The Existential Bagging Area

Arthur, a man whose life ambition peaked at "perfectly ripe avocado," found himself locked in a gladiatorial combat with the self-checkout machine at "FreshMart." His weapons: a single, defiant banana and a bag of salt and vinegar crisps. Her weapons: a robotic monotone and an unwavering conviction that there was an "unexpected item in the bagging area."

He'd tried everything. Lifting the items, replacing the items, even whispering sweet nothings to the scale. He’d rotated the banana 360 degrees, hoping a change in perspective might appease the digital deity. The crisps, a lightweight rebel, stubbornly refused to register its rightful place.

"Unexpected item in the bagging area," she droned, her voice a calm harbinger of existential dread.

"There's nothing here but my shattered dreams and this perfectly innocent banana!" Arthur retorted, gesticulating wildly. A small queue began to form, each person silently judging his life choices. He imagined them whispering, "Look at him, can't even scan a banana. Probably voted for... (insert unpopular political figure)."

He lifted the entire plastic bag, peering underneath like an archaeologist searching for lost civilizations. Nothing. He even checked his own pockets, half-expecting a rogue garden gnome to have stowaways.

Then, a voice from behind him, sweet as a newly ripened mango, chirped, "Oh, sir, it's just your wallet on the scale."

Arthur looked down. Indeed, his wallet, previously used to extract a loyalty card and then forgotten, sat smugly on the bagging scale, weighing a hefty 0.0001 grams. The machine, in its infinite wisdom, had deemed this a significant, unexpected item.

He slowly moved his wallet, and with a triumphant *BEEP*, the machine finally registered his items. Arthur paid, grabbed his banana and crisps, and walked away, a victor in a battle no one truly understood. He vowed, from that day forth, to only pay in cash and avoid all future encounters with machines that judged his wallet's intentions.