Parking lot fun
With much ambivalence, we took a ride to the local outlet mall. The parking lot, as expected, was beyond capacity with drivers slowly following shoppers out of the mall and down the parking lot aisles. Way down at the end of one of the lanes, we found someone backing out with no one waiting. We quickly saw why - the spot was kind of narrow because the driver one spot over to the left out had parked over the line separating the spaces. Additionally, the car to the right of the space I wanted was also parked very close to our space, so I would be forced to park almost on the line to my left. So we were going to pull into a spot that would have a very small spot vacant to the left - no one would be able to fit there, or so I thought. We were only in the mall about 20 minutes and returned to find this:
First, let me state that I have no idea why the parking line is blue, as this was near the end of the row and was certainly not a handicapped space. My car (on the right) was close to the line, as I mentioned, because the car to my right (not shown) was also way to the left in their space. The end result: the Sienna driver folded in both side view mirrors and wedged into the oh-so-narrow open space next to me, and made it almost impossible for me to open my driver side doors. Thanks a lot, buddy.
(In hindsight, I have to say that the driver did a heck of job threading that needle of a space…backing in no less!)