Random Little Things That Piss Me Off

• John Madden exclaiming over every freaking step in the football game. For one, he sounds like he's spitting when he talks. Also, he can't seem to control his compulsive need to draw everything out on the freeze frames with that damn pen. Why doesn't someone just take the pen away from him?! And finally, he should be made to choose whether he's gonna give the color commentary or the play by play because he tries to do both and he just ends up endlessly interrupting himself. "Okay now Thompson just called for a time out and that's the second time out this half, you know I heard that when he played for Georgetown that he used to pass his classes by hiring an underclassman to, and they're back on the field now, whoa did you see that snap?"
  

• Black Friday shoppers with nothing in mind to buy. There are about a dozen sale items in every store the day after Thanksgiving and usually about two thirds of the people in line are there for the same two or three things. But then there are those people who have no idea what they want to buy, who have woken up at four a.m. to stand in a cold parking lot just to browse the clearance rack. These people should be pushed to the front of the line so that the real shoppers can trample them.

• Sex Trend Articles. As the concerned mother of a 9 year old daughter, I can tell you without reservation that I DO NOT need to read about eleven year olds having oral sex, or how a rising percentage of teenagers don't consider anal sex to be violating their virginity pledges, or about the cuddle puddle craze sweeping the nation's middle schools. I don't need to fear colored jelly bracelets or the retro cherry pattern my daughter loves but I can't find because someone decided it was somehow sexual. Why can I not be allowed to believe that nine year olds watch Hannah Montana for the music and still see sneaking into Mom's make up as the pinacle of rebellion?

• Fattening food that's good for me. So olive oil is good for me, has lots of health benefits, but it's just fat so it's high-calorie and will make me gain weight? SO somehow I am supposed to eat like 20 servings of food every single freaking day to stay healthy, yet not eat too much lest I become a fat American stereotype? Suuuure. That makes sense.

• People who claim that cutting calories too much will stall weight loss. Explain to me how, if I cut the calories I take in below what I burn, I'm not going to lose weight? I mean, say what you will about the anorexic - they are thin. And correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't most people who starve to death kind of scrawny when they die? I mean, eating less isn't a real controversial and untested form of weight loss. It's pretty tried and true.

• Lawn Nazis. No I'm not going to rake. No I'm not going to fertilize. No I'm not going to do a damn thing about the brown patch. And yes, I like dandelions. It's natural, and I believe that my yard is my own tiny sea of nature nestled in amongst all the concrete roads and sidewalks and driveways. So please, stop raking and chemically treating and seeding my yard. You have your yard and I have mine and leave mine the hell alone thank you.

• People with secret upscale rules for living. There are some pretty basic rules for living in polite society, some conversational lines we don't cross and some behaviors we just don't engage in publicly. But some people seem to really make things up as they go along, just so they can then be disgusted when you break a rule. My brother is one of these people. He can share personal information that I never needed to hear and do it with a sense of camaraderie. But if I say anything personal back then suddenly he's all offended and all "TMI TMI". Like if I say something about a broken dresser drawer (hypothetical for instance but still), he'll jump up all put off like "I don't need to know about your bedroom." Yeah, little brother, cuz it's the PORN DRAWER and it's busted from the weight of all my PORN.

• People not much younger than me who speak like they're either a) from "da hood" or b) fifteen years old, and then try to blame my not understanding them on just how old and out of touch I am. This happened the first time my brother called to ask me for a solid ( A what?? Oh, a favor. Well, no, cuz you're being obnoxious, Mr Solid.) and also when a Canadian friend (and by friend I of course mean a guy I know online by a screen name and will never meet in real life) called a video game sick. And get this, he meant sick as a compliment. Because somehow "sick" is the new "awesome". And when I didn't know wtf he was talking about, he acted like I was all decrepit because I don't understand CANADIAN VIDEO GAME SLANG. I mean, c'mon, eh?

• People who point out my gray hairs as though their very existence proves me to be so old and cataract-ridden as to be unable to see them myself. Thanks, Mom.

• Parents who let their teenage (or younger) daughters wear tummy-baring clothes and pants with words on the ass. Also, why are these girls almost always obese? I mean, it's bad enough that your daughter looks like a hooker for the chubby-chasing demographic, but now I need to know that her backside is "Phat"? First off, why are you letting your kid show that much skin at that age, regardless of weight? Second, why are you not teaching your kid about shape-appropriate clothing? And finally, why do you let her wear clothes designed, with big bold font, to draw attention to her butt? And don't be all "You're a pervert if you see a kid that way." The fact is that no matter how asexually you see your kid, the guys her age don't agree with you and letting her dress like Anna Nicole in the 9th grade is just asking for trouble.

• People who act all hurt that you don't trust them, and then prove themselves to be untrustworthy. Gee, I wonder why I never told you what was wrong the other day, considering that I can name at least 3 other people who would have known by now if I had. And don't ask me what's wrong now either, because what's wrong is that you're still trying to get me to tell you my shit and it aint gonna happen.