Just say it

Just say it - throughout the course of a day, there are probably eleventy-billion thoughts we think to ourselves that we'd like to say (or shout) but instead we keep our mouths shut.  (Sidebar: Thank you Saturday Night Live, for many years ago giving the world the number eleventy-billion...the amount of which no one can fully comprehend yet I'm guessing it's more than ten billion.)  In my case, I've decided to just write it.  Unbeknownst to some, I do not always blurt out everything I think and that very limited censor will remain intact...except for these few things.  In no particular order:

• Stop licking the pages!  I think everyone I know does this except for me, so that would make me the outlier in this case.  Close friends, family, respected coworkers, professors, classmates, even people on TV do it.  They try to quickly flip through a stack of pages and then...they run into stuck pages...and they lick a finger or two and touch it to the page to continue flipping.  Yes, technically they are licking the finger and not the page, but the saliva still remains .....on ......that.....page.  I have tried this once to see what the fuss is all about and I didn't find it effective, but maybe it's because I don't practice.  Really, it's gross when you think about it.  Unless you washed your hands five seconds ago and then decided to find one piece of paper out of fifty, how clean could your hands be?  Are you the only person who has to touch those pages today?  I love many of you who do this, but I don't love this behavior.  Please, just stop.  Struggle through those pages, you can do it!   
• Learn how to drive!  This sentiment is said in a variety of words and phrases to all of the cars around me, because apparently I am one of the chosen few who were taught how to drive properly (thank you Mom, Dad, & Brother).  Unless you are lost or new to the area, you really don't have a valid excuse for not staying in your lane or going slow in the passing lane or going half the speed limit or not using turn signals or braking at green lights or letting four people go in front of you (and in front of Me!) instead of taking your proper turn.  I'm all for being nice, but being fair is a form of kindness too.  I'm also pro-cautious driving  particularly as weather, road conditions, and visibility permits.  The driving problem that irritates me the most is when people drive way under the speed limit and ride the brakes for no reason.  (Long Sidebar, Prepare Yourself: Once I had a very strange guy friend who was interested in dating me.  I told him no, and we remained friends.  My mom wanted me to date him, because "what could be so weird about him?".  I told her that he is a good friend, but he's just...you know...weird.  She didn't understand until he came over one day for dinner.  As we were all eating our spaghetti, as people were talking to him, as he was chewing his food... he was literally not paying any attention to the people or the conversation.  His head was doing slow turns upwards and around, taking in the bare sight of our dining room ceiling, as if he was contemplating the meaning of life and the concept of eleventy-billion Skittles thrown into a bouncy ball gym.  "Would the Skittles get lost among all the other colors?  Would pandemonium break loose and would the children "swim" to the bottom to eat them?  What else would they find down there?  How could you know if you found them all if you don't know what that number represents?"  After he left that evening, my mom said to me - "You were right, he is weird".)  Anyway, there was a point to that ridiculously long sidebar and it is this: Under the speed limit driver with your foot on the brake - I picture you as my very strange guy friend - looking around at the sights in bewilderment while gripping your steering wheel, instead of focusing intently and thus safely on your driving task at hand.  You are thinking in a Patrick the Starfish voice from Spongebob (Click here if you don't know his voice.) - "What is this I see?  What is this road before me, what are these trees and what is this blue sky?  Oh no, what are these other cars doing around me?  Why are they here?  What is this pedal next to my brake?  Where am I?"  And you continue to ride the brake while I fume helplessly behind you.  As my brother eloquently states, "You should always drive fast.  You never know when the person driving behind you is in a hurry because he has to go home and take a crap."  Well said, elder one.  Other drivers, please take notice.
• Men - trim your nose hairs if they extend past your nose.  This is a sad and defeated plea of mine.  No, I'm not criticizing and yes, I feel terrible that you have to shave your face most days.  I really do feel for you on that one, but please take care of business before I succumb to the thoughts in my head and ask you to do so in a tone that I think is perfectly reasonable and calm but you would think sounds like a mouthful of pure crazy that hurts your feelings.
• Stop saying like, like every single sentence.  This one plagues me because I myself am a struggling-to-recover like girl.  I try not to use it when recounting conversations, but it's a hard habit to break.  The word comes spewing out like a baby who spits when she doesn't want to eat any more pureed peas and it makes a mess everywhere.  Like the baby, I don't know whether to laugh at the ridiculous goop on you or cry because the taste is horrific.  Yes, I realize I just used "like" in the past two sentences, well three if you count this one, but these examples are not indicative of the incorrect usage.  As awful as it is to realize you're saying it against your own will, it's even harder to listen to when it comes out of other people's mouths.  Example from a friend of mine: "I was like 'what?'... And then he was like 'whoa'.... And then I was like, I was like....".  Yes, that example was totally pointless.  My point exactly.  Imagine if we showed our speech patterns in written form to someone from a hundred years ago.  Example: The man entered through the doorway and shook the snow off the top of his hat.  He brushed more snow off his shoulders as he wiped his feet on the mat before removing his shoes.  He was like, "Damn snow."  Aside from the quotation marks giving it away, the person from a hundred years ago might ask... "He was... like?...damn snow?  Meaning he was cold like the snow?  Or does he like the snow?  If so, why would he swear about it?"  Oh, you mean that he muttered "Damn snow", or he said or he stated or he cursed or he scoffed or he sighed or he declared or he shouted or he cried or he joked.  It's bad enough when anyone rocking in the free world can write as poorly as they wish on a pierogi blog about nothing at all....please do not contribute to the English language's downfall by continually saying and abusing like, a word which can mean so much when a certain someone whispers in the correct context, "I really like you".
• Stop using comic sans font!  In case you haven't realized just how atrocious this font is and you think I've officially gone over the edge....check out this website here.  It's not just me.  Seeing the font makes my eyes hurt and my face scrunch up like I just bit into a lemon when I was expecting a banana.  My understanding is that it was created for use in comic books, which actually makes sense.  Ergo, it was NOT created for people to use as an everyday font in the workplace.  Its proliferation makes zero sense.  One of my former coworkers was a very smart man; his emails carefully dissected GAAP and FASB complexities in clear language that made commoners like me comprehend.  His words were authoritative but his font was comic sans....which blew the whole tone.  It was difficult to take the man seriously.  Maybe he thought he would finally fit in with all of today's cool kids since he was using the coolest font from 1994, and they would forget that he was the leader of the bookworms back in high school.  Any other font, even webdings, is a vast improvement.  There is an amusing video regarding the font at the website given above, but I've attached a direct link to the youtube video here.  The video is rather crude and long, so viewer beware.
• Who do you think you are?  Is your time more important than anyone else's?  Are you too good to respond in kind when someone says "Hello" or "Good morning"?  Do you take yourself too seriously?  Are you a "taker" instead of a "giver" type of person?  Some people do not realize how good they have it... the lives that we lead, the freedoms we have, the jobs that keep us housed and clothed and full.... the opportunities and basically the beautiful life and world that is out there for us to explore and experience in our time here.  Yes, I'm complaining today about minutia... but I realize it's just that and not important at all, which is why I remain quiet most days.   I don't have any more answers than anyone else, but I do have a modicum of perspective!

So there you have it.  A few of my unspoken thoughts that you wasted your time reading.  I'm sure some of you are wishing you had the five or ten minutes back into your life that it took you to peruse this post, but for the overwhelming majority of you (that's three of four followers, people!)...I think you should come right out and just say it already....

You missed me.