I Hate That

You know what I hate?  I hate it when the tab on the cereal box won’t go in the dratted slot.  You’ve just opened a new box of cereal, and you’re going to keep the freshness in and the ants out.  You scrunch up the plastic wrapper, punch through the slot and, voila!  No not voila.  Un-voila.  The dratted thing won’t slide in.  You punch out the slot more thoroughly.  Nope.  You wiggle and waggle the tab around.  No, no, no!  Grrrr.  Eventually you push and shove enough to force the tab through the slot, and the entire box stands there listing to one side.  You give up and put it in the pantry and hope you can forget about its drunken, leering stance until you have to face it the following morning. 

I hate it when you’re changing the sheets on your bed, being a good housekeeper, and you run slam into the bed frame practically breaking your toe, and you’re hopping around, and blood’s dripping down, and you’re swearing and you can’t even kick anything.  What kind of reward is that for good behavior?

I hate it when you think you’ve paid a bill, but the next bill comes, and it’s almost twice as big as usual, and you figure out that you misread the previous bill and paid only part of it, and there’s no one else to blame it on, and what were you thinking, you idiot? 

I hate it when you buy something at the store -- especially something for a child -- and it’s in that heavy plastic packaging that can’t be opened, no way, no how.  You pull out a heavy pair of scissors or even some metal snips and jaggedly slice the stuff, risking slicing your hand opened on the stiff, sharp plastic in order to extract an object your Perfect Grandchild is dancing out of his or her pants to play with.  I hate that stuff.

I really hate it when you’re sound asleep, it’s 5 AM and you are awakened by shrill stabbings of sound.  The pastoral life is all well and good, but what’s a bird doing bursting his lungs with song at 5 AM?  By six, your eyes are a-goggle and more sleep is hopeless. By the time you drag yourself out of bed, the bird is silent.  Stupid bird. 

I hate it when someone tells you their store is two miles past a well-known landmark and, yes, come in any time during regular business hours to pick up that replacement part.  Then you drive out there, and it’s freaking seven miles past, plus five of those miles are under construction so the traffic’s been reduced to one lane, and, instead of half an hour, it takes you an hour to get there.  You get there at 3:05 only to find out that “regular business hours” to this person means 8 AM to 3 PM but not between noon and 1 PM which would be lunch, and no one will answer your tapping on the window or anything, and, well, Long Fence, yes I do mean you.  Then you have to turn around and drive a half hour home completely empty-handed and frustrated and exhausted.  Man, I really hate that, don’t you?