We’ll call this Annoyance #55.
It’s not really a pet peeve, but it’s slightly irritating: People who, in passing, ask, “What’s up?” or “How’s it going?”
Don’t ask such a question unless you want an answer!
In order to point this out, I began to respond with, “You don’t care.” But that usually resulted in guilt-ridden people stopping in their tracks to find out what actually was up with me—see, such an answer implies that there’s something seriously wrong and that I’m feeling alone and unloved. I don’t feel that way at all; I was only trying to make a point, and I wind up accused of being in denial.
Okay, so now I’m back to the semi-automatic responses “Not a lot” and “Better than average.” Smart-ass remarks don’t get the response I want; and I can’t fix ’em.
Tell you a funny story about fixing people, though. Dad has a bad habit of trying to fix people. For the longest time he was trying to get Burger King employees to stop asking him if he wanted cheese on that or fries with that.
“You want cheese on that?” they’d ask him when he ordered a Whopper.
“You mean a cheese-Whopper?” he’d say.
“Yes.”
“Did I ask if I wanted cheese on that?” he’d say.
This would make them hesitant to ask him if he wanted fries with that, but they’d ask it anyway because they have to. I worked for Burger King once, and the managers would tear you a new one if you don’t.
“Did I ask for fries?” he’d say.
“I can’t go to fast food restaurants with you anymore,” I told him. “God forbid I order the same thing as you and I wind up with the huge glob of spit in my food.”
Eventually Dad realized he was just frustrating the employees unnecessarily and stopped doing it. This happened regardless of my comments about hock-laced Whoppers. He just had to come to this conclusion on his own.
And yet we still have Christians that are convinced that nagging apologetics converts people…