Writing challenge, Day 15: three pet peeves

Only three? Looks like I have a lot of narrowing down to do. It's kind of funny how such a quiet, easygoing guy like me has so many things that bug him. I try not to let things get the better of me, but sometimes...grrr...

In no particular order, here you go:

Tailgaters. Driving in Southern California is hard enough, but it's just that much tougher when the guy behind you is trying to make love to your rear bumper. I really don't understand why some people need to be that close. There is no room for error. If the guy in front of me stops suddenly, I can usually stop safely (though hard). But the tailgater has to swerve all over to avoid hitting me. They know that they will be held responsible in the event of a collision, and yet they never learn.

People who are so busy trying to be cool that they act and/or sound like fools. You've seen them---the guys whose pants are sagging like they have a load in them. People who call our state "Cali." What if we called your state "Texi" or "Flori"? I could go on, but you get the idea. The good thing about this is that such people often bring a little revenge onto themselves: like when Mr. Saggypants's pants fall the rest of the way down, or when Ms. Coolspeak is so hard to understand that her food order is all mixed up. It's not always easy to listen to Garblese over a drive-thru speaker.

When I'm sitting alone in a quiet corner of an empty restaurant and someone (or a giant family) comes in and sits right next to or behind me. I am a quiet and generally solitary person. I like my personal space. If I want to be with someone, I will be. I don't like people sitting behind me because most of them can't sit still or they get up and sit down repeatedly. And most of those seats send the impact or movement through to the other side. In a few cases I've gotten up and moved to a different table (or asked the server if I could). This peeve is largely an Eric issue, not something that others do intentionally to annoy me. But it still does.

For tomorrow's reading displeasure, I'm going to take aim at a day in the life of...me. Stay doomed.