Everybody, even a preacher, has at least one pet peeve. “Peeve,” as defined by the dictionary, is anything that causes one to have a feeling of resentment, or be fretful, irritable, querulous in temperament, and etc.
Among my pet peeves is to spend a day or two preparing for a good fishing trip and on the big day hear someone say right off the bat, “Not much doing today. Y’oughta been here yestiddy.”
James Boyd
Pet peeves
If I can invent a “yestiddy” time machine, I can get rich selling it to fishermen who wish they had been there yestiddy.
Another pet peeve is for someone to zip past me on a four-lane only to pull right in front of me and slow to a crawl. If he is in such an all-fired hurry why doesn’t he go on. When I’m driving Big Red, it’s a lot harder for them to zip past me than it once was.
Technology is working a lot faster than our minds. Many doors to modern buildings open automatically. When you get within a certain distance the things opens and lets you in without having to put your hands on it. Some doors are still the old push and pull type.
I propose that legislation be passed making all doors either automatic or push and pull—not both. The other day, I failed to remember that the doors at a certain establishment are push and pull and I walked squarely into the one that read “Push, Exit Here.”
People who sleep while I preach cause me some grief. Mind you now, it is not the ones who rear back and snore during the sermon who needle me; it’s the ones who have learned the technique of sleeping with their eyes open.
Several years ago, I asked a parishioner why he had slept during my sermon. In reply, he asked, “Did you say anything different from last Sunday?”
Before I could answer, he commented with a wry smile, “If you didn’t I’ve heard it before.”
A parishioner in one pastorate offered to pay me a medical fee. He told me that I had accomplished what his doctor couldn’t—make him sleepy.
Driving on the Atlanta Bypass is a peeve for me from start to finish. I’m all the time feeling a lot of anxiety while trying to navigate the maze of streets and exits in that wild town. It really got to me the time I was doing seventy on I-285 and someone flashed past me and yelled out his window, “Whatcha parked out here for?”; these days that rarely happens when I’m driving Big Red.
Just to be in step with the times, I got me a credit card. If you can’t flash plastic money around these days, you are apt to feel like an odd ball. The holder of a credit card often comes under close scrutiny when trying to get through check-out counters. The other day a zealous young cashier studied my photograph closely for a minute or two glancing at me periodically. Finally, she asked, “Is this really you?”
“No,” I answered. “It’s just my picture. I was slimmer then.”
I had a dentist once who must’ve been a blacksmith before he went into dentistry. He had muscles like a weightlifter and would always come into the room rolling up his sleeves and looking mean. He would say, “Open wide.” Then he would pack my mouth full of cotton, stick his big fingers in it, fiddle around with my teeth, and tell me to hold my mouth open while he got his tools together. He would then stride back to the chair and say again, “Open wide.”
I would open wide, and he would say, “A little wider please.” Then he would stick a chisel of some kind in my wider-than-normal mouth and ask me, “How does it feel?”
Have you ever tried to tell someone how you feel with your mouth wide open, full of cotton, big hairy fingers and a steel chisel?
Well, life doesn’t always run smoothly. And it’s almost certain that somewhere along the way we are apt to get a little ticked off for some reason or other.
We’ll survive though even if we can’t remember which doors are automatic and which ones aren’t.
Another pet peeve is for someone to zip past me on a four-lane only to pull right in front of me and slow to a crawl. If he is in such an all-fired hurry why doesn’t he go on. When I’m driving Big Red, it’s a lot harder for them to zip past me than it once was.
Technology is working a lot faster than our minds. Many doors to modern buildings open automatically. When you get within a certain distance the things opens and lets you in without having to put your hands on it. Some doors are still the old push and pull type.
I propose that legislation be passed making all doors either automatic or push and pull—not both. The other day, I failed to remember that the doors at a certain establishment are push and pull and I walked squarely into the one that read “Push, Exit Here.”
People who sleep while I preach cause me some grief. Mind you now, it is not the ones who rear back and snore during the sermon who needle me; it’s the ones who have learned the technique of sleeping with their eyes open.
Several years ago, I asked a parishioner why he had slept during my sermon. In reply, he asked, “Did you say anything different from last Sunday?”
Before I could answer, he commented with a wry smile, “If you didn’t I’ve heard it before.”
A parishioner in one pastorate offered to pay me a medical fee. He told me that I had accomplished what his doctor couldn’t—make him sleepy.
Driving on the Atlanta Bypass is a peeve for me from start to finish. I’m all the time feeling a lot of anxiety while trying to navigate the maze of streets and exits in that wild town. It really got to me the time I was doing seventy on I-285 and someone flashed past me and yelled out his window, “Whatcha parked out here for?”; these days that rarely happens when I’m driving Big Red.
Just to be in step with the times, I got me a credit card. If you can’t flash plastic money around these days, you are apt to feel like an odd ball. The holder of a credit card often comes under close scrutiny when trying to get through check-out counters. The other day a zealous young cashier studied my photograph closely for a minute or two glancing at me periodically. Finally, she asked, “Is this really you?”
“No,” I answered. “It’s just my picture. I was slimmer then.”
I had a dentist once who must’ve been a blacksmith before he went into dentistry. He had muscles like a weightlifter and would always come into the room rolling up his sleeves and looking mean. He would say, “Open wide.” Then he would pack my mouth full of cotton, stick his big fingers in it, fiddle around with my teeth, and tell me to hold my mouth open while he got his tools together. He would then stride back to the chair and say again, “Open wide.”
I would open wide, and he would say, “A little wider please.” Then he would stick a chisel of some kind in my wider-than-normal mouth and ask me, “How does it feel?”
Have you ever tried to tell someone how you feel with your mouth wide open, full of cotton, big hairy fingers and a steel chisel?
Well, life doesn’t always run smoothly. And it’s almost certain that somewhere along the way we are apt to get a little ticked off for some reason or other.
We’ll survive though even if we can’t remember which doors are automatic and which ones aren’t.
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