This is an off-topic post about the most annoying invention in the grocery store since the little sprinklers that turn on every time you reach for a carrot: the oversized shopping cart that allows a child to pretend to drive while mommy or daddy shop.

Oversized grocery shopping cart

Let’s take a quick look at what parents believe people are thinking about them versus the actual thoughts of other customers:

• Parents: Billy is so cute pretending to drive.
• Customers: That freaking cart is larger than my car; move it—and that overly indulged child–out of the way so that I can shop.
• Parents: Billy is going to be a good driver, just like me.
• Customers: The way you make turns and maneuver through traffic with a shopping cart, it’s no wonder the parking lot is like a demolition derby competition.
• Parents: It’s nice that Billy can be distracted while I shop.
• Customers: Why do parents always feel the need to entertain or distract their children? Our parents taught us how to behave when we were young, not looked for more and better ways to distract us. What’s next–a DVD player in that thing?
• Parents: It’s nice that Billy doesn’t pull food off the shelves while I shop.
• Customers: I’d rather he knock a can of corn off the shelf that you have to pick up rather than block all of the cereal from Alpha Bits to Fruit Loops while in a cart half as long as a football field.
• Parents: I never hear Billy whine when he’s one of these carts.
• Customers: Can’t you hear you child whining? Oh, wait, probably not since he’s 10 feet in front of you and aimed the other direction. He’s whining at me, and I don’t care!
• Parents: These carts make shopping a pleasurable experience; I only wish there were more of them.
• Customers: Which aisle is the dynamite in?

–Paul