1. That even in this millenium, Hollywood insists on having us believe that everyone who lived during the Roman Empire (27 BC – AD 476), hundreds of years before there was a unified and recognized nation-state of England (964 AD), spoke with aristocratic, British accents. And even those who spoke English then sounded nothing like Gielgud, Brando or Crowe….

2. Forgetting to clear my browser history before company—usually a girl or a member of my family—comes over and eventually wants to use my computer. “Sure, you can check your email!” Then, as I hear their fingers clicking away on the keyboard, remembering what I last looked at before I showered, then having to dive back across the room in what feels like slow motion cinema, “No-o-o-o…!”

3. TMZ on TV. And the fact that I watch it near religiously….

4. The high improbabilty of the following:

First of all, I haven’t had a “classmate” in 22 years. Secondly, how discomfiting is the lack of gender specificity in that kissing proclamation?

5. That, after I’ve developed whatever amount of optimism I could from the above compliment, I not much later get this:

WTF?!?! I can only think of 3 people who hate me, one who I never even dated!! And why is the graphic for hate mail an envelope with a heart in it? Shouldn’t it be, like, a voodoo doll or something?!

6. That no time soon will I be a judge on Iron Chef America….

7. Speaking of food, I hate that I can’t remember the last time I had a Caesar salad that had actual anchovies in/on it. Or any taste of anchovy or even anchovy paste. And that there are young people—in their twenties!—who had no idea that anchovies were ever a main ingredient of Caesar salads.

8. That I too rarely watch channnels like, TLC, or THE DISCOVERY CHANNEL or THE HISTORY CHANNEL, although I keep them in my channel rotation because I know I should watch them. And I also hate how those channels’ call letters taunt me as I pass by them surfing for inane programs like The Soup or—gulp!—TMZ. The final straw being the regret I eventually feel when I get around to watching any of my prerecorded episodes of Jeopardy! “Who are the Cossacks, Alex…?” Damn! See, I should’ve known that….

9. The very busy mouse in my apartment who must be from the planet Krypton, since he seems to be immune to everything I’ve thrown at him! He’s been eating the rat poison for days to no effect. He leaves mouse paw prints in the glue strip, but seems to walk right off of it, like Jesus walking on water. Also, I have these mysterious long distant charges on my land line phone, it seems I’m going through a lot more cigarettes then usual (especially when I’m alseep!), and my iPod seems to be missing….

10. Not knowing how many time I’m supposed to say “God bless you” or “Gesundheit” when a person repeatedly sneezes. “Achoo!” “Gesundheit.” “Thank you…. A-choo!” “…Gesundheit.” “Thanks. (Sniffle)…. Wwwach-koo!!” “Alright, fucko, that’s enough….!”

Bonus Hatery

From my friend, Lauren (who I completely agree with): That with all the urgent and relevant good works, messages, and causes (teen pregnancy, drug/alcohol addiction, physical/emotional healthcare, abuse) that could be informed to the general public with television Public Service Announcements (PSAs), “Be sure to switch your TV signal from analog to digital” should be near the very bottom of that list in terms of importance. I think it would fall somewhere between “Try not to drink orange juice after you’ve brushed your teeth” and “Breathing is good”…!

.kac.

1. Forgetting that I’m “going commando” when zipping up my fly in a rush!

2. Zipping my unprotected “junk” and trying very hard to NOT make any noise or sudden movements while there’s a guy at the urinal next to me!

3. That flourescent orange dust that gets all over my fingers when I’m eating Cheetos™, especially when I’m nowhere near a napkin or paper towel. Then I feel like an idiot walking around my apartment like I’ve got cooties, or like I’m holding a steaming pile of dog poop, or a surgeon just scrubbed for surgery, looking for something to wipe my hands with! And whatever you do, don’t lick your fingers; you’ll wind up with toxic orange all around your mouth and be forced to convince people that you have NOT, indeed, been huffing spray paint out of a paper bag!

4. That more people don’t know that Bing Crosby’s version Of White Christmas—the best-selling and most played song of all time!—was written by Irving Berlin, who was Jewish…. “Irving Berlin was The Mensch Who Wrote Christmas…! Get it? Are you with me, people? No?” TAP, TAP. “Is this thing on…?”

5. Not knowing how to respond when my Bangledeshi cab driver wishes me a Merry Christmas “Thanks, you have a Merry Chri…, um, oh, what do you guys have? Ramadan? Is that now? No? I mean, I have Jewish and Chinese friends and, their things, too, are all over the place! Anyway, you have a good, uh, Saturday, boss…. You celebrate Saturday, right? DUH!—sorry! …You can just let me out here…. How much? Okay, just give me baaack…. Tell you what, keep the whole thing! That’s all you, brother…!”

6. That I think I would still “bone” Charo. I just saw her on the Tonight Show last week. To me, she’s still hot, even though she must be, like, 110 years old. Her wig alone must be 90 years old. She’s a freakin’ GGGILF! Note: If you are too young to know or remember who Charo is, please don’t Google her. It’ll only make you feel MORE sorry for me…!

7. People who misuse the adverb LITERALLY, as in “Dude, I was so high last night I LITERALLY floated home!” “Uh, no you didn’t LITERALLY float home, but your use of the word LITERALLY is LITERALLY the opposite of what the word LITERALLY means…!”

8. That, when it’s 15° outside and I’m waiting for a bus, the only way I can get the bus to arrive, it seems, is for me to light, and take a drag of, the very last cigarette I happen to have on me! Now, the conundrum: Give up the cigarette or give up the bus (and, yes, I know I should give up the cigarette for good)? And, when God’s feeling especially persnickety(?!), I choose to give up the cigarette—one last quick drag, drop it, step on it—then there’s no more room on the bus! So I’m still out in the cold…but, now, looking down on the ground at the 3/4 length cigarette I just stepped on…wondering…if anyone’s looking….

9. Realizing a little more than halfway through my random social conversation with my restaurant’s “fresh-off-the-boat” Mexican busboy that, although he’s nodding in assent, he probably has NO idea what-in-the-International-House-of-FUCK I’m talking about! And I doubt he gives a rat’s asiago either…!

10. Calling a very good female friend at home, hearing the other line pick up and a voice say, “Hello?”, and after I respond with an endearing, “Hey, whaddup, bitch?!”, having the voice on the other line say, “Um, are you looking for my daughter, Helena…?” Turns out Mom was visiting her daughter for the holiday! “Eh, no eh-speak-a da engless…! Sorry, wrong numero…” CLICK….

1. How long I’ve kept some clothing with the hopes that I’ll eventually fit back into them. Then, alleviating my guilt but convincing myself that these old, too snug, button-down shirts can be what my dates wear the morning after they stay over! …I still have a lot of shirts….

2. When I’m hungover and ordering in delivery, pretending to order for more than just myself! Yes, I’ll have the Crispy Garlic Chicken lunch special with pork fried rice, egg roll, and wonton soup. Hold on…”Hey, what are you guys ordering…?” Okay, make that two extra egg rolls for my, um, friends, here, an order of shrimp dumplings for my, let’s say, girlfriend, and my, uh, visiting uncle will take the free cold sesame noodles…. Even worse, the guilt I feel when said food arrives, and while emptying the food bag, accumulating enough plastic silver(?)ware for 3 or 4 people! And why never any plastic knives? Just plastic forks and spoons… WTF?!

3. Not finding something, like Scotch tape, when I’m looking throughout my apartment for it. But then 2 weeks later when I’m looking for a ruler, I find the Scotch tape! Especially when it’s the old roll of tape, not the new roll I bought when I couldn’t fing the old roll…!

4. Finding out that someone I had no inclination of buying a Christmas present for has already bought me a present.

5. Figuring out which present, already dedicated to someone, am I going to have to take back to give to this annoyingly thoughtful person…. Cuz I’m lazy and broke!

6. Women with strollers who believe they “own the road”. And I know many of you, my dear long-time female friends, are moms now so assume that this does not apply to you, please. I can only pretend to understand the daily hardship that is motherhood, but it shouldn’t mean that you can park your strollers in the middle of the sidewalk—sometimes 3 or 4 along—and “Jim Crow” everyone else. Nor does it mean you can park it in the doorway of the corner deli and expect everyone to affect some inconvenient, Twister game-like footing to avoid spilling their coffee on your toddler while trying to get out of the door! And—please!—stop trying to stop oncoming traffic by pushing your stroller into the crosswalk prematurely; you have the right of way, yes, but not the right to stupidly play Russian roulette with your kid’s life!

7. That seasonal TV specials like A Charlie Brown Christmas or The Year Without a Santa Claus lose a lot of their charm when they seem to be playing everyday…somewhere…! I used to love the Snoopy dance and accompanying music…USED to…!

8. That TV networks and MP3 players have YET to develop technology that regulate a constant, tolerable volume from broadcast to broadcast or song to song! Let’s see…. Man on the moon? Check. Hybrid vehicles? Check. 4-hour erections? Check. Not spontaneously shredding ear drums, not so much…. But, hey, be sure to check out new episodes of The Closer on TNT this January….

9. Google Earth, especially that Street View feature! Big Brother is here, folks…. His name is Tom…. And he is Peeping…!

10. How incapacitated I feel when my remote control’s batteries die, and I can’t find the fresh ones I just bought! Oh wait, but here are the scissors I was looking for last week…!

Bonus Hatery

That, in my effort to spread cheer and good tidings to as many of my friends as possible, I will inadvertently text MERRY CHRISTMAS on the 25th to many of my Jewish friends. In advance, please forgive me…. Shalom!

.kac.

1. Buying a brand new pair of jeans on, like, a Thursday, wearing them in while wearing them out on the town all weekend, then having someone finally tell me at work on Monday that I still have that long transparent sticker that tells your jeans size on the side of the leg of my jeans! Really?! None of you, my good friends, who were out with me the whole weekend, NONE of you noticed?! Really?!

2. When, during rush hour, people come out of the subway and then STOP right at the top of the stairs to figure out where they’re headed next. Meanwhile, there are about 200 of us stalled on the stairs who are trying to get the fuck somewhere! These are usually the same people who also stop halfway up the stairs to open up their umbrellas when it’s raining. Or they’re the same people who, again, when raining, step onto a bus with their umbrella still outside the bus, then do that violent bat-wing-like “shimmy” with their umbrella, shaking the excess water they are obviously so afraid of all over me!

3. Being charged $2.50 for a street vendor “hot water” hot dog. Listen, Habib, I grew up here, okay?! I didn’t just get off that double decker bus across the street! Don’t make me haggle for my quick but satisfying lunch! I think native New Yorkers should carry a card the guarantees that we don’t pay more than 1988 prices for anything!

4. Having a random 20 cents balance on my MetroCard. WTF…!!

5. Being the biggest guy in an office elevator when someone ELSE breaks wind, because, you know, everyone just assumes it was the big guy…! And it always happens when it’s lunchtime and I’m carrying, like, a big bag from Wendy’s. I have this theory that’s it’s the skinny, petite girl in the corner. The little, skinny girl who waits until she’s in the elevator with bigger people, then let’s an SBD escape. Because no one ever suspects the little, skinny girl…. Never…! And then the paranoia sets in, I get nervous—thinking every one suspects me—and, while thinking of my Wendy’s Double with Cheese, my stomach audibly grumbles. Out of embarrassment I look up and in the reflection of the elevator’s mirrored ceiling I see a little, skinny girl, with a salad in one hand and a bottled water in the other…. Smirking..!

6. The inflexible math in movie theater architecture that dictates there will always be more arms than available arm rests.

7. That in these trying financial times, some douchebag is still going to not only buy his significant other a brand new Audi, but will actually pay extra to have another douchebag wrap it with that annoyingly supersized red bow!

8. People who claim to want to try more exotic foods and cuisine but, no matter where I take them, order, if they can, the caesar salad and roasted half chicken, or whatever the plainest, most pedestrian item is on the menu. I didn’t bring you to Peter Luger’s for you to order the fish special. I’m sure it’s quite good, but that’s like me buying you a $100 gift card to Victoria’s Secret and you coming back with two pink shopping bags full of nothing but socks…!

9. When my barber says, “Oops!!” Especially when he tries to be sly by saying it in another language (Greek, Italian). No matter what he says, I can still tell something’s wrong because all the other barbers suddenly stop what they’re doing to stare at the back of my head, they, slowly, and without further expression, go back to whatever they were previously doing….

10. That smug Aryan Nation asshole from the Dyson vacuum cleaner commercials! Yeah, so you took an American invention that’s been around for 100 years and made it better, so what?! It doesn’t make you a genuis! The Japanese have been doing the same thing with American products for 25 years, and at least they’ve figured out how to get us to BUY their shit! So screw you, Adolph Edison; I’ve got your pivoting ball riiiiiight here! That’s right, Colonel Klink, you heard me! I bet your momma never loses suction either! …Oooh, SNAP!! USA! USA…!

1. The little squirt of water that comes out of a mustard squeeze bottle before any actual mustard does. There are few things more disheartening than, while putting together the perfect sandwich, having your condiment “piss” all over it, making the bread soggier and my day suck-ier!.

2. Tourists who keep their overstuffed knapsacks fully on their backs when they’re on a crowded subway car, so that every time they turn or pivot, they half knock you off your feet or into people on the other side of you. Hey, Bjorn! Can’t you see through your purple-framed glasses that the rest of us have our bags, briefcases and other crap either hanging off our shoulders to the side or on the floor between our legs?! Language barrier is one thing, sight barrier is another! And while we’re at it, stop pretending you don’t know you’re supposed to tip! You guys have been riding that sammelschiene for over 20 years…!

3. That Manhattan’s tony Upper East Side—much like the rest of NYC, it seems—doesn’t have a decent drive-in, diner or dive. I make a mean shrimp & grits with slab bacon bits, biscuits with sausage/giblet gravy and a 5-meat/5-cheese lasagna. Investors, anyone? =)

4. When, while trying to find a reason to stop talking to someone by pretending to get a vibrate-only phone call on my cell, having my cell phone then ring from an actual incoming call while I have the phone to my ear—and I’m the middle of talking in a now obviously fake conversation!—in front of the person I’m trying to avoid talking to.

5. The PREDICTIVE TEXT feature used with cell phones text messaging service which seems to, when it has a choice of words to complete, chooses the the least viable option, logically, and makes me seem like I’m drunk texting people in the middle of the afternoon! “I gate (have) to he (go) good (home)!”

6. Having a “private area” itch, in a very public place. Even worse, the Monty Python-esque series of walks I attempt in public to discreetly alleviate said itch…!

7. Not being able to ever find that one toenail clipping that didn’t land anywhere near it’s intended destination (i.e., wastebasket). Sometimes I think I can sense it—hear it!—in the wee hours of the morning. Hiding…. Under the bed, behind a curtain or in an old shoe…. Mocking me…!

8. That UNIQUITY is not a word in Scrabble, but VASA(?) is!

9. Knowing people for years and not knowing their names. Also, not knowing what amount of time needs to pass before it would be an insult to ask for the name. Especially when the they know my name and possibly might know I don’t know theirs. They: “Hey, Kerry!” Me: “What’s up, …you?!” And.., when my good friends, whose names I DO know, don’t help me out when I’m trying to introduce them to one of these nice people whose names I don’t remember. You gotta jump right in there, folks! Help a brother out…!

10. Dietary judgments aside, the fact that, at over 42 years old, I have yet to be able to predetermine the proper milk-to-cereal ratio so that I don’t have all that excess milk in the bowl once all the cereal is gone. Most people just drink that fine nectar that is sweetened milk; yours truly puts more cereal in the bowl and does this seesaw thing adding more milk then more cereal until I’ve depleted one or the other. On the plus side, I get more than the recommended daily allowance of vitamin D and niacin (and gas!)…!

Bonus Hatery

That a female friend of mine takes issue with the female doctors on the Fox TV show, HOUSE—claiming she, as a women, finds it offensive that these independent, intelligent, and strong female characters belie these very positive traits by eventually becoming sexually objectified in story lines—but then defends all of those REAL HOUSEWIVES OF… shows on Bravo and THE BAD GIRLS CLUB on Oxygen as “campy, guilty-pleasure fun”! Yes, she’s on Facebook, and, no, I won’t tell you who she is…!

.kac.