That attitude has no age.

You just slowly but firmly push your cart into that whole situation while saying “sorry! Scuse me! Sorry!”

Wednesday is Senior Discount Day at my local grocery store and it’s unbridled chaos. I do my best to avoid Wednesdays.

When I’m in the grocery store, I constantly have to remind myself that other people do indeed exist. My brain becomes 80% nonsense, 15% is focused on the thing on the shelf, and 5% spatial awareness.

If you ever intend to pants me, the grocery store is a great place to try it.

I’m glad I’m not the only one who gets overstimulated at the grocery store.

Costco drives me insane. I like Costco but not being in Costco.

Why is it that they're always exactly where you need to be too? Or, you try to hit an empty store aisle at 2:00 on a Tuesday to get your barings and suddenly, there's 6 people all around you on opposite sides, trapping you in the middle.

Hah, that's why I just cropdust their aisle upon turning around.

I'll just go down the next aisle and wait for the old person to be so grossed out that they move on.

Some one please explain what is this dude doing?

why I shop at night or as close to closing time as possible, and also why I have no issue getting close with people as and assertive for space or passage. you wanna go in public and act like nobody else exists? I'll act like you don't exist

My thing is why don’t people commit to one lane like driving rules? Why do they think it makes sense to have 2 people going the same direction right next to each other in the aisle?

I especially don’t get why some people are rude enough to turn their carts sideways like this. That’s never acceptable and seems like it would be less concern them as well.

It does make it easier to block a wider aisle but that implies it’s intentional

Never seen that in Germany

The super common thing here for geriatrics are to just stand in the literal doorway, seemingly bewildered by the overwhelming number of shiny goods they can see on sale immediately upon entering or perhaps they simply forgot why they were there.

Stores are also pushing the boundaries of how far they can reduce aisle widths. Every one of the corporate retailers in my area who have remodeled their stores since the COVID era, have reduced aisle widths. Having had to travel quite a bit the past year and change, my impression is that this seems to be an industry-wide thing.

Also since the COVID era, all or nearly all of the restocking happens during the day time now. In the before times, the bulk of shelf restocking happened during low-volume hours and/or over night. Now, the people stocking shelves are competing for aisle space along with customers.

And don't forget that pretty much all the stores have order pickers (for online pick-up orders) roaming around with large trolleys. In theory this helps reduce foot traffic to the stores, of course, but for a variety of reasons, the way they currently operate seems to negate any of those potential benefits making them a wash at best.

THEN you add the shoppers (particularly older shoppers) whose primary outlets for socialization are church and impromptu meetings in the grocery store aisles, and it is a recipe for frustration for shoppers. People around here are generally nice and courteous, until group dynamics kick in and they get distracted by the news that Betty Parsons was just diagnosed with a heart valve condition and Wanda McCabe's grand daughter just graduated from college.

I meticulously read labels on everything. I kind of have to since I can't just eat anything off the shelf - it's complicated.

But one thing I do is to be aware of how much room the cart/trolley/whatever is taking up. I much prefer to use a hand-basket or smaller cart if available. I'll also park the damn thing outside the aisle if there's room nearby, or next to my person parallel to the flow of traffic. Why gack up the whole lane?

At the same time, I also appreciate that a typical supermarket is an assault on the senses where even the neuro-normative struggle. It's not hard to find people that are clearly stuggling, doubling-back-and-forth through the whole market to complete their shopping list (just peek in the basket then consider where you are in the store). The frequency of this happening is kind of staggering.

The best is when you work up the nerve to say "excuse me" and they glare at you like you're in the wrong.

@thal3s the timing of this is in my feed is spooky. I was at a Walmart around 9:00AM trying to access the vitamin section. Of course there was a 177 year old townie woman comparing vitamin brands as if she would be able to make an informed decision from the labels alone. Then I noticed there was one in every isle. Male variants too. As they near end of life they must go where they feel most comfortable, drawn to fluorescent lights and surveillance capitalism.

Can't push them, but you can sure as hell push their cart out of the way

I thought it was just a joke about the tai chi looking pose = old people in parks. Did I understand wrong?