That Really Bugs Me

Here's a random list of stuff that annoys, confuses, or otherwise bothers me.

1. The smell of peanut butter

Status: Bother

I really cannot stand the smell of peanut butter.

By this I mean I literally get nauseated when I get a whiff of the stuff.

I blame this diet I went on in 8th grade. One of the strange meals involved 2 tablespoons of natural (meaning unsweetened) peanut butter on a bread.

It was an unholy alliance, and I still don't make peanut butter cookies.


2. My blood is a second class citizen.

Status: Annoying/confusing/bother

Whenever I heard anyone talk about giving blood, there was always the mention of how the most requested blood type in hospitals is O type blood.

I always feel a little flicker of shame.

See, my blood type is A-positive, because I am apparently just that awesome. Back in 1986 or so, there were at least a couple of people who decided to donate blood who were A-positive. Yet somehow...it doesn't have that O-type magic that everyone just craves.

You always get a feeling that the nurses are all like "oh...A-positive...well, I guess we'll take it" in their minds. Then you feel a little defiant.

Yeah, heck right, my blood's good enough. What.


3. I'm female, so I'm all over chocolate like Dracula in a blood bank.

Status: Confusing

I'll take a second to explain. While I was in college, I heard this one a lot. "Girls, don't you just crave chocolate sometime..." "Oooh, truffles..." "Girls, doesn't chocolate just make everything better..."

Uhm. No.

Now, I do like chocolate. I imagine a lot of people do, and I've only met a couple of people who don't prefer it. Fine by me; my candy of choice is Haribo Happy Colas, because they are scientifically proven to be that ambrosia stuff the Greeks kept going on about.

But, in an interesting twist of things, my fiance is the one with the sweet tooth. Mostly, sugar makes my teeth hurt and gives me a touch of heartburn. I don't eat meal replacement bars for that reason.

I actually refer to my taste as a "meat tooth."

I also don't drink, so I had a double advantage at BJU while all my fellow women students had their wits compromised by the presence of Lindor truffles.



4. "I pushed my blond hair away from my face, and my violet eyes stared across the land..."

Status: Annoyance, to say the very least.

I see this a lot in way too many first-person books. Usually they have younger characters. Sometimes they're self-published, sometimes they're bestsellers.

There's a pretty big reason you probably should avoid this.

By probably, I mean definitely.

Ready for it?

Here goes...

No one describes themselves when they're telling a story. I don't care if you're writing in a journal or telling a story to someone face-to-face. If you've resorted to having your main character describe himself or herself, then back off for a second. Look at it through the eyes of another person.

And don't freaking do it.

Honestly, readers will picture a character any way they please, regardless of your input. Also, if that character absolutely has to take the time to describe how mind-blowing their eye color is, then they're at best self-absorbed.

And yes, I just snuck writing tips in. Deal with it.



5. "Are you German?/You look German..."/"You look like your name should be Helga."

Status: Bother/Back the heck away now.

The first two aren't so bad, except they don't make a whole lot of sense.

I went to Bob Jones University for college, and because of apparent nutritional deficiencies within fundamentalism, I was among the taller of the students there. Also, people from Michigan are short. So there's that.

Apparently being tall makes you German, in BJU-World.

Now, sure, it would make sense if I had actual blond hair and fit any stereotype whatsoever, but I have brown hair. Yes, I have blue eyes, but that particular trait is more indicitive of my actual ancestry, which is partly of the British Isles. And BJU people are really good at asking awkward questions, like if you're German because "you're so tall."

The Helga thing actually hurt a little. I'm not even sure where it came from, or what the intent was, but it was said with a derisive giggle, by people I didn't even know well. It bothered me because nothing about my clothes or hairstyle invited such a statement. In BJU-World, someone with the name "Helga," however inaccurate the perception, is heavy-browed and lumbering.

I already know I'm quite far from being pretty by anyone's standards, but this little incident was just one more reason I was glad to graduate and get away from there, mostly because people there were willing to say anything about you behind your back, as long as it's "good clean fun."



6. I have a history degree, so I just know tons about the Civil War.

Status: Confusing

'Cause I really don't.

I mean, I really, really don't.

I never took a single Civil War-focus class in all my four years of college. Heck, I only took one American history class beyond the required U.S. History classes. Most of my choices included the ancient world and the 20th century. My personal favorite choices were a study of Germany from 1933 to 1945 and World War II. I woulda taken a bazillion classes on the latter if I could.

My favorite century is the 20th. I like seeing how it all meshes together. I love seeing how everything, from technology to pop culture to warfare, changed in just 100 years. The 20th century is like no other.

'Bout the only thing I know about the Civil War is the correct pronunciation of Antietam. Call me negligent, but it wasn't what really captured my attention as I grew up. At some point in high school, WWII caught my eye and everything just unfolded from there.




7. "Well, you can do stuff giving blood, because you're taller/bigger/like a giant..."

Status: Really freaking annoying

I think I first noticed this in earnest a little while back, when I was discussing a blood drive with some people. Now, as I've said before, I'm not exactly petite. By that I mean that I am 5 feet, 9 inches tall.

Not exactly a giant, either.

See, when I was a baby, my white blood cells decided to go on a witch hunt. Like most witch hunts, it went badly, and my poor innocent red blood cells were being eaten in pretty great numbers. I imagine it looked somewhat like when the T-rex in Jurassic Park ate that goat. I had to receive a blood transfusion of packed red cells. That's a heck of a lot of A-positive blood types. The crisis was averted, and I am here today, delivering your daily-ish dose of snark.

So you could say that giving blood is close to my heart.* I've done it two times now in my lifetime, and I'm trying to get my fiance to do it so we can have an excuse to go out for a steak afterwards. I try to encourage people to give blood if they can, when the subject comes up.

The replies are always what really get me. I can see if someone just plain doesn't want to. I mean, if you're squeamish, that's fine. Or, alternatively, you can't, for whatever health reason.

The annoying part is when smaller people say stuff like "well, I'd just get sick and have to go to bed all day; you're a lot bigger than me, so you can afford to give blood."

Uhm, actually, no I can't. The average human has about 10 pints of blood. The range for women tends to be 8-10 pints. I have as much blood in my body as I'm supposed to; when I give a pint, it's a lot.

See, I have trouble gauging what "a lot of food" is. What seems to me like it might be a lot of food very likely isn't. The last time I gave blood, I'd had a good breakfast, but "eat a lot" for me, that day, meant adding a piece of toast, which, you might have guessed, isn't iron rich. Couple that with having an upset stomach sometime that morning. I was running on empty and decided to give anyway. For some reason, filling the bag didn't take as long the second time around. I'd estimate 5-10 minutes, which is short for a donation. I got pretty nauseous after that. If I actually bled a pint, it would make a mess.

So no, tiny people, actually, I can't just "afford" to do without a whole pint of my blood. It's not money. I can't save it up and decide to splurge on a trip to the Red Cross. So spare me the excuses and just be honest, okay?


So now you know.

And it probably explains a lot.





*I swear, that wording was an accident.

Fried Slice: Do I Really Need to Know?

So wedding stuff makes me grumpy. Just a bit.

Don't get me wrong. My own wedding is something I'm excited for. I'm going to get an awesome dress and a great cake and eat good food and marry the man I love. Sweet.

Hmm. Maybe I'm not talking about wedding stuff. Maybe I'm talking about marriage stuff. It's more important. The heart has to be ready, and that really has nothing at all to do with contracts or gum paste flowers or the lighting effects on the dance floor. That fact is pretty obvious, right? So let me back up and explain myself.

My fiance and I have been together for over five years. A good portion of that has consisted of a long-distance relationship. I live in North Carolina, he lives in Missouri. We have long visits. My dog loves him (and that's amazing.) Together, we've made a relationship that has had a lot of love and a few fights. We know we have quirks, because we've seen them up close. We also know that everything's gonna get really real at about 2:00 A.M. sometime in the future when one of us gets a wake-up call via the "icy foot zap." So yeah, I know relationships take work. Five years, remember?

Obviously, being a (reluctant) Twentysomething, I've had a few friends get engaged and married over the years. Yeah, I've only been engaged since January, but that sorta just made it official. I've always sort of known. My man's still in school and I'm paying for the wedding myself. Yeah, it's gonna be a minute. When I see my all friends getting speedily engaged and hitched like little matrimony moon rockets, I cringe a little.

'Cause I know and fear what's coming next.

The SAGELY SAGE ADVICE.

Okay, to be fair, only one person has actually offered THE ADVICE and that was quite some time ago. This individual had known the intended spouse for a few years, they dated for a short while (like very very very very very short) got engaged in the spring of 2010, and were married by the end of summer 2010. A few months later, after I posted my engagement announcement on Facebook, this person ADVISED me that marriage was hard work, but worth it.

Durr.

For me, that was the equivalent of someone informing me in a condescending tone that the invasion of Normandy occurred on June 6th, 1944. But imagine that the teacher or whoever was sharing this advice because I'd shared with them my intention to write my dissertation in pursuit of a doctorate, the subject of said project being the strategies and movements of the U.S. Airborne units during Operation Neptune and an exploration into the assault on Brecourt Manor. At this point, I think it would be pretty clear that I know what I'm talking about and have known for quite some time. Imagine the person with the condescending attitude having just watched the first scene of Saving Private Ryan like five minutes before and that being the first time they'd ever heard of the invasion of Normandy, let alone Operation Neptune or Operation Overlord.

That's sorta what it felt like.

And while that individual has been the only one to offer SAGELY SAGE ADVICE, I still have this reflex of...something, every time. There is joy for my friends, because finding the one person who is literally your other half is awesome. What I don't welcome is the advice that has the possibility of coming.

If you've just seen a clip of a film that features a few bloody minutes on one beach in Normandy, and that's all you know, as much as it has touched you and changed you, you cannot give me a full-on lecture about leg bags and the problems therewith. You can't tell me merely about the existence of Operation Market-Garden. I already know, and I've known a lot longer than you.

I don't hate advice, and I don't hate learning. Most people are like that. Because of the time I've invested in a long-distance relationship, just as if I'd dedicated my life to studying the details in World War II, I know stuff that others don't yet. I know what it's like to be hurt. I know what it's like to argue. Heck, I know how to fight dirty. But I also know how to love, how to forgive, and how to savor moments, even when the theater's heater is broken and it's 20 degrees Fahrenheit outside and somewhere in the 50-60 range inside.

This doesn't make me any better than the ADVICE offerer I mentioned earlier. But I do have the distinct advantage of time and patience and sadness and fights and near-breakups and forgiveness and love and joy and laughter.

In a word, life.

A better teacher by far than all the ADVICE I could ever get.