty person, which I have always been. The odd time she acknowledges the shitty things she has said, she thinks I should take it and cow tow to her because she is my elder and better. She also believes herself to be better than younger women in general. But inferior to certain males. This type of belief is alive and well in some women of a certain age and pointing it out is not ageist.

sweaty SWEARY

This is not about old people in general.
This is about 2 women who thought another woman had pushed in front of them in a queue and came and complained and swore at her.

OP - I would have done the same as you.
I would have ignored the women completely.

Swearing and bad manners sadly are prevalent in all people of all ages.

That diagram. 👏👏👏

Tesco cafe isn't Starbucks. Often there's only one server and they take ages to serve drinks. If you delayed the women yabu.

Maybe they had their eye in the table you sat at and therefore by jumping the queue you nicked their seat.

I would have laughed in her face

Weird, maybe she had mental health problems because otherwise she was just obnoxious. You didn't hold them up or get in their way so why should you hover behind them or ask their 'permission' to jump ahead.

If anything they were the rude ones dithering over what they wanted and potentially holding other people up (I can't stand ditherers, just make a decision already!)

I would have asked

You are not wrong per se, BUT

It's not always clear what the 'form' is in a particular place and you obviously had different ideas to theirs

What swear word did she use?

On a separate not, I don't se why, as a non-coffee drinker, I should have to stand behind someone ordering coffee, that takes 5 minutes to make. There should be separate coffee queues. Riles me. I would not swear however

note

You were right but should have asked. They were terribly rude with no manners to say what they did. Agree they lost their manners.

As a none hot drinker i hate standing behind whilst they prepare the drinks and i just want to pay. Why does everyone think everyone drinks hot drinks. You get the food and your cold drink and they have to wait for hot drinks queue or someone asks about which hot drink you want. Must be getting old but i hate this. (Know being unreasonable but my bug bear! 🐛🐻)

you could have just asked them, before you went ahead

I didn't need to read your thread properly to know what you did and YANBU, that's how it works in all the supermarket cafes round here. People fanny over their meal so,ection or whether to choose prawn or egg whilst you only want a tea and the till is free.

I have never seen anyone get their knickers in a twist about it before, it's British queuing at its most efficient.

I think the "sidling" was maybe the thing. they maybe thought you knew you were being tricksy

Always best to be up-front IMO.

No excuse for swearing, OBVs

See I do this at places where they have separate sections of the counter for food/ drinks but all in one line as long as there are people near each serving bit. (Which there normally is) I wouldn't in costa or similar as tends to be one person doing both

Yanbu.

Can I ask your view on mine

I had full trolley at checkout. Forgotten item so dashed off to get it. While I was gone literally a few seconds as grabbed item and returned, a woman with toddler had put her trolley in front of mine and was unloading. I found myself irked. She said weakly I didn't know how long you would be. I must have been seconds.

Now if I have a large trolley I always let people with one or two items go in front but she actually had a small but decent sized shop.

KERALA

Again, if you'd just said ' i will literally be gone 1 minute, can you please mind my trolley?" only a dick would refuse that. She was taking advantage, sure, but talking to people, IME makes it less likely they'll do that, because you have made a connection with them

She had said nothing but appeared - pushed in - in my short absence.

I didn't smile and say that's ok etc but maintained an irked serious demeanour while she unloaded so hopefully that will teach her a lesson.