The Daily Peeve / Rant

[treehugger]

My daily peeve is my daily headache. It has arrived sometime in the middle of the night/early morning every single day since last Sunday. ARGH

Kara

[Jemima]

Thanks. I'm sore but on the mend. After tripping me and causing the bloody nose, while I was on the floor my 90# Golden Retriever got on top of me and tried to lick the bloody nose. I yelled to my husband for help and he wanted to know which dog I tripped over........ 'pardon me but I'm hurt here'. This is the 7th time something like this has happened and I just can't learn to not step over a dog lying on the floor.

At least the doggies are innocents. My cat dashes across my path on purpose. It's a good thing she's so cute or she would have been out on the pavement long ago wondering where to get her next meal.

[Stella]

I've complained about this before but it's on my mind again today. People who call five times in a day. ****! I'll call you back when I get a chance people.

Related to this, it seems like many of my friends think that because I am home during the day I am available. I have two kids to homeschool, a toddler, a baby and I'm pregnant. I have a lot on my plate. It's disruptive to have the phone ringing all day long while we are working on math or reading together. As it is my daily tasks, like cooking, cleaning, making appointments, paying bills and all that are frequently interrupted. I don't mind people calling, but 5 times in a row is excessive. I think it bothers me in part because if I had a paid job no one would expect me to interrupt my work to chat on demand. Running a household, raising four kids and homeschooling two of them is not a part-time gig.

[Jemima]

I've complained about this before but it's on my mind again today. People who call five times in a day. ****! I'll call you back when I get a chance people.

Related to this, it seems like many of my friends think that because I am home during the day I am available. I have two kids to homeschool, a toddler, a baby and I'm pregnant. I have a lot on my plate. It's disruptive to have the phone ringing all day long while we are working on math or reading together. As it is my daily tasks, like cooking, cleaning, making appointments, paying bills and all that are frequently interrupted. I don't mind people calling, but 5 times in a row is excessive. I think it bothers me in part because if I had a paid job no one would expect me to interrupt my work to chat on demand. Running a household, raising four kids and homeschooling two of them is not a part-time gig.

This is why my landline phone was permanently silenced the day I retired. I've given the cell number only to people who are very important to me, and after two-plus months of peace and quiet I don't seem to have missed anything crucial. I'm giving the answering machine to Purple Heart at their next pickup and using the landline only for outgoing calls and faxes.

My sympathies.

[Jemima]

What about really nice weather inspires every yahoo in my development to go outside, mow the yard, and otherwise ruin the day with power lawn tools? And I can't even leave and get away from it. With all the construction going on around here I'm bound to get involved with even bigger, noisier power tools. I never thought I'd look forward to winter, but now I do. GAH!!!!

[Jemima]

Today I received a big order from Amazon. Four of the items were books, and one of them was so tightly shrink-wrapped I had to go fetch my toolkit and use the utility knife to liberate it. Another item was a case of evaporated goat milk and I had to use a broken-off screwdriver and a claw hammer to get the box open. Then I opened a shoe box from L.L. Bean and found the shoes wrapped in plastic instead of the usual paper, and some sort of desiccant in the form of a plastic square which had warnings not to eat it printed in numerous languages.

I greatly dislike shopping in person, but the excessive packaging is getting to me.

[Jemima]

Oh boy--yellow pages phone books! Just what I wanted!

This is nearly unbelievable, but our phone books were delivered this morning at 2:45 AM along with the daily newspapers. I was up reading and heard something thunk outside, and about ten minutes later I heard two sharp raps as if someone was either knocking hard or trying to pry a door or window open by hammering a chisel into a wooden door frame.

I had tightening up security at my house on my mind all day. Then I went outside to plant a few fall items and found the d@mn thing laying at the foot of my steps.

If I'm up that late tonight, I may just go out and throw the phone book back.

[iris lily]

Today one of the dogs got into a bag of groceries and ate 3/4 sack of cashews. I am not happy about that.

[happy with less]

What about really nice weather inspires every yahoo in my development to go outside, mow the yard, and otherwise ruin the day with power lawn tools? And I can't even leave and get away from it. With all the construction going on around here I'm bound to get involved with even bigger, noisier power tools. I never thought I'd look forward to winter, but now I do. GAH!!!!

And why oh why does someone use a leaf blower on a windy day.

[Tradd]

I'm so freaking tired of people who canNOT follow a simple instruction sheet.

I'm coordinating my parish's participation in an area-wide toy drive for needy kids at Christmas. The wish list we are given for each kid has a number of squares at the top to cut off - these squares have the kid's first name, reference# for the toy drive, etc. - and tape on the package so the correct gift gets to the proper kid.

In the past too many people have just taped the tag onto the package with a small piece of tape across one corner and that was it. It wasn't on securely and was either ripped off by accident, fell off, etc.

I specifically wrote up a very simple instruction sheet that told people what date to return the gifts by, to securely tape tag to package (I specifically said not across a single corner).

And what do these people do? Return gifts with the tag on very insecurely.

What part of this do these idiots not understand? I have to go around to each and every package with a thing of tape in hand to secure the tags to the package properly because the idiots can't read instructions and didn't pay attention when I told them to make sure each kid gets the gift they're supposed to.

And another thing...

I had a master list with reference# for each person to write their name next to, so I knew which family had taken each one (also wrote it down in a notebook in my purse). At least three families wrote their names down for one kid, then changed their mind and took another one, without correcting the list. And when I discover this (because certain things aren't matching up - the list showed kids had been taken, yet the wish lists were still on the sign up table) and contact the people, all they can tell me is "Oh, I took a 4 yo boy. I think his name is X." REFUSE to tell me the reference#. So I had to go through the pdf scans I had done of all the wish lists (there are 25 total kids we took) to play detective.

I don't freaking have the extra time for this. I have time to do the project if people following instructions, but all this extra time? NO!

I'm sadly coming to the conclusion that a lot of people I thought had common sense don't have it at all.

Yes, I'm not exactly in a good mood.