You know America is lazy when...

When I went to PSU the campus loop bus was made free my senior year. It was constantly mobbed with people who would take it rather than walk for 5 minutes. This basically made it useless, because if you actually wanted to get from one side of campus to another (probably 3/4 of a mile) it was not often too crowded to use.

At my former employer there was a diet club. The individuals in the club would consider it their exercise to walk DOWN the stairs. They wouldn't even consider walking up.

I, for one, wish they would keep elevators operating during fires. I have worked with several people (not elderly, but grossly obese) who are a fire hazard themselves because they cannot make it down stairs at any reasonable speed.

Another good one is that practically every larger office building (and many schools now) has a vending machine on every floor that is filled with chips, candy bars, twinkies, etc - and one slot is for granola bars, nutra grain bars, or something similar. Anyone else notice that the snickers always run out before the machine is refilled but the one healthy option is always left?

There isn't a state in the union that would not consider it a violation of the fire code to have a building with no stairs. Even an apartment building. The staff lied to you.

another guest wrote:

hotels/motels replace their stairwells with elevator shafts.

Okay, let's hear some others!!

I once asked the information desk at a major hospital where the stairs were. The lady hesitated, thought, then said, "Well, I don't really know. No one has ever asked that before, and why would anyone want to take the stairs when the elevators are right there."

I saw a health club with an escalator for the 15-20 steps up to the door.

Punk does not suck wrote:

People drive around for 5 minutes just to get a parking space thats 200 feet closer.

or 25 feet closer

I teach at a community college. I get here before 9 AM. The first couple of rows of parking are taken by then but I'm usually able to get a spot maybe three or four rows back. Probably 80% of the parking lot is vacant at this point yet the same pinheads park on the grass at the front edge of the lot BETWEEN all of the "No Parking" signs. They probably save a whopping 50 feet of walking and we're talking healthy 20 year olds. Of course, the other half of this is that the security guards are either too lazy to write parking tickets or they've been told not to.

I see a similar situation at a local strip mall. The entire length of the strip mall has no parking signs along the front walkway. I always some lazy dumb-wit parking right in front of these signs, blocking traffic and making it difficult for people to cross into the parking area. You can bet there will be someone in front of the grocery store, the liquor store, the dollar store, the ATM, you name it. One of the clerks at the grocery store got so p*ssed one day that he picked up one of the signs (it has a weighted base) and plopped it right in front of some guy's bumper, forcing the guy to back up to get around it. Mind you, this guy is impeding flow into/out of the store and making it difficult for the clerk to retrieve carts and assist older customers. I heard later that the driver complained to the manager and the clerk was fired.

but how come obese people have no problem getting up and down to the buffet table 8 times for refills

The stairs might be for emergency use only. They might be accessible from the floor, but the door locks behind you and the only way to get out is to go all the way to the bottom of the stairs and then outside. There might not be a way to open the doors from the stairwell without a key.

Aside from that you are correct, but a business needs to respond to its customers.

hotels have begun to do that for security purposes; it's so they can see everybody who goes up to the upper floors, where the guest rooms tend to be. learned this from a guy who builds hotels. with stairs, it's a whole lot easier for people who aren't supposed to be there to slip upstairs b/c, first, you don't have to wait for the stairs; two, stairs tend to be along the sides of a building and not near the lobby; and, three, there's usually some sort of beep when the elevator arrives so the person manning the desk will know that someone is taking the elevator.

and all hotels have emergency stairs. they couldn't possibly be built without them.

While in my driveway yesterday afternoon of a beautiful sunny fall day here in Livonia, Michigan, obese woman #1 with her son age 3 or 4 says to obese woman #2 in the front porch..."he wants to try to run/walk around the entire block (FYI maybe half mile tops)" Sick isn't he, he's not doing this anymore." No wonder Michigan ranks at the top of the Fatest O'the Land category.

Back in the days before video-on-demand, there used to be a service in several large cities that would deliver your video selection to your door so you didn't have to get in your car and waste all that energy driving to Blockbuster.

I wait tables, and it's hilarious when fat people DEMAND diet coke with their bacon cheese burgers and fries. And if you "accidentally" give them regular coke, they flip out. It's great.

...people sit around all day with a holier-than-thou attitude bitching about the rest of the world not working.

Old Man By the Sea wrote:

I work p/t in a running store..you would be stunned at the market for motion control shoes..because of "bad feet"..When really it is obesity..just fat people who are not willing to change there habits...they walk in and act like a victim ..it is unreal...

Yet, I'm sure you're very eager to take the $130 they want to plop down on some clod hopper motion control shoes. How many people have you actually tried to steer away from those things saying they don't need them?........yeah, thought so....that's pretty ethical.

Oh yeah, and as far as a hotel not having any stairs...hahahaha....B.S. And I'll bet they also have Kerosene heaters in every room sitting right under the drapes. Maybe you're just too stooopid to read the "You are here" map in the hotel.

spoken like a person who would use a gas powered leaf blower.

KevinM wrote:

...people sit around all day with a holier-than-thou attitude bitching about the rest of the world not working.

PORT RUNNER wrote:

I wait tables, and it's hilarious when fat people DEMAND diet coke with their bacon cheese burgers and fries. And if you "accidentally" give them regular coke, they flip out. It's great.

maybe they're diabetic. can't think of a single reason, though, how they could have possibly gotten that way...

LaWoof wrote:

Lets start with the doctors. If all our doctors started be BRUTALLY honest, many people would begin to make changes and stop being lazy.

Sadly, this isn't true. In the course of my practice, I've tried a number of different approaches with patients who have serious health issues arising from preventable habits (smoking, drinking, obesity, etc.) The phrase "You are killing yourself, and will die very shortly" almost never has the desired effect of changing behavior. In fact, very little I say will ever change a patient's behavior: they have to decide for themselves that their behavior is self destructive.

We live in an instant-gratification world. It is EASY to be lazy, and thats why people do it.

guest II wrote:

spoken like a person who would use a gas powered leaf blower.

Perhaps, but it's more accurately spoken like a person who is annoyed by people who think that walking a few extra rows of parking to get to a store is an act worthy of sainthood.

KevinM wrote:

Perhaps, but it's more accurately spoken like a person who is annoyed by people who think that walking a few extra rows of parking to get to a store is an act worthy of sainthood.

That's an interesting flip. I haven't seen anyone in here claiming that walking a few extra rows of parking equates to sainthood. What I have seen is people complaining about others being inconsiderate with their laziness. This is a matter of minimum acceptable behavior among civilized people. Doing the minimum is never a cause for rejoicing.