Not all return situations are equal either. There is a difficulty factor. I've returned carts every time in my life except once. I was about 50 car rows deep in a massive crowded lot and I realized there were no cart corrals at all. At the back of the massive lot and much, much closer to me was a bunch of carts. I pushed a few together and added mine. The difference in this scenario was not me.
See this is an exception that proves the rule. The fact that there was no way for you to return the cart to a cart corral means that it was a noticeable and memorable event, a deviation from what should normally be the correct way of doing things. If you had been a person who'd never returned carts, this would have just been a day ending with the letter "y."