Inconvenient parking

Here's a little story that happened last year.  It's a good illustration of what Minnesotans are like.  They aren't actually interested in helping you, or being polite.  They are motivated by two rules:  (1) do things to demonstrate how they are going out of their way for you (the point is they don't do things that do help you, they do things to demonstrate that they are being inconvenienced by doing it).  (2) making sure you know if you've done something to inconvenience them.

We were going to a movie at the Trylon on Minnehaha Ave. in Minneapolis.  Across from the theater are houses, and parallel parking.  There was an opening on the curb, and a family standing in the yard.  I parked in the space.  The family went between a couple other cars and got into a waiting SUV to go somewhere.

Then the mother of the family came up to my driver's side window.  I rolled it down.  She told me that because I parked there in that empty space, they had to go between the cars, and it was muddy.  I said, "Why are you telling me this?"  She said, "I just wanted to tell you."  "Oh, okay, thank you," I said and rolled the window back up.

Translation:  I had been rude because I had not realized that it would be inconvenient for her if I do something totally normal.  The space was empty, there was no way for me to know they were about to walk in the space (and that would not have been a reason not to park there anyway), and all they had to do was walk between two cars, which is the normal state of affairs.  But she is angry at me for inconveniencing her, and tells me about it!