Keriosity

In no particular order:

1. Yellowjackets!!!! (that one is in order)
2. Parents who think everyone loves their children and aren’t annoyed by them
3. Recycled airplane air because it means we all feel like we’re sitting next to The Farter
4. Stickiness
5. Cigarette butts being thrown out of car windows
6. Cigarette butts being thrown anywhere except in a garbage or ash tray
7. Uncomfortable shoes
8. Groups of 4 or more women
9. Pet owners who do not keep their dogs on leashes
10. Silverfish
11. Love Stories
12. Slow walkers
13. Close talkers
14. The lingering hand-shake
15. California drivers (this encompasses rubbernecking, not using turn signals, stopping in the middle of the street because they forgot they had to be in another lane, riding the brake, speeding up when I’ve signaled that I’m changing lanes, taking up more than 1 lane, broken brake-lights, the pointed finger out the window in lieu of a turn signal, honking at me to flirt with me, not knowing how to merge, and spilling items onto the freeway from their trucks.)
16. The phrases “I’m all”, “he’s all”, “she’s all”
17. Cell phones
18. Starbucks cups as an accessory
19. Overuse of the word “surreal”
20. That licking sound dogs make
21. Women who won’t date men who are “too short”
22. Men who won’t date women who are “too pudgy”
23. That at the airport, the line for Starbucks is longer than the security line
24. Repetitive noises
25. The smell of mildew
26. The first day after getting my hair colored when my hairline is still stained with color
27. 98% of anything having to do with children
28. Pregnant women who think that we think their naked belly is beautiful
29. The word “snickerdoodle”
30. The word “spleen”
31. Cooking shows
32. Medical surgery shows
33. Reality tv shows
34. Messy car interiors
35. People who talk for their pets
36. Menus and flyers shoved into the slats of my fence
37. Dry rot
38. The word “dry rot”
39. Mud
40. Humidity
41. Subway track sludge
42. Shopping
43. Hot chocolate mix that forms into small powdery clumps rather than dissolving
44. Scary movie commercials
45. Ovaltine radio commercials
46. Any stranger who has ever sat next to me on a plane
47. The word “trunk” when it refers to a torso
48. Slobber
49. People who use the word “I” or “me” in every single sentence
50. Running
51. Spiders
52. Personal trainers
53. Jennifer Love Hewitt
54. Beavis and Butthead
55. The sound of a baby crying
56. Being tickled
57. Magicians, clowns, or team mascots
58. Pet owners with no medical background who feel they can give veterinary advice to other pet owners
59. Talking to someone who has food stuck in their teeth, a crumb on their chin, eyelash on their cheek, chapped lips – anything that distracts me but that I can’t bring to their attention
60. Pushy sales people
61. In-flight announcements
62. People who are oblivious to their position relative to what’s going on around them – ie. Standing in the middle of a crowded walkway, abruptly stopping in the middle of a moving crowd, stopping at the top of subway steps to figure out which way to go. What is wrong with people – MOVE OUT OF THE WAY!
63. Smudging a nail 20 minutes after getting a manicure
64. Pauly Shore
65. How my ears ache after coming in from the cold
66. Stubbing my toe or other exercises in clumsiness
67. Bratty dogs
68. That the cat always chooses the newest thing in the house to vomit a hairball on
69. People calling me “Milhous’ mom”
70. Artificial peach smell
71. The mispronunciation of the word “breakfast”. It is NOT “brefext”
72. The mispronunciation of the word “espresso”. It is NOT “expresso”
73. The mispronunciation of the word “especially”. It is NOT “expecially”
74. Static electricity from packing peanuts
75. How dental x-rays dig into your gums
76. Campbell Brown’s inconsistent lisp
77. Breaking a yoke while making eggs over-easy
78. Eating the last thin mint (well that doesn’t drive me nuts as much as it makes me sad.)
79. Mystery dog poop on my sidewalk
80. The word “socket” when it’s used to describe where a tooth used to be
81. Poking myself in the eye (this happens a lot)
82. Having the hiccups (this happens a LOT)
83. The smell of cigarette smoke
84. That I constantly use it’s instead of its
85. The song “Mr. Sandman”
86. Earwigs
87. How I get a runny nose 5 minutes into a massage when my face is in that cradle and there is nothing I can do about it
88. Katie Couric conducting an interview
89. Bird poop on my newly washed car
90. That starchy smell from self-tanners
91. That the cat thinks we share meals
92. Papercuts
93. When a bee buzzes around my car while I’m driving, especially if I’m in a convertible
94. Workmen leaving fingerprints on or in my house
95. Sitting near someone who keeps sniffing or coughing or making other bodily noises
96. That Emil twists caps on bottles tighter than the manufacturer does
97. Those junk emails that start out with biblical quotes but are really just ads for Viagra - neither of which I’m interested in

I just got finished reading a great book. Its cover is filled with accolades about what a beautiful love story and how it’s a triumph of love and how soaring and brilliant and poignant and sweet and blah blah blah blah BLAH. What did I think? I was depressed and sad. It was a great book, yes. But I will never read it again. And I often read great books more than once.

I never read love-stories and this is why: When I do read them, I feel unhappy afterwards. There is a reason that love-stories are always in the fiction section. They are so wrought with inaccuracies of real “love” that really they need a fiction section of their own. In fact, let’s make up a whole new bookstore section for them: The “Overly-Dramatized Never-Gonna-Happen Men-Aren’t-Like-This Fantasies That Make Every Woman Feel Bad About Her Own Relationship” section.

I don’t think I’m alone here. I happen to know that I have a great marriage. We aren’t perfect, but we have a strong relationship and I’d even say we’re happily in-love. Yet suddenly after reading a love-story or watching a love-story book made into a movie, I start to become resentful of all the normal marriage stuff that is too normal to be in the book or movie. Somehow, I start to think that since Vanessa and Mikel never fight about who left crumbs on the kitchen counter and their love is deeper and more passionate than this world can handle and so they need to quantum leap to other lifetimes to fulfill this massively endless timeless love, my simple one-lifetime crumb-filled marriage must be so…lacking.

Love-story characters never fight over the bills, they never slouch on the sofa watching TV all weekend because they are bored but too lazy to make plans, and 60 pages of each book are not dedicated to football. Also, love-story sex seems to bring about altered states of consciousness instead of inspiring such mood-killing outbursts as “oh your mother called today” and “don’t forget to pick up stamps.”

I think that the high divorce rate can be attributed, in part, to love-stories. If we can blame the media for warping women’s body-images, I think it’s not a stretch to blame it for our unrealistic idea of what a relationship should be. Men are not romantic by nature. (No, they are not.) When they do anything romantic, it’s a means to an end. And they know better than we do that there are many other means to that end, so Romance is the least used of all the means. He probably does the dishes to get the end more often than he lights candles and pours you a glass of wine, right? And how many of us have actually come home to find a pathway of rose petals, or candles, or love-notes, or anything other than dirty socks or piles of mail or the kids’ toys leading us to the boudoir? Hm?

With all these loving, romantic, thoughtful, apologetic, communicative husbands and lovers in these books we read - women develop very high standards for real-world men - who, by the way, rarely read books, let alone love-stories. How are men to know what they should be aspiring to be?

I think the solution is for women to start to write whatever it is that men DO read.

They like to read car magazines? Here’s a sample:

“According to Dodge, the new Ram Mega Cab boasts a number of “biggest” in its class: largest cab (perfect for when your beautifully pregnant wife is 9-months along…have you told her how beautiful she looks?), most interior cargo room (great for antique sales!), most cargo volume behind the rear seat (lots of long stem roses can fit there!), most second-row legroom (How about a double-date with her sister and brother-in-law? That new Julianna Moore movie is playing!)”

Is your guy a home improvement do-it-himselfer?

“The key to properly re-carpeting the master bedroom is to choose a high-grade extra-plush quality carpet, so that when you spontaneously decide to shower the bed with rose petals, light candles, play soft music, have chilled champagne ready, and present your lady with outrageously expensive new lingerie - and a diamond tennis bracelet to match - she has nice soft carpeting on which to faint from the shock of what a perfect and romantic man you are.”

Or maybe he’s a sports fan?

“Police have reportedly been called to the home of Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Milton Bradley three times this summer due to domestic violence issues.” …Uh…

“Anchor-reporter Carolyn Hughes has been taken off Dodger coverage at Fox Sports West during an investigation of her relationship with pitcher Derek Lowe. Neither Lowe nor Hughes would comment, but Lowe’s wife Trinka had plenty to say.” …Um…

“Nike is using photos of Kobe Bryant for the first time since his arrest two years ago for an alleged assault on a female employee at a Colorado resort.”

Ok I tried to find articles I could tweak to give examples of professional athletes being great husbands - but I couldn’t find any who are! Those guys are dogs!

I guess I’ll just go back to reading suspense thrillers and historically-based novels. At least those books make me grateful that no serial killers are after me and that I live in the age of chapstick and tampax.

PS - The Time Traveler’s Wife: good book, but don’t hold it against your man. Especially if he travels a lot.