A Compendium of Things that Irritate Me

The fact that I can't buy one of these right now is bullshit. I don't mean the costume, I mean an actual flying monkey. Or a person in a flying monkey costume, at least.

When I hear this song, it means that I've inexplicably found myself watching American Pie, or that I'm in a coma and am currently living in a 1990s suburban world that I've created in my head.

I'm speaking of the people, not the television series, which I've never seen. Although I'm fairly certain I'd feel the same about the show.

Instead of trusting the "Body Modification Artist" who prefers the black nitrile gloves and surgical masks because they look more "edgy," why don't you just call your father and tell him how much you hate him for working long hours when you were five? It's so much easier, and it carries a significantly lower risk of facial paralysis and/or massive infection than having a high school dropout stick a needle in your forehead.

It's usually pudgy twenty-something females that do this, too. I'm not sure why.

This happens every few years. Whether it's Microsoft, Apple or some upstart that disappears as quickly as their venture capital. None of the redesigns ever sticks and we end up right back where we started: The basic desktop metaphor. Tile based interface works for phones because... they're not desktop computers. So we don't expect the same things out of them. A tile based interface for a desktop general purpose computer is asinine.

It's not just wrong, it's a stupid waste of money. Now, if we were to institute drug testing for holders of elected office as a condition of their receiving their salaries, benefits and pensions, that would be a different matter entirely. But that's different. Because welfare recipients have no political power and the governor of Florida is political power.

The Seattle Police Union has won a decision in arbitration which will enjoin the city from releasing the name of an officer involved in a misconduct investigation. I think this is a great use of the SPUs time. It makes way more sense to work toward covering up problems than it does to encourage their member officers to not shoot woodcarvers eight seconds after getting out of the cruiser and then lying about the incident so it doesn't seem quite so shooting-the-guy-in-the-back-esque, or threatening to "beat the fucking Mexican piss" out of an innocent detainee while they're laying on the ground followed by kicking them in the head when they wipe their face, or punching a teenage girl in the face over jaywalking, or getting into a fight with a concerned citizen after the citizen tried to get the drunken cop to stop roughing up a young woman, or, you know, just not being such reprehensible pieces of shit. But I'm sure that no longer releasing the names of officers accused of misconduct will really go a long way toward curbing that selfsame misconduct.

They really have nothing of value to contribute to any sort of social discourse, even such inane discourse as that which occurs on Facebook. And when they involve themselves, it's generally of the, "Hezekiah did his poo-poo in the potty!" ilk. While I'm sure that, as a parent, you're terrifically excited about your unfortunately-named child's new-found excretory accuracy, I can safely say that the rest of the world -- all of it -- doesn't give a fuck. I only care about the excretory habits of myself, my girlfriend, and our two cats (and I only care about the last three in the context of not wanting their waste on anything I own). I understand that your children are not just your life, but in essence are your entire existence. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with nearly any life decisions made for oneself, eyes open and aware of the consequences. But in this case, one of those consequences is that the rest of the world -- all of it -- doesn't care that much about your day-to-day existence. And at a bare minimum, they don't care what comes out of any part of your child.

The guy has been a colonel in the Libyan army since 1969. It seems like they should either promote him or separate him. And what kind of person allows themselves to be treated like such a doormat? It's been 42 years! Yeah, he's gotten some pretty great things in the meantime (Prime Minister of Libya, safari suits, Chairperson of the African Union, supposedly a few Lamborghini LM002s, that whole Al-Gaddafi International Prize for Human Rights), but your career is your career.

I was really looking forward to all the christian whack-jobs leaving and having all the sexually adventurous women for myself.

I'm aware that ethnocentrism is not, in general, a good thing. However, in this case, I feel like I can fairly comfortably say that the culture of Saudi Arabia is fucked up. There are several reasons, but let's just tackle the one at issue: A woman in Saudi Arabia was arrested because she 1) drove and 2) posted a video of herself driving on YouTube. From what I understand, it isn't even against the law for a woman to drive, the local governments just won't issue driving licenses to women. There is just nothing I can say to this issue, because it is so obviously fucked up by anyone with any sort of analytical ability. (By the way, here's how irritating I find this situation: I'm not even going to make one joke about women drivers.)

It's dumb. It's not funny. It's not clever. It's dumb. In fact, most of the shit that Reddit finds funny is unfunny, not clever and dumb. Most memes are unfunny, not clever and dumb. You can make an argument that the original progenitor of the meme is somewhat funny, but every one of the sweaty, frantic desperate-for-attention repetitions that are presented as the height of inside comedy (and if you don't like, it's just because you don't get it) are lame. Sorry. If you're really that clever, come up with something original. Don't be Dane Cook, be Louie C.K.

This guy who died "planking" doesn't really irritate me. He amuses me. Don't get me wrong: I don't revel in the death of anyone. But doing something so stupid as trying to lay flat on one's stomach on a seventh floor balcony railing and then accidentally falling to one's death is slightly funny. We all did stupid shit when we were young. Many of us still do stupid shit despite entering into our third decade. But "planking" isn't amusing, clever, subversive, attractive, and I'm pretty sure it doesn't get you laid. In short: It's pointless, and not even amusingly pointless. It's just dumb.

Forming an opinion based on his ability to lead now would require data from... now. Or at least recent data. He hasn't held an elected office since retiring from the House of Representatives in 1999. And prior to retiring, he distinguished himself in my mind as one of the largest roadblocks of the Clinton presidency. Not that I'm not for some genial and intelligent opposition, but the impeachment of Clinton was a major distraction from other, actually important work that government could have been doing in 1998 and 1999.

The best part of this is when they are the one that has selected the music and volume, then attempt to talk to you. "I can't hear you," you reply. And rather than turn down the music, they simply repeat themselves at a slightly higher volume.