My most hated thing about the season is the inconvenience of going pretty much anywhere. I want to stop by the store and get a gallon of milk, but despite it being a grocery store, the lines are still horrific. Heaven forbid I have to go to Wal-Mart or Target to get something non gift related. The lines and crowds are still maddening to deal with. I just want to buy soap and some food and get the hell out of there. But that is made 10x more difficult by the holiday season. Bleh.
It's probably widely known at this point that I have a passion for good parking spots. Anywhere I go, I pride myself on my ability to take good parking spots from pregnant mothers and the elderly. I'm not some sort of monster though. Parking spots clearly designated for the disabled and the prego are holy grounds. I shall not touch them. However, if there is a sweet-ass normal parking spot next to those clearly designated spots, it's fair game. But this time of year really puts my abilities to the test. My passion for not walking long distances just to shop knows no bounds. I hate parking far away. Don't bother trying to put a positive spin on it like "You'll get your exercise in if you park further." I get plenty of exercise through actual methods of exercise like running and sports. I'm not to the point of fatty denial where I can classify parking to the back of the lot as "exercise." Not to mention it's cold as balls these days. The less I have to be in the cold, the happier I am. But now everyone and their mom will be at every single store I need to be, thus destroying good parking spots for a little over a month. Now I'll have to work to get a good spot. Life is hard.
Don't even get me started on the driving during this time. Just about every annoying driving violation will be encountered virtually every time you get behind the wheel. You'll have the people who slow down to a near stop just to turn right into a store lot instead of gradually slowing down, pulling off the side and turning. These people will just practically slam on the brakes and then turn. Then there will be slow drivers clogging up the works on every major street. All the people who aren't supposed to drive such as the elderly, the medicated, the felons, the teenagers with permits will be out in force. All of them will be out to drive slow and "play it safe" for their own reasons. Conversely, you'll have the asshole with a death wish zig-zagging through traffic lanes in the unsafest of manners just to get to Mcdonalds. Perhaps the most egregious of all offenses will be the jerkoff who merges in front of you without using their blinker. Or my personal favorite is people merging in front of you but only turning on their blinker after they are more than 3/4th's in your lane. Road rage central.
The crowds are just as bad as driving. Everyone is stepping in front of you, bumping into you, cutting you off, trying to take your place in line. Large groups of families will walk slowly in the middle of hallways and aisles to keep you from going anywhere you need to be. Or even better, someone has a huge basket full of crap that gets rung up, they use their card only to find that it gets declined. This person inevitably asks the cashier to run it again because it has to be a mistake. Nope. Declined. Now this person has to hold up the whole line while they take things out of their basket while estimating how much they might actually have in their account to afford the rest. The card almost always gets declined again. They will take more crap out until they can afford only two of the items, and in most cases, none of the items. While this is all going on, you'll look longingly at the other register aisles that are passing you up. You always think retrospectively, "I knew I should have got into that line," even if you didn't have the slightest inclination before to get into that line.
All of this hassle just so I can be broke, give a few people gifts and then forget about it for another 364 days.
No comments:
Post a Comment