Things That Bug Me

Maybe I’m getting old because suddenly more and more things bug me. Things have always annoyed me but now things bother me to a degree that I can no longer simply ignore them. More and more things are driving me crazy enough to make me snap at offenders whether in person, in literature, or on TV. Is it too much to ask to have everybody do things my way?

Anyways here is a short list, in no particular order, of things that make me want to scream:

1. People who mispronounce the words library, Arctic, and Antarctic. Is it too much to ask that people notice and value the letters that make up these words? For Pete’s sake, they aren’t pronounced Ar-tic or Li-bary! There are letters in there that deserve your respect. Arrrghhh!


2. People who chew gum. I loathe the sound of chewing in general and having to listen to people chomp on their gum and blow bubbles is enough to make me want to kill myself. This, of course, is yet another reason why Singapore is one of the best places on earth – chewing gum is illegal.


3. People who bring oversized suitcases on board airplanes and fill up the overhead bins. It’s one thing when *I* have four carry-on items that I have sneaked in past the watch guards at the boarding gate – that’s different. When other people think that full-sized cases and giant bags can fit into those small bins it’s simply rude!


4. Baby corn.


5. People who assume I’m American and then don’t care when I correct them. Canada is the second largest country (in land mass) on the planet and yet so many people seem to think it is just a slightly more northern state belonging to the U.S. Just because I have a non-accent (Hubby edit: Yeah right, eh!) doesn’t mean that my birthplace was south of the 49th parallel!


6. Bad customer service. I’ve worked in customer service for more years than I can remember – in call centers, libraries, book stores, charities – you name it, I’ve probably put in my time. So when people can’t be bothered to show me general politeness due to any customer it drives me nuts. Please and thank you are not by-words, they’re courtesies – learn to love them!


7. TV shows with stupid morals. I love the old “very special episodes” as much as any child of the 80s but some shows take it too far. My favourite example of this is “Seventh Heaven” the WB’s ultimate preachy show. While this show drove me nuts early on, the final nail in that coffin was an episode that said that drinking any alcohol made you evil. The main character in the episode was convinced to sink a 20-year-old bottle of liquor because his foster child believed that taking one sip of wine or liquor would mean the end of the world. Morals are great and everything but telling people that life should be lived in extremes is just wrong and highly annoying.


8. People who think all children are cute and my lack of children is a sign that I’ve been possessed by the devil. Yes, there are many cute children on the planet and I’m sure that yours are the cutest of them all. But not everyone wants to have short people running around screaming, crying, breaking things, and being uncute. Being child-phobic does not make me evil – it just means that my brother got my share of maternal instincts. (Besides, children are just as typ0-phobic and you don’t see people criticizing them!) I’m sure your children are lovely and I’m equally positive that they’re even lovelier when they’re not around me.


9. Skinny people. I realize that Hubby could be included in this list but his amazing hotness doesn’t make his sort any less annoying. I’m fat, I get it! I should lose weight, I get that too. If I were an alcoholic, you would feel bad for me and try to help me. But since I’m fat you skinny folks assume that it is something I have done to myself and I deserve to be looked down upon and mocked. It isn’t as if I can take a magical pill and be skinny, or just stop eating all together! Besides, it isn’t as if being able to count your ribs when you’re wearing a t-shirt is so sexy.


10. People who read pet peeve lists just so that they can replicate the behaviours to drive the author crazy. Really, please don’t. Ever.

So there you have a few of my pet peeves. And I think that we all know that there are many more that I haven’t bothered mentioning for fear of seeming like too much of a hater (scuffing shoes, people who chew with their mouths open, things I’m not good at, people who don’t like me, mortadella, etc.). I am, after all, nothing if not a big ball of short nerve endings waiting to turn on any innocent bystander at the chomp of a piece of gum. But the one thing that doesn’t annoy me is people who comment on my blog. Subtlety, obviously, is another thing that doesn’t annoy me.