The 7 People Who Turn Every Parking Lot into a War Zone
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Everybody has their own opinion on shopping. Some love it, some hate it, some prefer to forego the entire process in favor of shoplifting. But no matter what your individual opinion on shopping may be, there's one thing we can surely all agree on ... the parking lot is the worst place on earth.
It shouldn't be that way. A parking lot is just a place to leave your vehicle. Without it, we'd be whipping our SUVs and smart cars around the aisles of Walmart like a bunch of bargain hunting Mad Max extras. It should be so simple. Just park your shit, get out and go about your business.
But nothing is ever that easy. There are always those bad apples who mess things up for the rest of us, and that's especially true in the parking lot.
Here are seven people who turn every parking lot into a war zone.
#7. The Driving Lane Anarchist
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The Driving Lane Anarchist is that person who ignores any yellow lines or arrows painted on the ground in favor of just flying around the parking lot as if rules of the road no longer exist when a trip to Target is involved.
Why They Must Be Stopped
How many times have you been driving through a parking lot in strict accordance with all of those yellow lines and arrows and signs when, out of nowhere, some maniac comes flying at you from a northeasterly direction and nearly rams you into the shopping cart holding pen or whatever that contraption is called? It's a situation that's equal parts infuriating and terrifying. The worst part, if you somehow impede this lunatic's progress or force them to slow down a bit, is that they mean-mug you as if you just cut them off from making their exit on a busy freeway.
And if they aren't flying in from the periphery, they're driving the wrong way down a lane that's clearly marked with an arrow pointing in the other direction. This is how drunk drivers kill children on the interstate, but for some reason nobody has any second thoughts about driving the wrong way in a parking lot. Like I said, total anarchy.
What You Should Do About It
This is a tough one, because honestly, what can you do about it? The answer to that question hinges on how confident you are in your auto insurance and how far you're willing to go to prove a point. Because there's not a competent driver among us who wouldn't like to intentionally get into an accident with this person, if for no other reason than to sue them to the point that no insurance company would clear them to drive ever again. But how much of a fucking hassle would that be? So instead, we just let that shit happen and scream profanities that nobody can hear. It's the very definition of injustice.
#6. The Diagonal Walker
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Instead of using lots of those "words" that the liberal media elite seem to love so much, I'll explain the diagonal walker using a series of crudely executed Photoshops.
See, when a person is crossing that DMZ that separates every store from its parking lot, most choose a path like this ...
But the diagonal walkers? Well, they choose a path that looks more like this ...
Even if you didn't previously realize you hate these people, I trust that you do now.
Why They Must Be Stopped
Listen, assholes, the quickest route from Point A to Point B is a straight line. By laughing in the face of this universally accepted fact, you're ensuring that the person waiting for you to cross spends an extra 30 seconds or so screaming at you from behind the wheel of a ton of metal that could kill you with nothing more than a quick push on the gas pedal. And that's exactly what that driver is thinking of doing when you waddle your cart full of Cheetos and pot pies in front of them in this most dickish of ways. By moving diagonally, you are literally standing in the way of other people's progress for the entirety of your journey. That's some bullshit.
What You Should Do About It
The solution here is pretty simple. Just inch your vehicle forward in direct proportion to the Diagonal Walker's movements. For every second they spend taking a nonsensical route to their vehicle, you spend that same second moving ever closer to, at the very least, ramming them in the back of the knee with your bumper. The threat of being mowed down by a vehicle that they have no reason to be standing in front of is usually enough provocation to get them to get lateral like the Lord intended people in parking lots to do.
#5. The Family Band
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The Family Band is a family of four or more who, instead of walking in a single-file line down the parking lot lane you're trying to navigate, choose to walk side by side like the fucking Partridge Family on their way to a show at SeaWorld, thereby preventing any cars from passing them.
Why They Must Be Stopped
Hey, parents of the world, tell me something I've been dying to know for quite a while now: When it comes time to go grocery shopping, what is the harm in just one parent going to the store and the other staying home with your misbehaved clan of hellions? Is it really necessary to haul all six of your mistakes along with you?
It is, you say? Well, I don't believe you. But whatever, let me ask you another question: If you must haul the kids along, please, by all means, tell me how having your 3-year-old lined up on the outside like an NFL receiver in the spread formation in the middle of a busy parking lot amounts to anything resembling good parenting?
Are you trying to get your child killed? Because I'm not going to do it, and nobody else will either, hopefully. But we will follow along slowly in our car silently wishing you were all dead and therefore not in a position to turn what should have been a quick jaunt to the supermarket into an exercise in anger management.
What You Should Do About It
Honk. That's it. Just honk. Why? Because it will scare the ever-loving shit out of the Family Band's children, and scaring people is funny. And funny, in turn, is good for the soul. Turn that aggravation into a lighthearted situation that adds a few years to your life through the magic of therapeutic laughter.
And before you go feeling bad about terrifying children, understand this ... if they didn't have such shitty parents, they wouldn't be in a position that allows you to scare them so easily in the first place. So you get some much needed laughter, and the parents get a reminder that they're blatant fuck-ups when it comes to child rearing. Everybody wins.
#4. The Paranoid
There are probably several names for it, but in this case the Paranoid is that asshole or assholette who parks their Camaro or whatever other obnoxious vehicle of their choosing at an angle that ensures nobody else can park in any space near them. This usually happens because they're so proud of the pristine condition of their car that they can't stomach the thought of the unwashed masses coming near it.
Why They Must Be Stopped
If you need me to tell you why this needs to be stopped, then clearly you are one of these people. And in that case, fuck you, I'm not telling you a damn thing.
What You Should Do About It
There's only one thing to do when faced with a Parking Lot Paranoid ... key the shit out of their car. It will make you feel better and will teach the offender a valuable lesson. That lesson being, of course, that parking like a dipshit will result in someone keying the shit out of your car.
And if this police blotter article is to be believed, the most your "crime" will net you in terms of charges is a ticket for malicious mischief. That's a bargain at twice the price.
Maybe a step down from keying, is to show people how much it sucks to be parked next to some muddy jeep, just take some mud and smear it on their windows saying something short and simple like, "2 spaces" in really creepy writing.
ReplyThis article was f*****g epic!
ReplyOne of these days I'm going to rent a moving truck, fill it with shopping carts, follow one of those ass-hats who leave their cart in a parking spot home, and use those carts to barricade them in their house.
ReplyI do #1 & #2 every morning for school, and when I go in to work at a very busy shopping mall. My school was built in the 50's to have an approximate student body that is a quarter of what it is now, and parking is so terrible that even deploying those tactics, in the first two weeks of a semester, just finding a spot takes 30 minutes or more on average. Otherwise, I make sure to give people the room and time they need.
ReplyI can sort of understand the sharks when there really are no free spots, but most lots have hundreds of extras 11 months of the year. Go park in one of those!
ReplyI was waiting in line at WalMart to send a money order to my lover who lives on a small Grecian Isle. Yes, you have heard this one before. A woman in her late fifties, early 60's, cuts to the front and demands the clerk calls the police because there is a person illegally parked in a handicap spot. The clerk, starting to panic as the crowd grows more voluble in its rumblings of displeasure, asked could she wait til the she took care of the other people in front of her and she could not easily locate the police phone number. "It is right there on your blotter. That is where she wrote it yesterday." I had previously encountered a parking lot troll (possible the same woman)at a grocery store lot when I pulled up in the spot across from the cart corral. She circumnavigated the lot to come back and tell me she thought that space also belonged to the cart corral. Why she must be stopped? Why do you think she hasn't been stopped?
ReplyThe family band... This s**t even takes place in stores, walking down isles. So, as a vigilante of justice, I either face the largest male in the line up and walk at him while lowering a shoulder fullback style, face the family and kick a leg like a bull preparing to rush or stand in their path like a pillar of scorn. Lessons get taught.
ReplyJust make sure you throw a Tim Riggins style block (hell yeah Friday Night Lights TV series)
Just wanted to share this. I was at WalMart Saturday, and someone backed up the wrong way to camp for a spot they had just passed.
ReplyWe have to do #1 at our school - they loathe science students and stole all our parking, so it's one for one and GFOMW when it comes to parking around 9-10am. It's like great whites circling a caged diver, only the diver is a parking spot.
Reply Hide All See All 3 RepliesAlso, #6 isn't about the diagonal walking, it's about the attitude. I think you'd find the 'negro stroll' they do in the parking lots around here to be much worse than the diagonal walkers, because it can take up to 2 minutes for a regular fattie or saggy-pantsed moron to waddle insolently across, but if there's a crowd of niglets in tow, you best just go back home for the day.
Also happens with white people, so not race based. Think it's just a*****e based.
Look who weaseled their way over from Stormfront.
It was going so well. It was even vaguely amusing.
Then came the racism.
Anyone who tries to knowingly (or even unknowningly) counter #2 and #1 deserves to be beaten to death with a severed horse cock. Every time I see someone take too long to get the f**k out of a space I hope that they died in a fiery crash on the way home. Not from the impact mind you, but the actual fire. Also walking in a diagonal line (which is still a straight line) is faster depending on where you are walking to / from.
Reply Hide All See All 4 RepliesBut it's never the fastest way to get out of the path of the 1 or 2 ton death machine with a 16 year old girl texting on the phone and assuming you're going to get out of her way.
Also, f**k you if you're a number 2 or number 1 in anything besides a completely full lot. The author isn't suggesting you do these if college parking lots or stadium lots on gameday, but the lazy assholes who can't walk an extra 3 spots into WalMart
I agree with warrior. If you aren't in a f*****g PACKED parking lot, you are being creepy. If you are in a packed parking lot, creep away.
Do people actually do #2 and #1 in any other context other than a fully-parked parking lot? OK, fine, you get the odd lazy a*****e who'll spend the same amount of time waiting for someone to load their groceries as it would have taken to park at the far end of the lot and walk the distance, but seriously, anyone who thinks #2 and #1 are bad things otherwise are just selfish, insecure, self-righteous gits.
Yeah.... it's not that odd here. Most of the people my age (early 20s) are apparently fine walking, but it always seems to be that 30+ group that just will wait all day, other people wanting to pass be damned.
I have no problem with number 1, usually there isn't room, and when someone steps into their car to leave, it's only natural to wait for them, why should you go driving in circles while there aren't any spots. I think people who quickly steal a parking spot someone else was waiting for are the real assholes.
Reply Hide All See All 3 RepliesYup
I actually think #2 is worse than #1, for the reason hinted at in the article. It's unsettling to have a car slo-o-o-o-o-o-owly follow you around a parking lot like that, especially if they're so close that if you accidentally trip or have to stop for any reason they'll almost hit you. I get why they do it, and I don't think that they're necessarily bad people, but depending on the situation (middle of the day, crowded parking lot, not too bad; late evening at night, emptying parking lot, kind of creepy) it can be somewhat nervewracking.
My only problem with this is when it's not a full parking lot, and therefore not necessary, you end up backing up traffic behind you. Just walk your fat ass an extra five spots.
I love this article sir, please have sex with me.
ReplyI actually go out of my way to take my cart back into the store because I hate when people leave their s**t in the parking spots.
ReplyYou are a good Jewish kid as well as a good human being in general.
Thanks dude. People like you help curb my enthusiasm for stabbing. Fortunately, where Iive it's been rendered unfeasible to just leave that s**t lying like a condom on a Motel 6 floor.
Trouble with number three is, sometimes your parking spot is surrounded by people who have no idea what the lines are for. You squeeze into the gap, and the moment you leave your car the other bastards piss off, leaving your car parked like a drunk, waiting to get keyed by some vigilante with a mission.
ReplyThe Family Band is a problem inside stores, too. They keep to that same formation, making it nearly impossible to walk down any aisle they are in. They just lack any awareness of anyone who isn't immediate family, apparently.
ReplyAnd the damn Fat Family that has two empty trollys for no reason, that they park in the middle of the damn aisle. Then they stand there and STARE at the pasta, like it may change into cookies or something
I went to a college with over 50,000 people, and the parking lots and garages were impossible between 10am-1pm Monday through Friday. Parking Lot Stalking was literally the only way you could expect to find a spot if you were unlucky enough to try and park your car during that time. It was vicious, and really the universities fault.
ReplyBut I feel no sympathy for the lazy people who sit and wait for the closest non-handicapped parking spot in front of Walmart to be vacant, when there are plenty of decent parking spots that would literally take 30 seconds more to walk from.
When you drive a car that is worth more than the s**t i have under my shoes, you HAVE to park so others don't slam their junk-ass doors into your car. It's common knowledge. I hate people that actually touches other people's cars with their doors. f*****g morons. They deserve a shot to the neck. Just because YOU have a car that looks like crap and isn't worth anything, doesn't mean everyone has a car like that.
Reply Hide All See All 4 Repliesyeah, because everyone who doesn't take up parking spots has a s****y car, and everyone with a nice car always takes up multiple spaces. except thats not how the world works...and I bet you are some college freshman who is overly cocky about driving his older brothers '99 Camaro or something stupid like that
Or you could park in the middle of the space and not on the line.
You could also just park at the very, very, very end of the parking lot where NO BODY ELSE PARKS.
Or you could just park at the very, very, very end of the parking lot where NOBODY ELSE PARKS. That would solve your problems. Just walk the extra 20 feet. It won't kill you and your car won't be damaged.
I always get pissed off by people who park on or way too close to the line. So one time when some b***h did that to me (on my passenger side, luckily), when I got back to my car I just sat there for about five minute. She put her s**t in her boot, and then she had to just stand outside her car like a d******d, because her crappy parking meant she couldn't even open her door. And since the entire thing was her fault, she couldn't say anything to me. Very enjoyable!
ReplyHey, I happened to work for a while as a Cart Attendant before. It's really just the bottom rung of the employee hierarchy.
ReplyNow, people who leave diapers in said abandoned shopping carts? f**k those people. Happens way more often than you might think. Leaving just the cart is one thing, but leaving a little ball of s**t in one is just heinous.
Maybe they wanted to swop out for all the s**t they just bought at Walmart?
I've heard that happens! My heart goes out to you for having to handle s**t bags.
I always hate the wrong-way drivers in parking lots. The arrows are there for a reason! Those people piss me straight off. Once, while driving in a parking lot and following the yellow arrow, a car turned into the lane I was in. If I hadn't been all the way to the right of the lane, they would have hit me. Their car barely had room to get past. As they drove by, the driver looked over at me, knowing they were in the wrong. I began screaming a long chain of profanities. They obviously didn't hear me, but saw how angry I was. When I found a parking space, I saw them again as they parked right next to me. The driver looked over, and upon seeing me in the next space, started their car back up and went to find a different space. The look of fear on their face was quite satisfying.
Reply