The Petted Peeve

I usually don't have much that bothers me.  One day gives way to an irritation and by the following day, I've forgotten what was so bothersome.  Today is one such day.  Everyone was law abiding citizens, driving exactly the speed limit, coming to full complete stops at stop signs, and slowing down to crawling pace to make turns.  It was as if everyone in the south was given a sleeping pill... except for me.  The worst is waiting for the car in front of me to compute the enormity of exactly what it means when the red light turns green.  It's a delayed connection between the brain and the foot pressing on the gas.  It. Drives. Me. Nuts.

Really I shouldn't care.  I should, after seven years of living in the south, come to grips that I have to tack on ten minutes of driving time everywhere I go.  That or come up with better excuses for why I am late.  Somehow, saying "I got stuck behind a southern slow poke" just doesn't fly around here.  They just don't get what I am complaining about.  My next excuse is that I got stuck behind a guy who was dead set on not getting pulled over for drunk driving.  So much so that he stopped at a red light, looked both ways before crawling through the intersection.  Shoot me.  I nearly put a permanent indent of Subaru's logo so far up his hind end he could be a walking ad for them on the back of his head.  Luckily, my brakes work.

In other news, I got a jangling call at 1am.  I keep my phone on at all times for the errant emergency call.  My dad is dying and my hubby is 1300 miles away.  If the phone rings late at night, I kind of freak out.  However, this 1am call was not about my dad's precarious life or death situation or a lonely hubby wishing to steam up the airwaves.  It was a fairly irate woman screaming profanities in Spanish.  I assume it was profane because I don't know a lick of the language to know otherwise, but it was clear that she was hell fire mad.  When she took a breath, I informed her that she got the wrong number and I most definitely was a NO Habla Espanol connection.  There was a long pause then a barely audible, "oh shit" before the line went dead.  My heart thumped for another hour which explained my intolerance for minor indiscretion irritants today.  No sleep coupled with single parenting... yep, my day was screwed.

But, this was not all.  I had to go to the dentist today.  I am a religious attendee of the dentist.  I don't like cavities and dental work beyond a cleaning is an activity I try and avoid.  I go every six months expressly with the intent of hearing him say that I am good and my teeth are lovely.  I have a low sugar diet, I floss and brush.  I am a teeth nazi because, frankly, anything that has to do with teeth gives me the willies.

Today, I was not so lucky.  I laid back in the chair, opened my mouth and promptly fell asleep.  I don't know how it happened.  One second I was looking up at the ceiling tiles and the next I was being shook awake by the doctor who was wiping away drool off my cheek.  He thought it was hilarious because I was so knocked out, I was snoring.  Awesome.  Oh, and by the way, I have a cavity.  I was so excited about the news, that I went home, opened up the package of Oreos I save for sugar emergencies, took it outside, built a fire and roasted marshmallows to goop between Oreo cookies.  I ate myself sick.

Tired.  Sugar rush. Cavity. Stuck in traffic with an old gal who probably can't SEE the light to know that it turned green...

I've got this weird tick in my left eye and it won't go away.  Awesome.  I've been pet peeved.