No matter which vehicle Im driving I always park at the back of the lot , I prefer walking a extra couple of feet to dents and scratches, since moving to Az. I have learned to expect the unexpected like seeing people walk in to public places with side arms which is legal here unless posted otherwise on the door, at Christmas time when the temps sometimes drop below a bone chilling 65 degrees I see people shopping with scarfs and gloves and on the flip side I've seen people walking around in hooded sweat shirts when it's 100 degrees outside,
While this does not necessarily surprise me it's not something you see every day, I went to the corner grocery store to pick up a prescription (this was prior to taking the drug) and while trying to find a open space I saw this , I did not ck the horses saddle for the handicapped sticker just figured the sign was the only place the owner could tie him up !! I love AZ. I did notice the horse was courteous and left a space for a handicap vehicle.

saw this

 

Very good looking horse.

 

I park toward outer areas even with my daily drivers. People simply don't care if they damage others' property. Plus I figure I can use the exercise.

Not unusual to see an Amish horse and buggy rig in parking lots here. Also not unusual for an inattentive driver to run over one. Two buggy/car collisions in the past year with predictable results.

 

I Park away from the horseshit

 

Near the outside, shade if I can get it.

 

As far away from the herd as possible, and in shade if possible.

 

I'd take a scratch over a hoof-print in my car door any day.

I park in an empty area of the lot when I'm driving one of my summer toys. If I can get an end spot to leave an extra foot or two between me and the next car, I'll park there even when driving one of my winter beaters.

Back in the day when my winter beater was a real POS ('77 Dodge Tradesman 100 panel van, affectionately nick-named the UAV by my co-workers), I once saw 2 cars parked offset leaving minimal room between them for another car. I wedged the van between them so tight that I had to exit from the back door. I wish I would've seen the one fool have to enter his passenger door and crawl across his console to back out his car.

 

Looks like one of the early one horsepower models with a saddle exterior...

Seriously, that is a great picture!

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Horsepower is a weird unit that is sustained power of a horse over a long period of time. That horse there could, when rested, probably punch 15 HP for a while. He or she would be just fine chilling at 1 HP for all day, but would get tired at some point. It was something made by Watt to rate an engine to something we knew. Later, a much better unit, the Watt, was named after him. Nowadays, we get around it by saying 550 ft lbs / sec but it's an approximation to an actual horse's power.

 

I, too, keep to remote parts of the parking areas.

When you do this, your car occasionally and inexplicably attracts a car to park next to you. This happened to me 8 months ago and resulted in damage to my Challenger. I waited 2 hours for the driver to return; she refused to talk to me and drove away. I filed a police report with numerous pictures of the perp's car and the damage plus measurements and a diagram of how the car door caused the damage. The $350 repair claim was denied by her insurance company because I didn't prove she did it.

 

In the handicapped zone near the front door but away from horse $hit.... Tedd

 

In keeping with the theme of the post, the stores usually provide these things called CART CORRALS !! well apparently no one has educated the public on there existence or provided them with detailed instructions on how to use them, they are generally abundant and well placed;
My daily driver is a 2016 Jeep Laredo, when it was approx 1 month old I made a grocery trip to the same store where the horse was parked I went to the back of the lot as usual,
not a vehicle with in 100 feet, satisfied with my babies safety I completed my mission and returned to find still no vehicles with in 100 feet, however planted smack dab in the middle of the drivers door was a shopping cart which of course inflicted damage about the size of a quarter in my new Black Beauty, now it was quite a breezy day and my theory is it got loose from a non secured open area blew across the parking lot with enough steam to damage my new ride, While this may not have been the fault of a thoughtless person parked next to me it was probably the fault of someone to lazy to return the cart to the CART CORRAL what a novel idea !!!!

 

I usually park away from the herd and pull through so the front of the vehicle is facing out...old muscle car habit...in case the car won't start.

Then there is always the xtgfde!? that parks right on top of me with 20 empty spots around us.

 

I once also looked for shade whenever I could. 'Till the day came when I exited the store and birds in the tree had sh@t all over my hood. Now I'm perfectly fine parking in the sun. It just means that I run the a/c a little bit more, that's all.

 

With my beater daily driver Neon, closest as possible to the gate!!! If it’s raining when I get off work, I don’t want to walk 1/4 mile and be drenched when I get in the car. Added bonus, if I’m parked close to the gate, I’m usually in the car and driving towards the exit before anyone else gets to their car. This avoids the mad rush and 500 other people trying to get out of the parking lot and home.

When I drove my Ram every day, I didn’t even bother walking to the gate until my shift actually ended. That meant by the time I actually got to the parking lot, most of the crowd had already left. Less people, fewer cars, less headaches.


I can sympathize with the shopping cart dent. My truck was maybe 6 months old, I noticed a scratch that started about the middle of the passenger bedside, over the cab corner, the rear door, and finally stopped about the middle of the front door. I’m guessing someone carelessly rub s purse, shopping cart, something all along the side of my truck. Most of it buffed out.

It really sucks that you have to plan ahead for other people’s carelessness. When I did daily drive my Ram, I would look for cars that belonged to the previous shift, or people I knew got off work after me and would park so their passenger door was facing my truck. That way, there would be no one opening the door against my truck. I knew I was in for a relaxing day when someone I worked with would park on the drivers side!

To most people, cars/trucks are just modes of transportation. And granted, that’s true. Just very expensive transportation! Occasionally, I get new truck fever. And when I window shop, it doesn’t take long to calculate that it would cost about 60K to buy a new truck equivalent to what I’m driving now.

 

I try to park away, but here in Cal, so many cars hard to hind a spot to yourself. Do you guys remember the commercial, from a couple years ago, can't remember if it was a insurance company, or something to do with car painting, but anyway, starts with a aerial view, of a large parking lot, with one car in it, and you hear a loud car in the back ground, and it comes driving by, slams on his brakes, and slides past the car, backs up and parks so close to the one car, he has to go out the passenger side, I think it funny and yet so real, you just can't get away from some people.

 

I think it was Allstate. I remember it, empty parking lot, not another car in sight. I think it was a old station wagon, smoking, squeaking,rattling heap. Parks inches away from someone’s pride and joy.

To most people, that commercial is humorous. To automotive enthusiasts, that’s fingernails on a chalkboard!!!

 

Like others have said, away from the main crowd, try to get an end spot, and leave as much room as possible from the adjacent spot.





But sometimes that doesn't work out as you would hope.

 

I always park in the far extremities, even with my New York state winter rat. I like to walk. With my semi-better vehicles, at the grocery store, I try to stay away from the cart coral and if the grade allows uphill from it. I guess I'm still smarting from when I was a teenager, I parked my LS6 Chevelle in the far but lower corner of the store I was working at. That evening I found a shopping cart into the left fender. That was decades ago but I can still picture the dent!

 

Ken, You could be safest next to that cart corral no one uses them !! probably would have been the safest place for the horse too !!

 

It's on the other side of the landscape island so there's lots of room. I typically park there in whatever vehicle I'm driving.

 

This past week here a KIA Soul was headed westbound around 7pm blinded by sun and ran over a buggy, killing a 19yo Amish boy and putting his siblings in ICU. Amish have been in the area long enough ppl should know to watch for the buggies, esp since there are signs on all state roads in the areas they live.

An Amish builder is putting up my state trooper cousin's house. Extraordinary craftsmanship.

 

Well, best laid plans....Went to see my brother, in Lubbock. They have wide "L" shaped driveway leading into the garage. We weren't there an hour and my S-I-L backed smoothass right into the drivers door. Had to back-up over 30 feet to do it. I had made sure to park to the far edge of the drive to give her plenty of elbow room. Even worse, she wasn't home when we arrived and drove right by my truck to pull into the garage.

When she told me, she had BIG 'ol tears in her eyes. I told her if that was the only thing we had to cry about I would cry with her. (But, the reason for our visit was to see my brother who very likely is fighting the last of his seven year battles with his third cancer. Almost lost him 2.5 weeks ago). So, in the grand scheme of things...it ain't nothin' but a thing.

Tore the hell out of her Toyota Odyssey, too. To top it off, that sucker is surrounded by cameras and sensors.

 

Only good thing about that story is the Odyssey is a Honda (says the Toyota engineer). God bless your brother.

 

Damn...and I know that, too. Just got off the phone with my Grandson telling him he might want to look at a good used Tacoma for his 1st vehicle. I guess my brain got caught in the intersection. Ha, Ha!

Thanks for your well wishes for my brother.