PEOPLE I HATE - Pt. 2

George Carlin knew

I had a friend call me the other day. I know...right? He didn't text me, email me or FB instant message me! It's like a miracle when someone actually tries to communicate by SPEAKING to me! It almost never happens any more. So I did what anyone would do under the circumstances. I stared at my cell phone until it stopped ringing then texted him back. "What do you want?"

It turned out one of my good friends had been reading this blog. He wanted to know when I'd be doing People I Hate pt. 2. I called him and we spoke for a few minutes. "I don't hate anyone really and I am trying to have a positive attitude." I said. He couldn't relate. "Everyone knows you have a crappy attitude. Just write it down. Trust me you'll feel better."

Maybe he has a point. This time of year always pisses me off. New England fall always lasts around ten minutes then it's cold and we are getting beaten over the head with the holidays. Halloween isn't done for two seconds and I have to start buying people presents? I just had my long johns on for the first time yesterday. 11/9/2014. That's early. That's not cool. So yes I am pretty sick of everyone. The weather only makes it worse. People seems to get worse this time of year too. The entitled, rude, ignorant sheer stupidness seems to come out full force.

I'm not as cynical as I come off. I want to like everybody and actually I do like many people. I used to think everyone deep down is good and can be reasoned with. All you really need are good communicative skills, a sense of humor and a bright disarming smile. That is all you really need to make friends and allies wherever you go.

Then you can ride your unicorn off into the sunset and pick daisies in the land of Oz while naked bodybuilders make love to you next to an ocean of melted chocolate.....

Yup. That is what I USED to think. I don't really believe that any more. Some people are completely unreasonable. Some are entitled fools who believe the world is actually revolving around them and some people are just batshit crazy.

You can not reason with those types. You will never be able to trust them. Obviously you can't depend on them or consider them friends but actually they might be enemies.

Today's edition of People I Hate is going to be focused on crazy people. Let me explain. I am not writing about the mentally ill padded cell types although some of these people in today's post could easily benefit from years of therapy. More or less I want to touch upon the kind of person who can not be reasoned with. Maybe you can relate.
Maybe you're one of them...Hopefully not.

I. The Narcissist

There's selfish and then there's SELFISH. Everyone knows a Narcissist. You may not realize it so let me lay it all out for you.

1. Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) is a personality disorder in which a person is excessively preoccupied with personal adequacy, power, prestige and vanity, mentally unable to see the destructive damage they are causing to themselves and to others in the process.

Now that sounds pretty cut and dry but it isn't as easy to spot one as you might think. So ask your self these questions:

• Do you know someone who has no problem whatsoever blowing you off?
• Does that person constantly break their word and then somehow make is seem as if it's your fault that they screwed you over?
• Is everything always about them? Is their Ego so big that any time they get insulted they hold a grudge for like FOREVER?
• Are they in and out of romantic relationships because the other person is always somehow crazy or too demanding?
• Do they more or less suck but still make you laugh and can be charming when they want to be or more likely want something from you?

If you answered yes to these questions there is really only one thing to do.   RUN!!!

I heard Judge Judy say once that you can't fix stupid. It's the same with a Narcissist. You're never going to fix that person. They will always be that way. It's better to cut and run. Get far away and move on and if you are stuck working for a person like this well......good luck. 

II. The OCD Person

I used to have a friend who would love to go out to dinner. He was always raving about the newest place or some dish he heard about. He would get a group of us together and we would all go out. The thing that would drive me crazy was that he could never just order off the menu. 

Do you know anyone like that? I've known this person for over twenty years and have to this day never seen him just pick an item on the menu and order it. He always has to ask for changes. Can the chef make him a special side dish? Can they cook it differently just for him? Is it possible to put it on an extra large plate? (seriously) It's embarrassing and incredibly annoying. I came to realize that he just couldn't help it. I just couldn't help getting pissed off. I always say the same thing to him. "No matter what they do for you man it's always going to come back tasting like spit." But at least he'll have his saliva HIS way right?

I know this other guy who hates to be driven around. He needs to be the driver wherever he goes. Great. I love to be driven around but here's the thing. He has this ritual that he needs to do before we can leave. 

He checks the rear view mirror.

He fixes his seat belt

He turns on the heat or AC.

He checks the side mirrors.

He fixes the rear view mirror

He unbuckles his seat belt and puts it back on again.

He checks the side mirrors

He lowers the heat or AC

He checks all the mirrors.     (am I annoying you yet?)

Yes it can go on for ten minutes or more. He's normal as far as I can tell in every single other circumstance. But if I attempt to get him not to do this long insane ritual then we can't leave. It would be funny if it wasn't me that has to wait for this. One time I forced him to just start the car and go. We had to pull over ten minutes later because he said the mirror was messed up. "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" I would ask. He didn't really have an answer. I wondered what he would do if he came across a car with no mirrors, just a steering wheel and that was it. His head would explode.

You guys must have people in your life that do completely irrational things that drive you nuts. It isn't clinical enough to get them help. It's just bad enough to be annoying. We all know people who hoard. But are they hoarders? Maybe not. Maybe they are just doing it on purpose just to piss you off! Naah. You should just learn to be more patient like me.
(yeah right)

  

III. Mr. or Mrs. Instant Best Friend:


There is this acquaintance of mine who always has to hug me when she sees me. She LOVES me. She speaks to me as if we have been best friends for life. She asks about my family, my wife, my health. This is not a big deal if not for the act that we are complete strangers more or less. We hung out twice at a big event. That was it. Now she and I are best friends apparently. Nothing makes me more uncomfortable than when a person who is sort of a friend says "Bye! I LOVE you!" Come on. You don't love me. It took me years to say that to the woman I married. Now I'm supposed to say it back to a girl I know from a Blogger party? " I passionately love you too! I'm totally comfortable with this! BYE!!!"  ugh ugh ugh.

Some people are like that. I am pretty friendly and I like to make new friends but there's a little imaginary line that once crossed makes you a fruitcake. Some people touch a little too much. I have this imaginary box around me. YOU don't get to enter that box unless I invite you in. Okay? Some people just barge right into that imaginary box.  They move in with luggage. Then they are too close. They are breathing on you. They are touching you. Once they leave you can still smell them and they better smell good because now you smell like them. Thy have left pieces of themselves in your PRIVATE BOX! WTF!  They are all over you. God, I hate that!

Not cool. Not Cool at all.

I know a guy like this who is always asking for favors. "Can you do me a quick favor?" 

"Cappy, can I get your friends number that (Insert job here) so he can hook me up with some free service?"

"Would you mind helping me move?"  

 HAHAHAHAHA! That's always a good one. If some "acquaintance" ever asks you to help them move that's where you spell it out for them like I did for this guy.

He needed an intervention so I gave him one.

"Look bud." I said calmly. "You and I aren't brothers are we?"  

"No" He said, "Why do you ask?"

"Because my brother wouldn't ask me to help him move because he knows I'd say no."

I then went on to explain that manual labor is expensive and that if someone was going to do an expensive, time consuming task for someone else for FREE then it could be considered a "FAVOR" and that favors of this magnitude should be reserved for people who you have known for a LONG time or who you are extremely close or intimate with.

"Are we close and intimate?" I asked him. 

"NO"  he said.

"So do you think I am going to take an entire day off from work and from being with my family to help you do some back breaking work for free?" I said.

"NO" he said.

and he was 100% right. We don't really talk much any more.

Cynical Face

SO. these are a few more types who just crawl up my keister and give me Agita.

The list really is endless.  Next time when we do People I Hate pt. 3 we can do a whole post on the passive aggressive people who deserve special recognition for things like Yelp reviews and asking questions with no answers. Venting like this really does help keep me positive though.

Positive I am not leaving the house today.

Dealing with D. B 's

World War Douchebags pt.1

My next book is going to be a coffee table book about douchebags. There’s just so many friggin people out there who exist simply to piss everyone else off. I wonder if they knew that they would be in a color photograph on someone’s coffee table forever immortalized as a total friggin dipstick, if they would re-think the behavior that would be giving them this title.

I think most assholes are just selfish. Most entitled behavior stems from someone not giving a crap what happens when they do …...anything. Stupidity can also enter into it but lets leave the brain dead out of the equation for a moment. Today I’m addressing the people who know better but do it anyway. Do what? You may ask? In my coffee table book under each full color picture would be a graphic depiction of what got them in the book. For example:

I love Boar’s Head cold cuts. Once in a blue moon I go grocery shopping in a place that sells these delicious slices of meat and must have pounds and pounds of it to shove into my gaping maw. Sometimes I even make a sandwich at home like normal people do, but  usually I open all the packages in the car and spread them out on the passenger seat so I can eat while I drive. I’m partial to the maple ham, rosemary turkey and beef bologna but it is all good stuff.

SO I saunter up to the deli counter and take a number. Usually it’s the weekend which means it is crowded. I hate crowds, mostly because when a crowd is waiting for something in a line of some sort then crowds decide they want to make friends.

I am cursed with a friendly face. I know this because no matter how much I scowl and frown people always seem to want to talk to me. I wear a baseball hat about 50% of the time I’m outside and I can pull the brim all the way down, close my eyes, make a horrible face and try to look invisible but SOMEONE will still try to talk to me about the weather. Why do people always want to talk about the weather? Yes it's been hot. Yes it's cold out. I'm standing in it! I see it. Go away! Sometimes I am on the train with a full train load of idiots and the dirty guy at the other end of the train will catch my eye somehow and yell across the whole train, “How bout them Red Sox buddy!” and if I yell back, “Fuck Off!” He’ll think I’m JOKING and laugh. I get away with being rude a lot because everyone always thinks I'm just kidding. I'm not kidding!There can be a dozen people standing next to me on the streets of Boston but I’m the one who the tourist taps on the shoulder and asks where the Cheers bar is. Why me? There's 50 other people who probably go to Cheers every day so they can act like their Norm. Not me!  So it’s a curse. It is. People never leave me alone.

Now you can understand why I want to do my time on the deli line, wait for my number to be called, order my honey ham and go. On a busy Saturday there’s usually around 10 people ahead of me so let’s say I’m number 69. They are up to 59 and I wait. 60. 61. yes the lady who is number 62 orders enough stuff for an army and is extremely annoying but I can deal with her. 63. 64.  OH, 64? “Has anyone seen 64?  Where are you 64?”"Ok next number then since 64 obviously left" ……..OK 65. 66.  Here it comes….  67.   68….

Now it’s my turn . The deli schmuck says “69”  I say, “Right Here!”

This is when number 64 shows up. He’s old. Real old. And he decided to grab a number and go shopping. He decides to come back AFTER they called his number and insist he go next. But he also denies ever leaving the area. “I was here.” “I didn’t hear you call my number.”  “ YOU skipped my number””I go NOWWWW!”

{Maybe I’m wrong. I think a life rule is that if you leave any line for an extended amount of time you are no longer on that line.In addition to that rule if you carry on like a bitch when you are in the wrong you lose your place in line. In addition if someone else is about to be served and is in the process of stating their order for Boars Head cold cuts you do not interrupt. You wait until that person is finished then calmly explain that you left and didn't get back on time. You apologize for being so stupid (and so old). You hope but not expect the deli shmuck to be considerate and empathise with you but you don’t make a scene because if you do you can expect what did happen to happen to you.}

I just want to give one more analogy then I’ll explain how I handled this situation. If I go to Disneyland and the line to meet Mickey Mouse is 1000 people long and I get on the line for a sec then ask the guy behind me to hold my place in line. Then I go back to my hotel and take a nap for an hour. When I get back to see that guy already on Mickey’s lap can I expect to push him off and take my turn? NO I can’t, can I ? I may be mixing up Mickey with Santa but you get the picture.

I watched Grandpa Joe have a mini meltdown about the conspiracy to make him miss getting his 1/8th of a pound of no sodium Alpine Lace Swiss cheese and waited. The deli guy was explaining that he just saw him appear from aisle 3, the Metamucil aisle. He asked me if I would mind if the man went first. Although I was there alone I said that I just wanted to make sure my wife who was 9 months pregnant waiting in the car was ok with waiting even longer. Although we were expecting triplets and she could pop at any moment I'm sure it would fiiiiine. I took out my phone and pretended to call her making everyone wait. I had a five minute call with my wife who I called Snookibottom about the man who wanted to go first, speaking very loudly and with a weird new accent I invented just for this occasion.

Now, the OLD MAN was waiting. He didn't like it. I got off my fake call and starting talking to him. I asked him if he had a big order. He said he didn’t. I asked him what number he had. He told me. I asked him where he was from? Now numbers 70, 71 and the rest all starting to huff and puff.

Deli man was getting a little fuklempt at this point because the whole store was waiting. He finally asked me to just give him my order already. “Are you sure?” I asked very loudly now not effing around any more. “I mean, we can all hang around pandering to this old fart all day if you want. I have nowhere to be.” "Maybe we should all wait outside so this guy can get his shopping all done with no other people in his way! I then made a big show of asking everyone there if it was ok if I went next since it was MY TURN anyway. Most people were laughing their butts off at this point. Grandpa Joe looked red faced. He had a look on his face as if he wished he never ever would buy cheese again. I ordered as slowly as was humanly possible , got my meat and left thinking.  “YOU sir just made a page in my new coffee table book”

I bet he waited right next to the deli counter, number in hand the next time he needed cheese.