Oddly enough, I find the "tuned out" nature of most checkout people to be an opportunity. At least for the past fifteen years, I play a game with checkout peop

Oddly enough, I find the "tuned out" nature of most checkout people to be an opportunity. At least for the past fifteen years, I play a game with checkout people. My goal is to get them to smile. I make some comment about something, anything, with the goal to get them to respond and hopefully smile at me, and take me as something other than one of the hundreds of people they contact each day. I'm about 90% successful, but I keep trying for 100%. Every once in a while, either I'm really distracted or I see they are so distracted that I don't try. I have an ulterior motive: as I polish my skill at making a random stranger smile, I get better at tossing out a verbal gambit on very short notice to an attractive stranger.