Besides, it’s not as though my blog is drowning in new content this week (I wonder if slacker bloggers are on anyone’s pet peeves list…)

Ok!  So, my pet peeves…

People who misuse words that sound similar but really aren’t. For example, someone who uses eminent when they meant imminent.  Affect vs. effect, illicit vs. elicit, insure vs. ensure, you get the idea.  This bothers me most in writing.  When spoken, sometimes I can give someone the benefit of the doubt owing to speech patterns and the general unwieldiness of the human tongue, but in writing?  There’s no excuse.

Bad table manners. I don’t want to see you chewing away with your mouth open, hear you slurp your soup out of your spoon, or watch as your napkin sits unused by the side of your plate while food speckles the corners of your mouth and the top of your lap.  Sure, not everyone knows how to drink wine properly, and very few people know how to eat an artichoke at a fancy restaurant, but criminy.  How difficult is it to not behave at a restaurant like you’re eating a Hungryman dinner in your underwear while watching reality TV?

People who choose squiggly fonts in bright colors for their work emails. Unless you are the director of admissions for clown college, this kind of thing is not cute.  Or endearing.  It’s unprofessional, and it makes me want to delete your email without even reading it.  How am I supposed to take a requisition request seriously when it looks like a kindergartner scribed it with a crayon?

Calorie counts at restaurants. Actually, let’s just include most instances of the government trying to “help” me.  I don’t want your help.  I don’t need to know that my scone has 700 calories, I don’t want to pay higher taxes so you can “help” me get health insurance I’m able to procure on my own thanks so much.  If you want to help me, leave me alone.  I’m a big girl, I can decide whether my hips are capable of adding a scone here and there, and I can get health insurance on my own.  Seriously government, do us all a favor: Stop “helping” the economy with stimulus packages and just leave us alone.  Your spending is helping all right.  Helping us all into an early grave.

Weed smokers at concerts. You’re standing there at a concert, super excited and waiting for the band to start playing, when the smell hits your nose: Weed.  Foul, stinky, weed.  Thanks to some jack-hole who can’t enjoy live music without being high as a kite, you’re forced (literally, you can’t escape thanks to the press of bodies all around you) to partake in an illegal substance against your will.  I don’t think weed is evil.  I don’t think it’ll ruin your whole life.  What I do think is that it’s inconsiderate to remove my ability to choose what goes into my body.

People who leave public bathrooms in complete disarray. I was at Babies R Us this weekend and the bathroom was so unspeakably foul I was actually angry that I had to use it so often.  How is it ok to leave toilet paper all over the floor, or bodily fluids dripping off the toilet?  Where is the decency, man?

That’s all I can come up with for now.  How about you?  Any pet peeves you want to get off your chest?

The topic this week is which five fictional characters you’ve always had a thing for.  Being a huge book nerd (and movie nerd) I, of course, started chomping at the keyboard to share mine so here goes!

1.  Louis from Interview with the Vampire.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt at all that Brad Pitt played him in the movie, but I loved him in the book.  So brooding!  So passionate!  So tortured!  He made Twilight’s Edward look like a chump.

2.  Harry Dresden from Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files.

Ok, this guy is amazing.  Honorable, brave, courageous, tall, powerful, and funny.  What is not to love? He thinks nothing of sacrificing his time and safety for others, and continually shows incredible moral fortitude.

3.  Dr. Gregory House from House, M.D.

Ok, he’s cagey alright but he has a delicious squishy middle that I can’t get enough of.  Intelligent, witty, and talented (at diagnostics and music!), he is awesome to watch but I fully admit he’d probably irreparably hurt my feelings in real life.

4.  Roland Deschain from Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series.

In the series, Roland is a gunslinger from a time before “the world moved on.”  He’s romantic in that he’s honorable and chivalrous in a world that has forsaken manners.  He’s also a ruthless, cold-hearted son-of-a-gun who’s seen more tragedy and loss than one hundred people.

5.  James Bond, specifically from Casino Royale.

Laying aside the fact that this is a fantastic movie all around, the James Bond in this film is so deliciously flawed and vulnerable that it gets me every time.  When he says to Vesper “I have no armor left, you’ve stripped it from me.  Whatever is left of me – whatever I am –  I’m yours” it just rips my heart out.

I fully admit that every single guy on this list is tortured and brooding in some way.  This amuses me to no small extent because I married and am deeply in love with the most loving, emotionally well-adjusted man I’ve ever met.  Just goes to show you, I adore all of these guys on paper/screen, but they would all drive me bananas if they were real.

I suppose that’s the point of fiction, then, isn’t it?  To give our minds a chance to go beyond the confines of reality.

Should you read this meme, and decide that it sounds like fun, by all means participate in the comments section or do it on your blog and leave the link in the comments.  Either way, I win.  I think we can all agree that everything is generally better whenever I get to say that I win.

Look! High school sweetheart!

How long have you been together? We started dating seven years ago and got married three years ago.  If you were so inclined, you could call Wes my high school sweetheart.

How long did you know each other before you started dating? One year.  The day we met, Wes thought to himself “I just met my future wife” but didn’t ask me out for another year.

Who asked whom out? Wes asked me out.  He called and suggested we go for a walk together.  We met up, spent about an hour walking and laughing, and then he kissed me.  He didn’t call me again for a month after that and I was convinced that I was the worst kisser ever.  It’s distinctly possible I’m still mad at him for doing that.

How old are each of you? I’m 23, Wes is 28.  This age difference becomes less of a big deal every year, but back when he was 21 and I was 16 it was downright illegal.

Which situation is the hardest on you as a couple? I have a long, brutal history with depression and it’s one of the few things we have difficulty facing together.  If I’m having a bad day/week/month, it’s very difficult for me to communicate well and, as such, Wes can’t pick up the cues he needs to avoid stepping on landmines.  As I get better at dealing with it (I’ve been off meds for about two years now) I get better at giving Wes the information he needs, but it’s still a huge challenge for us.

Did you go to the same school? Not hardly (please see above re: 5 year age difference).  Wes did drive for three hours each way to see me when I was going to school up at Western Washington University though!  He went to school for music production and I went to Northwest University (after Western Washington University {after Bellevue Community College}) to get my degree in psychology.

Are you from the same home town? Nope.  I was born and raised in southern California until the tender age of 14, wherein I moved to the arctic wilds of the Pacific Northwest.  Wes was technically born in California but moved here when he was three weeks old.  He’s lived in the same city since he can remember.

Who is smarter? Hehe, if this isn’t a loaded question I’m not sure what is.  While I do have the uncanny ability to be right almost all the time, Wes’ IQ is technically higher (he tests well into the genius range).  Our strengths are in almost diametric opposition: He’s great with spatial reasoning, my verbal skills are off the charts.  We’re both musically talented, can pick up foreign languages with ease, and ingest huge sums of information accurately and quickly.  I’m not sure it’s possible to answer this question.

Click on the little “More” link if you’d like to keep reading!

Who is the most sensitive? I am.  By far.  I’m pretty sure this answer surprises no one.

Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple? Jordan.  Technically, it’s east of Israel so I’m almost positive that it’s the farthest we’ve ever been from home as a couple.

Who has the craziest exes? I guess I do?  Wes only ever dated nice church girls, and I once dated a guy who had a lip ring, so I guess that’s that.

Who has the worst temper? I do.  Wes’ temper is like a pot of cold water you’re trying to boil, whereas my temper is like the pot of water that was boiling just a second ago.

Who does the cooking? It depends.  Mostly I do, but Wes has a talent for cooking chicken that will not be ignored.  If the meal involves onions, though, forget it.  Wes cannot tolerate the smell of raw onion.  This may explain why I do most of the cooking.

Who is the neat-freak? I am.  I gave Wes fair warning about that when we got married, though, so this was not a surprise for him.  It occurs to me that, between the sensitivity and the temper and the crazy exes, I’m not coming off too well in this thing, am I?

Who is more stubborn? Wes and I just tried to discuss who might be more stubborn and we couldn’t agree because we each maintain that we’re more stubborn than the other.  This argument goes unresolved still, so I’m assuming that answers that question nicely.  Just for the record, though?  I am way more stubborn than Wes is.  Compared to me?  He’s JV stubborn whereas I’ve been playing for the Major Leagues since birth.

Who hogs the bed? I am a notorious blanket thief, but neither of us hogs the bed because our bed is teeny and you can’t hog what no one has.

Where was your first date? The wilderness.  We went for a walk.

Who’s better with the computer? As much as I would love to maintain that I’m a geek and therefore better with the computer, I must allow Wes this small victory.  He has magical computer abilities that I never will.  He designed this blog, figured out how to host it right and set it up correctly, and removed a virus from my hard drive yesterday.  He’s awesome.

Who drives when you’re together? Wes, because I’m a horrible driver and we both know it.

That’s it, friends.  I did it.  If you’d like to participate, feel free to leave off whatever questions you don’t feel like answering.  I sure did (I’m absolutely certain you don’t care who does laundry at our house) but you’re free to be as long or short winded as you like.  If you figure out a way to condense it more than I did, mazel tov!  If not, whatevs.

This is a little tough for me because I’m essentially an open book on this blog and you probably now know more about me than you even probably realize. So, here goes:

Three Things You Didn’t Know About Me:

1. When I was little my favorite game to play with my brother was “Let’s Pretend”. One of the most frequent scenarios was that I was a wizard and Nick needed to buy a potion from me. This scenario stopped when my Dad realized that my potions were made out of his spices from the kitchen (which are pretty expensive). I believe my favorite one to use was Arrowroot. I still don’t know what it’s used for but even to this day it still seems intriguing and mysterious to me.
2. When “Titanic” came out I was convinced that I was going to marry Leonardo DiCaprio. I even practiced writing out my signature with my first name and his last name. I never attempted to contact him, however, and surprisingly he never knocked on my door to whisk me away like I thought he would. When the marriage (obviously) never took place I decided that it was bad luck to write my name with someone else’s and never did it again. I never practiced signing my first name with Wes’ last name until an hour before our wedding when I knew he had signed the wedding license.
3. When I’m flying on a plane I never look out the window on take-off. I have this silly little superstition that the plane can’t crash on take-off (which has always seemed to me the most dangerous part of a flight) if I’m not looking out the window. I’m not afraid of flying per se, I just see no reason to take foolish chances.

OK, beloved readers, it’s your turn. It’s Friday! Go crazy! Leave a comment! Tell me about your wonderful self!