SANTA MONICA, CA— Emphasizing that his thoughts were always and only for his fellow motorists, local parallel parker Ed Billings admitted Monday that he strives to leave just enough room between the cars ahead of or behind his own so that other drivers are eventually infuriated into simply giving up after a few abortive parking attempts. “All right, this looks like exactly enough space for the driver of a midsized sedan or small SUV to spend about 10 minutes giving it their best shot while other drivers honk at them before they finally get unnerved or annoyed and drive away,” said Billings, 39, expertly evaluating the carefully calculated space between his 2005 Honda CR-V and the crossover SUV seven-eighths of a car length in front of him. “I want to leave just enough distance for a car of average size to struggle with taking a stab at several different angles of approach and getting exasperatingly close to wedging themselves into this spot before they finally just yell ‘Fuck it’ a few times and pound on their steering wheels before calling it quits. It’s just a little thing I do for my fellow drivers. I also want to make sure I leave exactly the right space so that the person in front of me has to hit my front bumper while trying to back out.” At press time, Billings was struggling to suppress his rage and frustration as the driver of a 2017 Smart Fortwo simply breezed into the undersized parking spot in a single attempt.

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