There are a few things which really press my buttons, they rankle, they tick me off:
Lists in adverts is one. Stabbed out at us until our ears throb and that little vein starts pulsing in my temple.
The Navy do one.
Repitively rattling away until we want to “elvis” the TV.
Fortunately, with modern media, we don’t watch a lot of live TV now so the fast forward button is our friend.
Lack of Manners is another. I’m not talking holding chairs for fragile ladies or using the right fork. More the day to day things we do which show that we recognise that there’s not just us in the universe. Tooting goodbye to your friends may be jolly (and legal at 10:30) but it shows no thought for little local kids who have been asleep for a few hours. And terraced houses, like apartments, have people juuuust the other side of that party wall – which isn’t named so that you can shout, sing and hump against it until the wee small hours.
Teen resistance to picking up and putting back is understandable because you know, one day, it will change or the horrors will move out and mess their own place up. At work though it just annoys. The canteen is constantly littered with the debris of the Care-Nots. It’s “self clear” which does not mean a wonder of automation or something Hogwart, it means pick it up and sort it out. It’s totally unfair to leave it to the cooking colleagues. Coffee is spilt on the stairs by folk who don’t give a thought to the potential danger to others. Come on people.
And now the modern techno age has brought us the mobile (cell) phone. “Text walking” is a thing and has actually moved beyond annoying and inconsiderate because it’s harming and killing people due to lack of attention to holes and large heavy vehicles. Phones have graduated from the Dad World of leather pouches hanging from belts and are now in 80% of our pockets. Conversations are louder than ever and hey, don’t get me started on the absurdity of blue tooth ear pieces.
The other day we witnessed someone Facetiming as they were driving. Now that’s scary.
These aren’t life changers. I’m not getting high blood pressure over them. But they do prickle like little needles and on a more than daily basis.
Thought for our fellow man doesn’t entail giving out flowers and hugs.
It just means look up and use some of the dust covered 90% of your brain to work out the implications of what you do.
It’s not difficult. It’s just good manners.
