Things That Are Irritating Me: The November 2, 2005 Edition

Ahem.

• Leftover Halloween candy. Yes, I know, how could I possibly be peeved by leftover Halloween candy? That's just wrong. Well, believe you me, I can be peeved by it because there are no tootsie pops in the bowl. There's a lot of chocolate, provided by Hersheys and Reese's. There's also Sweettarts. But there's no tootsie pops.

  Did I mention that we only had two trick-or-treaters? So we have shedloads of candy left?

  This is what happens when you send the husband out to buy candy. He forgets the tootsie pops and he buys too much of everything else.

  Sheesh.

• The obnoxious Cake Eater neighbor bought his sixteen-year-old kid a Beetle. It's used, but it's only two years old, so it ain't that used.

  Whatever happened to sixteen-year-olds being forced to drive 1973 Monte Carlos? Does that happen anywhere anymore? Why on earth should a sixteen-year-old get a nice car, eh? Explain that one to me, would you? And don't give me that excuse about newer cars being safer and these parents are just protecting their precious little brats. Bullshit. Kids are awful drivers, hence they deserve a car that is built out of steel and will survive a wreck---unlike a Beetle, which is made out of plastic and will, I have a feeling, disintegrate at the first tap of an opposing fender. So what if the old Monte Carlo doesn't have airbags? A whopping case of whiplash is just what a kid needs to learn to slow the fuck down.

  None of which, of course, covers the long forgotten Presidential directive laid out in the second Nixon Administration that decrees sixteen-year-olds should not be driving cars that are nicer than those their elders drive.

• My 35th birthday is sometime this week. And, yes, really that's peeving me.
• I sprained my ankle last week and while it's turning a spectacular shade of blue, it's still swollen to fuck-all levels. HEAL, motherfucker!
• I was supposed to earn some spare Christmas money next week and that opportunity just got shot out of the water.
• I have to go clean out the pantry. This is one of my least favorite things to do, but it must be done because, well, there's just no frickin' space to move around in there right now.
• I've been savoring this novel for the past week. And while it's so much better than the one that came before, I have to ask: does Diana Gabaldon have a freakin' copy editor? The reason I ask is...

  BECAUSE THE CONTINUITY ERRORS ARE DRIVING ME UP THE GODDAMN WALL!

  I'm not going to list all the errors I've found here, because I'm not done with the book yet and I will undoubtedly have more to say about it later on. But there are some pretty goddamn basic errors in this book that should have had alarm bells ringing at the publishing company. That they didn't ring bells---and actually made it into print, for Godsakes, well, this tells me that something is not quite right.

And there you have it, kids. Now I'm off to clean out the pantry.

UPDATE 11-03-05 One more to add to the list. Ahem. I am irritated that Steve-o spelled my name with a 'C'.

Waaaaaaaaaaah.

It's like he never knew me at all.