Land of Oz

'tis the Season

Traffic. It's not just the roads. Traffic in stores is even more scary this close to Christmas. Many people have undoubtably gone mad. People seem to lose their minds when they go shopping. One of the biggest things is shopping carts. Why do so many people stop their cart in the middle of an aisle intersection? It's bad enough, people will stop in the middle of one aisle, but they seem to pick the intersection so they can annoy four aisles of people. Pull over to the side and get in one aisle or the other. Is that really so hard?

And why is it that women (yes, in general) always grab a shopping cart? I've lost track of the number times I've seen some woman - rarely a man - with one or two items or even none in their cart. Often they just seem to use them for a care blanket.

What bugs me even more is when they leave their carts in the middle of the parking lot. If you're going to drag a cart around, at least take the 30 seconds needed to either put it back or park it in the shopping cart corral. Parking lots aren't flat and the wind blows, and I can't count the number of times I've watched some idiot's cart rolling across the lot aimed at a fender. By the way, these are the same lots that you can't get to roll across the smooth tile floor inside the store. I almost stood up and cheered one day when I watched an old beat-up pickup truck smoosh one of those rolling carts into a ditch - better the ditch than my car.

And as an afterthought, up here where I live, there's snow and ice on the road. It's SLIPPERY! Is that so hard to remember from one year to the next? I don't care if you have two, four or six wheel drive, the road is slippery. You're not going to stop on ice like you do on pavement - unless you pick a tree or lamp post to use as a break. Slow down and don't run into my ass again this year.

Just one reminder - it's white, it's under 32 degrees, it's slippery!!