A LITTLE MENTAL SPRING CLEANING BEFORE SUMMERTIME

Fidget spinners, air conditioning, speeders, bogus news and poutine deserve derision

As spring gives way to summer, I thought it a good time to do a bit of last-minute, mental spring cleaning — getting a few things off my chest that have been bugging me.

So inspired by my colleague Rob Vanstone’s Pet Peeves, consider this my inaugural Barb’s Bugs. In no particular order:

1. Fidget spinners. I’m OK with these little spinning thingamabobs for those who truly need them to calm down or concentrate. But now they’ve become the latest toy, everyone has one everywhere. And it’s not calming. I recently sat through a concert wondering the whole time when this spinner was going to get caught in someone’s hair as the person kept thrusting the device at the heads of those seated in front of her.

2. Drivers who do 183 km/h in a construction zone on the Ring Road. Absolutely ridiculous! Think about the 18-year-old flag person killed on her first day on the job near Estevan five years ago or the 88-year-old killed in Regina seven years ago when the vehicle in which he was a passenger slowed for a construction zone on the Trans-Canada Bypass and was rear-ended by a drunk, speeding driver.

3. Those who think every possible activity must have a windup function. I’m OK with things just ending — without the need to gather socially, bring a salad or dessert, eat hotdogs and hamburgers and donate to a gift.

4. People who don’t understand the difference between an advertisement (a paid promotion), a news article (a report of a news event or story) and a column (which can be a one-sided rant because it’s opinion and not news.) And while I’m on the topic, I’m also bugged by those who ask why we can’t deliver what we once did but don’t buy subscriptions. Journalists need to be paid for the news you consume online for free.

5. People who are all about free speech rights — so long as they’re in agreement with the message delivered.

6. Conflicting parking laws. When I recently wrote a column on parking, I heard from several motorists ticketed in residential areas for being too close to a “curb crossing,” including an Estevan couple in town for a medical appointment. The driver stayed in the vehicle to move if there was any issue — only to be ticketed and photographed by a parking officer. Yet downtown, a number of parking meters are immediately next to driveways and fire hydrants.

7. Parking meters that eat my money — $3 so far this week — but don’t actually work or return my coins. Is it just a down payment on the parking spot?

8. Media handlers who make unreasonable demands, like putting restrictions on news media photographers while members of the public are free to snap everyone and anything on their smartphones and upload the pictures to social media.

9. Bogus “news” releases that fill my inbox. In the past couple weeks alone, I got one in all caps and red ink directed to the “child-hating & family wreckng (sic) media”; one headlined

“news story” for an anti-stress product ad; a promo for a U.S.based “calm journey;” another promising “essential news” about a new phone; a survey by an appliance manufacturer on how best to connect with neighbours; another supposed survey about which celebrity you’d like to clean with, by the makers of a mop; and a “study” on the nationalities of sexually charged women.

10. Buildings that are ice cold in the summer. My sweaters get more wear now than in winter.

11. Infill houses that aren’t in keeping with the existing neighbourhood. For years, the house next to my friends’ home was a bungalow, like every house on their quiet, residential street. The single-family home was removed to make way for two “cash towers,” two-storey, multi-unit rental houses with a revolving door of tenants. Their situation is sadly, not unique.

12. Pretend poutine. It’s not poutine unless there are cheese curds on it. Mozzarella bits aren’t the same.

13. People who still think it’s OK just to abandon their trash wherever it’s convenient to them, instead of in a nearby garbage can, especially as summer festival season arrives.

14. Those crazed, angry blackbirds that dive bomb you for no reason. I just want to go for a walk, not re-enact a scene from the The Birds. And speaking of bugs, shouldn’t the plethora of worms appease them?