Biggest Pet Peeves

[sweetcaroline]

Mine include repetitive noises, naivety, attempting to prove me wrong when I know I am 100% correct (which would go along with the naivety, I think), being pompous, and underestimation.

What are yours?

[Pompey Bum]

The word iconic referring to anything but Byzantine art.

[Iain Sparrow]

Mine is... pretense.
I like to be engaged with people and pretense and decorum stand in the way of that. And my big pet peeve, it's these damn smart devices that people are addicted to! How can something that is essentially for communicating, turn folks into shallow gossips who say nothing. I'm tired of going to parties and half the people are tapping away messages on their phone... sometimes to someone at the same party!
I ditched my smart phone (gathers dust in the kitchen drawer), closed my facebook account... and I feel better for it.:)

[Iain Sparrow]

... oh yeah, and another pet peeve of mine... lightning storms!
We've had some real nasty weather blow through Jacksonville this week and one lightning strike hit close enough to zap my computer monitor into oblivion. Thank goodness my Apple laptop survived, but the monitor that it was connected to is dust.

[sweetcaroline]

Very interesting pet peeves, guys! Those are all perfectly sound.

In regard to the smart phones, I admit that I am guilty of that to a degree, but it's because I can be so gosh-darned introverted at times that my phone is my resort.

In regard to the storms, I was in Richmond, VA when those hit and it took out the phone lines of our hotel! The thunder rolled so loudly, it set off a smoke alarm for a moment. It was absolutely terrifying! I am sorry to hear about your monitor, that sounds horrible...They should have insurance for computers pertaining to weather misfortunes.

[Iain Sparrow]

Like most people who have a tendency toward being introverted, you probably benefit a great deal by using social media to express yourself, having the freedom to engage others in conversation when the time is right. I can tell you from the position of being a more extroverted sort, that what I miss about social media is the visual sense of the person. So much of human interaction is about body language and nuance, and for me that's what is missed online.

I don't mind admitting that I'm a grown man who gets very anxious when the lightning comes too close for comfort. I was born and raised in Southern California and we just don't have weather like that. Sometimes it's so bad here in Florida it's like artillery shells are exploding all around. The strangest thing I've witness in a lightning storm is when a large crow fell from the sky. The poor guy actually looked like it had been electrocuted. Talk about a bad omen.:)

[Pompey Bum]

All things Brian Williams:

Brian Williams' voice

Brian Williams' eyebrows

Brian Williams' lies

Brian Williams' excuses

Brian Williams' wagging his head

Brian Williams' shilling books, movies, and Apple

Brian Williams' thinking it's cool to plug Peter Pan over and over without mentioning that his daughter is in it--or at all

Did I mention the eyebrows?

[Pompey Bum]

I also hate it when people come up to a room with an open door and say: "Knock knock!"--or even worse: "Knock knock?" That one's probably me, though. I should really just relax.

[Clopin]

Seeing people I know when I'm walking around in town always puts me off. And I really don't like when people look too much at my face during a conversation.

[Pompey Bum]

And I really don't like when people look too much at my face during a conversation.

Me neither, Clopin, but that's how it goes in the working world. Holding someone's glance is a dominance and submission game, especially among men. It's a necessary interview skill, too. I've literally seen trainings a in it.

[Pompey Bum]

Striptease weather reports ("Certain death in the forecast--we'll have more after the break!")

[Clopin]

Okay another pet peeve, job interviews and stupid questions like:

"Can you give us three examples of times you've helped to motivate your co workers (team is an often used word) to provide exemplary customary service, above and beyond your job description?"

I'm actually terrific at job interviews though, but I hate them all the same.

[Clopin]

Striptease weather reports ("Certain death in the forecast--we'll have more after the break!")

Well how about clickbait? Seven uses for pomegranates, number three will CHANGE YOUR LIFE! Sixteen horrific murders, number four will SHOCK YOU!

[Pompey Bum]

Any article that is also a list, especially on webpages where you have to turn the page for the next item (and get a new set of ads). Robots write that stuff. Seriously.

Also weathermen who stand in front of Monday. Get out of my way!

[Clopin]

Any article that is also a list, especially on webpages where you have to turn the page for the next item (and get a new set of ads).Robots write that stuff. Seriously.


I think they're flying a bit too close to the sun with this practice especially, I don't even think that people who wanted to read the stupid list in the first place enjoy looking at the hideous websites and popup ads and mobile crashes that come with trying to load the next page on one of these clickbait ad lists. Websites like cracked which publish lists are actually pretty successful too, without doing this sort of thing.

[Pompey Bum]

I think they're flying a bit too close to the sun with this practice especially, I don't even think that people who wanted to read the stupid list in the first place enjoy looking at the hideous websites and popup ads and mobile crashes that come with trying to load the next page on one of these clickbait ad lists.

Yes, but number three will change my life!

[Clopin]

And okay, Cracked.com is also a pet peeve, as are any websites on the Gawker Network, and the Huffington Post.

http://i.imgur.com/FcoGXfl.jpg

[Pompey Bum]

Bruce Jenner. There, I've said it.

[Clopin]

Transphobia eh? Tsk tsk.

My next biggest pet peeve is people writing dumb crap in books and then selling them to used bookstores where I buy them and then have to read their stupid notes.

[Pompey Bum]

My next biggest pet peeve is people writing dumb crap in books and then selling them to used bookstores where I buy them and then have to read their stupid notes.

Oh I kind of like that. I have an old book about the Black Hills War with a frontispiece photograph of Sitting Bull on a low stool in front of a big teepee. The caption reads: SITTING BULL, to which some late Victorian wit has added: "sitting." I don't know why, but that just kills me. Still, old Bibles and old copies of Thus Spake Zarathustra perennially have stupid things written in the margins.

[sweetcaroline]

Hey now, hey now, my mother's an on-air meteorologist!

[Pompey Bum]

Cool! I've got nothing against meteorologists, but I don't like it when they hide behind the furniture (or stand in front of the forecast). :)

[sweetcaroline]

I assure you that she is very good about not doing that. ;)

[Helga]

social media.. yes I know that I am currently using one but this and goodreads are the only two I use. I hate it when I get coffee with friends and they quote conversations on facebook or check out facebook while we sit there. It dominates so many people, I have never had facebook or any other account on any similar wesite.

I am maybe not against it in general but I can't stand to hear how people use it and the fake persona they display.

Also snapchat, I don't have a phone like that, mine simply makes calls and sends texts. I was having coffee with a friend the other day and another friend couldn't come because her daughter hurt herself so instead of showing up for coffee she sent endless amounts of pictures of the girl and snapchats, hate it!

[YesNo]

I used to have a pet peeve about making a left turn onto a particular street at certain times of the day. This would be like taking a right turn if you are in the UK.

Those times of the day would be when the high school was letting out or people where going to work or coming back from work. This was only a problem when I was late. When I wasn't late, I could better enjoy the universe conspiring to block my way.

I would sometimes go right and then circle around the block on the other side of the street so I could make a right turn onto that street. The best solution was to not take that street during rush hours.

[Pompey Bum]

This one may tax my descriptive powers, but perhaps people will be familiar enough with the situation from their own lives. It drives me insane when I am waiting to turn right or left onto a street with a lot of traffic, and eventually only one car needs to pass for there to be a sufficient opening to safely turn, but the driver of that one car SLOWS DOWN because, oh, um, is this guy going to pull out in front of me? Because he looks like he might. And it wouldn't prevent a collision if I slowed down, but, oh, um, I think I will because it kind of feels safer, and, you know, maybe I could even stop and let this guy go, and maybe I will, but no, maybe I won't because I have the right of way and, after all, would he stop for me? But I think I'll slow down some more because, well, even though I'm not stopping for him it still seems nicer than just zooming by, and hey, what if he DID pull out in front of me?

And by the time all that has been examined, the big column of cars behind the idiot has easily caught up and there is no longer an opening in the traffic.

I hate that.

[YesNo]

Yeah, I run into that sort of traffic coming back from yoga class at a particular intersection. In this case I'm the guy with the right of way that someone else is waiting for. And after an energetic yoga session, I'm in no hurry.

A similar situation is what sometimes happens right at a blocked intersection. Instead of leaving the intersection open even though there is a green light sometimes a driver will fill the intersection not letting cross traffic through. After all the light was green even though the cars weren't moving.

I've noticed that this blocked intersection situation occurs when you are trying to drop your child off at the beginning of a semester or pick her up at the end. There is some intersection around the dorms where the traffic becomes disorganized. This is especially true if the college specializes more in liberal arts than engineering.

[Pompey Bum]

Yeah, I run into that sort of traffic coming back from yoga class at a particular intersection.

Oh YOU'RE the guy! :)

I know that in some cases the person in the car is trying--irrationally-- to be "nice." It's irrational, of course, because just because it's courteous to stop and let the other person turn doesn't mean that slowing down, which is sort of like stopping, is "sort of" nice. That kind of niceness--self-aggrandizing gestures of useless pietism--is another peeve of mine. It's not supposed to be about you. Grrrrr. I need to read.

[YesNo]

It may be that I'm too nice, but sometimes I don't even realize the other guy is waiting for me to get moving.

Another pet peeve I have is reading James Joyce. I'll admit it's my own fault.

[tonywalt]

Small talk boring conversations about the traffic or their washing machine or types of sheetrock.

People who work in large corporations (note: I do not include mom and pop/small business, education, academia- different dynamic) and claim to "Tell it like it is" when actually they are just "kick down" but "kiss up" people. The only people they "tell it like it is" are people they can get away with unedited honesty. But, having said that, most people I work with or ever worked with, typically, in one way or another, claim that they "tell it like it is". I suppose to say you lack the agency to "tell it like it is" is fairly unbearable, past unbearable. Anyone who seriously rocks the boat at a corporation will soon be put in career purgatory (which, i would say, is worse than firing).

Obvious and highly contrived "grooming" of relationships with high level people at head office. I was at a cocktails after hours thing and I heard roars of laughter from the table. Without even looking I knew it was the CEO at the table, and this person is not funny.

Reality TV

Loud people who have to make their presence know at a bar by speaking ostensibly to one person but trying to gather the attention of everyone else. Ignoring them is infuriating for them and something I do not admit to doing.

[Emil Miller]

Loud people who have to make their presence know at a bar by speaking ostensibly to one person but trying to gather the attention of everyone else. Ignoring them is infuriating for them and something I do not admit to doing.

I agree with most of your peeves but this last one is a major peeve of mine; the trouble is I'm unable to ignore them, as unnecessary extraneous sounds interfere with my concentration. I recently met someone who is a medico dealing with hearing problems and I am seriously thinking of asking him to recommend ear plugs that I can ostentatiously place in my ears when the bar room bores are in full flow. It will also enable me to drink in bars which have pop music: another unnecessary intrusion on a person's right to drink in peace.

[MANICHAEAN]

War zone newscasters in flack jackets and Palestinian scarfs who wave their arms about and tell you "Mohamed thinks that ------."

Women with huge glutus maximus who wear leotards, overflow on bar stools and expose tattoos on their lower spines.

TV personalities with strangulated vowels.

Celebrity Italian chefs who go on and on about " extra virgin olive oil."

[Pompey Bum]

People who respond to the unpleasant experience of another by saying: "Ouch!"

[UlyssesE]

Lack of verbal clarity. Glaring grammatical mistakes.

[Whifflingpin]

People who respond to the misfortunes of another by saying: "If it's any consolation to you, I've ...."

[Clopin]

Losing a game of Chess when I had basically already won it, or losing to a bad player.

[Emil Miller]

This post should probably have been incorporated with my peeve about loud people in bars who are part of the overall problem of noise.
The night before last I went into the garden for half-an-hour and sat watching the stars and revelling in the silence.
While recognizing that there are often unavoidable situations where we must of necessity make or suffer a certain amount of noise, I loathe it.
The word 'noise' is derived from the Latin for nausea which just about sums it up.

[Pompey Bum]

Being referred to by the any member of the media as "we" or "us" or (as in, "She's the celebrity we love to hate!"), or the name of a city (as in: "Good morning, Boston!") much less a country. If you don't know my name, then leave me alone--or at least stop speaking for me.

Also the expressions "love to hate" and "guilty pleasure." I don't feel guilty about anything that gives me pleasure, and if I did, I'd just do something else I liked. What the hell is wrong with people?

[Emil Miller]

What the hell is wrong with people?

How long have you got?

[Pompey Bum]

How long have you got?

:)

............

[YesNo]

Lack of verbal clarity. Glaring grammatical mistakes.

Yeah, that one annoys me as well. It is like noise going through my head.

[Sancho]

Pet peeve number 42: Armrest hogs.

...sitting in coach, in the the middle seat, screaming child in the seat behind me, and an armrest hog on both sides of me. I don't mind the child, in fact I sort of like fussy babies. They remind me that the future will be as exciting as the past. But an armrest hog - that right there is a low form of life.

So here's what I do: I sort of shift around until armrest hog has no choice but to be touching me with his offending elbow, specifically my side just below my armpit. If armrest hog holds his ground, then I will myself to sweat profusely. In very short order the armrest and the armrest hog's elbow is soaking wet, and generally speaking the armrest is once again free territory.

So here's coach-seat etiquette according to Sancho:

Window seat gets the window and one armrest. Aisle seat gets the aisle and one armrest. Middle seat gets two armrests. Oh yes, and it's always rude to recline your seat in coach if there's somebody behind you.

[Munshie]

Mine is... pretense.
I like to be engaged with people and pretense and decorum stand in the way of that. And my big pet peeve, it's these damn smart devices that people are addicted to! How can something that is essentially for communicating, turn folks into shallow gossips who say nothing. I'm tired of going to parties and half the people are tapping away messages on their phone... sometimes to someone at the same party!
I ditched my smart phone (gathers dust in the kitchen drawer), closed my facebook account... and I feel better for it.:)

Etiquette about when or when not to use smartphone type devices would be helpful imo. My wife spends a lot of time on it, but then she used to spend plenty of time on the phone to family of friends. I hate people making out I'm a techno-phobe. I'm a science graduate and have an interest in gadgets. I just choose to interact with the world on my terms i.e. when and if I want to. In the old days of the landline telephone, there was many a day I just unplugged it. I choose when I wanted to communicate with the world. My approach to using my cellphone is still pretty much the same. I make the "I'm going to be late", or some other essential call, then switch the device off. Yes it drives my missus wild, but what's so damn important it can't wait till we see each other face to face?

[Munshie]

Being referred to by the any member of the media as "we" or "us" or (as in, "She's the celebrity we love to hate!"), or the name of a city (as in: "Good morning, Boston!") much less a country. If you don't know my name, then leave me alone--or at least stop speaking for me.


I hate the American term "Guys" when referring to mixed gender group. The damn expression has caught on in the UK. I refuse to use it. If an expression of that ilk needs to be used, i prefer "Folks" or "People". Yes I've heard all the blah blah about 'guys' referring to both genders and not being problematic - but then why not start referring to mixed groups as 'Girls' and we'll see how well people take to that!

[North Star]

...but then why not start referring to mixed groups as 'Girls' and we'll see how well people take to that!
Well, all children were called girls until the late 15th century - boys were called knave girls, and girls were called gay girls. :smilielol5:

[YesNo]

Etiquette about when or when not to use smartphone type devices would be helpful imo. My wife spends a lot of time on it, but then she used to spend plenty of time on the phone to family of friends. I hate people making out I'm a techno-phobe. I'm a science graduate and have an interest in gadgets. I just choose to interact with the world on my terms i.e. when and if I want to. In the old days of the landline telephone, there was many a day I just unplugged it. I choose when I wanted to communicate with the world. My approach to using my cellphone is still pretty much the same. I make the "I'm going to be late", or some other essential call, then switch the device off. Yes it drives my missus wild, but what's so damn important it can't wait till we see each other face to face?

My phone is always on, charging at night. I do set it to vibrate when in a movie, but generally no one calls me. What I get are emails and texts. I hear switching it off once and a while might be a good thing, but I would have to set my calendar to remind me to do it. Like I have to do to remind me to take out the garbage or clean the air filter on the furnace.

In that scenario I have lost all choice when I want to communicate with the world. I am always communicating with it. When I take a walk through the park, my wife knows just where I went and when and can get a map of the route. I know where she's been, too.

One of my peeves, or amusements, about phones was with a bakery I used to go to some years ago. They do make nice apple croissants. However, on the counter they had this sign: "Don't use your cell phone at the counter. It's rude!" Clearly there was an anger issue going on behind the counter. That bakery has changed owners since those days and the sign is gone. I had been tempted to comment on the sign saying that the sign itself was rude, but I never found it worth my while. All I wanted was a croissant.

[Pompey Bum]

Being referred to on the internet (or anywhere else) as "peeps."

[YesNo]

Or "sheeple". Actually, I kind of like sheeple.

[Tyrion Cheddar]

Toenail growth. When you're an old fat-arse like me, reaching down there to clip them is a day's work and involves all known Twister positions.

[Lykren]

One recently acquired pet peeve I have is that feeling you get when you spend eight weeks in close quarters with other people your own age who also speak English, but are required to speak only Japanese. Then it ends, you have a day and half to get to know those people, and everyone has no choice but to spend that time crying and hugging each other.

[HCabret]

Or "sheeple". Actually, I kind of like sheeple.
I like genetics too!

[LadyDedlock]

Glasses/shades/any sort of eye wear that brush against your lashes.

[YesNo]

Glasses are pretty bad. Luckily my eyes are not so bad that I have to wear them. Contacts give me the shivers to think of putting them in. I suppose sunglasses have some benefit, but they block out the sun.