Pet peeve of the week.

There should be a standard for the way ATM machines work. Most of the ones I use these days don't take your card - you just dip it or slide it and it never leaves your hand. I usually slip it back into my wallet while I'm waiting for the screens to change, so once my money has appeared and I hit "no" for receipt and "no" for another transaction, I'm ready to roll. I don't have to think about where my card is, because I already have it.

Yesterday I was at an ATM that used the old-fashioned method of swallowing your card during the process, and sure enough, I walked away without it. Luckily I stayed in the vestibule for a few extra minutes to fit my wallet back into my bag, because the guy at the machine behind me found and returned my card. Thankfully. Not that I worry that anyone could use it - you'd have to re-enter a pin number to get anywhere - but it would be a royal pain to have to have it replaced.

I don't know how people lived before cash machines. When I was in college, one of the grocery stores in our little town had one of the first - but it wasn't automatic. You went up to a little window in the front corner office, and rang a bell until someone appeared. Then you handed your card over and they gave you a little box to type your pin number in, and if it went through, they distributed your cash. We thought it was so amazingly high tech.