Pet Peeves

I'll tell you what really winds me up.

But first, here's a sample of what some Facebook friends said wound them up:

Drivers who don't indicate, people who clog up fb with farmville and other such apps, Leeds Utd, an unelected PM, people who don't reply to texts / emails, cold - wet weekends followed by dry weekdays, metal cutlery scraped on baking trays /chalk on boards, people who lie, when the person behind you in the cinema keeps kneeing the back of your seat, when you've had a bad day and tell someone who turns out to have had a worse one, litter, dog mess on the pavement, monday mornings, supermarket queues, people driving whilst smoking etc, people who don't talk directly to a person in a wheelchair, when people think you are thick because you are hearing impaired, when people get to the checkout and act surprised that they now need their wallet, when you lose your £ in the trolley - that didn't go straight in the first place, when you wake up with no duvet on your side of the bed, clothes left on the floor, young men acting as grumpy old men, being called a grumpy old man.....



I've highlighted ones that wind me up too, but my real pet peeve is - well, I'll tell you after a couple of stories:

It was a nightmare. She'd woken up cold and duvet-less. Then when she'd gone back to the room after breakfast there were clothes strewn all over the floor. She already had a tight schedule and really didn't have the time or energy, for that or for this. The idiot in front hadn't indicated when he'd pulled out in front of her, then he had clearly lost the accelerator whilst fumbling to light his cigarrette. Late, she'd been hampered in the supermarket by a trolley that seemed determined to go it's own way. Finally, when she'd got to the checkout the woman in front took forever to find her purse - as if it was a surprise to her that she needed to pay. Almost driven to distraction, she packed the boot of the car and returned the wayward trolley only to have to engage in a 10 minute struggle to get her £1 coin back.



Now though she could relax. Off to pick up her friend for that promised trip to the cinema. The wheelchair took some dismantling as ever, but finally they got there with minutes to spare. That's when she really got annoyed. When they got to the front of the queue the salesperson insisted on asking her what they wanted to see instead of addressing her friend directly. She knew she shouldn't, but that's when she blew her top. Suitably chastened, the attendant then almost whispered 'what film do you want to see'. Of course she couldn't have known about the hearing problem, but the patronising tone implied she was addressing an imbecile. She almost stormed out there and then. Finally the flim started. And then it ended. She had no idea what happened in between - she was so distracted by the man sat behind her who kept sticking his knee into the back of her chair... When she got home, looking for sympathy, and began to tell her husband, he immediately started to list the things that had gone wrong for him. The scream seemed to go on for ever - until she realised it wasn't a scream, but the alarm. It really had been a nightmare.

She lay there a while, thinking about each incident, replaying it from a different perspective. Maybe the guy in the car had some unseen disability and she was been harsh on him just as the attendant had unkowingly been to her friend. Maybe if she had such a low-paid, soul-destroying job, the trolleys would be in an even worse state of repair. One by one she realised that with a broader perspective, her attitude might have been very different. That's better she said to herself. Shivering slightly (there was no duvet on her side of the bed), she swivelled out of bed, treading on a discarded shirt. This time, the scream was real.

I wrote a booklet on scripture once called 'The Bible Exposed' (let me know if you want one...). In some areas it isn't traditional conservative evangelical fare. I went to a party where I didn't know everyone. I met some friendly people and we chatted for a while, parting no doubt feeling that we were all good solid Christians. A little later I was chatting to another group near them. I couldn't help overhearing them dismantling some poor bloke who had written some terrible, heretical booklet on scripture. They made all sorts of assumptions about him and the booklet (which they hadn't read), blissfully unaware that he was the man they had such a good opinion of a few minutes earlier. It did make me laugh (really).

So here's my pet peeve. Judge not that you might not be judged. God is so openly loving that the Trinity flings open their arms and welcomes us in - fully knowing, having the perfect perspective with which tojudge as unacceptable. Shall we leave the judging to God?

Except when it comes to duvets....