know parking
Seriously, gentle readers..
(oh yeah…hi, hope you are well, blahsie blah)…..
and while we’re on the subject of pet peeves
(by the way we’re on the subject of pet peeves…)
You know what I would quite happily sacrifice my tax dollars for? Parking enforcers. Not meter maids, not rent-a-cops….people who are paid to do nothing but heavily fine idiots.
Can’t we all get behind an idea like that?
First of all, non-handicapped people who park in handicapped spaces should have to do a lot more than pay a fine, in my humble opinion….(practice dummies for attack dogs seems like a nice off-the-cuff (pun intended) punishment, for one…) These are the dregs of society and don’t seem to get caught nearly enough.
Secondly, there are those Entitled Ones…such as the gangsta guy who stood chain-smoking outside his low-rider car, casually parked in the only available ‘expectant mother parking’ space when I was 9 1/2 months pregnant and had the bladder capacity of a garbanzo bean (look it up). Granted, some may see ‘expectant mother’ parking as a luxury, but those people are morons. (or, to put it in a nicer way, have never been pregnant). I’m a fair-minded person. I wouldn’t even mind if they changed it to ‘visibly pregnant’ parking. Once you get to that point a trip to the mall sounds like a field trip anyway, and you need all the help you can get. Trust me on this.
But wouldn’t it be just *fabulous* if there were consequences for those few who live outside society’s rules of engagement? I certainly think so.
Who wouldn’t love to see a ticket smacked onto the window of the brand new Lexus that parked at an angle and took up two spaces just to be a bag of feminine hygiene wash?
Who wouldn’t feel a sense of vindication (and I’m just pulling this example out of thin air, mind you….) when a fine gets slapped onto the SUV who parked 1/4 inch from your door in the space clearly labeled COMPACT as you somehow try to load your en-carseated precious cargo in by osmosis?
It’s funny, gentle readers. Hahahahahhaa. No really. Because I seem to recall, back in the stagecoach days when I took driver’s ed….(which, believe it or not, is short for ‘edUCATION’) there was a whole entire thingamajig made about parking. We even had to practice! With a car! We had to parallel park! Our cars didn’t even do it for us!
It was unprecedented.
Nowadays….road rules seem to be more of…..guidelines. Suggestions, if you will, for the weak-minded or those who have vehicles that can be eaten by larger vehicles. Or, say, mommies like me, who actually would like to make it from A to B without incident, collateral damage, hand gestures, yelling, or psychic accidents. Is that really too much to ask?
Apparently so. I’m not normally so tightly wound but I gotta say, between the instinctive need to protect my offspring and the instinctive desire to throttle insensitive blowhards, it’s a struggle.
Here’s a thought, for all those social misfires who feel the need to circle the parking lot 20 times just to be 17 feet closer to their destination….if that’s how you really feel, lose the Nautilus equipment back home. Cancel your gym membership (you know you have one!). Clearly the extra effort is not part of your exercise regimen….so something’s gotta give!
And as a final thought, please allow me to express my concern, as a parent, for the increasing number of witches that have been appearing at alarming rates wherever I go. That can be the only explanation I can come up with for the epidemic of Those Who Will Melt If They Get Wet.
Newsflash: at times, the sky will leak moisture and form ‘droplets’ that will then….drop. Sometimes they drop slowly, and sometimes not-so-slowly, but I can honestly say I have never seen one person melt yet. Not a one. I’ve even *gasp* seen people….GET WET. Umbrellas do help, yes. But during a downpour….short of a full-body condom, chances are you will find yourself victim to moisture. My question, then, is a simple one……
AND?!?!?
“But Mayor” I can hear you protesting….”My clothes! My hair! Everything will get wet!”
Precisely. And yet….life does, somehow, manage to go on!
I know this is shocking. I know there will be…pardon the pun…ripples from this statement….but I defy you to deny laughing the last time you got soaked in a downpour. (if you didn’t, please disregard and call a therapist..you have bigger problems than I thought).
And another thing. People spend lots of hard-earned money on pursuits such as bungee-jumping, parasailing, skydiving, scuba diving, hang-gliding…..because these are great adrenaline rushes. Try running from your car to your destination in a downpour next time. It’s free, and has all the adrenaline you could want!
Think back to the last time you were at a store and it was pouring rain. People come rushing through the door, all a-twitter, laughing, smiling, and shaking their heads like dogs. Don’t we all need to do a little bit more of that?
I ask you, gentle readers, because I respect your opinions.
So, to sum up: We need parking enforcers to punish the weak-minded who feel false senses of entitlement. We need a return to social etiquette. And we all need to get drenched once in awhile. Boo-yah.
I don’t ever want to be one of those mommies who wouldn’t dare smudge her makeup, or get her hair wet. And Dry Clean Only isn’t in my vocabulary. I like to think life is just a little more fun in my world And I daresay so far, my lil Puddin Face seems to agree with me.