The Money Mustache Community
Around the Internet => Antimustachian Wall of Shame and Comedy => Topic started by: Dee 72013 on August 11, 2013, 05:56:37 PM
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Don't know if this has been mentioned before but I was thinking of some of the funniest places I've seen people drive to and my favorite is when people get in their car to check their mail when the mailbox is at the end of your street... Hello.. UMM.. Can't you walk a few hundred yards?
What are some of your funniest places you've seen people drive to?
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I live about 100 feet from the edge of a shopping center. Occasionally I'll see my neighbors drive there.
Although, I am guilty of stopping there on the way home some times. It feels ridiculous.
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In my apartment complex there is only one dumpster / trash compactor. I live in the furthest corner from it, and it takes maybe 5 minutes to walk over there and back.
More than half of the people in my complex put their trash on top of their car like it was a smelly hat and drive it a block to the dumpster.
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The gym.
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The gym.
Came here to say this. Especially the treadmill users.
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I live about 100 feet from the edge of a shopping center. Occasionally I'll see my neighbors drive there.
Although, I am guilty of stopping there on the way home some times. It feels ridiculous.
At my last apartment I lived directly across the street from a Fred Meyer store (grocery/department store.) I was the only one in my apartment complex who walked there. Now I live about 1/4 mile from an Albertsons. Neighbors all drive there. Utterly insane.
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My housemate's dad used to come pick her up to take her grocery shopping.. 1 km away!! (0.6 miles). What!
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My partner drives 2 blocks to work, he says this is primarily because he wears fancy clothes, carries a laptop and does not want to get mugged. If it were me I'd be walking but I don't want to insist and push him too far out of his comfort zone. Picking my mustrachian battles at the moment.
We do walk further distances for groceries and whatnot, so it's not that he's averse to walking.
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To be nearest the door of the market with the electric scooters. That way they can take a short walk from the van to the scooter to sit down and do some shopping.
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To be nearest the door of the market with the electric scooters. That way they can take a short walk from the van to the scooter to sit down and do some shopping.
This reminds me of the spaceship scenes from the film Wall-E, where everyone on the ship has a personal hover seat that carts them everywhere. They are so used to them that their bones shorten, their muscles atrophy and they are all pretty lardy. Pretty horrific and saddening in equal quantities...
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Don't know if this has been mentioned before but I was thinking of some of the funniest places I've seen people drive to and my favorite is when people get in their car to check their mail when the mailbox is at the end of your street... Hello.. UMM.. Can't you walk a few hundred yards?
This. I saw someone the other day drive out of their driveway in their Hummer, go about 15 feet, leave the car idling, get out, check the mail with no sense of urgency, get back in the Hummer, and drive back (spending a bit of time turning around). Probably burned a few bucks in gas in that monster.
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A number of people in my neighborhood drive their kids to the school bus stop every morning. You seen them there, cars idling while they wait, even in beautiful weather. For most of these folks it is 2-3 blocks away with nice sidewalks and walking paths everywhere. The farthest corner of our neighborhood is about 0.3 miles from the bus stop. I think they are missing a great opportunity to teach their kids the many benefits of using their own two legs to get somewhere.
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The summer after my senior year of high school I took a job doing grounds maintenance at a park about a mile from my home. I think I drove there every day except for one. That one day I did ride my bike.
It's over the top funny to me because immediately after this job I moved off to college and I haven't owned a car or used a car for daily transportation since. It's crazy for me to do anything other than walk or bike for a distance that short.
At the time, I think I was too embarrassed by my sloppy grounds maintenance attire to bike more regularly. But also, I just wasn't aware of how silly these trips were until I moved off to college and lived without a car.
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I regularly see people waiting in running cars at the end of their driveways with their high school aged kids for the school bus. In good weather even!
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My SO likes to drive 300 yards to the gym. To exercise.
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I don't have a lot of room to talk because I still need a kick in the pants to try riding to work (slicks on order, so that may happen soon after I get my old MTB tuned up), but the funniest place I see people driving unnecessarily is around parking lots looking for a spot as close as possible to the doors in busy parking lots (at the mall, WM, etc.)!
It's baffling to me that people will spend 3-5 extra minutes idling around the parking lot or camping behind someone else packing their vehicle to leave just to save "having" to walk 100' from the open spots.
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Bakersfield.
ZING!
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The summer after my senior year of high school I took a job doing grounds maintenance at a park about a mile from my home. I think I drove there every day except for one. That one day I did ride my bike.
It's over the top funny to me because immediately after this job I moved off to college and I haven't owned a car or used a car for daily transportation since. It's crazy for me to do anything other than walk or bike for a distance that short.
At the time, I think I was too embarrassed by my sloppy grounds maintenance attire to bike more regularly. But also, I just wasn't aware of how silly these trips were until I moved off to college and lived without a car.
Same story, pretty much. Where I grew up we drove everywhere. Now, when I go back to where my parents live, I insist on walking to the places I used to drive to. It boggles my mind that we didn't walk the 0.3 miles (SERIOUSLY, just Googled-mapped that shit) to the local grocery store. We drove. Insanity.
Just for kicks, I looked up how far it is from my old house to my old high school. It is 0.6 miles. I drove every day. Now I walk over 2 miles to work most days. Oh, the shame of looking back on my younger self!
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I don't have a lot of room to talk because I still need a kick in the pants to try riding to work (slicks on order, so that may happen soon after I get my old MTB tuned up), but the funniest place I see people driving unnecessarily is around parking lots looking for a spot as close as possible to the doors in busy parking lots (at the mall, WM, etc.)!
It's baffling to me that people will spend 3-5 extra minutes idling around the parking lot or camping behind someone else packing their vehicle to leave just to save "having" to walk 100' from the open spots.
What I find even more amusing is that those same people often don't even park in the spot closest to the door. These lots fill in a predictable fashion, and there is a bias toward the aisle that aligns with the door, even if the space is actually farther from the door. (Lots more tidbits like that in this book, BTW: http://www.amazon.com/Traffic-Drive-What-Says-About/dp/0307277194 (http://www.amazon.com/Traffic-Drive-What-Says-About/dp/0307277194)... get it at the library, of course)
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Sharks! They'll circle the lot and then stalk poor defenseless people leaving. I make a point to take as long as I possibly can when they wait for me to leave because they want my spot :D
Damn that is annoying, stressing me out and often blocking my safe path out.
However, here in Europe where lots and streets are often practically full, getting that one spot feels more important because it is the only spot, not just the closest one.
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The other day I saw a woman get in her truck, drive 50 feet, and get out (leaving the truck running with A/C on) to check her mailbox.
You can't even make this stuff up...
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The Subway (sandwich place) at work. It is across the street from our building and I know it has to take longer to navigate the 5 levels and speed bumps in the garages just to get out than it does to walk straight there. Sure enough, I've seen the unmistakable parking passes dangling as a vehicle pulls up outside Subway to try to find a parking spot.
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The other day I saw a woman get in her truck, drive 50 feet, and get out (leaving the truck running with A/C on) to check her mailbox.
You can't even make this stuff up...
Did she immediately U-Turn and go back home? Or was she on her way out somewhere and stopping to grab the mail on the way?
That actually seems semi-reasonable to me (rather than walking out to get the mail, walking back, then leaving in the truck). Leaving like that may be a reminder trigger to grab the mail. (And leaving it running will have used less gas than turning it off/on, if her stop was only a few seconds.)
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In my apartment complex there is only one dumpster / trash compactor. I live in the furthest corner from it, and it takes maybe 5 minutes to walk over there and back.
More than half of the people in my complex put their trash on top of their car like it was a smelly hat and drive it a block to the dumpster.
Guilty of doing this when I lived in a townhouse community, but I never made a trip just for trash, it was always on my way out to do something else! Maybe that makes it a little better? LOL.
I have two that amazed me:
- My Sister in law driving my able-bodied, teenage nephew halfway down the block to his friend's house. She felt it was too hot to bike or walk. Not surprisingly, the kid is overweight...
- The parking lot at my work. We have an upper and a lower lot. The farthest spot would require 4 minutes of walking to get into the office. At lunchtime, many people will spend their break waiting for other people to leave, so they can park closer to the office! They don't otherwise leave the lot or anything, they just really want the closer parking spot...
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About once a month my office goes to happy hour at a bar about two blocks away. One of our middle aged female staff walks the fifty yards to where she has paid for parking, drives two blocks back the other direction, and then circles looking for street parking (downtown), which she also pays for.
The group that walks always gets there before she does. We've suggested she walk with us on multiple occasions, to which she replies "oh, I don't walk." I think part of it is that she feels beholden to use her very expensive car, like she's not getting full value out of it if she doesn't use it more often.
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About once a month my office goes to happy hour at a bar about two blocks away. One of our middle aged female staff walks the fifty yards to where she has paid for parking, drives two blocks back the other direction, and then circles looking for street parking (downtown), which she also pays for.
The group that walks always gets there before she does. We've suggested she walk with us on multiple occasions, to which she replies "oh, I don't walk." I think part of it is that she feels beholden to use her very expensive car, like she's not getting full value out of it if she doesn't use it more often.
When the heat here isn't too oppressive, I'll walk 1/2 mile to the supermarket down the street from my work on my lunch break to get some groceries. On the rare occasion that I do see other workers walking back, it's with fast food takeout in hand. If I mention that I walked to the store on my lunch break, people seem so surprised because it's too far away to walk.
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The other day I saw a woman get in her truck, drive 50 feet, and get out (leaving the truck running with A/C on) to check her mailbox.
You can't even make this stuff up...
Did she immediately U-Turn and go back home? Or was she on her way out somewhere and stopping to grab the mail on the way?
That actually seems semi-reasonable to me (rather than walking out to get the mail, walking back, then leaving in the truck). Leaving like that may be a reminder trigger to grab the mail. (And leaving it running will have used less gas than turning it off/on, if her stop was only a few seconds.)
I watched her in the mirror... she U-turned and went back home.
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I watched her in the mirror... she U-turned and went back home.
Wow. You win.
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Not quite in line with the topic but I work in a building where the parking lot is two very small blocks away. There are two people who regularly park in the "2 Hour" parking along the street in front of the building instead of in the lot and are there all day
Well if there's no parking enforcement why not?
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Bakersfield.
ZING!
Touche
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My parents have an aged neighbor with a steep driveway. He drives down to the mailbox!
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We have a community pool in our sub division and people who live down the street drive to the pool / playground. I am always amazed people can't put their kids in a stroller/wagon with a towel and walk down the street..
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We have a community pool in our sub division and people who live down the street drive to the pool / playground. I am always amazed people can't put their kids in a stroller/wagon with a towel and walk down the street..
We don't have amenities in our very small subdivision, but we do have a tunnel that leads right into a massive park & trail system. People will either drive to the tunnel, or worse yet, complain loudly on our FB community page that it would be nice to have a park in the neighborhood for their young kids to play. I often wonder if this perfect park would need to be located in their front yard to be close enough...
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We have a community pool in our sub division and people who live down the street drive to the pool / playground. I am always amazed people can't put their kids in a stroller/wagon with a towel and walk down the street..
We don't have amenities in our very small subdivision, but we do have a tunnel that leads right into a massive park & trail system. People will either drive to the tunnel, or worse yet, complain loudly on our FB community page that it would be nice to have a park in the neighborhood for their young kids to play. I often wonder if this perfect park would need to be located in their front yard to be close enough...
Well to be fair, children can't play in out there, cause that's where hobos and mountain lions roam. Plus there might be a rusty nail or something. WHO KNOWS?
<--- bitter guy who was recently kicked out of a city playground for being too old. F that
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just watched my neighbor drive her kids to the bus stop at the end of the court (less than 1/2 a block away) and then drive home after she dropped them off. she does the reverse at the end of the school day
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just watched my neighbor drive her kids to the bus stop at the end of the court (less than 1/2 a block away) and then drive home after she dropped them off. she does the reverse at the end of the school day
I've seen this same thing on my bike ride into work in the mornings. They drive their SUV out of a nice little neighborhood, turn down the street, and park and idle with their kid waiting for the bus. Just stuck it in google maps... 0.3 miles
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Our neighbor's driveway is about twenty feet longer than ours, and every trash day he uses his pick up truck to take the two trash cans to the front for pick up. And no, he doesn't do it on his way out to somewhere else. Zoom! To the end of the driveway. Zoom! Goes back inside.
He uses his truck to bring the empty trashcans back too. I just pick ours up and *gasp* carry it as I walk home from the train station. Roughly 3 car lengths. I even walk to our mailbox.
And obviously the same happens with his recycling bins.
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just watched my neighbor drive her kids to the bus stop at the end of the court (less than 1/2 a block away) and then drive home after she dropped them off. she does the reverse at the end of the school day
I've seen this same thing on my bike ride into work in the mornings. They drive their SUV out of a nice little neighborhood, turn down the street, and park and idle with their kid waiting for the bus. Just stuck it in google maps... 0.3 miles
I see that here too. I don't get it. One neighbour drives her kids to and from school everyday, which is at the end of the street. It would be a 3 to 4 minute walk.
Yesterday I saw one of my neighbours put her 2 kids in the car and drive to the park. Which is across the street. Literally. I think she moved her car about 50 feet. She must have forgotten something at home, because a few minutes later we watched her hop in her car, drive back home, then drive back to the park. My SO and I were speechless. All that in the span of about 5 minutes...
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Don't know how far they drove, but on Monday I saw somebody working hard to squeeze their SUV into a tiny parking spot so they could be close to... the beginning of a hiking trail.
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The gym.
Came here to say this. Especially the treadmill users.
Okay, I'm just gonna say that I drive to the gym because
1. I go at 5:30 am and it's dark
2. I swim.
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A number of people in my neighborhood drive their kids to the school bus stop every morning. You seen them there, cars idling while they wait, even in beautiful weather. For most of these folks it is 2-3 blocks away with nice sidewalks and walking paths everywhere. The farthest corner of our neighborhood is about 0.3 miles from the bus stop. I think they are missing a great opportunity to teach their kids the many benefits of using their own two legs to get somewhere.
+1
People and driving kids to school has become very ridiculous.
There's a school near where I work. It has several school buses. Every morning as I walk down past the school to get to my office I pass between 80 - 100 vehicles. Each has one driver and one kid in the passenger seat. Mercedes, Lexus, BMW, Porches, the occasional mustang or corvette . . . but they're mostly big dollar SUVs. They actually cause a enough back up that often police need to come by and direct traffic to help clear the roads.
Boggles the mind.