Stupid American Story of the Day

Technically this happened yesterday, but if I hadn't told you that you would never have known...

I was working the walk-up window at work (that's Starbucks, not Gap - they haven't gotten that advanced yet) and this woman comes up and asks if it is OK for her to leave her car in the handicap spot so she can watch her kids. I ask her how long she plans on staying there and think that I hear her say that she's just going to leave the car there until she orders her drink. We go back and forth for a bit and finally I tell her that the decision ultimately has to be hers because it's illegal and clearly I can't recommend she does something illegal. As I'm making her drink I'm thinking "what a sweet mom, she doesn't want to let her kids out of her sight for five minutes". However, this illusion was shattered when she and what I assume was her boyfriend take their drinks and go to sit down and smoke a few fags. Now I'm not just talking about a quick chuff, no, they smoked and finished their drinks.

You may be thinking this isn't that bad, certainly people have done worse. But let me tell you the kicker, the kids (a boy and a girl) were no older than 4, it was at least 90 out and all the windows in the car were rolled up. This is how kids die! I was absolutely irate and the only thing any of my colleagues said to acknowledge it was "well, at least she isn't smokig in the car with the kids". Excuse me?! Like this is going to matter when her kids are dead from heat exhaustion (OK, I'm not actually sure that that is what they would die from, but I know they could die).

While I continued to rave, she did come back to the car and I thought "finally, she's going to take them out of the car with her". No. Instead she took the boy out (I couldn't see for what reason) and immediately put him back, going back to her nicotine and caffiene binge. I was about 30 seconds from calling the police when she finally pulled away. I probably should have called child services anyway.

I was absolutely disgusted and even more so because none of my colleagues seemed to think this was remotely disturbing. I can't imagine this going unnoticed other places - even in America - and shutter to think this woman will continue to do this because no one will ever say anything.