Got my grumpy on

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Maybe it’s the weather. Maybe it’s just me, but I have my grumpy on. Over the past week or so I was thinking of things that would make me smile.

Something that brought a hearty chuckle (out loud) was the thought of having a loudspeaker attached to the roof of my car. I wouldn’t really do it (or would I?). Yet the thought is so fun!

I talk to other drivers all the time. They just can’t hear me and perhaps that’s for the best. Some of them may be packing heat and I’d get my head shot off. (My comments are kind and loving! Mostly…I think of it as gentle correction persuasion.)

Here are some great real-life uses for car loudspeakers.

I’m in the Starbucks drive-through in back of a driver whose eyes are glued to his crotch. Me: “Hey yo! Get off of your cellphone and move up! You left a space big enough for a herd of buffalo to roam through!” (I have to assume he is not really looking at his crotch because that would be gross!)

Me driving along a road with a 45 mph speed limit in back of a putzer doing 20 mph. “Hey sweetie (my attempt at being nice), put your pedal to the metal dammit. No need to worry about squirrels running out. They are trained. I trained them myself! Your slow driving will confuse them.”

Second message to the putzer: “Dude, now you’re getting on my nerves (technically my last one!). Move it or I’ll move you!”

Back to the Starbucks drive-through. Me: “Hey stupid (I love terms of endearment!) You cut me off to get in front of me. I only want one coffee.” Three minutes later (who are we kidding, I’d never wait a full three minutes!) “I can’t believe you catered coffee and buns for your entire office! You could have let me get my single coffee. Hope you choke on your sous vide egg bite! (Not that I would really wish that on anyone…maybe.)

To the person wearing shorts in 20 degree weather: “Are you crazy? Never mind I don’t have to ask! By the way that tee-shirt doesn’t match your shorts and your boxers are sticking out.”

These are all true stories. The person who cut me off in the drive-through line ordered 6 drinks and did not pay for mine. Karma will get her.

The clip below is one of my favorites from the Modern Family sitcom (because I can see me doing this). It takes a fun turn at 29 seconds.

Is there something you’d like to say to someone who annoys you?

80 thoughts on “Got my grumpy on”

  2. That same episode of Modern Family made me laugh, too, and I’ve also thought I’d love to have a loudspeaker on my car. I do assume I’d get in trouble with it, but just for one day I’d like to have the opportunity! I wonder if it would accelerate road rage or help to curb it because people would have an outlet for their frustration!

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  3. It’s the dog-days of winter ~ people around here are ornery, too.

    Loved the loud speaker idea (a real instrument of power!) — I’d like to use it for the ppl who are trying to merge that, when you slow to let them in, are on their phones and miss the opportunity — gah!! Then when they look up to see traffic passing them by, they get snarky and we’re the a**holes – seriously? Pay attention already.

    I write this as another 6+ inches of “Lake Effect” snow pummels Michigan ~ in some places, a foot of snow is expected. At least it’s Friday 🙂

    MJ

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  4. You’re nicer than me. in my perfect world, I’d have a switch in my car next to the steering wheel. When a bad/mean/”unconscious of anyone but himself” driver comes near me, I hit the switch and a big stick comes out of the side of my car (with a small punching bag at the end of it) and I can punch the driver’s car (or maybe him, through the window?). Don’t tell anyone about my fantasy. I’m usually a very docile, peaceful person. But some drivers – whoa – they deserve some BIG time Karma coming they’re way.
    But as second choice, I like your speaker on the hood of the car… 🙂

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    • We are perfectly reasonable. Stupid should always be pointed out. I’m not unkind. I was with a someone who was driving in back of someone hogging two lanes on an exit. One lane went north, the other south. The driver was swearing up a storm when I pointed to out-of-state plates. The other driver didn’t know if they wanted north or south. Eventually they had to pick and life went on. Cooling that driver was my good deed for that decade.

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  7. LOL! I love the image of you driving around with a speaker on your roof.

    Grumpy February. Although I’m feeling pretty good today. I’ve recovered from the terrible Charlie horse that lasted a week and made it hard to walk, and now the weather is in the mid-50s, and the sprinkles are only off and on. So I’m not really grumpy.

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    • Oh the fifties! We will get some of that weather next week! I didn’t know a Charlie horse would last that long. That must be painful. Although I’m not a fan of winter and cold bitter weather, I love a rainy day in the spring. Everything smells so fresh afterward.

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  9. I’ll just use what you said as my answer to this question: “Are you crazy? Never mind I don’t have to ask! By the way that tee-shirt doesn’t match your shorts and your boxers are sticking out.” WHY ARE MEN WEARING SHORTS IN THE MIDDLE OF WINTER?!

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    • I’d love to have it for drive-through lines. Sometimes people don’t understand that moving up so you can at least get your order in makes things go faster. My husband won’t go through a McDonald’s drive through. We only go for the ice cream and we walk inside every time.

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  11. Are you ready for this? In 1976 my dad had 2 speakers, with a gigantic sign with my mother’s name on it strapped to the top of our Caprice Classic, which was already the size of a tractor-trailer to announce the fact that she was running for office. So, as a 6th grader at the time, it was a bit much sitting in class hearing my name being bellowed from the speaker as he drove past the school. But not as bad as when my sister was taking too long in the store, and he said “get your ass out here” without having to leave the car. Hope this made you smile!

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  14. Pardon me if this is not PC, but people who barely speak English trying to help me in Customer Service. Especially when they get frustrated with me because I don’t understand them.

    I think it’s cabin fever. We’re getting socked with snow this week. 2 to 4 inches every day all week. February is my least favorite month of the year. Stay cool . . . meaning calm. 😉

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    • I’m beyond polite with CS people who can’t communicate. I’m not even nice anymore. I know they need jobs, yada yada, but if they can’t communicate, it isn’t working. A few years back I had a 3 hour session by phone with a Dell CS from some faraway place. His English wasn’t too bad but it was really work to follow him. I always had a 6 second delay in my head until I understood what he said. After the call, I was exhausted. I wouldn’t never get a Dell service contract on a computer again. I have the Geek Squad now. They are local. I can walk in if I want to but if I call there is a long wait. There must be a better solution. I need a nerdy grandson! You are right about the cabin fever. I had several errands to do on the weekend and I cut it short in the middle. The wind was so brutal it took your breath away.

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    • I can’t stand calling customer service. I got an Internet bill for a landline in Missouri. That’s halfway across the States from where I live. I wasn’t about to pay it, and it was building up, and destroying my credit rating. I called repeatedly trying to straighten it out and kept getting people who could barely speak English. I was speaking with one young man, and his thick accent made translating impossible, so hoping that he would slow down enough for me to catch what he was saying I interrupted him with a loud “Excuse me?” The line went silent except for the sound of flipping pages. A full sixty seconds later he came back on the phone and announced, “You’re excused.”

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      • If this wasn’t true, it would be really funny. I got a questionnaire after my experience. It was worded in a way that I couldn’t give my real thoughts. Could I understand him — yes (but barely). Did he fix the problem — yes (after 3 hours). There was no where I could say that I wouldn’t buy from that company again or how frustrating it was. Their statistical data looked good so people got raises and everyone high fived!

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        • Many places are not like that but today it’s all about statistics. Oh yes and Yelp. A few years back I went to restaurant about an hour from me prior to a show. The service was so bad that we didn’t get to eat before the show despite getting there very early (and all the other tables did get their food). I emailed the owners afterward. They verified my story through time stamps on the order. Their resolution was to tell me to come back for a free dinner. Seriously? I was an hour away and there was no reason to drive there. I would have preferred some credit on my credit card. I didn’t give them a back review on the internet because it was the waitress who screwed everything up. Although they have a responsibility for that, it could have been her first day.

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  15. LOL. I’ve often thought it would be helpful to have a microphone or something to alert the drivers in the opposite direction that there was an accident ahead or something. To actually use it to call out the idiots never occurred to me. Marvelous clip from Modern Family too!

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  22. I’d like to believe I’m much better at managing my irritation with other drivers, but then I’d have to admit I still occasionally hurl verbal abuses that would make a sailor blush.
    I’m convinced that an inordinate number of people have obtained their driver’s license from a Cracker Jack box. That’s my only explanation for some of the weird stuff people do. What’s the expression? – you can’t fix stupid?

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  23. I was really grumpy this week until today, which feels better to me somehow.

    Sometimes expressing grumpiness is helpful. I hate feeling stuck and not being able to say what I want.

    I find it freaky when people use those actual in-dashboard phones, since I CAN HEAR every thing they say and everything the other people say from outside their car. The people seem not to know that using a giant amplifier in their car also amplifies it right out into the street, and I have heard all kinds of private stuff when the people were parked and thought they were being private. Maybe it’s good that your thoughts don’t do that!

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  24. I talk to people in the car ALL THE TIME. Usually it’s, “Your turn signal is a Very Useful Item! Try using it!” or “Could you please drive at something remotely resembling the actual speed limit?!”

    I don’t want a loudspeaker, though. I want an LED display in my back window: “You’re now approaching gynecological levels of closeness.” (Men are super scared of “woman words” and I think that would do the trick for most tailgaters.)

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