A handful

Things I hate:

People who do not know how to "keep to the right". Please stop making me do that awkward dance with you and try to be polite as you weave side to side, faking me out each way as we try to pass each other getting on/off an elevator, traveling a crowded hallway, mall etc.

People who throw gum on the ground/floor: There should be a special place in hell for people who do this, I decided a couple of summers ago as I walked barefoot at a community fountain onto a melted glob of someone else's saliva soaked, melted hubba bubba. It is bad enough when it ends up on the bottom a shoe and then you make that sickly, clicking sound with every step you take until you get a chance to scrape it off, only by that time, the gum has attracted a giant scab of dirt, pine needles and sundry other unsavory cling-ons. This was worse. Throw it away! If there is not garbage can, put it in a piece of paper and into your pocket- or swallow it for crying out loud! Choke on it for all I care, but don't, under any circumstances, spit it onto the ground!

Napkin withholding: You know who you are, Subway and KFC... seriously- two of the messiest places in the universe to eat and they keep the napkins behind the counter and dispense them grudgingly 1 or 2 at a time! Is the secret to their fiscal success... they money they save on napkins? That's OK Subway, I'll get my revenge by sneaking FREE refills on my soda (see next thing that I hate).

No free soda refills: Come on already! The only two places left in the world that don't just let you drink your weight in complimentary soda refills are; 1) Subway, 2) The Sea Hag in Lincoln City Oregon (stay away- star FAR away unless you like hair in your Gorton's, being passed off as fresh, fish & chips). Trust me Subway, you do not want to have your good name encrusted in barnacles by being the Sea Hag's partner in soda withholding stinginess...until you change your policy, I will be forced to continue my life of crime, one bogarted Diet Coke refill at a time.

When people say to me, regarding my kids, "Wow, it looks like you have your hands full...". Nothing nice is ever truly meant by this. It is in the same obnoxious comment genre as the ever popular, "you look tired..."

Please do not attempt to commiserate with me about my OWN kids! This is like saying, "I am sorry your kids are brats, how hard it must be for you." The reason I know this is true, is because nobody ever says it when your kids are sitting nicely at a restaurant, or, say, helping an old lady across the street. No, it is snooty salespeople, nervously glancing over at my kids, who are probably poking each other, and flinching every time they touch something, or old ladies standing in line behind us at McDonald's while my starving, cranky children behave like... starving cranky children.

When this happens, I usually turn to my husband and say something like, "we are NEVER babysitting these kids again!" When what I should really say is, "really, you look like you need your teeth kicked in by my gum covered shoe, because your oh so astute observation about the fact that my kids are out numbering me right now, is not helpful, kind or, let's be honest, well intentioned.. oh and by the way, you look tired." Then I would push past her (on the right) to run and refill my Diet Coke and then discreetly stuff a 2 inch stack of napkins into my purse just in case of future emergencies, like, say, lunch at KFC?