Christina Is Pissed Off And Rightly So........

Parking hierarchy Everybody but me has a designated place to leave their car

by Christina Blizzard

I was driving around the busy parking lot of the newest superstore in my area recently, looking for a spot.

Numerous empty spaces were all reserved. No, not for disabled parking.

The latest trend at grocery stores is for specialized parking.

First, it was parking for pregnant women. Now, some grocery stores have expanded it to parking for people with small children.

What I found in this latest lot simply floored me: Parking for hybrid cars, the sign proclaimed. All the spots were empty, except for one very sanctimoniously parked Prius.

C'mon, now. How stupid is that? There are hybrid SUVs these days, which is an oxymoron. Okay, forget the oxy part. A small, non-hybrid car is going to use way less gas than some big honkin' hybrid SUV. And since when was it up to grocery stores to preach to their customers about their lifestyle?

I am a customer. I would like to park my car. So just shut up and take my money.

Ditto for this parking for expectant moms and small kids malarkey. First, how pregnant do you have to be to use the spot?

Look, I've been pregnant -- twice. I didn't even drive at the time. I took the freakin' TTC to the grocery store. Trust me, back then no one gave up their seat, so you didn't get to park your pregnant butts anywhere on a crowded subway car in T.O. I hear it's no better now.

Frankly, I'm not all that sure people should give up their seats -- or parking spots -- for expectant moms. Pregnancy is not a condition to be pitied. It is not an illness or a sign of frailty. Sure, in its latest stages, it can be uncomfortable. But so is arthritis -- and you don't actually welcome arthritis, the way you do a new baby.

If not exactly a self-inflicted wound, pregnancy is certainly a condition you usually enter into in the peak of youth and physical fitness.

Leave 'em at home

So why are we falling all over ourselves to accommodate pregnant women in parking lots? And since when was shopping a family experience? Leave the kids at home. Why should the rest of us give up precious parking spots so families can take their bratty kids to terrorize the vegetable aisle?

There are people with other uncomfortable conditions that don't merit a disabled sticker yet which make walking far more difficult than pregnancy does. But those conditions may not be as visible as a pregnancy and therefore harder to enforce. What next? Parking for obese customers?

While I'm on the topic of grocery stores, surely they are the only business in the world that frowns on people who buy lots of stuff. All grocery stores have express checkouts for people who buy eight items or less. What kind of reward system is that? Have you ever got the evil eye from the checkout clerk or other customers when you try to sneak that ninth forbidden item along the conveyor belt?

Surely smart businesses would give preference to the people who shop by the buggy-load? Yet when was the last time you saw an express checkout for people with 100 items or more? (Okay, I know you're going to say it's not express if you have 100 items, but I beg to differ. If there's only one buggy in the 100-and-up checkout and 10 carts in the eight and below, it's gonna take about the same time to check out).

I have a feeling there is a large boardroom somewhere where grocery store executives sit around dreaming up new classifications for customer service.

I have a few suggestions: Parking for people who care about the environment but can't afford a hybrid. Parking for people with hemorrhoids (they hurt like hell, but who's going to admit to 'em?) Parking only for a cranky old journalist with a corn on her left foot just trying to get home in time to put dinner on the table so she can get out to her bellydancing class.

That should do it.