Who needs TV? Reality’s irritating enough for my inner curmudgeon

Once again my inner curmudgeon seeks release. Normally content to just buzz around inside my head, causing twitches and murmuring and irritation, it does need to be let loose from time to time so it doesn’t do irreparable internal damage as it thrashes around in there.

(Please hear my husband saying: “Too late.”)

It is being freed here temporarily in the form of a list of people and things that bug me to distraction.

First are the people who push their grocery carts through the doors of Rosauers (or any supermarket) and stop dead in their tracks to check their grocery lists. They are first cousins to those who step off an escalator and come to an immediate halt. Don’t these people realize what’s happening directly behind them?

And why is it that I’m always a penny short? If I buy something that costs $8.02, I will have all sorts of change in my wallet, but only one penny. And, of course, the little dish by the cash register that should contain spare pennies for moments such as these will be empty.

I hate all bottle caps, even on nonchild-proof prescription bottles. If you have even a touch of arthritis in your hands or maybe have a little muscle weakness (or not), I challenge you to go ahead and try squeezing the two designated spots on the sides of the caps while twisting or pressing down and twisting at the same time. There’s one particular brand of mustard jar I still can’t open even after popping the seal with a bottle opener. My husband, who has the strength of vise grips in his mitts, is hard-pressed to open certain jars for me. C’mon, bottlers of the world, this isn’t a rocket science fix.

I hate it when people go through the drive-in teller line unprepared, leading to at least four voyages of the pneumatic banking tube. First the tube has to be sent back to the teller for the right paperwork, then the paperwork has to be filled out and sent back (assuming a separate suction trip isn’t required for a pen), then when the cash back arrives and the driver wants different denominations, back it goes again, etc. Can’t these people hear me screaming two cars behind them?

And speaking of cars, why is that during beautiful sunny weather when the speed limit is 70 mph, people drive 65 mph on the freeway – in the left lane? And they usually do this right next to another car in the right lane also doing 65.

And why do drivers turning right onto a four-lane road not remain in the curb lane but swing wide into the left lane, which causes drivers turning left onto the same road (usually me) have to brake hard so as not to hit these miscreants? Read the driver’s manual, people!

It makes me crazy to see a patron berate wait staff for some vapid reason, but mostly because they can get away with it.

Why do local commercials end with shots of young kids, who I assume are the children or grandchildren of the business owners, who deliver some message, intended to be adorable but in fact is chirped at a pitch so fast and so high that it is only intelligible to canines?

And what’s with all the reality shows blighting the viewer landscape? News flash – if there are cameras and production staff all over the place, special lighting and makeup and an edict to keep up the conflict, there isn’t a hint of reality in sight. And why is somebody else’s reality, even faked, more interesting than your own? Besides, as my cousin said, “If I want to observe a dysfunctional family, I’ll call my sister-in-law.”

I have come to hate the word “amazing,” used by every broadcaster, local and national, when showing some viewer-contributed video or kid’s science project or tale of a six-toed cat. No, amazing is a picture from the Hubble Space Telescope. These other things are mildly interesting, maybe. Surely these TV personalities can move off rote mode and find a real descriptor.

To ratchet up the grumpy factor a tad bit more, is it just me or is the happy-talk and pseudo joshing banter of the TV news guys seeming more and more inane, forced and, well, kind of dumb? Let’s get on with the news, shall we?

And why is it that a perfectly nice newspaper like this one grants space for such ranting? No doubt because it has a soft spot in its heart for grumpy old women such as me, for which I am grateful. As is my inner curmudgeon.