Pet Peeves

In honor of the fact that today is my half birthday, and probably because of the fact that I'm PMSing, I would like to present a list of my pet peeves. I invite no one to tell me why any of my pet peeves is irrational---I admit that every one of them may well be irrational. If you are guilty of any of my pet peeves, I invite you to seriously consider the fact that you could be very, very wrong and I could be very, very right. Here they are in no particular order:

Hymn Number vs. Page Number:

When people in church refer to hymn numbers as page numbers. They're not page numbers. They're hymn numbers.


Craip vs. Crep

The word is crepe. Yes, the word comes from French. Yes, in French, they pronounce it crep. And returned missionaries from French-speaking missions insist on pronouncing it crep instead of the anglicized version craip. And that drives me nuts because although the word came from French, it is now officially English and we have our own pronunciation. When I argue this with people, I use the example of sushi. I ask how annoying it might be if every returned missionary from Japan insisted on pronouncing the word exactly how the Japanese might pronounce it. And I make an impression that is so indisputably annoying that the crep offenders can only hang their heads in shame.

Michelangelo

The i in Michelangelo is like the i in bike. It's not like the i in sit. I hate it when people pronounce it with the short i. In an English usage class, a teacher claimed that though she knows it sounds a little affected, she pronounces it with the soft i because that's more authentic. More authentic?? The soft i sound does not even exist in Italian and most Italians would be unable to even make the sound. If you're going for real Italian, start pronouncing it Meechelangelo. But look at my above pet peeve if you want to know how stupid I think you'll sound if you do that.

Panino vs. Panini

And now to go the complete opposite way (I know that everything I write here will contradict what I just said), I hate the fact that a panini is a type of sandwich here. First of all, panini is plural. Second of all, it means sandwich. Any sandwich is a panino. It grates my freaking ears to here people say, "I want a panini."

The Extended Goodbye on IM

When I'm talking on IM, I like a quick goodbye. But some people insist on extending the goodbye with useless communication. When it's clear to me that the conversation is over, I close the window, without even necessarily saying goodbye. But some people, when you end the conversation continue it with annoying meaningless words. Like: bye, see you later, talk to you later, ok, bye, talk to you later. Now, I'm not annoyed with any of these things as a signal of the end of the conversation, but if the end of the conversation has been made clear, then any of those things is really unnecessary.