One Car, One Spot

Pet peeves are those little annoying things that niggle at you when you encounter them. To be a true pet peeve, it has to be something minor that you encounter often. For instance, genocide is not a pet peeve. That guy in your office who always greets you with "Heeey buddyyyy" in a rellay grating voice, that's a pet peeve.

My pet peeve, or at least the one I'm most aware of, is people who take up more than one spot when parking their cars. I work in a strip mall that contains a convenient store and a laundromat, and people seem to think that just because they're not going to be there long, they can just park their cars however they want. They'll go right down the middle of a painted line, or they'll be sloppy and leave the car at a drunken angle in the spot so parts of it are hanging into two other spaces. They usually don't even bother to straighten their tires.

Even more annoying in it's own way, though, are the guys who manage through Herculean effort to squeeze their car into only one spot, but are off-center in the spot. So they're only using one spot, but if they happen to be too far over on the right, anyone trying to park in the spot on the right won't be able to open his car door enough to get out. On the other hand, idiots who park too far to the left can have the same thing happen to them. I sometimes do this on purpose just to let them know what I think of their poor aim.

My job involves driving in and out of the parking lot several times a day. Which means I have to park my car in the same lot many times, so I find myself hampered by these people a lot. At least once a week, I witness a situation where two cars pull out of the lot, and suddenly five spaces are opened up. Usually after I've had to park my car on the far end of the lot from my work.

Then there's the guys who take up several spots because their vehicle is so friggin' huge that it's physically impossible for it to fit in one spot. Hey, pal, you live in an urban environment. Can you explain to me why you need a truck that can tow 20 tons of lumber across 100 miles of dirt road in the middle of one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world? Besides your obvious self-esteem issues, that is.

I don't drive a small car. I have an SUV. Some call it a truck, and it does have plenty of storage space, but it's not a truck. I manage to park, every single time, right in the middle of the spot, and without my ass hanging out into the lot. It's not hard. Sometimes I have to back up and fiddle with the steering wheel to make sure I'm lined up correctly, but that only takes a few seconds. If your life is so packed that you can't spare 5 seconds to be a decent human being, then it's time for a serious re-assessment of your priorities.

And speaking of those enormous trucks, it kills me whenever one of them slows to almost a dead stop to cross railroad tracks. My friend, that vehicle you're babying was designed for rough terrain. Mountain passes, dirt switchbacks, gravel. Trust me, railroad tracks are not going to damage that thing. "Yeah," you might be saying, "but that off-road suspension is hard on the kidneys." In that case, let me remind you that you are crossing over railroad tracks. Vehicles that make yours look like a Matchbox car move across them all the freaking time. By slowing down, you're spending more time on the tracks, thereby increasing the likelihood that one of those nigh-unstoppable engines of doom will be trying to occupy the same space as you. What's more important to you, your comfort, or your life?

And to those who think I may be over-dramatizing the danger, I'd like to point out that people die on the tracks in my area every year. Some by trying to outrun a train, but just as many have died because they were moving slowly (or in at least one mind-numbingly stupid incident) or at a full stop on the tracks.

In short, get over yourself.

-Long Days and Pleasant Nights