Supermarket Playground

While I’m on a minor food store rant, I want to touch on couple of matters that rankle me at the local supermarkets.  First, the overdoing of the reserved parking spots near the doors and next, the ridiculous oversize plastic baskets made up to carry a couple of kiddies in front, complete with plastic steering wheels as though they were driving.  

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m quite happy that my old bones still carry my frame in from the North Forty and that I don’t need to get one of those handicapped tags.  However, that someone's sign suggests that I should park in the North Forty to accommodate a twenty-something mommy with a rug-rat or two irks me…especially when the 10 reserved spots near the door for mommies and their kiddies are vacant much of the time, especially early in the morning.  I usually just park there...I have kids and I'm a customer.

For some inexplicable reason my local market has deemed mommies with children a privileged class and not only set aside 10 close-in parking spots for them, but they have also charged a grocery cart kid with being sure that no one but young mommies with kiddies park in those spots.  One thing that I find good about becoming a cranky old bastard is that younger people really don’t want to tangle with me…they lack the tools.  “F.O. or NO” pretty well ends any clucking they may have considered.  The whole exercise resides near the far edge of the theory of ridiculous limits so it’s really a non-issue, but nonetheless irritating.

Then there are those pretend truck carts that are so damned large that they often block the aisles.  All I can do is shake my head and make my way by as best I can.  However, I do wonder what on earth is churning inside their heads…the mommies pushing these behemoths around, that is.  Of course once inside the store, the kiddies are out of those things in a flash, running freely through the aisles and getting under foot.  Mommy can't be bothered to keep her crumb-crunchers under control.

Maybe I’m just getting older and losing whatever patience I have left.  However, a small display of common courtesy and rational thought from these whack jobs would certainly be welcome.  And I wonder what kind of air-head in the store management thought this nonsense was a good idea…probably the same kind of idiot who thought a Pontiac Aztec was a good looking car.

Adios