Annoyances: Laundry List Style

Given the fact that the past two days have been spent grinding my teeth and attempting not to disembowel the next person who says the phrase “heat wave,” I’m a bit irritated at, well, everything.  Maybe my case of the Mondays has been extended to include our friend, Tuesday, but whatever the reason, I’m not in a great mood, and I blame everything but myself.  Why?  Because I’m an American, dammit, and that’s perfectly acceptable in this country.  So, here is yet another list of crap that bugs me.  I know you’ve been losing sleep over the lack of these lists in your life. 

1.  Being held “gift hostage.”  A friend of mine recently had a dilemma.  You see, a friend of hers that she didn’t particularly like wanted to meet up with said friend to give her a birthday gift.  Mind you, these people aren’t exactly on “talk every day and finish each others’ sentences” terms, so it was a bit odd.  After politely declining the birthday gift, my friend then got an e-mail that said, “But I had something monogrammed for you, so it can’t really go to anyone else.  I’d love to catch lunch and let you enjoy it.”  I’m calling bullshit on this one because who on earth gets someone a monogrammed gift when you barely talk to the receiver of the gift?  This, my friends, is a classic case of gift entrapment.  My guess is the alleged gift giver actually has a favor she wants to ask of gift receiver and is using the gift as a wickedly-trapped bait to lure this favor out of my friend.  The friend called shenanigans and has yet to be snared by the monogramming bandit.  Stay tuned for news, but please, don’t do this to someone you kind of know.  It’s not cool, yo.  Not cool at all. 

2.  There’s a school called Universal Technical Institute.  Yes.  They call it UTI.  Why you would want to name your school after a common female bladder ailment when it’s an institution designed for entry-level auto mechanics?  What grease-stained dude on a creeper is interested in pledging his allegiance to Urinary Tract Infection?  The idea that they somehow did this on purpose to cement their name in the minds of potential students hasn’t surpassed me, since they blatantly refer to it as “UTI” very often in their commercials.  The fact that they thought this was a good idea, however, has totally surpassed me and left me slack-jawed and hunched over with laughter. 

3.  This next annoyance is actually a two-parter.  Annoyance #1:  Our shower is leaking.  I can only tighten the faucets so much before they strip themselves out and flood my bathroom.  The constant dripping is driving me crazy, not to mention, with the idea of a triple-digit water bill looming on my pay-strapped horizon, the insanity is reaching new levels of, well, insanity.  That’s annoyance #1 with this situation.  Annoyance #2:  When I went to Home Depot yesterday to inquire about getting new seals for my faucet, I found a very helpful man who looked me up and down and said, “Do you have a boyfriend or husband helping you with this project?”  Granted, I was totally just going to buy the seal, hand it to my lovely husband and ask him to replace the seals, but THIS MAN DIDN’T KNOW THAT (I feel that’s one of the advantages to being married: getting your husband to do stuff like this.  I cook and pay the bills.  He fixes stuff.  It’s on the marriage certificate somewhere, I’m sure.) Now,  I’ve done a lot of handy-type things in my life: I’ve installed a ceiling fan all by my lonesome (well, I was helped by three cats and several expletives.)  I’ve taken apart a garbage disposal, under the influence of a coupla drinks, and removed what looked like Styrofoam spider webs from it so that it would properly dispose of my garbage.  And oh yeah, Mr. Smarty Pants Home Depot employee?  I’ve castrated a bull before.  So continue with your completely wrong assessment of this chick, get me the damn seals, and quickly shut the F up or you’re going to be singing soprano at the next Home Depot holiday gathering.  Asshat. 

4.  “50 Shades of Grey.”  Yes, I have read the first two books in this horrid series, so yes, I feel like I can make fun of it.  The “author” is obviously lost in some world of sexual made-uppery as no one ever has had sex like this.  Not to mention that the minute some control freak millionaire tracked my cell phone to a bar, found me at the bar, and then proceeded to chastise me for drinking so much as I hurled into some bushes, I would kick him in his bathing suit area (unless he likes that.  Who knows?)  The writing is stilted, the characters are unbelievable (the main character got drunk for the first time when she hurled into the bushes.  She then continues throughout the book to drink every chance she gets, including the night after the vomiting.  You don’t jump back on the alcohol horse that quickly.  I know these things) and the plot is just this side of asinine.  I suppose the real reason I’m so angry about these works is that I’m probably just jealous that old E.L. somehow got a book deal and I’m stuck writing on my couch and not flying around the world to a host of adoring fans that for some reason like my writing.  Screw you, E.L. James.  I’ll keep my crappy writing where it belongs: on my self-maintained blog.