Angela Mollard: 35 annoying things that benefit no-one, ever

I’M NOT sure whether it’s Facebook or age or because I surround myself with deeply annoying and highly unoriginal people, but I’m over platitudes.

No, “good things do not come to those who wait” but those who have the wherewithal to get off their backsides and try.

Likewise “that’s just my personal opinion” — indeed it might be but the passive-aggressive manner in which it was delivered, not to mention your grievous tautology (opinions by nature are personal) are like fingernails down the blackboard of my soul.

Yes, “tomorrow is another day” — congratulations Einstein on cracking the Gregorian calendar — but how do you know if “it wasn’t meant to be?”

Who are you? God? Buddha?

Worse, though, than “thinking outside the box” and “time healing all wounds” is that most platitudinal of platitudes: Don’t sweat the small stuff.

Are you kidding? Have you seen the devastation wreaked by a mosquito trapped in a tent on a sultry night?

Long ago I worked out that if you work yourself into a state of apoplexy about the “small stuff” you’ll sail calm and sanguine through the big problems. Here, then, a list of irritants and annoyances to ruin your day:

• Figuring out which sheet fits on which bed — particularly frustrating when you have a queen, double, king single and single in one house.

• Bumping into someone you know in the supermarket then that awkward moment when you see them again in every aisle.

• Herbal teas with delicious names that nevertheless all taste like an armpit after two hours of Bikram yoga.

• Hair ties — where do they go? I must have gone through more than 1000 in my lifetime but am currently wearing some ghastly fuchsia tie belonging to my daughter. Are they all having a secret party somewhere and mocking us?

• The ding emitted by household appliances. Honestly you’re an appliance — do you really need attention for every task you complete?

• Paper cuts. Such pain from something so benign.

• The way lettuce goes slimy when it’s toasted in a sandwich or panini. Use spinach or have the foresight to remove it preheat.

• The vanishing properties of sunglasses. Are they partying with the hair ties?

• The state of staffroom mugs. Is it really so hard to rinse out Tuesday’s tea?

• Polyester sold at silk prices. Duh, we read the labels.

• The five hour “call” window insisted upon by Telcos, electricity suppliers and delivery companies even though they always arrive 15 minutes after the window, just as you’re jack of waiting and have gone to work.

• The euphemisms used by real estate agents. It’s not “cosy”, it’s dark, small and smells worse than a week-dead cat on a 40 degree day.

• The false economy of Shellac nail polish. Yes it lasts but it takes half a day to get it off.

• Bucket lists. Why would you start living only when you find out you’re dying?

• Putting on a doona cover. Anything else you practice you get better at.

• Chefs who take mundane ingredients — abalone, semolina, polenta — and serve it as some new wonder food for a ridiculous price.

• Friends’ overseas weddings/birthdays/honeymoons/all other “festivals of me” that leave you too skint to enjoy your own celebrations.

• Grandparents who tell you to treasure every moment with your kids even though they were disengaged and miserable parents themselves.

• Hanging your washing out only for it to rain.

• Forgetting you’ve just sent yourself an email, getting all excited by the ping, then realising it’s only the one you sent yourself.

• Bagging a cheap flight then discovering the cost is doubled by airport fees.

• Coffee loyalty cards where you have to buy 1500 coffees before you get one free.

• Smooth peanut butter. Why?

• Having a flu jab then getting the flu anyway.

• Unpacking — such a joyless way to end an otherwise blissful holiday.

• People who overuse the word “bliss” or “bless” — as in “Oh, bless”.

• Standing at a crossing and having some moron push the button to cross the road as if they’ve got a special power to make it happen faster. Ditto elevators.

• People who stand on the right on escalators.

• Sardines, four bean mix and every other tinned good that you buy as a store cupboard “essential” then throw out three years later because it really wasn’t essential.

• Heinously ugly passport photos. Why is the one picture that lingers longer than any other always so bad?

• Handbags — symbol of the ongoing emancipation of women. Not only do we carry our stuff but we’re seen as a convenient repository for everyone else’s.

• The lie that is “new season military”. Military is as perpetually fashionable as it is reliably unattractive.

• The failure of all public venues to recognise that women need more bathroom facilities than men.

• Perforations that fail to tear along the perforated line.

• People who are humourless, indignant and morally superior and start muttering about First World Problems upon reading a lighthearted list of annoyances and irritants.