Petty Peeves

Betty is frequently accused of being "too nice", or "sweet, to a fault". Betty finds these labels, which follow her across cultures and continents, to be flawed, because she always feels like she's complaining (or at least crying) about something.

So instead of blogging about cute little dogs this time, Betty will here list all her known PET PEEVES. In the interest of getting to know our contributors better, everyone is hereby *officially* encouraged to likewise gripe.

Remember the parameters: pet peeves cannot be seething hatreds or long-repressed (or currently-elected) icons of fear, injustice, and malignance. But they *must* draw out your inner Larry David, that is, your inner heartless bastard. And now, without further ado, Betty challenges you to match the total irritatingness of:

1. BOOK JACKET SUMMARIES - Betty despises book jacket summaries. They always give some critical surpise away, even if the hack who wrote it thinks he's hidden the twist somewhere between pointless thesaurus words for "soaring" and "transcendent." After reading a book jacket summary, Betty finds that great books become trivialized, good books get ruined, and just fine books become unreadable. Also, this PR drivel makes every book -- even books where terrible, terrible stuff happens! -- sound like a laundry list of Oprahrific pap. Betty would rather read Cliff's Notes - at least the writers of those had to actually, you know, read the book.

2. MANNY RAMIREZ - This weekend, Betty watched Manny "the green monster is my co-pilot" Ramirez actually try to stop a ball that had caromed off the wall -- with his foot! He never runs out ground balls or tries to catch outfield flies that would require him to move, violating every code Betty learned in Portland sports camp all those years ago. So smug, so arrogant, so intentionally provocative, Manny is the .203 hitting all-star Betty loves to hate. But maybe this is a Freudian doppleganger thing -- just look at how he "wears" his pants.

3. PEOPLE WHO HOLD OPEN SUBWAY CAR DOORS - Why do you do this, people? When you do this, you hold up every single car behind you, and there is another train coming in two minutes! And I'm hungry.

4. DVD COMMENTARY TRACKS: With rare exception, these "extras" are totally inane. They should call them "suxtras". The actors don't want to be there and so understandably crack in-jokes with each other while your favorite movie, now sullied, rolls. And the film historian people effortlessly show us that academic pursuits actually decrease one's ability to use the English language.

5. DVD "CHAPTER" TITLES: See BOOK JACKET SUMMARIES. Thanks for calling the last chapter "Teary Homecoming"!! You really kept me guessing where this was going, spoilers!! And so poetic, too! Assholes.

6. PEOPLE WHO ASK FOR LIKE 40 MILLION LITTLE DETAILS WHEN ORDERING FOOD - Dude. This is Chipotle. Just take the burrito and chill out. No one signed up to be your sour cream slave. Back away from the sneeze guard.


That's all Betty come up with right now. Hmmmm...maybe she is too nice.