Life of a Blogger: Pet Peeves

Life of a Blogger is a weekly meme hosted by Novel Heartbeat. Every week there’s a new topic, not related to book blogging. This week’s topic is: Pet Peeves. (For a full list of topics – past and future – go here.)

Oh man. Get me started on my pet peeves and you are going to be here for a WHILE.

1. People who damage borrowed books or even worse just don’t ever return them.

This one had to go first because… well, just look where you are. I used to lend books out to anyone who wanted to borrow them. But I was shocked to discover that not everyone views the published word with the same reverence that I do. See, I treat books not only with respect, but as if they’re treasured works of art. I don’t care if it’s a paperback I picked up at a used book store for a dollar or a thirty dollar hardcover. I will read it carefully, and try to keep it in whatever shape it was in when I purchased it. I cannot abide broken spines, bent or torn covers and crumpled pages. But apparently, most people aren’t like me.

I’ve had people break spines, tear and dogear pages, stain with food (I hope) and otherwise destroy books I’ve lent them to the point where I don’t even want them back. I’d rather just buy a new one. These were people who even knew how important my books are to me. People I thought I could trust to take as much care with my books as I would myself. I’ve learned a tough lesson on that one, and now I don’t lend out books I care about to anyone except family, because family I can get mad at.

2. People who get up in my grill.

I value my personal space. That personal space extends about two feet around me in every direction and includes all my stuff. Obviously when I’m on a crowded bus or train I can’t have this much space to myself, and as long as people are trying not to breathe garlic breath right in my face or dig an elbow into me, fine. But if you’ve got lots of room, don’t crowd me. Don’t touch me without permission, don’t pick up and play with my stuff without asking and definitely don’t come and sit right next to me if I don’t know you and there are about 20 other empty seats all around me. Just don’t.

3. Mean people.

I hate jerks and bullies. Whether they’re pushing a smaller kid around on the playground or talking behind my back at work, I have absolutely no respect for them. You don’t have to like everyone else in the world – in fact there are some people you probably shouldn’t like. But you do have to act like a decent human being if you want to deserve to be here. Can’t we all just be nice to one another?

4. People who routinely make grammatical or spelling mistakes.

First of all, notice I said “routinely.” Everyone, and I mean everyone makes the odd mistake here and there. Even published books contain typos and the odd missing punctuation mark. So I’m not saying y’all have to be perfect – god knows I’m not. But there are a few very commonly mis-used words (then and than; their, there and they’re; your and you’re, its and it’s – just to name a few) that really aren’t hard to learn to use correctly. There are multiple cheatsheets and tutorials out there to refer to (like this one from The Oatmeal), so I find it really annoying when I see these used incorrectly over and over again!

5. People who are unnaturally cheerful in the morning.

Just…NOPE.

I have a ton more, but I’m going to stop there before you guys hate me. I’m a grumpy bastard, what can I say. What’re your pet peeves? Share in the comments! //<![CDATA[ var sc_project=10144299; var sc_invisible=1; var sc_security="82f610c9"; var scJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://secure." : "http://www."); document.write("”); //]]>