Rants of the miniature variety

The BBQ Pit
21

Lunch guests from heck, not bad enough to pit on their own.

We had a small group of friends over Sunday (already yesterday for us on this side of The Pond).

Two of the guests show up two hours after it starts, because they had to go shopping for ingredients even though we had told everyone not to bring food as we had planned a whole meal. (And did a lot of the cooking the day before, as well as cleaning our apartment and getting all ready.)

When we say 12, we mean 12. We had all the food ready to serve at 12:15. The cold food was cold, the hot food hot. The BBQ had been started and the food on the grill at noon. The other guests had this figured out and came with deserts or alcohol, like good guests do.

You, our lunch guests from heck, had to show up well after everyone is done. We then need to reheat your food and light new charcoal. No problem, really, but then you want to take over the kitchen to prepare your food. It’s your specialty and needs to be prepared just, just right, but you don’t need to comment on our pans. You don’t like the ones we have? Bring your own fucking pan.

OK, go ahead, but guess what? Everyone’s already ate, and no one is really that hungry, so even though you spend an hour cooking, our guests are only going to pick at it. Also, since you always make the same damn thing, people aren’t going to rave as much about it as they did they last time you made it, or the time before that, or the time before that. So please don’t look hurt when we don’t rush to eat it.

Then, four hours after we start, now you’re ready to start talking to everyone. That’s nice, although everyone else is starting to wind down. The “lunch” drags on for a while longer, until people who already have plans need to go and it breaks up.

Next time, just plan your own damn party.

22

I hate not being able to be mad!

I was soooo mad at you Friday because you failed to both invite me to your mom’s extra Thanksgiving thing, and then failed to call me to tell me I wasn’t invited.

I stewed all day Saturday thinking now you’ve completely pussed out and was ignoring me for not calling me Friday.

Now it’s 10:30 PM Sunday and I haven’t heard from you in 3 days and now I’m no longer MAD I’m WORRIED, thinking maybe you’re dead or laid up or something.

I hate that you causing me worry has made me forget my mad. Dammit!

23

Hell. Yes.

I had this week off and I actually took it OFF, a very rare occurrence for me. In the next four weeks I have: my PhD candidacy exam/meeting, normal twice-weekly translation assignments, a presentation this Wednesday, a BIG presentation next Monday, a sight-translation exam, a 20-30 page research term paper, two translation exams, and a take-home essay exam.

I’m starting to feel like mini-rants is the MMP equivalent for bitter people.

24

I fucking hate depression. One shouldn’t be stuck sitting at the Thanksgiving table thinking for five minutes trying to come up with something that’s not lame to be thankful for.

And if you’re going to ask the depressed person for what he’s grateful for, don’t say he can’t say family and everyone being together!

25

raises hand

Although I don’t have it as bad as some of you…15 page paper due at the end of this week, and trying to learn my calculus that I’ve been slacking on. I have a feeling I’m going to have to retake the class.

And my favorite bar is closing tonight, because the block is going to be torn down for condos. :mad: :frowning: It’s where I can walk in and be guaranteed to see someone I know and like. I don’t know where I’ll hang out now.

26

Safeway store you have 10, ten, TEN!!! checkout lanes, but you frequently have only one of them open. Only when the line stretches so far out that people don’t really know where to stand do you grudgingly open another one. Then we have to do the dance to figure out who goes into which lane in which order. And while you’re dicking around no one who is still shopping can get past all of the people standing in line to go find the stuff they are shopping for.

I understand not wanting to hire more people for the cost…but it is bad enough that I’m looking for a different place to shop. Get some of those self checkout things already!

27

Hey,ThinkGeek-what’s your problem with the good old USPS? Since I live a whole two miles from the US you want to charge me $25 to ship an $18 tshirt via courier. To my home where I am not during the day, so they take package back to the depot located somewhere stupid. Whereas if it goes as regular mail, I can pick up said tshirt at the local postal outlet. But that’s not good enough for you. Pthhhtt.

28

It’s more of a pit than a rant.

I pit the pipes in my house that go CLUNK every 20 seconds when the heating comes on at 5:30am.

I pit this keyboard for being a bit awkward to use.

I have rant now: ArrRR GRR ARG ARG FRIGIN FRIG! FOR FOGG FROG DOGSSOCK BOLLDUCK WARG!

29

Gah. I got a cold sore this afternoon, which is annoying enough on its own, but I’ve got a job interview on Tuesday. I’ve got some ointment to keep it more or less under control, but it still means I’m going to be showing up with this unsightly thing at the corner of my mouth.

30

Hey–fires? Yeah, you. We’re getting a little tired of your burning-stuff-up act. I know, I know, you’re really fast and you make it look cool, and I got a week off of classes and stuff, but it’s really getting old. Please go bother Colorado or something.

That was me. Sorry, I thought you’d have found it by now. Check the freezer. No, the one at work.

31

The last basket available in the store had about 8 balloons tied to it. The clerk told me to go ahead and use it. So there I am, second in line, with a hand basket that has 8 ballons tethered to it. I’m wearing a bright yellow shirt. My hair is far more red than I wanted it to be. In other words, I’m kind of hard to miss.

But hey, lady, you didn’t see me. I understand, because when you walk up from the front side of the cashier and see quite possibly the most obvious person in the whole wide world standing there with a basket full of stuff, the safe assumption is that I’m still waiting for my pink pony to arrive and I don’t actually want to cash out and leave.

After I regained control of my lower jaw and my blown brain cells, the cashier and I had a good laugh.

Did I mention they were shiny mylar balloons? With brightly colored ribbons tied to them? I was the definition of conspicuous.

32

Thanks for reminding me. My favorite place closed down too. Small & cozy. Great people. Live music. No smoking. Now I’m just depressed.

33

I got a cousin to your cold sore, I guess. Its timing is excellent , as I am seeing the dentist in the morning, and I bet the corner of my mouth will split open and blood will flow all over the place. I hate going to the dentist.

34

cracks knuckles Not isolated incidents, but here goes:

First off, when I’m trying to back out of a parking space, don’t walk behind me while I’m backing up, and if you’re going to anyway, at least have a little sense of urgency.

Next, I like to use text messages for brief communications, but not an hour-long discussion. It gets expensive. If I call you while we’re texting, please pick up the phone. If you have time to type in what you want to say, then you have the time time to just say it.

Also, I know I attend college with a bunch of macho 18-25-year olds, but seriously, what is up with the dudes who wear shorts and tight t-shirts in 40° weather (and I don’t mean during athletics)? Okay, man, you’re tuff… we get the point. Put on a freaking sweater or something… we all know you’re freezing.

And McDonalds, Burger King, or any other fast food restaurant: please employ someone who has a firm grasp of the English language and distinguishable enunciation to work the speaker at the drive-thru. It’s extremely agitating when I have to repeat my order five times because I don’t understand your employee, or she doesn’t understand me, or both.

Finally, SUV drivers: when attempting to back your Ford Excessive™ into a parking spot, hang up the damn cell phone. You’re having enough trouble as it is… use both hands to steer.

35

I pit myself for being such a pathetic procrastinator that I just pulled an all-nighter – shades of undergrad! – to get ready for a 10 a.m. hearing for my work. The hearing should be okay but who am I kidding? It’s not like I’ll be at my best, and I’ll be for shit the rest of the day.

Self, I get that on a subconscious level you resent having to work the weekend, but for Chrissakes, it’s not like you’re better off for having put it off until 9 p.m. Sunday night. YOU’LL HAVE TO DO IT ANYWAY. Budget your time! You are 38 fucking years old, so if you could actually absorb this lesson, that would be super. I am too fucking old for this.

36

Good luck. At my last dentist’s office, if you had a cold sore, they would make you reschedule and send you home!
’

37

Traveler’s checks are not cash. They are not green. They don’t have “Legal Tender” on them. They do not go into my drawer, to be added up with the rest of the cash. They go in my work, to be sent down for processing.
Stop putting the checks down as cash! I’ve told you three times already. You can’t possibly be that stupid.

Don’t throw a check at me in the drive-up and expect me to read your mind about what you want me to do with it while you roll your window up and start talking on the phone. Is it a deposit? A payment? Are you cashing it? It’s really a simple thing…a little acknowledgement of the human on the other side of the glass.

38

I am now too tired to hate everyone. I didn’t sleep at all last night. I cried a lot, though, so it’s all good. :rolleyes:

And now I get to go Christmas shopping because that’s what moms live for. Fucking hell.

39

That’s one of the stupidest store policies I’ve ever heard of. Buying cigarettes takes time (AIUI- I’ve never bought cigarettes)- it requires the cashier to do something out of the ordinary. I thought the point of the express line was to not get behind someone who is doing something that will take extra time.

Fuck grant proposals, and fuck whoever decided that so many of them should come due at the same time. Mr. Neville has been working non-stop on grant proposals the last couple of weeks, and he’s going to be working on more of them this week. This, of course, does wonders for his mood…

Cell phone: Why do you not have a volume setting on your ring tone that is audible above music that is audible above road noise, yet you can put out a noise with a volume normally associated with Krakatoa when you beep to give me some urgent message like “you missed a call” or “there is a new voice mail”. And you keep beeping ALL NIGHT LONG. At just the right interval that I’m just starting to drift off to sleep again after one beep when I’m woken up by another.

40

Ditto. If I had the energy, I would hate nearly everyone right now. I also didn’t sleep last night. I wish I could shut off the part of my brain that thinks, and just run on auto-function all day.