Parents today... most don't seem to care.
I have my work cart at the rescue, graciously donated by my mom a few years back. I use the top usually for when people are signing adoption papers, and the second shelf has all these little red bins, like the type you see in a divided toolbox. I have a much larger version (complete with the red bins -- about... 20ish of them?) of this:
So...for the purpose of making my hardware accessible to me when I need it, I don't have these bins in the actual toolbox, but rather, I have them lined up on the second shelf of my work cart.... where they are apparently highly-sought-after-playthings.
Now, before you think that I have one or two of each item in each bin, consider this. One bin holds washers... I can at least get 20-30 in there, probably more if they're nicely lined up. For something smaller like snap clips (the clips that hold the toys and hammocks to the cage, I can undoubtedly get over 200 in there. And that's how they all are... the smaller the item, the more I can get in there, and I try to keep them relatively full, because when I need them, I rarely need one or two, I need several.
This is becoming a problem.
I have them on the cart for convenience -- when I need them, they are easy access to me, as the cart is always kept accessible, as we use it every day. However... it seems, especially this fall / winter season, we've had an unusually large number of kids playing in the bins. If I see this, I have told the kid something along the lines of, "oh honey, please don't touch that." Trying to be nice, and you know, it's not my kid. Usually the kid stops for a bit.... but in every instance I can think of, has gone right back. Usually there's two parents / adults there, and what has happened several times... AFTER I have already told the kid to not touch, the kid resumes touching, and one of the parents points out out to the other parents, hey the kid is touching the stuff again. (why they don't tell the kid no, but rather point out to the other parent, I don't know). Here's the best part -- the parent they tell, in almost every instance has turned to them and said something like, "oh it's ok, I'll fix it before we leave." Now, I probably don't need to tell you that they, in fact, do NOT fix it before they leave.
This is a problem for two reasons. First, these are small pieces, and even for not-so-young children, could easily be a choking hazard. Apparently this isn't a concern for parents, nowadays. Second... when they leave, I have to re-sort all the parts! The last time this happened, they were so messed up, I literally had to dump out all the bins and re-sort them all. This took about an hour or so for me to individually sort all those little parts into their bins. This is time I should not have to spend!
See, when I was growing up, and going somewhere with my parents, before we'd even leave the house, my parents would remind me, "now, don't touch anything." Then, as we'd be walking into the store, they'd again remind me, "remember, don't touch anything." Apparently this isn't a thing anymore! But it made sense, because if I didn't touch anything, I couldn't touch anything that would potentially hurt me or mess stuff up for anyone else to have to fix or clean up. Nowadays, it seems, the kids touch whatever they want, and the parents let them, to keep them occupied. Now, I don't have kids, so I know a lot of people say, oh it would be different if I did. No, it wouldn't! If I was at someone's house and my kid decided to play with their obviously-not-toys and mess them up, I would tell the kid to knock it off! Not only do I find it disrespectful that the kid isn't listening to me, you know, an adult asking them to not do something, but I also find it disrespectful that the parents don't seem to care what I said, cause they let their kids do the exact opposite! That's just not right. I shouldn't have to "hide" my needed tools, to the inconvenience of myself, because people can't seem to control their kids. I find this maddening.
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