Fun with asshats

"What is an asshat," you ask? Well it's one of those people that go around with their head up their... well you can figure it out.

We see them everywhere. They're always ahead of us at the store, with 26 items in the "12 items or less" line. (They usually want to pay by check too.) Or they're at the ATM ahead of you, continually re-inserting their card to conduct a hundred different transactions, totally ignoring the line building behind them. Sometimes they're at the drive-thru restaurant window in front of you. They're the ones with the long list of what they're eight co-workers all want to eat. And of course they want to have the cashier ring up each order separately. These are the people that just don't think--or care--about other people as they wander along through life.

Well I met one today. I went to the post office in town and as I waited to turn left across traffic into the small parking lot behind the building, a rather obese woman in a small, newish SUV made a right turn into the lot ahead of me and pulled into the only two parking spaces there. And she really did--she straddled the line between the two sports almost perfectly, effectively preventing anyone else--me included--from using either space. I pulled in behind her and rolled down my window as she got out.
"Excuse me," I asked nicely. "Can I have one of those parking spots?" She looked at me and said "I don't see why not," then turned to walk away.
"Ma'am, you're blocking BOTH spots," I said loudly, figuring that she'd get the clue and move her SUV. I mean, here I am still using crutches and both they and my Handicapped Parking placard were clearly visible to her. But she just shouted back: "I'll only be a minute" and quickly walked off with a small box of mail under her arm.

OK, so it's going to be like that, huh?

I took note of her West Virginia personalized license plate. It was something like: "MARNIE". I could remember that tag. I then squeezed my Jeep Cherokee into the spot to her left. There was just enough room for me to get my Jeep in there, but it meant that my passenger side was 6-8 inches from her driver's side door. Oh well. I took my crutches and got out, then I headed into the Post Office. As I hopped up the steps, "Marnie" was just coming back out. She avoided making eye contact with me. Asshat.

So I went inside and waited for the clerk. There was only one person ahead of me and he was just about finished. Cool. That almost never happens here. Usually you wait forever. I got to the counter and told the clerk that I needed a money order, and just as he began to make one out for me, Marnie stormed back in. She pulled open the door and glared at me. "You need to come out and move you car," she said loudly.

"My car is legally parked and I'll be out to move it when I'm finished," I replied, turning back to the clerk.

"You need to move it now! I can't get into mine and I need to leave!"

I took the money order from the clerk and turned to look at her. "Lady, you're the one that decided that you needed both parking spots. I asked you to move into one or the other so I could have one and you blew me off. I needed to park too and I used the small space that you left me. Now I'll be out in a couple of minutes and if that's not good enough, you might want to use your passenger side door and just scoot over." Then I began filling out my money order. As she turned to leave, I called out to her again. "By the way," I said. I know your license number and I know where you work." (The box of mail that she'd brought in was still sitting on the counter and it all bore the return address of a local business.) "If there's so much as a scratch on that Jeep when I get out there, I know where to find you.

She turned and stalked out, doing her best to slam the door.

I finished my business a minute or two later and hopped on out the door. Marnie must have managed the passenger door trick after all because her SUV was gone and there weren't any fresh marks in the dust on the side of my Jeep.

I realize that it wasn't very nice of me to mess with Marnie like that, but shame on me. I have this character flaw that always tempts me to engage asshats and sometimes I just can't resist. I hope that Marnie realizes that had she not been an asshat, this never would have happened. But I doubt it. Asshats rarely realize that they are asshats so she's probably still fuming about it. And I'm still chuckling.