By: Ardo Omar
I was never a fan of 60 Minutes as a kid. Who could blame me? It was dull, dry, and was meant for people who were nearing the end of their lives. My parents were those people (obviously, I didn’t realize that they weren’t as old as I thought) and enjoyed watching it regularly. For some strange and unexplainable reason, they thought I would benefit from watching it too. So I’d sit there, master the art of sleeping with my eyes open, and silently beg for the program to end so I could watch Stargate: SG 1.
Then he came on. During the last couple minutes of the program, Andy Rooney would come on and complain about something. Watching him for the first time, I thought, “Wow, that old dude is really good at complaining, and he makes it sound logical and shit.” He was amazing, and, more often than not, he would say what was on everyone’s mind. Unfortunately, he died November 4th, 2011, and no one has since been able to complain as eloquently as him. This is why I thought I’d give it a go and list the top 5 things that really piss me off.
Mayor Rob Ford became my enemy when he announced that he wanted to close down libraries in Toronto in order to save money. I love the library, not York’s, but the public library. The public library has books that I actually want to read, not because it’s required of me for a research paper that I have to write for a class. Adding to the bad mood of already pissed off Torontonians, Ford’s brother, Doug Ford, went on to say that there were more libraries than Tim Hortons stores in his neighbourhood. Oh, well, why didn’t you say so? I never took into account the library/Tim Hortons ratio when considering the future of literacy in this city.
What’s so great about this country is that we can protest about anything that pisses us off. Right now, I’m able to write about what pisses me off because of that freedom. So, when I hear residents of Toronto complaining about Occupy Toronto, I get annoyed. People are peacefully protesting because they’re frustrated with the one percent. Yet, residents and business owners of Toronto who either work or live near the site are pissed off because it’s ‘ruining the neighbourhood,’ and residents have ‘trouble sleeping.’ Here’s a tip: invest in some earplugs. The protesters are taking a stand that the rest of us are too busy to do, and unless you have some legitimate reasons as to why you want them gone, then I suggest you suck it up.
Here in Canada we’ve built our criminal justice system on the concept of innocent until proven guilty. Why? Because asking someone to prove his/her innocence doesn’t make any sense. Yet, we still end up going about trials with a guilty-until-proven-innocent mentality that can cause wrongful convictions. How can you prove that you haven’t done anything? Shows like Law & Order piss me off because the conversation usually goes like this:
COP: Do you have an alibi between the times of 3:00-4:00am?
SUSPECT: I was asleep.
COP: Is there anyone who can verify that?
SUSPECT: My wife was asleep next to me.
COP: Did she at any time wake up between those hours and see you asleep with her own eyes?
SUSPECT: No…she was asleep…
This is a disaster waiting to happen. When the Texas Conservatives say that PM Harper’s Get Tough on Crime initiative is a “been there, done that; didn’t work” type of initiative, it makes you wonder if it’s such a good idea. It pisses me off that PM Harper wants to get tougher on youth offenders and build more prisons but doesn’t get tough on white-collar crime, which affects more people and is rarely ever punished. Not to mention, it’s more expensive to house criminals in jail than it is to rehabilitate them. Harper is willing to waste billions on this initiative while a person like Mayor Ford wants to cut services like libraries to save money. Is it just me, or are you pissed too?
Bet you didn’t see this one coming. I’d like to start off by saying that I have nothing against Christmas. What it stands for in terms of giving to the less fortunate and so on is a noble idea. What pisses me off is the timing of it. During the year, it’s hard to kick back and curl up on the couch while watching your favourite TV shows because of school or work. So, when you have time on your winter break to just be lazy and brain-dead, you get excited. What piss me off are that (1) my shows go on hiatus, so I have nothing new or interesting to watch during my well-deserved break and (2) the Christmas specials are annoying. If there was a new show or TV movie on once or twice a day, I’d be okay with it. But no, it’s the same frickin’ shows and the same frickin’ TV movies that come on again and again, to the point where I overdose on Christmas cheer. I don’t even celebrate Christmas, so I don’t even get presents as an award for enduring this torment. Why not go outside? Because I hate winter. I hate the cold. I hate the slush. I hate the salt that turns my boots white. I hate the layers of clothes that I put on in order to feel warm but they only end up making me wobble like an obese penguin. I hate looking at people’s deformed Uggs. I just want to sit at home and not think. Is that too much to ask?
