Queuing

[Vicarious Thrillseeker]

I read someone on Twitter's story of queuing for over eight hours to pay his respects, and apparantly there's a four-mile queue to see Brenda's casket. Each to their own. I once queued with my housemate (who supported Manchester United) to buy tickets for the 1990 FA Cup final replay. We had to wait about three hours and I thought that was about 2 hours too much for me. It's the only time I've seen an FA Cup final and I could have done without it, to be honest. Old Wembley was not built for spectators over 5' 8". I also got in a fight queuing for tickets to see the Pyramids at Giza (I was hot and bothered and people were pushing in). We got the tickets, and again I felt that I would have been better off being turned away - at the time, the area around the pyramids was dirty and full of plastic bags floating around. Not to mention the industrial strength tat hawkers.

I know it's meant to be a British speciality but I absolutely fucking hate queuing.

[ursus arctos]

It is five miles now.

I can't think of anything that I have queued longer than an hour for.

Maybe passport control on a particularly bad day.

[Janik]

Pretty well every time I did the Wimbledon queue I got there between 6:30-7:00am, and got through the gates onto the grounds around 10:30.

The really bizarre thing at Wimbledon is that some people, having queued for ~5 hours to get in, immediately join another queue that won't move at all for hours - the one at the ticket charity resale booth. People with Centre/Court 1 tickets who depart the grounds for the last time in the day are encouraged to scan their tickets as they leave. These are then sold via the resale booth, so avoiding empty seats for the evening matches. This is also why the evening crowds at Wimbledon have a tendency to be more raucous - the early departees are often those on corporate jollies who are really not all that into Tennis.
Great in theory, but queueing for another 6 hours whilst Tennis is going on within earshot just to get one of the first handful of seats vacated on Centre Court, when you have already queued for hours on end to simply be standing there, was never even slightly tempting.

[San Bernardhinault]

Yes. The longest I've ever queued has been at immigration.

The worst was at Washington Dulles in the immigration hall. It was close to 2 hours, with multiple flights from the kinds of places where US immigration takes a long time to ask questions having landed in front of us (I think India or Pakistan or Egypt or somewhere like that). The non-US-nationals line had maybe 2 booths open. The weird Dulles buses kept emptying more and more passengers into the hall, enough to keep the US nationals officers busy so they couldn't ease the load. The hall got so full that it felt like you're in a bad dystopian future fiction film.

Maybe an hour and a half at Tijuana for the foot crossing (the car crossing would have been 4 hrs or more, but I've always been warned against that).

I can't think of anything else. Queues for roller coasters at amusement parks have maybe been close to an hour but usually if it's that long I'll go and do something else instead.

[WOM]

This year, I queued from 4 a.m. to get my kids their new passports. It was 'extreme circumstances' and there was no other option.

I once queued for two hours for one of the Harry Potter rides at Universal and thought I was going to start crying. I can't think of anything else I've been arsed to queue for.

[caja-dglh]

This year, I queued from 4 a.m. to get my kids their new passports. It was 'extreme circumstances' and there was no other option.

I once queued for two hours for one of the Harry Potter rides at Universal and thought I was going to start crying. I can't think of anything else I've been arsed to queue for.

I thought your kids were old enough to leave at home.

[Billy Casper]

I queued six hours to get tickets to see Liverpool vs Barnsley in the FA Cup Fifth Round in 2008. My Crohn's Disease was playing up and the six hours felt like six days.

It was well worth it though, as Brian Howard scored an injury time winner which provided the single most joyous moment of my life.

[Sunderporinostesta]

Three hours ON Liberty Island to go inside the statue and upstairs to look out of the crown. We’d been told not to as there’s only the horizon to see and the possibility of a passing ship. Once you’re up there you’re moved on within seconds. Madness.I could see the sea meeting the sky from my bedroom window and from the school bus as a kid ferchrissakes.

[Toby Gymshorts]

I can't remember how long we queued to go up the Eiffel Tower, but it was too long in any event.

[ursus arctos]

The harbour is full of vessels carrying petroleum products at the moment, but yeah, that hasn't been worth it since I was a kid (and there was next to no queue on the island)

[elguapo4]

Just short of three hours for my first Covid shot.

Non essential stuff, one and a half hours for a Cup semi final ticket a few years ago

[Sporting]

I was in some queues before football matches in the NW in the 70s in which the various lines rapidly became a chaos of people trying to enter the stadium. I wonder if there were all ticket league games in older times.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

When at university I joined my NUFC supporting brother-in-law in queueing for tickets for their FA Cup tie at Blackburn. The tickets were supposed to go on sale at 9am, I think we joined the queue at around 5am, and people had been queueing all night, some of whom had joined at closing time, well refreshed, and it had got rowdy, with arrests made. It was February or early March and Newcastle being Newcastle, people were standing in the queue wearing t-shirts. Eventually someone deduced that there were more people in the queue (taking into account you could buy two each I think) than tickets available so they started selling them at something like 6am, and we missed the cut.

The worst theme park for queueing that I've experienced was whatever the second Disney park in Tokyo is called, the queues for that year's new rides were over two hours. They were all new to us so we focused on the shorter queues, plus that's where we discovered the "Single Rider" option, which massively cut down the waiting time for certain rides - this is a separate queue which as the name suggests they use to fill gaps created by odd numbered groups, but means you don't get to sit next to whoever you're with. Only available on certain rides but surprisingly effective.

[treibeis]

I once queued for two hours for one of the Harry Potter rides at Universal and thought I was going to start crying.

Because you were so happy when "it finally happened" or because you were so sad after you'd realised that grown men shouldn't queue for Harry Potter rides?

Or was there a windmill?

[Gangster Octopus]

About three or four hours for tickets for the FA Cup game between Rotherham United and Leeds United back in 1971. It was bloody freezing, and there was snow on the ground. The game itself was postponed, and ended up being played on a Tuesday, finishing goalless. It's when I realised that the Leeds players were dirty bastards...

[WOM]

Because you were so happy when "it finally happened" or because you were so sad after you'd realised that grown men shouldn't queue for Harry Potter rides?

Full disclosure, it's a really great ride. And to Universal's credit, standing in the queue is not as dull as standing in line for, say, a rollercoaster. There's always something going on around you to watch and distract you, all in the theme of the ride. But goddamn...was two hours a slog.

[longeared]

Three and three quarter hours when Wednesday got to the play off final in 2005 and sold all the tickets at the ground. I still think of that every time I walk under the South Stand at Hillsborough. The moment of purchasing the ticket itself and walking through the turnstile was rather underwhelming after all that.

By the time we next got to the play off final in 2016 Wednesday had discovered the internet and purchasing the ticket took a whole three minutes from the comfort of home.

[Jah Womble]

I’ve always spelt it ‘queueing’, but I think either is accepted. Guess I just like the idea of a word with five consecutive vowels.

Anyway, as you were.

[WOM]

Also, they're shockingly accurate with their line-times. If it says '70 minutes from this point', it's going to be 70 minutes.

[WOM]

I’ve always spelt it ‘queueing’, but I think either is accepted. Guess I just like the idea of a word with five consecutive vowels.

Anyway, as you were.

In Canada, of course, it's calling 'lining up' and you're standing 'in a lineup'. Not a line...but a lineup.

Also, if you want to stand a really good chance of getting murdered in a country with relatively rare displays of stranger-violence, cut in line in instead of waiting your turn.

[steveeeeeeeee]

Queued for about 6 hours to get tickets for Benfica v Barcelona in the 2006 Champions League QF. The experience made me upgrade from Socio member to season ticket holder, never had to queue for Champions League tickets again, largely because they didn't get that far in the competition again for another 10 years.

A colleague of mine in Egypt, who was much older than me and had seen her fair share of jobs in underprivileged countries, once told me you can understand someone's privilege by the way they queue. In general, Egyptians literally can't queue to save their lives, and her opinion this related to the desperation of missing out on the leftovers from those in power, which in Egypt, was the corrupt military. Tipping gets you to the front of the queue, a tactic I used frequently when buying lunch, for about 10p I would glide ahead of the average working Egyptian to get my foul and tamaya sandwiches.

[DCI Harry Batt]

In Canada, of course, it's calling 'lining up' and you're standing 'in a lineup'. Not a line...but a lineup.

A lineup, I mean, that's an identity parade, isn't it?

Also, if you want to stand a really good chance of getting murdered in a country with relatively rare displays of stranger-violence, cut in line in instead of waiting your turn.

So the myth of British queueing exceptionalism is exactly that, a myth? Thought so.

I've never been much of a queuer. Can't think of a long one I've been in, not off the top of my head.

[treibeis]

I’ve always spelt it ‘queueing’, but I think either is accepted. Guess I just like the idea of a word with five consecutive vowels.

Anyway, as you were.

Yeah, well, if you don't like vowel-consecutive-poor words in English, then go and move to fucking Finland.

(joke, smiley face, and that)

[San Bernardhinault]

Also, if you want to stand a really good chance of getting murdered in a country with relatively rare displays of stranger-violence, cut in line in instead of waiting your turn.

If you jump a queue in Britain you'll just get a side-eye glance and an air of disapproval. But for many in Britain that would be a fate worse than being murdered.

[treibeis]

Tipping gets you to the front of the queue, a tactic I used frequently when buying lunch, for about 10p I would glide ahead of the average working Egyptian to get my foul and tamaya sandwiches.

Good on you, then.