I’ve talked about the idiocy of Boston drivers before, but today I realized that I’ve been staring at the best example of how bad their behavior really is without even knowing it.

At work, I park in an underground garage, the first two levels of which are devoted to patient parking. In order to get to the levels that allow employee parking, I have to spiral through the two patients-only levels, and every day, it’s like negotiating a maze. People jam their rides into these two levels in ways that leave micrometers between cars, obstruct the driving lanes, bottleneck the ramps, and even block in other cars. Now, let’s reiterate: in order to park on level 1 or 2, you either have cancer yourself or you’re driving someone who has cancer. And as if that isn’t bad enough, and as if going to hear bad news, get chemo, or be blasted with radiation isn’t worse, there’s a decent chance that when you get back to your car, some jackass has made it hard for you to get your car out, all because he couldn’t be inconvenienced by continuing on to the next tier of the garage.

It’s sad when you pine for your old, calm days of driving in Manhattan!