Things that may annoy me more than most people, or more than they should:
• People that don’t keep close control of their children in grocery store parking lots.
The general environment of two rows of parked cars, often with vehicles moving in lanes both ways, plus pedestrians, create a tight maneuvering situation with almost no line of sight for tiny people who may not stand above a car’s trunk, especially with the large number of SUVs and trucks in use.
A small child can be just steps away from mom or dad but still be dead in the path of a vehicle with a perfectly careful driver having no clue a youngster has slipped into the rear blind spot.
About a year ago I saw a young boy, probably six or seven, step out the door of a grocery pushing one of those toy grocery carts. He took off running fast and wild. The three adults with him yelled in righteous fear, but none took off after the child.
He, of course, just went racing down the line of parked cars, converging on a sedan with a female driver backing up.
As she made her final look to her right before backing up, the boy went behind her car and disappeared from her line of sight.
The boy was literally right at the back of the car as it backed up. A tragedy appeared certain.
But, the kid was rolling.
He went past the passenger corner of the vehicle just as it backed up to where he had been.
All across the parking lot people literally cried out in relief.
The adults with the boy, obviously shaken to the bone, scurried to him.
The motorist, having no idea of what has almost just happened, drove away.
A store clerk looked as me in disbelief and asked, “Can you believe she just drove away?”
I replied she didn’t bring a kid of the parking lot and certainly had no idea or any way of knowing one was running loose out there that she needed to be looking for, and even if she had known wouldn’t have seen the child.
Had the timing for the incident varied just a tiny bit, a tragedy would have occurred.
And, who would have been the villain?
The only time I can remember striking either of my children was in a parking lot when they pulled the old jerk their hand away from mine and tried to run. I was never much on corporal punishment but that potentially life-or-death situation drew a smart smack on the arm or leg to send a glaring “listen-to-me right now” moment.
• And how about when a child is crying or acting out in public and just doesn’t stop. Now the parent may decide to let them wear it out, but owes it to the rest of us to take the child outside.
If we were loud or, heaven forbid, cried even silently in public, barring injury or sickness, our mom would stop our breathing, and certainly tears, with just one menacing look.
Of course in those days, children were to be seen and not heard.
• I’ve whined about this before but have seen no improvement.
Why can’t drivers understand it’s just one lane per vehicle on our many multiple-lane roads?
One vehicle does not get one full lane and an eighth of another lane.
It’s no wonder one sees so many cars with crushed or scraped sides on the roads.
Geez.
•••
Don’t you think it’s ironic that Nashville’s English-only ballot initiative is tied up in court because the two sides can’t agree what the English definition is for “two years?”
I guess the NFL receiver formerly know as Chad Johnson, now legally renamed Chad Ocho Cinco, is not a supporter of any English-only referendum?
•••
Internet conversation through blogs and comments to online news site such as murfreesboropost.com certainly greatly expand the scope, diversity and participation of debate and discussion of issues, events and opinion.
But, they certainly are not doing much to enhance public civility, decency and fair-minded, logical discussion.
•••
You know the Old Ball Coach, Steve Spurrier, doesn’t look like much of an offensive genius, as he was so often dubbed while at Florida, over at South Carolina where he doesn’t have the advantage of the immense talent pool of the Sunshine State.
In fact, the Old Ball Coach appears to be pretty average. Don’t know for sure, but I imagine Gamecock fans would swap their team’s records over the past five years for those of Tennessee faster than a rooster can peck a kernel of corn.
•••
To end on a positive note:
Wow, a black president or a female vice president. Looks like we will get one or the other.
Either way, it’s time.
Don’t you think this will be the highest level of voter participation ever?
Won’t it be sad if it’s not?
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