2006-03-10 - 10:01 p.m.

3/10/06

I'm not in a bad mood tonight, but for some reason lately I have been compiling a mental list of things that make me nuts. Here are a few that I can actually remember as I sit down to type:

- Speed bumps. LJer Jupiter29 asked me a while back what there was to be angry about, so this is my answer. They are jarring, for starters. To my mind, a speed bump should be smooth if you are going at the preferred speed, and jarring if you're going too fast. Speed humps are like that. I am okay with speed humps. Speed BUMPS, however, are like inverted potholes. But what really makes me mad is that they don't work as intended, so the jarring is for naught. They're there to slow people down, but people only slow down at the bumps. They speed up and then jam on the brakes before the bump. If you really want to slow people down, DON'T MAKE THE ROAD SO FUCKING WIDE. A wide road makes people feel safe because there are no obstacles, so they drive fast. The narrower the road, the slower people will drive because they're afraid they'll slam into something. You've seen people freak out on the highway and slow down because they're trying to go between a semi and the median, right? Same thing. Here in Philadelphia we have several two-lane one-way crosstown routes with parking on one side with the lights timed so that a lot of the time you can go 10 blocks at 25mph without stopping (assuming that nobody's blocking the road making a delivery or trying to parallel park, anyway). People COULD go faster than 25mph, and the occasional idiot does, but most people go between 20-25mph because that is the fastest they feel COMFORTABLE going.

- Pointless useless "security" measures. When I leave Lowe's or Home Depot, I have to show my receipt to some ... how did Camille describe a DMV employee? ... "bored and vaguely hostile" Lowe's employee. Presumably s/he is looking at my receipt to see that it matches the items in the bag so that I am not shoplifting. But NOOOOOoooooo, he just makes a little mark with his highlighter on my receipt without looking at me OR the bag, and that's it. But if I try to sneak past him when he's chit-chatting with a cow orker and avoid the whole process, I get yelled at and called back. WTFFFFF is that all about? Poindexter theorizes that it's an excuse to profile, like airport security. Check everybody so that if you actually see somebody who looks like a shoplifter, you can check 'em out more closely without being accused of doing exactly what you're doing: profiling.

- "Credit or debit?". I wrote about this months ago and it is still seriously pissing me off. You know what makes me really nuts? Sometimes I will say clearly to the cashier, "I scanned my credit card," trying to anticipate the question, but it's as though they do not hear me because I am deviating from the script, so they ask me the goddamn question anyway, usually when I am trying to bag my groceries and not looking at them, so I look up and see that "WELL!?" look on their face because I didn't answer. ARGH.

- While I'm ranting about grocery stores, what is it with these people who are too lazy to help bag their own groceries? Sometimes there are baggers, sometimes not, and twice now during the "not" times I've seen customers just STANDING there, doing absolutely NOTHING, in the EXPRESS LANE, while the cashier bags three or four bags of groceries. WTF? Wouldn't it be the polite thing to HELP bag the groceries so that you're not holding up the EXPRESS LANE?

- And ALSO, while I'm ranting about cashier's inability to hear me say "I used my CREDIT card," how about the inability of fast food workers to process anything you say? I love efficiency, so I try to be efficient by presenting my entire order at once, like so:

Evelynne: I'd like a medium number one to go with Dr Pepper, please.
Cashier: Ok, a number one. Do you want to supersize that?
Evelynne: No.
Cashier: What do you want to drink?
Evelynne: Dr Pepper.
Cashier: For here or to go?
Evelynne: To go.

I've realized that my way of being efficient does not work; I am forced to do things their way, so I just start with "Number one" now and answer their questions in the order presented. But for godsakes.

On Tuesday night, after I put the fingers in the cookie tin, Poindexter DID NOT EAT ANY COOKIES. I went down to hop around, came back upstairs, not a word about the cookies.

We're getting ready for bed:

Evelynne: I can't believe you didn't find the fingers.
Poindexter: How do you know I didn't know where the fingers were, and didn't just pick them up and move them somewhere else?
Evelynne: Did you find them!?
Poindexter: I'm not saying. You could go look and see if I found them.
Evelynne: I can't go look! Then you'll know where they are!!
Poindexter: I guess you won't know if I found them, then.
Evelynne: NNNRGH!!! I hate you! (flops over, turns off light)
Poindexter: [laughs evilly]

So the next day, he goes off to work, and I check the cookie tin. The fingers aren't there. All day I live in fearful anticipation of encountering the fingers, but they don't turn up. When Poindexter gets home:

Evelynne: So you DID find the fingers last night!
Poindexter: You know, I went into the office, and I looked over at my desk, and I saw the cookie tin, and I thought, "The fingers are in there."
Evelynne: [gapes]
Poindexter: Yeah. And then you went downstairs to hop around and I opened the tin and there they were.
Evelynne: How did you know?
Poindexter: I don't know; I just knew.

It took me until this morning to turn them up again. He'd put them inside the Tylenol bottle, which I discovered because the change in the weather gave me a headache. There was only one pill left in it, which was stuck to the fingers. *gag* I texted him at work to let him know I'd found them, then hid them.

The fingers are now inside a little Ziploc snack baggie inside the can of Pringles in the office, nestled underneath about 20 Pringles. He hasn't turned them up yet. We have multiple cans of Pringles open in the house, one in the kitchen, one in the office, and sometimes one in the living room. He used the kitchen Pringles at lunch today and had no Pringles at dinner. Hopefully tomorrow. I also hope he hasn't already divined that they're in there! Jeez!

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