Culture Clash In Hillmomba

I had to take the boys bowling today because HH had to work. While at the new bowling alley, my T-Hoe got blocked in the parking lot. We got there at 11:45, seeing as how the league starts at 12:00, and last week they had to sit in the car until 11:50 because the workers wouldn't let them in. This week, they must have let everyone camp there overnight. The tables were full and everyone was practicing and had already ordered food.

When I pulled in the lot, I said, "They must have let people in earlier. Look at all the cars." There was a row of cars parked against the building, then an expanse of blacktop that was the 'road' in front, then some gravel where the parking lot will be paved. There was a row of cars along the gravel, with their front tires just up to the blacktop. I parked next to the last one there. While we were bowling, the people arriving later had parked behind our row in the gravel. Kind of like you park rows of cars at the fairgrounds. One row pulls in, and the next row parks right behind, so you have a double row.

Oh, but then the city slickers came to town. You can tell them by their snottiness and the good haircuts on their kids. They act all entitled-y and sh!t. When #1 and I left bowling, we found T-Hoe sandwiched in between two rows of cars. That's right. The fools had pulled in front of us and parked on the blacktop, leaving a very narrow road in front, but more stupidly, a triple row of parked cars. That's crap. Crap, I say! What kind of idiot parks to create a third row of cars? How do they think the middle car will get out? Do they think everybody leaves bowling at 11:00 p.m. closing time? Like the end of a concert, or football game?

I sent #1 in to have them announce that a white Honda something-or-other was blocking us.

When #1 returned, he stood beside my door. I told him to get in. He said, "I want to see if someone comes out, or if I have to go back in." While we waited, a bearded guy (but not in a meth-y way) came out. He called to a teenage girl who had just gotten something out of the car parked behind HIM, "Darlin', I'm glad you're out here. Could you back up so I can get my car out?" She did. #1 said, "That guy was right behind me inside. He had them announce that the blue car or the white truck needed to move, because he was blocked in."

Just then a chubby lady with a Dorothy Hamill haircut came out. She stomped over to her car, yanked open the door, plopped in, jammed it into gear, and gunned it in reverse. I was only halfway paying attention, what with buckling up and fiddling with my XM stations to get the radio off that confounded Obama train ride on FOX news. Then she took off down the narrow front-of-the-building roadway that deadends. #1 got in. "She was yelling, 'I wouldn't say I'M the one blocking you in!' when she got in her car. Then she pointed her finger at you." I asked if she flipped me off. He said, "No. She just pointed it right at you, like 'YOU!' and glared at you." Hmpf! And I missed a chance for a good flipping-off, Obama-style.

I pulled up into the space she had left. I said, "Do you think we should just park here and go back in?" #1 didn't think so. But it would have been sweet, sweet revenge. That woman's antics were even more proof that she was a city slicker. Any respectable redneck would have come right to my window, grabbed me by my lovely lady-mullet, called me 'b!tch', and told me to get out so she could kick my a$$. That's how we do things around here.

Well, now. How DARE I arrive and airlift my Tahoe into a space in the middle of two rows of cars. Apparently the whole middle row of us shared the helicopter. There is no freakin' way I would have driven in, seen a row of cars parked on the gravel, and thought, "Oh, how nice! They've left the blacktop parking spaces for me and my buddies." Nope. It was a ROAD. There are no parking spaces painted anywhere. That will happen when they pave the parking lot. The nerve of some people! And I don't mean ME! She knew she was blocking me in when she parked there. She didn't want to walk an extra 50 feet. She was just mad about being called on it. Too bad, so sad. Go back up the highway 55 minutes and mingle with your own kind. She must have been down at the lake development for the weekend. There was a whole birthday party of kids in wool sweaters. They weren't from around here, by cracky!

I am entitled to park without being blocked in. I am entitled to ask for a car to be moved so I don't have to wait hours to get out. I am entitled to leave peacefully without some lunatic pointing her finger at me. I am entitled to a peaceful day amongst my hillbilly brethren. That woman never would have been caught dead at the OLD bowling alley, the smoky, dark, carpet-stained, grease-and-stale-beer-smelling, everybody-knows-your-name old bowling alley.

The country is going to h*ll in a handbasket. And I don't mean the United States. I mean laid-back, Mayberry RFD, Petticoat Junction, Green Acres, Walton's Mountain, mainstreet Hillmomba.