Weekly Pet Peeve: Distracted Drivers

Content warning for traffic accident, gore, and trauma.

Last night, a friend and I had dinner at the Marion Hotel. It looks kind of scruffy on the outside, with the beer vendor out back, the parking lot full of pickup trucks, and the line of gleaming Harley-Davidsons out front all summer. But the sweet potato fries are fabulous, and the servers are great.

But my friend told me a shitty story. Her sister-in-law was killed last year by a distracted driver. The SIL was out cycling with a friend. A driver was weaving all over the road because she was texting. She struck my friend’s sister-in-law and killed her pretty much instantly. The friend cycling with her wrote a Victim Impact Statement for the court about how she saw her friend’s brains crushed out of her head onto the roadway, and her pretty blue eyes go lifeless, and blood everywhere, and how she now has flashbacks and nightmares in which she relives the event.  The victim’s daughters wrote impact statements, too, about how now their mom won’t ever know her first grandchild (one of the daughters is currently pregnant).

The sentence was handed down recently. The “distracted driver” got her driver’s license suspended for ninety days. That’s it. THAT’S IT. I put “distracted driver” in quotations because my preferred term is MURDERER. It’s not involuntary manslaughter or negligent homicide or whatever. It’s pure and simple murder.

If you text while driving, if you drink and drive, if you smoke pot and drive, if you are distracted or impaired in any way—especially ways that you KNOW are illegal!–then you are an asshole, a shitbag, a waste of fucking skin, and you deserve to have your license revoked forEVER, your car impounded, and your name made public.

I can hear the whining now: “But the punishment should fit the criiiiiime!!! It’s not faaaair to do that to someone just for having a couple of drinks / toking up / texting!!!”

You’re wrong. It’s entirely fair. If someone puts my life at risk for the sake of their own convenience or recreation, they deserve to be charged and convicted with Attempted Murder.

 

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Edited 13 May 2016 to fix a typo.

 

Weekly Pet Peeve: Toast-Related Injuries

You know when you make the perfect toasted tomato-and-cheese sandwich? With a tasty, juicy tomato in thick slices, and some sharp old cheddar, and coarsely-ground black pepper. With the stone-ground whole wheat bread toasted to the exact perfect crispiness, and the layers of tomato and cheese perfectly constructed. When nobody interrupts your progress, so by the time you slice the sandwich in two and sit down to take the first bite, everything is still fresh and warm.

And then, with that first bite, the top layer of toast scrapes the top of your mouth raw, so that every chewing motion hurts, and the pleasure of savouring your perfect sandwich is lost.

I hate that.

 

 

Weekly Pet Peeve: Cats at Night

You cat owners out there probably know that cats are nocturnal. That was a nasty surprise to me when I got my Kittenz five years ago. The cat I knew before that, Rakkertje, was already a sedate eight or so years old when I moved in with my then-partner. Rakker spent most of her days on a sunny windowsill, and most of her nights on our bed, with an hour of hunting mice in the yard around twilight.

That’s what I expected of the Kittenz (aside from the yard bit, as they are indoor cats). Boy, was I surprised to find out that no matter how much I played with them, kept them awake, interrupted their naps, and adjusted their feeding times, there would be a nightly hour (at least) somewhere between 1 and 5 am in which they’d be running around wrestling, jumping, singing, and stalking each other. And that’s on a good night! On a bad night, their schedules are staggered, so as one finally curls up to sleep, the other stretches, jumps lightly off the bed, and commences his hour of nocturnal frenzy.

I love the Kittenz. That is a fact. And I will never give them up. But I am a light sleeper, and insomnia is A Thing for me at the best of times, so I can tell you with a fair certainty that I will never get a cat again once these pretty Boyz are gone.

 

 

 

 

Weekly Pet Peeve: I Am Not a Mental Health “Consumer”

Words matter. The labels we are given or choose to use matter. Language structures how we think, and how we think structures how we use language.

Once we were victims or sufferers.

Then we were patients (and if we were lucky, ex-patients).

Clients.

Person with X.

Survivor.

All problematic in different ways, but none as problematic for me as the trend to call us users or consumers of the mental health care system. My mental illness is not a commodity. To deal with it, I am not choosing or shopping or consuming or using the mental health care system. That implies that there is actually an array of effective, accessible, affordable, respectful options from which to choose. To commercialise mental health care (and all health care), to position the people who need health care services as users, as consumers, as if we are freely choosing to use and consume resources, as if we are the same as anyone shopping at WalMart for plastic toys made by kids in factories in overexploited countries, is to make illness and its treatment on par with any other goods and services in a capitalist system. That is absurd. Getting help isn’t as simple as picking out canned goods at the grocery store. Health care is not a commodity, and illness is not a lifestyle choice.

Weekly Pet Peeve: “I’m not racist, but…” (aka “Some of my friends are…”)

I got nothing against passive-aggressive a-holes, but…

In all its various permutations:

“I’ve got nothing against gays, but…”

“I’m all for equality, but…”

“I got no problem with immigrants, but…”

“There’s nothing wrong with blue collars, but…”

And so on, and ’nuff said.

 

 

Weekly Pet Peeve: People Talking Through the Show

This week’s pet peeve is piggybacking on For the Love of God—Make It Stop, about a person talking in a movie theatre during the movie. This is a huge peeve of mine. Not just in movie theatres but also at home. Not just during movies, but also during TV shows. Or even YouTube videos. Or when I am on the phone, and someone in the room is talking during my phone call because they have something to add or to pass on to the person on the other end.

JUST SHUT UUUUUUUUPPPPP!!!!!!!!!

OBVIOUSLY I am paying attention to The Thing. Either pause The Thing, or wait for The Thing to be over. And if The Thing is something you’re trying to share with me, please don’t abuse my patience and wreck my enjoyment with “okay, here, wait, here it comes, wait, yeaaaah!!!” and hysterical laughter even before the funny part.

Also, if we’re watching a movie together that you’ve seen before, ffs do NOT speak along with the dialogue. Especially do not say the lines right before they happen! And honestly, seriously, don’t watch my face the whole time to make sure I am laughing at the funny parts or otherwise responding immediately and obviously the way you think I should.

In general, I really prefer to experience media by myself. People can be so annoying. Don’t they know they’re causing me to miss plot development? That information is there for a reason! I need it!

The dogs can be annoying, too, if a movie doorbell rings. But somehow, watching the Brindle Dog barking wildly at the TV with a shocked and betrayed look on her face (through what interdimensional fuck-up did a doorbell appear in the living room???) is far more entertaining than biting my tongue (and sitting on my fists) when dude in front of me at the theatre is muttering into a cell phone.

 

Weekly Pet Peeve: Workplace Phone Manners

How I look when people don’t know how to talk on the phone at work.

I was so focused on writing about Poe today that I nearly forgot the Weekly Pet Peeve. My heart’s not in it 100% today, so I’ve hauled this one out of my drafts and tweaked it a bit:

You know what I hate? When people are making a work-related phone call and don’t bother to introduce themselves properly. If you are calling in an official capacity, you should at the very least state your first and last names, and preferably also what your organisation is.

I’ve had people call and not say their names at all, or just say “This is *Sarah” and then demand client information. And then I have to go through the whole interrogation to find out the relevant identification of Sarah, during which time Sarah is getting more and more irritated. Would this not be easier if she started out with”Hi, this is **Sarah Palin, I’m a social worker at XYZ Child and Family Services and I’m looking for information on Jane Doe who is a permanent ward of my agency”? Yes, it would indeed be easier. So, Sarah, when I point that out to you in the course of our phone conversation, there’s no need to get all hissy. Because the minute you raise your voice to me, I’m hanging up.

Weekly Pet Peeve: Comments about Appearances

How I feel when people comment on someone else’s appearance.

If you’re going to comment on someone’s appearance, don’t.

But if you’re one of those people who can’t resist, here’s a tip: say something actively positive. The whole “Ooooooh, I see you got your hair cut…” or the dubious “Are those new glasses?” aren’t actually pleasant things to say to someone. If you must, then try something like “Hey, great glasses!” (complimentary, and does not require a response.)

The whole “neutral” thing is kind of passive-aggressive and  an infringement on people’s personal territory. What gives you the right to make a random unasked-for comment about someone’s appearance, or on a choice they’ve made? A choice that was possibly difficult and is certainly personal? On a haircut they maybe aren’t happy with, for example?