CDog vs. The World

The Little Things (Or, “Take 5 Seconds and Get It Right, Jerk”) March 2, 2010

Hello, March!

First, a little follow-up. Remember my last post where I basically just pimped out a bunch of bands that are on tour? Remember when I was going to actually go see MCS and The Swellers? For free? Yeah, that didn’t happen. The powers that be saw fit to strike me down with a cold. But this was no ordinary cold. It was some weirdo mutated cold that manifested as throat pain and a violent, neverending cough. I spent every moment of my glorious, extremely rare 3-day weekend at home. The only time I left the house was to pick up the narcotic cough syrup I was prescribed after calling the advice nurse at Kaiser, and I still coughed for hours instead of sleeping for the next two nights.

Fortunately, a trip to the doctor and a prescription for an inhaler helped me catch some Zs, and – minus a mild, lingering cough – I’m pretty much myself again. I did watch Superman on Valentine’s Day. Greatest love story ever told, you know. Suck on that, Romeo & Juliet.

But let’s move things along, because it’s 4:12 and I’m sure as hell not staying at the office past 5.

Has anybody ever asked you what your pet peeve is? I find it to be a bit of a hard question to answer. A lot of things bug me, which may or may not say more about who I am than the state of the world at large. Now, if I had to use one term to describe these irritants, it would have to be this: the little things.

Now you see my problem. “Hey, CDog, what’s your pet peeve?” “Oh, you know. The little things.” It’s not exactly self-explanatory, is it? Yet, if I started to list some of these “little things,” you’d understand right away. So I’m going to do that right now. Here are a few of my “little things.”

1) It’s Christopher Reeve. NOT Christopher Reeves.

Maybe I take this a little personally, as my name was once spelled 6 different ways in one of my grammar school yearbooks (student editors – you get what you pay for).

2) When getting on an elevator, you wait for others to get off before you get on.

Same rule applies to buses and all other passenger transports. Duh.

3) Their = possession. There = location, point, or condition. They’re = they are.

Me, fail English? That’s unpossible.

4) “Casted” is NOT a word. It is cast.

I have to cast the show. She wants me to cast the show. The show has been cast. He was cast in the show. I will put you in a cast if you keep talking about this.

5) If you’re out in public and cuss around children once, it’s an accident. Twice, and you really need to start being more careful. More than that, and you are probably a jerk.

6) If you spill a big puddle of coffee in the hallway at your office and just leave it there for somebody else to discover and deal with, your are definitely a jerk.

6) Rapidly clicking your pen every time you walk through the halls is not even close to okay.

7) Sequin = a small, shiny disc used to ornament articles of clothing and accessories. Sequence = a pattern of one thing following another.

Really, I could go on all day, but you get the idea. So what is it about all of these tiny infractions that is so profoundly irritating? For me, I think it’s the lack of self-awareness. Sure, sometimes all of us make at least one of the aforementioned mistakes every so often, but we learn from them and correct ourselves. I get irritated when people can’t be bothered. It takes five seconds to make sure you’ve spelled somebody’s name right. It takes a tiny bit more brain power to make sure you don’t type “their” when you meant “they’re.” Am I still going to understand what you meant if you use the wrong word? Probably. But isn’t it just nice to get it right?

Maybe I’m crazy. I probably am. However, if that’s the case, at least I can rest easy knowing that I’m the kind of crazy that uses proper grammar, spells correctly, cleans up after herself (and, more often than not, others), and observes proper etiquette when utilizing public transportation.

Jealous?