Quiet the prices

Dear decision-makers at CVS,

I use the word "dear" only as a social convention, and not at all out of affection.

I have an issue with your stores. Actually, I have lots of issues, but let's just focus on the one for now. The rest will have to wait for when I see you...in hell.

The current gripe is this: While I'm glad to see that you've put in a self-service counter at my local CVS at 17th and P, is it really necessary to have this machine loudly announce the prices of everything I buy? These announcements are unnecessary in the first place, and then ridiculously loud on top of the unnecessariness. I don't need prices announced out loud, because I learned to read. And as bad at math as I am, I still know numbers when I see them, so the computer display will be sufficient.

I guess I can at least be grateful that you stopped yourselves from creating machines that announce what products we're buying. I mean, at a drugstore, most of us are trying to cover up the products we're buying while standing in line. That machine would be used by exactly no one if a friendly female voice calling out 3-PACK CONDOMS or ATHLETE'S FOOT LOTION echoed through the store.

I don't know what it is about having prices called out. I guess it's just that I was raised with manners, which say that money is just something you don't discuss out loud. I'm assuming you don't have manners, since you work for CVS. I'm not exactly sure what the connection is there, but I'm sure there is one.

Anyway, you know I'll still shop at your store, since the single quality I look for in any store is convenience, but come on: let's mute the thing, huh?

Yours sincerely (I suppose),
    Initial Reid Lastname