# Things You Do That Irritate Your Friends **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 4, 2008, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468 "2008-10-04T18:53:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Alice\_The\_Goon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed8c4c/32.png) [@Alice\_The\_Goon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alice_The_Goon)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/1 "2008-10-04T18:53:35Z")
This is probably a common complaint amongst the friends of Dopers: “You think you know everything!” :o Oops. Another thing I do that irritates my friends- all summer I’ve had no AC in my car and it’s been murderous, to me and anyone that happens to ride with me. But I’m buying a new car in February, so I’ve refused to get it fixed. I’m not spending hundreds of dollars on a 20-year-old car that I’m only going to have for a few more months. Next summer we will be cruising in cool comfort but for now I’m toughing it out- _you_ drive if you don’t like it. (But I’m never going through another summer without AC here- I almost died.) I also probably talk about my cat way too much. What irritating things do you do? ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/2 "2008-10-04T18:56:46Z")
I correct their grammar. I insist on being early or at least punctual if we are going somewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Some\_FNG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/48db29/32.png) [@Some\_FNG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Some_FNG)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/3 "2008-10-04T19:28:11Z")
> [@Alice\_The\_Goon](#): > > What irritating things do you do? Speak out when remaining silent is the better option. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/4 "2008-10-04T19:43:22Z")
> [@Alice\_The\_Goon](#): > > (But I’m never going through another summer without AC here- I almost died.) Last May the compressor blew up in my Honda. $700 to get it replaced; because of circumstances, it was a week to get it done – best $700 I ever spent. To contribute to the OP, show up on time. They tell me the party’s at six. I show up at 6:05 and they’re running around with wet hair. “We didn’t expect anyone this early!” Well, then you should have said 6:30. ---
**Author:** ![Euryphaessa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Euryphaessa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euryphaessa)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/5 "2008-10-04T19:48:12Z")
I am incapable of not making a joke at someone’s slip up. If there’s something snarky to be said, I will say it. I often feel bad later, but it doesn’t stop me the next time. ---
**Author:** ![Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Speaker_for_the_Dead)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/6 "2008-10-04T19:57:40Z")
Keeping my house too cold in the fall and winter. Repeating stories. Low-self esteem, ironically. Complaining. ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/7 "2008-10-04T20:08:36Z")
Hmm, if you put a couple drinks in me, I’ll probably start hitting on some of them. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/8 "2008-10-04T22:01:39Z")
I’m a complainer. I’m very assertive. I insist on punctuality. I say “no” when I want to say no, and I damn well mean it when I say it. If I’m not happy about something, you’ll definitely know it. ---
**Author:** ![Girl\_From\_Mars](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3da27b/32.png) [@Girl\_From\_Mars](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Girl_From_Mars)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/9 "2008-10-04T22:04:23Z")
When travelling, I will leave the bathroom when brushing my teeth and aimlessly wander around. It drives one particular friend crazy. ---
**Author:** ![ChrisBooth12](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e95f7d/32.png) [@ChrisBooth12](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ChrisBooth12)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/10 "2008-10-04T22:05:21Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > I’m a complainer. > > I’m very assertive. > > I insist on punctuality. > > I say “no” when I want to say no, and I damn well mean it when I say it. > > If I’m not happy about something, you’ll definitely know it. Quoted for truth. ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2008, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/11 "2008-10-04T22:18:02Z")
I will sometimes agree to do things I don’t really want to do, and then be a little pissy about it. As if it’s anyone’s fault but my own. I’m also a very slow eater when dining in a group. ---
**Author:** ![Bites\_When\_Provoked](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bites_when_provoked/32/18073_2.png) [@Bites\_When\_Provoked](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bites_When_Provoked)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2008, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/12 "2008-10-05T00:45:51Z")
My best friend and her husband just told me yesterday that I’m apparently far too girly(?) to be dressing like a boy(?) all the time. They think I need to embrace my femininity. I love ‘em, but sometimes I really don’t know what planet they’re from. I’m 6’ tall, broad-shouldered, and about 20kg overweight… and they think I should be embracing frills and flounces\*? Good lord, it’d look like a floral couch stomping through the door. :eek: - Against my personal nature, I might add. I _don’t like_ frills and flounces, and I hate skirts. I \*like \*jeans, slacks and other long pants. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_In\_A\_Top\_Hat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f6c823/32.png) [@Cat\_In\_A\_Top\_Hat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_In_A_Top_Hat)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2008, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/13 "2008-10-05T00:49:10Z")
> [@Alice\_The\_Goon](#): > > What irritating things do you do? I make obscure references, then attempt to explain them if they don’t get them. I get louder as I get more excited. I send links over IM a _lot_. I use a lot of “I” statements. Things like that. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2008, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/14 "2008-10-05T00:57:46Z")
> [@ChrisBooth12](#): > > Quoted for truth. Um, do you know me and are seconding my comments, or are you saying they apply to you as well? “QFT” is kinda ambiguous here. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Purgatory\_Creek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/74df32/32.png) [@Purgatory\_Creek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Purgatory_Creek)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2008, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/15 "2008-10-05T15:22:05Z")
I refuse to leave my house most of the time, and when they finally get fed up and threaten to abandon me, I just absent-mindedly wave goodbye at them and go back to reading. I’ve lost a couple of lifelong friends just because I didn’t care if I lost them. Oh, and the “correcting their grammar” thing. ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2008, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/16 "2008-10-05T20:32:18Z")
I like to point out to my co-workers the neat things that our work applications can do, resulting in saving us lots of time. It took me a long time to figure out that they didn’t appreciate it. What I thought was being helpful and sharing cool stuff they saw as being officious and know-it-all-y. I keep my mouth shut and let them do it the long, tedious way now. ---
**Author:** ![Bites\_When\_Provoked](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bites_when_provoked/32/18073_2.png) [@Bites\_When\_Provoked](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bites_When_Provoked)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2008, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/17 "2008-10-05T23:46:30Z")
> [@teela\_brown](#): > > I like to point out to my co-workers the neat things that our work applications can do, resulting in saving us lots of time. It took me a long time to figure out that they didn’t appreciate it. What I thought was being helpful and sharing cool stuff they saw as being officious and know-it-all-y. I keep my mouth shut and let them do it the long, tedious way now. I had that happen the other day. I’d just had a sudden insight into how I could get pictures to form part of a mail merge in Word 07, which I think is super-cool, and all I got from co-workers was ‘Yeah, you’re a brainbox’. There was no enthusiasm whatsoever for what I see as the coolness factor of having pictures linked to specific mail-merge text. (I work at a community college and was thinking that next year’s graduation invitations could have a personalised college graphic at the top of the invite that tied in to the student’s field of study.) This kind of thing makes me sad. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![nevermore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a587f6/32.png) [@nevermore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nevermore)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2008, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/18 "2008-10-06T00:11:23Z")
I… comment on people’s food. I’m breaking myself of this, because I’ve recently made a friend who does it more often and less tactfully than I do, and I find it _incredibly_ grating. :o I don’t answer my phone about half the time (for various reasons), and I refuse to set up my voicemail, because I HATE IT. That’s probably the most commonly voiced complaint about me, and it will continue to be, because I fuckin’ hate voicemail and I’ll never listen to another one again if I don’t have to. Deal with it. ---
**Author:** ![Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Speaker_for_the_Dead)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2008, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/19 "2008-10-06T00:13:24Z")
> [@nevermore](#): > > I… comment on people’s food. I’m breaking myself of this, because I’ve recently made a friend who does it more often and less tactfully than I do, and I find it _incredibly_ grating. :o How so? About its healthiness or quality? I mean, I tease friends about eating “gross” stuff (like tomatoes…yeck) all the time. ---
**Author:** ![SmartAleq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smartaleq/32/163_2.png) [@SmartAleq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAleq)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2008, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468/20 "2008-10-06T00:40:59Z")
Assertive–check. Punctual–check. I refuse to dumb down my vocabulary unless I’m talking to a literal child, and even then not as much as most people do. On the plus side, I’m really cool about defining words people don’t know without being an ass about it. I insist on precision in my own speech–this drives my SO insane. He’ll ask me a general question (along the lines of “so x is y, right?” to which I’ll respond “no, x is similar to y but there are some differences and even though x = y is nearly accurate, it’s not completely so,” but a bit less pedantic, usually) and I’ll give him a very precise answer that to his mind contains no differences to a simple yes or no answer. He takes umbrage at my longer answers and maintains that I’m saying he’s “wrong” about something. Not true, just precision. He also gets pissed when I explain at length that “right” and “wrong” don’t enter into it, it’s purely a matter of different means of expression–of course, this is perceived as yet another form of attack and putting him in the wrong and the cycle continues. We’ll probably end up separating over this eventually, again. I drive old, weird cars by choice and have no interest in buying something newer or less crotchety. Sorry, I like my cars! I also get the redass from coworkers when I figure something out or streamline a process–what is up with that, anyway? My sense of humor gets me into trouble quite often–apparently I find many things screamingly funny that many other people regard as sacrosanct, oops! [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/things-you-do-that-irritate-your-friends/466468.md?page=2)