Some convenience-store cashiers are better than others. The guys at the QuikTrip at 43rd and Main? Modern-day supermen. Maybe it's something in those slowly rotating taquitos that gives them their powers. With razor-sharp intuition and unshakable good cheer, the QuikTrip employee has rung up your order before you set your items down on the counter, and he has your change ready before you so much as find the right amount of cash in your wallet. It's like he can tell, just by looking at you, whether you're paying with a five-spot or a ten. No matter how many drunken art-school kids stumble in from the surrounding "art ghetto" or how many cops stand guard over the parking lot, the QuikTrip cashier never seems annoyed, intimidated or tired. And he's often moving two different lines of customers through the store at one time, never unsure of who's next. When you tell him what kind of condoms you want from behind that pesky counter? Not so much as a chuckle, even if you include the phrase "for his and her pleasure" in your request.
