Steve Moseley

Breaching year 75 this past summer did not mitigate my list of maddening stuff one whit. To the contrary in fact. It is increasingly obvious; living beyond one’s usefulness is not all it’s cracked up to be.

Small and not-so-small ‘Arrgghh!’ annoyances pile up something fierce after 7.5 decades of irritations great and small. Let’s pick a few to poke and prod just for fun (and perhaps purge while we’re at it).

Where to begin?

How about on the light side, say all the times expletives erupt when the toilet paper defies the perforation and tears the long way down the roll? Not a big deal, I admit. But little things become big things when you’re all achy and give-out and your tinnitus is screeching like a chorus of crickets.

Is it written somewhere the first driver in line at a red light must, without fail, be the last one in line to notice it has turned green, then barely creep into the intersection and turn left without signaling? Asking for a friend.

Men over 40 with their cap on backward? Arrggg! Bermuda shorts and sandals with socks or, even worse, sandals with knee-high socks and shorts. Linger too long admiring sandals with shorts and knee length WHITE socks at your eyesight’s peril.

Unbearable as all that be, the list goes on. Oldies radio stations that waste what little time a 75-year-old has left with mindless DJ chat and silly call-in games? Just play the damn tunes. Please! We’re beggin’ here.

Shout into the PA mic as loud as you can, “I think I went in my pants!” I experienced this annoyance in person at a Nebraska rodeo this summer. Must so many rodeo clowns bray like donkeys? I know. I know. Modern political correctness demands rodeo ‘entertainer’ not clown. So, sue me, I’m old school. I love rodeos, but not the silly skits. Most likely jaded by age and over-exposure. Over 30 years this schtick, predictably I suppose, lost its luster for me.

I am monumentally annoyed by careless folks who casually flick their cigarette butts everywhere. So tacky. On the good side, most adults nowadays are too smart to smoke. Perhaps they can’t afford $8 a pack or are banned from lighting up next to their oxygen tank. Those little disposable plastic flossers ‘disposed’ of on parking lots and streets seemingly everywhere. Truckers who pitch plastic bottles of bladder effluent along the road or, more personally offensive, folks who, even in this supposedly enlightened age, still walk away from the fetid contents of their canine’s bowels on neighborhood lawns and public parks.

I see I have myself all riled up. But still, it doesn’t end.

Carpet bombing strangers with constant, easily overheard F-bombs in public almost sets my nose hair to smoldering, doubly so when kids or moms or grandmas are within earshot. Selfish. Rude. Ignorant. Underdeveloped brain. Profoundly immature. This foul and thoughtless habit has become endemic in our downward spiral of social civility. Spew your vitriol in private if you must but, please, not in public.

Let’s wrap up today’s rant with a deadly serious gripe.

The sight of an adult in traffic smoking a cigarette with kids in the vehicle makes me see red instantly. The debilitating, potentially lethal impact of second-hand smoke has been common knowledge for decades, so there is no excuse. What disgraceful, despicable, selfish, indefensible behavior. If I could get away with it, I’d shoot the offender right in the snoot with one of the Kimber Pepper Blasters (look ’em up, they’re great) in the driver’s door compartments of all our vehicles.

Then again, maybe on the age thing I should look to the big picture, calm myself, recall my ships from a war I cannot win and contemplate what few comforts remain at 75. At least I don’t have to get up in the wee hours to pee. Yet. So, I’ve got that going for me, which is nice.

The message seems clear; we Boomers must shut up and take victory where we find it.