the photographer not the model

A quick lunch time dash to Sainsbury's saw me tick two more items off my list today. The first was easy - straight to the travel money counter to get my US dollars. Got a crappy rate of only 1.52, but at least it's done.
Next stop was the photo booth for my two visa photos. I don't know if you've ever been in one of these new digital passport photo booths, but my first experience today in the one inside Crawley's Sainsbury's has to go down as something I hope I never have to do again. The first problem is its' location... not discreetly placed at one end, or in the hidden away customer facilities area, or even in the entrance foyer area, oh no, this one is stuck at right angles to the end of the busy tills, right slap bang in the middle of the store. So the people paying and packing their shopping can practically sit on your lap. Not only can they see your lower half beneath the pathetic excuse for a curtain hanging across the booth entrance, but the machine is so bloody loud, they can also hear you being instructed "press green if you are happy with your image, or the left hand button if you'd like to try again", the volume for some unknown reason then seems to increase enormously to ensure half of frickin Crawley can hear your vanity being announced with "Please be aware you only have one attempt left!"
After an agonising 30 second wait I ripped the sheet of 5 printed images from the front of the machine and trotted out of the store. By the time I got to the car I had to laugh as I gazed at the strip of highly uncomfortable, slightly mad looking women staring back at me. Let's hope the Cambodian customs officials aren't so fussy!