What won't we do for the sake of convenience? We will make our lunch the night before so we can get an extra 10 minutes of sleep in the morning. We will buy a house near a metro stop so we can walk to the station and not have to take the car into town. We will even buy a product like the Oral-B Brush-Up because brushing our teeth the usual way is just too damned time consuming.

And we will do whatever we can to ensure we have the single best parking space in the entire parking lot.

Normally, when I see you circling the lot for the 26th time hoping for a space to open up near the main entrance at the mall when there are about a dozen spaces a mere 20 yards away, I might silently chuckle at your misfortune, but I haven't ruled out hanging out with you. I've been there. You've had a long day, you're tired, and you just can't think about walking more than you have to. That's fine and is what I would consider a reasonable pursuit of convenience.

But when I see you pull up into a crowded parking row, pass the only open space, stop, then throw your ride into reverse...I die a little inside.

Not because you are backing into a space, but because the person behind you--who was doing things the normal way--has to watch you awkwardly back into the space that he thought was legitimately his. So then he has to back up, which makes him look like he's the one with the problem, which, in turn, confuses the hell out of everyone in the immediate area and, more than likely, makes tense, stressed-out people even more tense and stressed out. Haven't you ever been in a crowded parking lot before? Don't you realize what it does to regular folks? Why would you intentionally add to such a volatile situation, when pulling head-first into the space would make so much more sense?

All this for a couple extra seconds of convenience on the departing end of your trip, as if the V-neck tees you got at The Gap will go out of style if you dawdle too long in getting home.

Your putting your swift departure from the Galleria before the comfort and sanity of others is why I don't want to hang out with you.

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