A friend recently chastised me for my letters to the editor, which often begin or end with the statement: "I love this town" and just as often are favorable to the leaders of our community. His position was that "I love this town" is smaltzy, and further, that I should follow the lead of other citizens and criticize our officials, or at least complain about things. I do love this town and am not ashamed to say so.
However, to placate a friend and demonstrate my ability to bitch with the best of them, I've put together a short list of things that I hate and despise:
People who insist on taking their dogs to public functions, such as the Farmers Market, carnivals at Mills Park, open house at the airport, etc. People who drive at full speed up to the line at stop signs, then slam on their brakes. I'm never sure if they are going to stop.
People with darkly tinted windows whom you can't see and don't know if they see you. (see above).
People who open all their car windows, turn their amplifiers up to stun and park next to me at stop lights.
And most detested of all are those inconsiderate, lazy people who use grocery store carts to deliver their groceries to their cars, then leave the cart in the parking space rather than push it 20 feet it to the cart storage place. It's irritating to see what appears to be an empty space only to find a cart making it useless. Even more irritating is when the jerks leave the cart to be bumped by other cars or blown by the wind into my car creating scratches, dents and scrapes.
Having vented my rage, and hopefully demonstrated to my friend that I'm not all Mr. Nice Guy, I can say that the vast majority of my fellow Carsonites don't do any of the above things and that this is the best place in the world to live. I love this town.
DENNIS RITCHIE
Carson City
