# 174 My Pet Peeves the Poltergeist...

I have a few pet peeves.  Most of the time, I'm sugar and rainbows and unicorns and kindness all the time, but occasionally, I get a bit peeved at certain things.  Today has been one of those days.  Not a great day, but since I have this outlet, instead of seething inwardly, I get to rant and rave to my blog and you can all just ignore this post.

Here are some of my more minor pet peeves:

When someone on Toddlers and Tiaras says "She's going to be the next Miss America," or some variation thereof.  No, she's not going to be the NEXT Miss America.  She might be a Miss America (although, really?) but she will not be the NEXT Miss America unless Miss America 2012 is going to be a 4-year old toddler in stead of an 18-24 year old state pageant winner.

Paris Hilton-- famous for absolutely nothing.

The song "It's Five O'clock Somewhere".  The lyrics clearly state "its only half past twelve, but I don't care.  Its five o'clock somewhere."  Its NOT five o'clock anywhere if its half past twelve.  Its half past four somewhere and its half past five somewhere, but its NOT five o'clock anywhere.  That's the rules of time, Alan.  Get it together.  You could have just as easily have sang "its only right at twelve, but I don't care.... its five o'clock somewhere."  And you'd be right!

People who annoy me when I don't blog as often as they'd like.  Enough said.

Annoying reality show cliches-- "I'm not here to make friends" is the worst.  I take a shot of Diet Coke everytime I hear that. 

Now, we come to my two biggest pet peeves.

1.  Taking an awful idea, sentiment, or feeling, and using that to express how you feel.  I'm guilty of this, we are all guilty of this.  Exaggeration is in our blood.  We are imperfect beings by nature and we tend to be selfish and believe the world revolves around us.  So don't compare your problems to those of people in a war-torn country, or people who live in extreme poverty or who have survived awful situations in their lives.

Today I received a letter of "complaint" (that's how it was titled) at work.  It wasn't really about me, per se, but more about the court system in general.  Yeah, join the club buddy.  The legal system isn't perfect and you complaining about little things make the bigger issues that much more unreachable.  This particular man took offense to the fact that our child support court was held in "open court" rather than in a judge's chambers.  First of all, have any of you ever been to child support court?  We aren't the red-headed stepchildren of the legal system.  We are the crazy cousin Grizelda who drinks out of a flask when she thinks no one else is watching, with two, mismatching left shoes on, and some green fuzz permanently attached to the skin above her lip.  You deal with her when you have to (in my case, twice a month) by not making any sudden moves and sticking her in the back room, hoping none of your friends happen by and see her.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining.  I love quirky cousins (though none of mine are that weird.  Except Em.) and I love my child support court job.  I do.  I really love court.  I get lots done, no ones bothering me, and the best part?  I rarely have to deal with attorneys!!!

But we, like most courts, do our business in open court.  Meaning, everyone is in the room while you are having your case heard.  This is NOT unusual.  I've practiced all over this great state and I've rarely ever been in the judge's chambers, unless we specifically ask to see them in chambers.  I have noticed, however, that in Coahoma County, before the Chancery Court Judges, a LOT of business is done in chambers.  Its strange to me, but there are a couple other counties who do that-- must be a Delta thing.  But, this is child support court and we don't have a Chancellor, but a Family Master (someone appointed to hear only child support matters) and where you hear a case is a judge's preference, and our FM lets everything be done in open court.

Personally, I think that's the smart thing to do-- no allegations of impropriety or anything-- its all in the open.  I'm sure our Founding Father's wanted it like that.  Back to the story-- this guy had court recently and his case was heard in the small courtroom in front of several other people who were, in all honestly, not paying a lick of attention.  This isn't interesting stuff.  They can barely hear and they are more worried about playing on their phones than listening to a case.

But this guy took serious offense to it, and in the letter, he expressed his great displeasure at having all of his "personal business" being done in open court.  Yeah, buddy, that's called reality.  Most court cases are open to the public and anyone can come in or out.  Now, I don't mind the complaint letter, I really don't.  Something like that would have bothered me a lot in my previous life, but here and now, its water under the bridge.  I did nothing wrong or out of the ordinary, and he wasn't really complaining about me, but about the system in general.  Its not like I typically take cases in chambers but wanted to hear his in the open courtroom just cause I'm a mean person.

But what really angered me about this letter is this sentence-- "having my private and personal business be heard by every single person in the courtroom made me feel as though I was being raped."  Yeah.  That sentence.  Where he compares his child support case to rape.  Uh-uh.  Not acceptable.  I'm not sure those two things are even close to each other.  Nor would child abuse, genocide, murder or assault be like that, either.  I don't take that lightly at all.  And I'm sure the many victims of abuse and other atrocities would feel the same way.  The rest of the letter made me laugh.  This part made me angry.  I'm no women's libber or anything, but comparing rape to being in a large courtroom and having an attorney and a judge ask you questions like "where do you work" and "what is your monthly income" and "where does the child live?" isn't a good idea.   Let me be clear-- I have not been a victim of any of these awful things, so don't freak out and think I've gone all nuts-- I am blessed to have not had to deal with these things-- Thank you, Lord-- but that doesn't mean I don't understand the horrific nature of them and don't think that people should take these things very seriously. 

My second major pet peeve (and this one might offend some people, and if it does, I'm really sorry.  Also, I apologize for the salty language to come):

Telling someone to "go to hell".  Yep, I said it!  I know there are all sorts of cuss words and you could very well argue that one cuss word is the same as any other ones and they all mean the same thing, with the same intent behind the language and there is some sort of law school activist/four corners of the document/traditional intent parallel going on here that no one but my law school friends would understand or appreciate, but that's not the point.  The point is this:  I believe in hell and I believe it is a pretty awful place.  And I believe that many people, not myself, but many people, will be going there when they die.  And I don't think its a place that I would tell anyone, even my worst enemy (you know who you are, PC) to go.  I just don't think, if you believe there is a hell, that you should be telling people to go there, even in jest. 

Also- I'm looking at you too, GTHOMers.  I don't like it, and when you say it, you are saying it to ME.  I am an Ole Miss fan and that is being said directly to me and all the other Ole Miss fans.    And I don't take that lightly.  Just ask the people I've deleted off facebook in the last year for saying it over and over.  Oh, you can't, since I deleted them.

Don't fuss at me, its my opinion and it might not be your opinion.  That's fine.  You can share it on your blog and I promise to read it (No, seriously, everyone should start a blog-- its fun!) I get that it's your little acronym and you might like it.  But I don't think its funny.  I don't think its clever.  And  I don't like it when the Ole Miss fans say it to the LSU people, so I'm not entirely biased against MSU fans.  There are other schools who say it all the time.  And other people who have nothing to do with college teams that say it.  This applies equally.  And I might be making some people angry who don't think its a big deal.  That's fine--there are plenty of other blogs you can read.  Though, none probably as fun as mine.  Just kidding!  I have many MSU-rooting friends.  To be fair, most of them now come to Ole Miss games and hang out in the Grove, so they are obviously smart, fun, good people who know a good thing when they see it.  But I don't think they've ever said it, and I KNOW they've never written GTHOM all over facebook.  That's not how they roll.  They are more into taking obnoxious pictures of their sick friends who have taken too much medicine and have passed out on a boat (yeah, those pictures better never see the light of day, girlies.  Not flattering.)

Anyway, if anyone is still reading my ranting, then you will be glad to know I am finished.  I will wrap this up and