Situational Awareness Discussion

**IronButt** · December 31st, 2010, 07:33 PM

Originally Posted by heili

I was out with a coworker once, having lunch, and she made a comment about how men will never sit with their back to the door. It took a minute before I realized why I had never noticed this ... and that's because I usually pick my seat first so that my back isn't to the door.

I notice things in my surroundings, and when I mention something later, I find that people often have no idea what I'm talking about.

Good habit. When my wife & I go out to eat, she always gets the receptionist to seat her facing the door, because she knows that's where I like to sit. I've also taught her to look for alternate exits; like the kitchen door, & for cover.

**heili** · January 1st, 2011, 09:08 AM

Originally Posted by IronButt

Good habit. When my wife & I go out to eat, she always gets the receptionist to seat her facing the door, because she knows that's where I like to sit. I've also taught her to look for alternate exits; like the kitchen door, & for cover.

It's something I've always done without thinking about it. I don't like to sit anywhere that people can sneak up behind me.

Most of my situational awareness is automatic stuff that I have never really had to think about. It's difficult for me to put it into terms more specific than being aware of the environment and everything in it, because until someone points out what I'm doing I don't consciously know I'm doing it.

The only other thing I know I do is identifying the dead weight in a group, the people most likely to freeze, cry, or completely shut down if suddenly we are in the shit. I don't like being in a group with a lot of those.

**ungawa** · January 1st, 2011, 09:41 AM

I have a SA story.

Yesterday I was at a grocery store near a woman with her two young children. One of her children was standing in the middle of an aisle complaining to his mom about something. The woman saw somebody coming with a cart at her 4-o-clock from at least 15 feet away. She grabbed the kid and pulled him to the side, saying, "Get out of the way. Don't stand in the middle of the aisle like that." Not in an angry voice or anything, just instructional.

How often you see that shit at a grocery store nowadays?

Around here grocery stores are filled with completely stupid and oblivious people that walk backwards into me while their little demon monkeys swarm around like rabid foxes.

**IronButt** · January 1st, 2011, 11:43 AM

Originally Posted by ungawa

Around here grocery stores are filled with completely stupid and oblivious people that walk backwards into me while their little demon monkeys swarm around like rabid foxes.

......... knock displays over; scream at the top of their lungs, when Mom says, "No" to them; etc. All the while Mommy's checking her PDA or on the cell phone & saying, "Honey, please don't do that anymore."; & completely ignoring the kid.

**tsor39** · January 1st, 2011, 11:55 AM

The first real lesson my son received was as I picked him up at work one night over the summer. I like to keep the windows open for fresh air.

We were stopped in a light in Allentown, when the door of the car behind me opened. A darker gentleman came running around the car to my side. Before he got there my sidearm was released and hand on the grip. Lucky for all that the guy just needed directions.

Did I over react? Maybe. My son did not realize what was going on until it was almost over. He learned to pay attention.

**XD40coyote** · January 1st, 2011, 07:10 PM

On the subject of bratty kids, I actually don't run into them often in SYC and on the MD side where it is rural. SYC has all the restaurants and shopping centers and suburbanite MDers, either who moved, or who come to the walmart ( the Shrewsbury Walmart is like a shrine to a bunch of Baltimorons). I am plain surprised that there are so many well behaved children. Now my parents did come across a kid that was acting up major time at the Cracker Barrel, and the parents and kid ended up leaving and the mother was making snide comments about being " kicked out". My guess is a young kid with autism ( not the aspergers type) or other mentally challenged condition. However it doesn't matter if it's autism or good old fashioned spoiled brattyness, people get annoyed by screaming children that go on and on, and a crowded place like Cracker Barrel is no place for a young kid with autism ( way too much stimuli and too many people).

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