You're Schmoopie!

Schmoopie...aka Orange from Orange Tangerine has blessed us with her presence...

Grievance 1: The Caring, Honest Asshat

You haven't been sleeping well. Or maybe you haven't been feeling so hot lately. Or you're hung over. You roust yourself out of bed--no mean Feat of Strength. You lug yourself into the shower. You toss back some coffee or OJ. If you're a woman (or incredibly metrosexual), you slap on a little makeup and you feel you can pass for normal now. You make it into the office, ready to face the day.

"Wow, you look really tired."

"Are you all right? You don't look so hot."

"You are having a rough time these days."

Damn. You thought you could pull it off and didn't actually look like a truck had run you over. But your coworkers are eager to correct you: You look like hell! Have a nice day.

Grievance 2: Demanding Yet Pointless Platitudes

People--—and by people, I mean men, because it always seems to be men who do this—--who greet an acquaintance with "Hey, what's going on?" but don't wait around for an answer.

What the hell kind of question is that? "How's it going?" is vague and answerable with a simple "All right." or "Good. You?" Keep walking, no need to slow down. Hell, you can even answer a "How's it going?" query with one of your own:

Some guy: "How's it going?"
You: "Hey! How ya doin'?"
[Both parties continue walking.]

"What's going on?" demands specificity, an accounting of your actions and plans and the state of the world.

Some guy: "Hey, what's going on?"
You:: "Oh! Uh, well, I'm tired of working on that report, so now I'm walking down this hallway and I'm thinking I'll go to the john or maybe get a drink of water. Then it's back to work. I'm not done with my Festivus shopping yet, and the in-laws are coming to town this weekend, so there's a lot of stuff going on. I'm supposed to go to the gym tonight, but I just don't know if I feel up to it. God, I could use a drink."
Some guy: [Has evanesced into the past because he really didn't give a shit what was "going on." He just thinks he's too hep to utter a pedestrian "How are you?"]

I got what's-going-onned by my UPS guy the other day. Was he hoping I'd tell him where I was going? No?

If you greet acquaintances with "What's going on?" but don't give a crap what's going on with them, quit saying that. It won't kill you to say "Hey, how's it going?"

Grievance 3: The Social Contract of the Supermarket

What keeps people from just killing each other? The social contract: You drive on this side of the road and I'll drive on this one. I won't knock you down the stairs and you won't knock me down the stairs. We take these things for granted, most of us. But sometimes, someone shreds the social contract and causes untold suffering among their fellow humans. That's right: I'm talking about the supermarket checkout. WTF? We all know how it goes down. You put your stuff on the conveyor belt in an efficient manner--don't spread your shit out so that there's no room on the conveyor for the person behind you, and for the love of god, be quick about it.

The other day, the social contract was shattered and a rift opened in the universe. The woman in front of me opted to split her cartload into two batches to be rung up separately. She put the second batch of three small items (including Preparation H, because being evil makes her ass burn) on the conveyor behind the plastic divider. But the first batch? The big batch? Two thirds of that remained in the cart. So she could hand those items to the cashier in the sequence of her choosing. One. Item. At. A. Time. On a Saturday afternoon, when the store's jammed.

Classic lane-choosing error, ending up behind that insane broad. But last in line in the adjacent lane was an elderly woman, and that usually means trouble at the checkout. There's a price check, a delivery order, a laboriously hand-written check, or a surfeit of coin-counting action. But today? She made her rounds at the front of the store after checking out and was still out of there before I was, because Mrs. Itching and Burning violated the social contract of the checkout.

Comments

[SL22]

People always ask me if I "just got up" when I come into work. Technically, I just came into work, so yeah, I did just get up. But it's still aggravating.

[ZaZ]

How about when you say, "What's goin' on?" and they answer, "Fine."
That's worse.

[jackie]

"Grievance 1: The Caring, Honest Asshat

Noisy fucks. I almost always tempted to ask if they are writing a fucking book.

"People--—and by people, I mean men, because it always seems to be men who do this—--who greet an acquaintance with "Hey, what's going on?" but don't wait around for an answer."

Guilty.

[Eli]

"People--—and by people, I mean men, because it always seems to be men who do this—--who greet an acquaintance with "Hey, what's going on?" but don't wait around for an answer

I prefer a simple "dude". Even my mother's gotten used to it now.

[Kristal K]

"Wow, you look really tired" is just a polite person's: "Shit! What's the matter with you!?! You look like ass -- what are you doing here?" question.

Next person who says that to me, I'm smacking.

[Assman]

I could write three books about jackasses in supermarkets. Three! And two could be on Oprah!

[Art Vandelay]

At least we've gotten past that awful era when everyone was screaming WHAAAZZZZUUUUP!!!! at each other.

[Billy]

It's all about the self-checkout at the supermarket; that's how you avoid those douchenozzles. Then again, the self checkout line creates its own breed of douchenozzle; you know, those people who don't realize that the machine in most cases only knows what price to charge you by reading the fucking UPC label, so go ahead and locate that and point it at the laser thingy, ummmk?

[Schmoopie]

The self-checkout machine is a douchenozzle. Fucker always plays like I'm scamming it by putting extra stuff in the bag. Or when I opt not to bag a large item, it tells me I have to wait for approval from an employee to skip bagging. What?! God forbid my child brushes against the bagging area—the machine will totally freak out and accuse me of stealing.