cure for annoyingness

3/18/07

is there a cure for annoyingness? can you just say, "hey you're annoying" and then the person will stop being annoying and thank you for saving them?

i feel guilty for disliking annoying people. because most of the time, their annoyingness isn't something that is necessarily bad. it might be related to the way that they pronounce certain words. it might be their choice of aftershave combined with their choice of clothing. or the way they gesture when they get excited. or how they are always making themselves the victim. or their lack of volume control. or how they fish for compliments. or how they're always talking about the people who have crushes on them. or how they comb their hair. or how they tell long stories that aren't funny or interesting. or the fact that it's thursday.

and i don't know if they are only annoying to me, or if they actually are annoying in a part-of-their-identity sense. like, "aw man, here comes Annoying Frank. [insert emphatic word here], he's so annoying."

and as much as i wish i could be nice to everybody, i know for a fact that my niceness levels are inversely proportional to a person's annoyingness levels. even when Frank isn't casually mentioning that he's an award-winning figure skater, i am still rude because i want him to go away as quickly as possible.

it just doesn't seem right, that i should hold it against him. it's not like Annoying Frank's mom said to him one day, "now Frank, look people in the eye when you're talking to them" and little Frank said, "heck no woman. i'mma stare at their foreheads! yeah!"

it's so uncomfortable to watch somebody get destroyed socially, when all they have to do to fix it is quit talking about their stuffed squirrel collection all the time, relax their facial muscles a little, and shower. but who's going to tell them that? can you think of a graceful way to tell somebody that they'd actually have friends if they would quit being on the defensive all the time?

because let's be serious: it takes a very big person to be able to look past all the annoying qualities to find the person inside. there aren't that many big people in the world. maybe one big person to every dozen annoying people. it would be so much easier of the annoying ones just changed.