I can't tell you the number of stores I've gone to the past few days and found shopping carts all over the parking lot. What is wrong with people that they can't walk the darn thing the few feet it takes to get to the cart corral? I'm so fed up with lazy people unloading their carts and pushing the things between the vehicles and leaving them. I couldn't even park in one spot yesterday because it had become a de facto corral — and the corral wasn't full and wasn't far away.

Do people really not care if their cars get dinged with these runaway carts? Or do they feel that since they are leaving, their car isn't in danger? Of course there are legitimate excuses not to take the cart back — sometimes a person is sick or hurt and just wants to get in the car and go. It happens — but not to every blessed person at the store on the same day!

I always walk the cart to where it's supposed to be. I even walk carts into the store when I get out of my car and there's a stray cart perilously close by. I still have a huge dent in my door where some lovely person in Hawaii shoved a car door or a cart into it and then skedaddled. It's just a dent, not missing paint or anything, so I still haven't had it fixed (2 years later). But I think about it every time I see stray carts all over the parking lot. Irritates me.

So, it's the holiday season and I'm ranting. 🙂 But in this season of giving and goodwill toward others, why are people so rude about shopping carts? Why can't they return it? For most of us, there is no excuse.

What bugs you about shopping this time of year? Is the rampant outbreak of homeless carts merely an Alabama phenomenon, or is it happening in your corner of the world too?