Thursday, May 8, 2014

Five Things That Drive Me Crazy... By Invitation Only


Five Things That Drive Me Crazy!!
Even though I’m a wee bit late, I’m so delighted to be participating in sweet Marsha’s Splenderosa monthly, By Invitation Only.  The topic this month is fun and, as always, generated a lot of ideas.  So without further ado... here is my own personal list of Five Things That Make Me Crazy.  Do tell me if any are familiar to you.  It can’t be just me.  Can it? 

1.  Stickers on Fruit
They are on every banana, every orange. 
Every grapefruit, every pear.  
These ubiquitous little blue stickers! 
I don’t think one has to have a design background to both love the look of a colourful bowl of fresh fruit sitting on the sideboard and abhor these sticky, vexatious blights on each and every one.
  Do they really need to be on every one?  Really? 
 And yes, I pull each and every one off.  
They drive me crazy.  Seriously.

2.  Guests Who Arrive Early To Dinner Parties
The flowers are arranged and the stickers are off the fruit.  Dinner is cooking; the music is set.  I have forty-five minutes to freshen my lipstick and check my hair; forty-five minutes to sit in the quiet and collect my thoughts and ... then... oh, it can’t be!  A knock at the door! 
 “Oh, sorry we’re a bit early.  We knew you wouldn’t mind!”
Well, guess what?  Sometimes I do mind! 
Five minutes I can handle; thirty or forty-five, I’d rather not, thanks.
  I’ve toyed with the idea of answering the door in my underwear when this happens because, yes, it drives me crazy! 

3. The Over, and Improper, Usage of the Word, “Awesome”
There was a day when it was used to describe the staggering bulk of Ben Nevis; when it was the only word appropriate for the face of a lion.  But these days this wonderful word is forced to slum as a description of every triviality from the perfect parking spot to a well-done hamburger.  It drives me crazy!  And don’t even get me started on the word, “like”.

4.  Designing Rooms To Look Like Hotel Lobbies
I recently had the good fortune to meet the uber-designer, Nina Campbell, and was utterly thrilled to hear her say how much she, like me, detests the current trend in design of creating rooms that resemble hotels.  Sleek, cool, always neutral.  Straight-lined and contemporary, with nary a personal object or whimsicality to be found.  Rooms that appear more suited to a business meeting that to curling up with a good book and a furry dog.  Happily, and I got this straight from Nina herself, this trend is dissipating, with colour and personality on the rise, so perhaps it won’t drive me crazy for too much longer.
(Here’s a photograph of Nina and me.
  And yes, having it turn out with my blasted eyes closed drives me crazy, too.)


5.  The Marketing of Beauty Products as “Anti-Aging”
Talk about setting women up to feel badly about themselves!  Who amongst us can really be “anti” aging?  We are all doing it, whether we’re twenty-five or fifty-five.  And guess what?  Aging is not a disease, it’s a privilege.  Yes, I love my creams and potions but I want to believe they make me look my best, not that they are stopping me from aging.  Because when we stop aging, we cease to exist.  You guessed it... this drives me crazy.  How about you?

****
So there you have it.  Five things that drive me crazy.  Hardly a complete list, mind you.  I didn’t even get to mention when the car window rolls up and catches my hair.  Or American Idol. Or commercials in movies!  Whatever happened to cartoons??  Or when the Sunday edition of New York Times arrives and is missing the book review section and I call to report it but it’s too late to deliver another copy and the lady offers to credit my account but I don’t want my account credited I want the dad gum book review section! 
Or... guess I should stop now.
Thanks Marsha!  It was fun!

36 comments:

  1. I get so annoyed with stickers on fruit too!

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    1. i detest fruit stickers and sometimes when i'm feeling lazy i put the oranges in the bowl sticker down

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  2. Pamela, goodness, we share a lot! I hate having people arrive EARLY because I need every single second until the prescribed time. So happy you are one of us, and I know how you will stand out when we begin anew in September.
    This post was just great, my friend.

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  3. Stickers on fruit. That got a laugh out of me! (I can see where it's annoying, but it doesn't bother me, personally.)

    But the ANTI-AGING schtick? (Don't even get me started.) Anti-aging means we bite the dust!

    Lovely to meet you and read you!

    D. A.

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  4. The anti-aging campaign insults not only my intelligence but my generation! Seriously, to have a twenty year old try to "sell" me on the benefits of the newest $300 cream that is anti-aging is pathetic. I've been know to ask these fresh faced beauties" what's wrong with aging?" Lovely post! Welcome.

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  5. Welcome to our little group, Pamela. Lovely post. Stickers on fruit - that does make me a little loopy sometimes. Hope you enjoyed this month's topic - looking forward to more in September.

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  6. I once hosted my best friend's wedding at my house, a fairly formal affair for 150 guests… an uninvited hurricane left 5" of water in the courtyard where the ceremony was to take place. Early guests found me barefoot, covered in mud trying to direct traffic away from my lawns as cars were getting stuck in the mud…so much for the quiet moment to regroup before the storm… as you, i can't stand when guest arrive way before the invitation time.

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  7. Boy, you got me with "awesome" and "like"! Both expressions are on "tombstones" that my students created for overused, meaningless words and phrases! They grate on me like the proverbial nails on a chalkboard! Seems people can't express a single thought without using one or the other--including my colleagues! I shall go to my own grave trying to rid the language of these "word weeds."

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  8. i love your totally different list to the rest of us!!

    the other word which drives me nuts is "literally"…gets dropped into every half sentence of every person under the age of 25 it seems….so when a sentence contains "literally", "awesome" and "like" its hard to even concentrate on what the rest of the sentence is supposed to be about (umm….maybe I'm getting old since I sound so grumpy!!)

    concur on the early guest thing…can never believe how much is required in those last 30 minutes…when everything comes together (or doesn't if the guests arrive too soon!)

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  9. Welcome, Pamela...to our little group...a fun post to end on ;)
    Looking forward to reading more of your posts in September...enjoy the summer!

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  10. Pamela... you have made me smile and nod as I read through your list...

    Your first post is totally awesome... like fantastic... so like great... ;) ;)

    Loathe those words too... xv

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  11. Oh Pamela,
    Welcome to our BIO family …… and what a wonderful list of things that drive you crazy. You really made me laugh { people without a sense of humour are on my list !! } ….. love the one about the stickers on fruit !! XXXX

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  12. Absolutely like your awesome blog! Just kidding. My list is so long that I find that each one I read mirrors my own! The season of my discontent me thinks.

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  13. Workmen here show up early, which can be maddening if you want to sleep past 7 a.m.

    My dad's cousin once showed up for lunch 30 minutes early. This was after I had told him several times to come at 1 or 1:30 because I would need to get home from the gym and take a shower and cook. He showed up at 12:30, so I did answer the door in my robe.

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  14. You have me giggling (stickered fruit!), laughing about 'anti-aging' products and thereby getting even more wrinkles (I mean 'laugh lines'!), and falling off my too small uncomfortable desk chair seeing you (even lovely with eyes shut) with the great Nina Campbell, and sharing the big news, the come-back of real rooms with PERSONALITY - love it!!

    Great post Pamela.
    Hugs - Mary

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  15. You could add my name to every single one on that list Pamela.

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  16. Not only do the stickers on fruit drive me nuts, it drives me even crazier when I peel them off and the fruit's peel comes along with it--often on ripe pears.

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  17. Perhaps the grocers and farmers' markets could be convinced to pile up all the red apples in one bin, the yellow ones in another, the pink ones in another and so on, and leave off the stickers, which would make it easy for those making selections for their their sideboard. Personally, my taste buds like to be assured my grapefruit is a Rio Star from Texas, my Meyer lemon is from California--not Florida, my Valencia orange is from the Texas Rio Grande Valley, and the oh-so-delicious apple is a Honey Crisp from Washington.
    The sticker that really irks me is the one placed on the back side of a book's beautiful dust jacket, which is well nigh impossible to remove without either defacing or damaging the paper. A book has a cover and a price inside that tells you what you want to know, but why does a paperback book, which already has a price and bar code on the back require a second sticker over the one already there. Stickers on fruit are there for the benefit of the buyer; stickers on books are there for the benefit of the seller.
    I'm with you 100% on the anti-aging!

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  18. Amen to all of yours! One of mine is grocery shopping carts left in the parking lot. How much effort does it take to walk it back to the cart stand that is in all parking lots these days. When you live in a cold climate, it gets even worse. People will push it through snow and ice to get to their car but then leave it for some poor store employee to walk that entire parking lot in the cold to corral all of them back to the cart stand. It's so thoughtless and lazy. Hope I haven't offended anyone here, but that's my two cents!

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  19. WONDERFUL!
    YOUR LIST IS WONDERFUL!!!!!!!!!!
    I agree with YOU on EVERY topic!Especially, the FRUIT STICKERS!Just think how many times they have to be touched..............or hit by a machine!
    Welcome,I am new too! Only two POSTS under my belt..........again what am I doing with the likes of this gorgeous group of writers I do not know!How utterly FABULOUS you met NINA C. Do tell was it a book signing?I can imagine how FRUSTRATED you were when you saw the photo!DESERVES A FRAME ANYWAY!

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  20. Oh, yes, the stickers that take the fruit peal when you try to remove them, especially on the lovely nectarines. Drives me crazy! And the abandoned shopping carts,

    and anything anti-ageing. Men should not be permitted to create ads for women's cosmetics. I agree with your list, Pamela. Like, totally : ).

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  21. Hello!
    What a wonderful and very funny list you have written, early arrivals for dinner are definitely going to the end of the invitation list

    ...I have popped over for the first time as I love Marsha's Invitation posts... and Edward ( I think I am not alone!!)
    I am so thrilled for you how fabulous to meet Nina Campbell....I am an Interior Designer too and guess what? we have been fitting master bed window treatments today in one of her BEST fabrics...Birdcage walk in pale aqua, it looks amazing.
    I am going to save your quote by Gertrude Jekyll..it is extremely touching
    Lovely to meet you

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  22. I was also thrilled to read what Nina Campbell said about designing rooms to resemble hotels. I will be so glad when this design phase is over, though I don't ever see it going away entirely. Never did care for soulless sleek and spare vanilla boxes, and the design world has worshiped at their feet for too long in my opinion. Show me some personality.

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  23. What an amusing post! Loved it. Another pet hate of mine is phone calls from telemarketers - normally just when I have switched off the computer and am getting dinner. They claim to be from Microsoft, Telco companies, solar power companies and all sorts. I screamed - I know, awful of me - at one caller a few weeks ago and told her I had signed up to the Do Not Call Register. All she said in reply, "Why is that?" which made me even more annoyed. I mean, what didn't she understand about my not wanting her calls???

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  24. So brilliant Pamela, you had me in stiches. Are you sure you haven't been watching too many episodes of Fawlty Towers?
    My Bête noire has to be the very irritating "Can I get?". It seems to be a pandemic prerequisite to buying something nowadays. Isn't the whole point of being served that you don't have to "Get" anything!
    Apart from that, everything's just awesome!

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  25. Pam, very enjoyable few minutes, reading and commenting; thank's for a nice interlude to my day. Stickers on fruit are annoying but just another way for me to slow down and enjoy the process.Guests who arrive early...the day Dave and I were married, here on the farm, my best girlfriends were downstairs preparing flowers, food when Mom came upstairs where I was in the claw foot bathtub. She peeped around the door corner, "You need to get dressed and come downstairs, now!" I looked up at her, "Why?" She replied, "Because people are beginning to arrive!" "Not a problem, Mom, I'm one of the guests of honor and nothing much will happen until I get there." Bless her heart...her mouth dropped open and she back downstairs. I still laugh, she still doesn't.
    Awesome and so unique...I'm just about ready for the insane asylum! Rooms as hotel lobbies...ugh. And finally, please God save me from anti-aging!

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  26. dang. should have proofed better...thanks...is what I meant to type.

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  27. I enjoyed reading your list of what drives you and me crazy and I agree very much with the anti-aging Please aren't we all aging from the day were born

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  28. Stickers on fruit have been my number one 'niggly' ever since they came into being (I also peel them off for company...or photos), and hotel home design has been second (can't stand it) every since it was created as well, so sterile and devoid of personality and character, and the current mainstream entertainment industry, is third. Where did all the talent go? I think it can't get past the intensely homogeneous, un-talented, mish-mash that has overtaken the airwaves...incredibly sad. Does anyone actually play an instrument and write real songs anymore?? Why yes, your dear songwriter does of course...all is not lost!!
    Wonderful to get some of this off my chest...thanks Pamela, I truly thought I was the only one adverse to those darn stickers, as well as the rest...nice to know these sentiments are shared by such as yourself, I feel much more vindicated now (and relieved)!
    xo J~

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  29. Awesome list! Sorry, couldn't resist that. I hate stickers on fruit too, and I have been known to be late to my own party. Seriously, a guest who came 5 minutes early would find me in the shower. Here's to looking good at any age: cheers!

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  30. This will sound terribly ungrateful but It drives me crazy when a guest arrives with a bouquet of flowers. I'm tempted to hand them a vase and send them out to the garage to arrange them. I'm sure they expect the flowers to be displayed prominently somewhere but they don't always match what I've got going and surely not in the middle of my dining room table. I'm awful. Sorry.

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  31. Could not agree more.

    MK

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  32. Your list is a statement to your good sense, perhaps something that comes with pro-aging.

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  33. What drives me crazier than crazy: media talking heads, politicians, teachers (!!) et al. pronouncing "nuclear" as "nuke-u-ler" and "jewelry" as "joo-ler-ee". I have old-English-major-itis from witnessing the widespread and unrepentant disrespect for the language! (And don't even get me started on the over-used "at the end of the day...".)

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  34. What an entertaining topic! I'm pleased to find that I'm not alone in wishing to leave the delicate skin of a pear unblemished. Got that, growers, grocers?

    A fad that grates is use by radio (even NPR) announcers of the present tense in place of present continuous or future tense. About a year ago I began to hear them say at the end of a program, "We're here on Wednesday at 8 o'clock," rather than, "We will be here . . . . " Does that aggravate anyone else?

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  35. I like how you developed this theme.
    I agree with the 2° rpoblem...! Absolutely!
    Sending a big hug from Rome Italy

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I love to read your comments! Each and every one! Though I'm always reading your comments, I may not respond in the comment section. If you want to write me directly, you may do so at pamela@pamelaterry.net. Thank you for reading!