Things that mildly irritate me: pet peeves
Things That Mildly Irritate Me: Pet Peeves
Things that mildly irritate me. Pet peeves. We all have them. Not major worries or problems like global warming or being stalked by Jehovah's Witnesses. The minor things that aren't even important enough to react to. Things that cause no real pain, don't do any damage (except to your inner steam level). Things that if you mention them to a loved one they give you a funny look. But they get to you! Like the faith healer from Deal, you know, oh yes you know ....
Even if you're a calm person there are things that will irritate you: Read on and see what irritates me and I'll bet you're nodding your head or saying "why hasn't he got ....". You don't know how many pet peeves you have until you start writing them down.
I'd like to thank all the people who've commented at the end of the page and described some of their own pet peeves - we're an irritable bunch :)
A big box of chocolates with the key to flavours on the bottom of the box. Did nobody at the company see the flaw there?
Various Things That Mildly Irritate Me
Random pet peeves
He's Only Being Friendly
We've all had this, from a daft dog owner when her Rottweiler jumps twenty feet at you and licks your head off. I'm British, we shake hands and take five years to make friends. Control your damn dog,
Get Off My Shopping
You put your shopping on the conveyor belt and kindly put a divider after it. The person behind you puts a few items on, then shoves your shopping forward withj the divider. And they always arrange their own items geometrically, perfectly spaced and aligned. Why?
Let Them Off First
Yes, the perennial - trying to board a bus or train while people are trying to get off, especially when said transport is crowded - it has to be one of the most futile and stupid things to do. This irritates me even if I'm sitting down in the train just watching.
Move Down The Bus Please
And the perennial's brother: Get on bus, look down aisle, see no vacant seats, stay by door. Block other people getting on, block people getting off at next stop. Ho hum.
Burnt Cakes In Sainsbury's Supermarket
Usually the raisin whirls, marked half price. You're a huge corporation, buy a kitchen timer!
Serving Suggestions
I've just seen a serving suggestion on a packet of peanuts - apparently I should pour them into a bowl. You live and learn.
Product Advice
Open Before Eating (yep, seen that one, just in time before I starved to death). Caution: Product Hot After Heating. Then there's Keep Away From Children -- all of them? For ever? What about my nephews on Christmas Day - can I give them their presents? Okay, Packaging Dangerous To Children And Pets, yes, but please do be specific.
Electronic Indicators At Bus Stops
A few years back Arriva (better known as Arrivalate) bus company spent a fortune putting electronic boards in bus stops in Liverpool. It's not smart technology, it just parrots the timetable. Doesn't half add to the fun of standing at a windswept bus stop on a wet night for half an hour, seeing a bright, scrolling display of buses that should have come along and haven't..
ps they've stopped using these now - just the blank display to remind us that they spent all that money.
Pedestrian Crossings
A particular type -- you have to stand on a pad and press a button to change the lights. Bags of shopping in hand, the button's too far away to press with your nose so you have to put the shopping on the dirty pavement. And the pads usually slope towards the road - great for senior citizens and mums with prams. And the pads don't register you when they're covered in snow and ice, like today.
Motorists: Begin Indicating, Then Turn
Give us pedestrians a chance, don't put on the indicators to show you've almost completed a turning manouevre.
People Who Repeat The Last Few Words Of A Punchline
Please don't do this, please, please.
People Who Moan Too Much
Erm, well, er, ...
"Pan Fried" on a menu.
Difficult not to use a pan to fry something
The Faith Healer From Deal
(in case you were wondering)
There was an old faith-healer from Deal
Who said,'Although pain isn't real
If I sit on a pin
And it punctures my skin
I dislike what I fancy I feel'
Healing Moon artwork by Elena Soldatkina, used with kind permission
Burning Flags
Certain countries love to burn flags, especially US and UK flags. At the first hint of a political controversy there's a couple of flags burning and a TV camera rolling. How? Where do they get the flags? Do you know where to buy a huge Afghani flag, for example? Do you know where to rustle up a US or UK flag at short notice?
Yet thousands of miles from home, someone is selling these things. I wouldn't have thought a market stall full of western imperialist regalia would be too welcome but someone must import and sell the things in large numbers. And flags are quite expensive as well - no point in buying a cheap flag that'll burn out before the TV crew gets there, you need a good few minutes of flames.
Newspaper headline: "Police warn about bogus home intruders."
As opposed to real home intruders?
More Mild Irritations
Pet peeves continued
When I started writing down the things that irriitate me I didn't realise it would be an ongoing task. Try these mild irritations and see which you might add to your peeves list.
Mwah Mwah
It used to be a kiss on the cheek, then two cheeks, then air kissing, now it's three cheeks. Why? What's next - there aren't many more choices for cheeks.
Putting dead matches back in the box
Just one word. Don't. Or is that two words?
Traffic light probing
Sat at a red light, the driver's index finger reaches nosewards ,,,, Icky.
Xmas baby signs in the garden
"Santa. Heidi lives here". No, no, no.
Valentines presents for the wrong people
Valentine's Day is for lovers or secret admirers. When did people start giving Valentine' presents to members of their own family? In some rural communities, perhaps, but come on -- this is going too far.
If you're having one
When you ask someone if they want a tea or a coffee and that's what they reply. Just answer the question, I wouldn't have asked if I minded making you a drink.
Cinema binge eating
They get to their seat, next to you of course, as the film's just starting. They have coke and burgers and popcorn and crisps and boiled sweets and ice cream and orange drinks and ..... And why do cinemas sell things that have crinkly wrappers?
Cab drivers who talk on their mobile phone
Irritating if it's a hands free -- if it isn't I tell them to stop the vehicle.
Bar staff or shop assistants having a conversation
I've done these sorts of jobs in my younger days and I know how the day can drag, but break off the conversation to serve a customer. I don't want to stand there while Debbie tells Sharon what Kylie said to ....
Whatever
Now worked its way across the Atlantic. I don't support the death penalty but I'd consider it for anyone who delivers this as the universal one word answer. Teenagers, beware.
I apologise for any upset I've caused
Celebrities giving fake apologies on TV - note, not sorry for the actual offences, serial adultery, lying, cheating, stealing, etc. Sorry for upsetting people and losing endorsement contracts.
Shirt collar stiffeners
Whose bright idea was it to start leaving a gap in the collar so these fall out? And nobody remembers to remove them before bunging the shirt in the washing machine.
New parents
Sorry people, your child looks like Winston Churchill for the first few months. And whenever I hear "hasn't he got his father's eyes" I look across at Dad in case Chuckie has pulled out Dad's eyeballs. Don't ask a non-parent to admire your baby., we don't know what to say, apart from generalities. And check for smells before proffering Junior for approval please.
Useless money-off vouchers
My local supermarket has just started a really annoying scheme: spend over twenty pounds and they give you a voucher for £2 off your next shop of £20 or more - but it's only valid for two days.
Toilet paper
Double thickness toilet paper carelessly unrolled so the perforations on the two plys don't match.
Nose Studs
Nose studs. Expensive fake pimples. Why does anyone pay money to insert something that looks like a zit into a part of their face?
There's a tale that Mick Jagger once had an emerald inserted in a tooth - he changed it to a diamond when people kept telling him that he had a bit of spinach stuck between his teeth,
People who moan about the weather. There's no such thing as bad weather, just inappropriate clothing. Every season is awesome
From a blog I came across
Pregnant Women Irritated
Peevish pregnant people
No, it's okay, I don't find pregnant women mildly irritating! There's a good thread on a Mums To Be forum that has a nice long list of the things that annoy pregnant women:
A Quick Joke
A boy asks his father to explain the differences among irritation, aggravation, and frustration. His father picks up the phone and dials a number at random. When the phone is answered, he asks, "Can I speak to Bill, please?"
"No! There's no one called Bill here," says the person who answered the phone.
His father hangs up. "That's irritation," he says.
He picks up the phone again, dials the same number, and asks for Bill a second time. "No, there's no one here called Bill. Go away. If you call again I shall telephone the police," the person says.
His father hangs up and says, "That's aggravation. "
"Then what's frustration? " asks his son.
The father picks up the phone and dials the same number a third time. "Hello, this is Bill. Have I received any phone calls?" he asks casually.
Cars And Their Irritating Drivers
Pet peeves galore
Confession time: I don't own a car, I've never owned a car and I can't drive a car. I had motorcycles for years until I knackered my back, now I'm a pedestrian or what BMW Series 3 drivers call a target. That's assuming they even see me, of course. Vorsprung durch Technik maybe but Series 3 BMWs appear to come without indicators.
Anyone who's blurting out "That's the Audi slogan, not BMW", guess what ... Pet Peeve #27
About the only thing I know about cars is that GTi is meaningless and the letters are in the wrong order. I can distinguish size and colour: "The little red car turned right without indicating and hit the oncoming big white one" but that's all.
Before I list a few pet peeves for car drivers though, let's watch a few of the sorts of thing that get to me, starting with the good old "No Entry signs don't apply to me" brigade.
Daft Drivers
Irritated By Drivers
Pet peeves prompted by idiots in cars
Parking too close
Usually in supermarket carparks: they park six inches from your door.
Circling the carpark
Another supermarket behaviour: drive round and round for ten minutes looking for a space twenty feet closer to the door.
Foot down, the lights are changing
Lights on a crossing about to turn red - accelerate to get through. God forbid you should be held up for thirty seconds.
Driving Miss Emma
Taking little Emma to school in the Range Rover. Chubby little girl never walks a yard. Park six feet out from kerb and nip out to talk to Tamara's mother. Don't worry about the road being single carriageway here - you'll only be a couple of minutes. In the morning rush hour.
And a pint of milk
Convenience store, no parking: simply block road and turn on hazard lights. You're only nipping in for a loaf of bread. And the evening paper. Weird display - have a quick look. Oh, milk. Damn queue at checkout.
BMW Series 3
Just owning one. If you're male you buy lads' mags and think Sam Fox is still hot. If you're female you read the Daily Mail and agree that tomato ketchup causes cancer, cos the Mail says so. And your indicators don't work.
Jokey personalised number plates
1 AM BO5 - that was a waste of £250 wasn't it.
Little angel on board
"Baby on board" stickers may have a point if you crash in the wilds with a baby swaddled on the back seat but take them down when there isn't a baby in the car. MInd you,.why is there a baby on the back seat anyway?
Euphemisms
SUV. People carrier. It's an oversized, over-specced gas guzzler. No amount of marketing flimmery is going to make it any more acceptable. And "people carrier"? As opposed to what gets transported in smaller cars?
Traffic light creeps
It's be green soon, inch forward. A bit more. Again. Why?
Dedicated To An Audi Driver
Jaw-droppingly idiotic
Mild irritations above dedicated to the most stupid behaviour I've ever seen - putting aside people who drive at 80mph in snow. You're a businessman, fat, fifty and you have a company Audi, You're doing 65mph and you're having your lunch - left hand is holding a tin of beans on top of the steering wheel, little finger free to steer the car, right hand is dipping a fork in and out. You wouldn't want to ruin your day by dropping bean juice on your shirt so you concentrate fiercely on the fork. And clip the kerb.
I have never in my life so regretted not having a camera on me as on that day.
Why is there always one type of chocolate in the box that tastes like rat droppings boiled in sugar?
Another Quack Joke
A duck walks into a bar and asks: "Got any Bread?"
Barman says: "No."
Duck says: "Got any bread?"
Barman says: "No."
Duck says: "Got any bread?"
Barman says: "No, we have no bread."
Duck says: "Got any bread?"
Barman says: "No, we haven't got any bread!"
Duck says: "Got any bread?"
Barman says: "No, are you deaf?! We haven't got any bread, and if you ask me again and I'll nail your ******* beak to the bar you ********* ****** duck!"
Duck says: "Got any nails?"
Barman says: "No"
Duck says: "Got any bread?
Current TV ad aimed at baldies: "We specialise in hair loss"
Some ad agency charged a fortune for that idiocy.
Irritated By Things That Don't Work Very Well?
Who has a drawer full of these in the kitchen?
Raise your right hand if you have a garlic crusher rusting in your kitchen drawer. You used it twice, realised you'd get more garlic with less effort by combing the cat and lobbed the crusher into the drawer where you keep all those keys, instruction booklets for things you no longer own and a photo of a relative whose name nobody remembers.
Have you ever bought a small but apparently clever gadget and then found out the advert was a load of codswallop? That grey and white thing is an electronic peeling device that doesn't peel, Yes, I bought one - £2 from Amazon. Hold it on a potato long enough and the potato develops a small bald patch. Tomatoes just laugh at it. Yet they're still on sale.
So then if you've ever brought the credit card out at Ronco this bit's for you ...
New designs for potato peelers
None better than the old styler peelers - stop reinventing the wheel and making it worse.
Garlic crushers
Worth mentioning twice: crush a clove, spend five minutes extracting the skin from the slime, End up thumping another clove in annoyance.
Anything with the word "magnetic" in its name
Magnetic tin openers which don't open tins. Magnetic lights that don't adhere and don't, after the first day, light.
Everlasting knives
No they're not. And these were advertised on television with "buy one, get one free". Why would you need a second everlasting knife?
Food dehydrators
Leach all the goodness and pleasure from fresh food and turn it into something a pitbull can't chew. Brilliant idea.
Steam cleaners
The sort you see on infomercials when you can't sleep and don't fancy Two And A Half Men for the 87th time. On the telly they strip clean an old car in ten seconds, in real life they struggle to push a dust bunny around.
Salad spinners
Thousands of years of evolution for this: a plastic device to make lettuce dizzy. You can even buy a posh one from France at ten times the normal price. Oh la la.
Captchas
That's a captcha from Google Adsense and yes, my setttings were for English UK. I know Guess The Captcha is a bit of a game but please, give us a sporting chance.
"We want people who can influence the roadmap"
Irritating Business Phrases
A pet peeve: business-speak
If you can influence the roadmap then you're probably expert in recapitalising your ideas bank. Yes, yuk.
Thank you for your input
I've just wasted twenty seconds of my life listening to that.
Let's take that offline
In a meeting, means you've raised a subject your boss knows nothing about.
Ladder them up
From one "how to do business" website: 'Interrogate major findings. Ladder them up from stated attributes “this aftershave smells flowery” to consequences, “I don’t smell like I’m trying too hard to be a man” to values, “The cool girls like guys to be a bit androgynous.”…'
Move the needle
"There is real upside in the brand really growing, in terms of accessibility and digital social engagement. I think these type of things could really move the needle."
And a final note, to whoever wrote the job spec that contained "Can you work with dev teams to productionise new software and make it bullet proof?" -- you should be ashamed of yourself.
I'm on the train. I said "I'M ON THE TRAIN"
Mobile Phone Users
Ever been trapped on a bus, sitting in front of someone who's on the mobile for the whole journey? Having the same conversation with five different people? Have you ever had to listen to some loudmouthed idiot shout down a mobile to another loudmouther idiot? "ARE YOU GOING TO THE PUB TONIGHT?" Probably, as the two of you go to the pub every night.
Perhaps worse, they board the bus while in the middle of a call, then stand there in front of the driver, unaware of the quaint old custom of paying a fare or showing a pass. And they do the same at supermarket checkouts - while the queue behind seethes. Mind you, there is a way to handle this: take out your own mobile and pretend to make a call (loudly) "I'm in Sainsburys. I'm stuck behind some woman on her bloody mobile." That shifts 'em.
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