Pet Peeves

Living on sleep deprivation, I'm a tad surly right now. Lots to do at work, which as well as keeping me up late into the night and then into the early morn also bites into my writing time, but I figured I could jot down a quick post about just a few things that get on my nerves. What could be more pleasant for a reader? Perhaps Ken will do the right thing and delete this post before I offend too many people. But who knows, maybe some will identify. So what's buggin' me right now? Glad I asked.

1) Hair left in hairbrushes --- UUUUUUUGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!
2) Toothpaste gel leftovers in the bathroom sink --- scrump-dilly-icious not-so-much
3) Staying in the Colgate family, the little toothpaste blotches all over the lower half of the mirror
4) Walking into a public restroom, like my restroom at work, "theoretically," and having to listen to someone in Stall 2 mumbling (well, a little louder than mumbling) to themselves. "Are you talking to me, Bob?" No? Then please stop talking and just get on with your business.
5) Half-popped bags of microwave popcorn
6) Missing about four of the Christmas decorations that still need to go up in the attic
7) Having a cell phone; not having one when I need one
8) Drafting at # 16, the Dolphins will be hard-pressed to find a QB, and they HAVE to get a QB
9) $.39 stamps
10) Work deadlines
11) Mistakenly writing "2005" on the date line of my checks
12) Letting mayonnaise into my house - every time I open the fridge I can't avoid seeing that grossness
13) Toilet seats -- the price for having boys -- they're either up or they're wet and most likely both

There. A cool baker's dozen. Oh, and as long as I'm complaining, in retrospect I'd like to grumble about the "Sacred Room" we had in our house growing up. Did anyone else have one of those? Usually it's a living room. Some room in the house that no one's allowed to go in. Man, did we have one. And if you set a toe in the carpet, Mom could tell and there was a price to pay. What's with that anyway? You purchase a house, and you decide part of what you're buying is too special to use. It's like buying a chocolate-iced doughnut and deciding the icing looks too good to eat, so you cut off the top part and just look at it for eighteen years until the kids move out. I'll never get that.
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Okay, enough pity-partying. I take so much for granted, and I really don't have the right to say word one (although I went ahead and gave thirteen peeves). When I look at my life realistically, especially considering the rest of the world, any time I complain I probably ought to be taken behind the woodshed and have the tar beaten out of me. I wouldn't trade my wife (well, I wouldn't most of the time) or kids for the world. My job is a very good one, and the people I work with are great. I have a few friends, and they're awesome. If I was to let God pick me up and randomly place me anywhere else in the world, I'd be worse off and probably far worse off with a whole heckuva lot more to fret over. So why am I complaining?

Because deep down, I'm basically just a total ingrate... and I need to get better.

Maybe some sleep would help.

Pet Peeves