Christmas is one of my favorite holidays in the year. It's fitting that my two favorites are basically the opposite time of year - Christmas comes to break up the bitter cold and short days and gives us all something to look forward to. My other favorite holiday is the 4th of July because I get to blow shit up. But I digress...
One thing I don't look forward to about the holiday season is shopping. I try to shop online as much as possible and have the things I'm buying come to me, instead of hunting for it among the mob at the mall, Target, or wherever. Unfortunately, I ran into a few circumstances where I was forced out among the masses this year, and had to fight my way through stores.
A little background about me - I typically don't mind being in public and dealing with people, except when it gets a little too crowded for my liking. You know, those situations where I constantly feel my personal space is being raped and pillaged and thrown away like some mutant castoff. That seems to happen a lot this time of year, along with a phenomenon I like to call, "shopping speed."
Shopping speed is defined as when someone is strolling along in the middle of the aisle so slowly that a 1 year old could crawl faster. Not only do the people tend to go amazingly slow, but they also sprawl out into as wide of an area as possible so that nobody can pass. Frequent establishments where you can run into people using shopping speed include the grocery store, any mall, and department stores, such as Target and Wal-Mart.
Why is it that people must come to a complete stop in the very middle of a damn aisle? To me, it would be a similar concept as if I came to a complete stop in the middle of the interstate so that I could consult a map (more realistically, program my GPS), without any regard of those around me, just so that I could take care of what I needed to do. Imagine what kind of havoc that would cause.
In grocery stores, why must people park the damn cart perpendicular to the aisles so that they're taking up the WHOLE DAMN AISLE? Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot that I wasn't allowed to shop in your aisle. I'll just go ahead and turn around and move elsewhere.
The thing I enjoy doing is when I get held up by someone that is going shopping speed is that, when they eventually wake up and go at a human pace, I purposely cut in front of them, and then return the favor of going at shopping speed pace, and block them off. I usually get dirty looks and bitched at, but I just respond, "how do you think I liked it when you were doing this shit to me?"
I wish I could end the whole shopping speed thing, or at least be allowed to throw a large object at perpetrators to let them know what they are doing so they can come to their senses. I tried once, but was told that was frowned upon as I was being blocked from throwing. I was not happy.
I mean, is it really that difficult to move off to the side, out of the flow of traffic to figure shit out? I mean, when I have one of my, "ooh, shiny" moments as I'm shopping, I don't just stop and sprawl out to block everyone. I glance over while still moving, and walk towards the shiny thing and get out of the damn way. People can keep walking, and not be held up by my "ooh, shiny," moment. I tend to believe that the general public doesn't give a damn about how intrigued I am by this nice shiny thing, so why would I make them stand around while I figure out if I want to get it or not? Maybe they should care, but I'd rather let them decide for themselves, rather than me forcing my will on them like that, just because I'm nice like that.
Shopping speed is just simply evil. It's a very screwed up version of a traffic jam, caused by one putz that just decided to stop for no apparent reason.
A swarm of bees came for my birthday.
14 years ago
2 comments:
Duuuuuuude....are we related? I could have written this, seriously. My personal space getting raped is not something I enjoy. And just yesterday I was at target and like 800 people blocked my way, so that I had to turn around and go down a different aisle....like they didn't even see me. And I know for a fact that one lady did see me...her and her damn kids and loud husband, just standing around in the hand lotion aisle. What damn xmas present are you shopping for?
Well, I feel better.
MY god I go through this every time I dare to go to Walmart during peak hours or saturdays. the sheer of joy of parents who have decided that THIS is the perfect time to let their kids practice their slow waddle of a walk. Yes must not exclude the Elderly who discuss frank's surgery at the end of an aisle blocking people's way when OH MY FREAKING GOD THERE'S A MCDONALDS RIGHT PAST THE CHECK OUT. WHY YOU COULD GO spend 2 bucks have a coffee a muffin and a lovely gossip session about your kids, your grandkids and what ever else is in your gray haired little mind as opposed to the grocery section. But wait a minute I'm talking about things that would be too easy. like having your toddler in a stroller on saturdays or not talking at the end of aisle etc etc.
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