Annoyed

There are certain things that annoy me, I try not to let them take over my day as that then means I walk around like a bear who has his hand stuck in a honey pot and can't get it out all day. There are however some instances of stupidity that are so bad, so annoying, so damn right infuriating that they need slapping in the face with a huge wet cod. So for your enjoyment and my own sanity I am about to go on a rant of nuclear proportions. You have been warned.

DVLA

How bloody hard can it be? You pay £33.50 to renew your driving license, the lovely people in the post office tell you it will be with you within 10 working days. You explain that you need it to complete your house move and they smile sweetly and say 'you will have it within the required time' you thank them and go home waiting for the postman to drop it through your letter box.......and three weeks later you are still waiting.

So you call the DVLA and get through to a person on the end of the phone ( we shall them Jessie, I have no idea if that's their real name but what the hell I don't care and to be honest he could have been a transvestite who recently buried his mother and is now sitting at work in her clothes for all the use he was). Anyway Jessie tells you that because it isn't on his computer screen he can't tell you where it is. You explain that the post office said it would be 10 days and you paid the exspress delivery for it. Jessie sighs and says that he cannot help you until it has been three weeks exactly as he cannot access the system until then. When he can access the system he won't be able to tell you where it is, just if it's been processed or not. You again explain the need for it but hey Jessis is programmed to read a script and cannot deviate from it as the seems on his mothers ball gown will burst and everyone will see his pink bra doesn't match with the green g-string he's wearing. 'call back in a few day's he says. You enquire how that will help and Jessie now with his five o'clock shadow showing says hat he will then chase it up and get back to you in two weeks. Fearing an anurisam you hang up, feeling like someone has just dumped in your toilet and left the skid marks on the pan for you to clean.

Estate Agents

Oh my old favourite the much abused and downtrodden estate agent. Oh shucks I know some of you are not as bad as the one I'm going to tell you about and you do a great job, so go on then give each other a hug and say well done to each other, yeah go on you deserve it after all your not a service industry or making a shit load of money out of people selling their houses are you? I mean you get such a bad press, well I think we should all have a bank holiday in your honour just so as we can say, oh my god it's sticking in my throat, 'thank you, you bunch of money grabbing manipulative bastards'. The estate agent who I am buying my house from is the lowest, worst kind of estate agent there is. She doesn't listen to anything I tell her, she lies on a regular basis, and rings me EVERY SINGLE DAY to ask me the same bloody question.

She plays a great game as well, are you ready you may want to try it with some of your mates, here are the rules.

1. Ring purchaser and tell them you need some information as their client is getting worried and may pull out

2. This will send you into a panic as you think you are going to lose the house you and your family have set your heart on, the kids are excited and planning bedrooms, the wife's excited about new carpets, curtains and settee's, you are excited about finally getting the 50 inch plasma you've always wanted as well, so you do as they say and ring the mortgage broker/solicitor/DVLA.

3. After spending your lunch break making the necessary calls, after all you don't want to be the reason the house falls through do you? Imagine the sad little faces and tear stained cheeks, you ring back the estate agent armed with the information they so desperately needed only to be told they are on the phone and will call you back shortly.

4. This is the key moment, DON'T call back the person who you've scared the shit out of even when they ring you three, to four times and you say you are on the phone. No make them wait, oh I don't know, let's say 24hrs and then ring them, as if nothing has happened and say you don't need the information anymore.

This estate agant has done this 9 times to me now. Yes 9 times, she has me by the short and curlies, she is cupping me like a tight jockstrap, I know it and she knows it, so being the man that I am what do I do? Do I decide to speak to her boss? Do I storm in there and tell her exactly what I think of her? Do I ignore her calls and see how she likes it? No I do what any right minded married man would do. I send in the wife. That fearsome creature who has you even tighter by the balls than the estate agent and who doesn't like anyone cupping her husband unless it's her. You wind her up, this normally takes a few days of moaning about the estate agent but tell her you'll sort it knowing your getting nowhere, you watch as she sees you trying to keep a lid on it and then only then do you ask for her help.

If you have planned this correctly you will launch a 5ft 2" mother of four ball of fury at the estate agent who will then become a quivering wreck as she is told in no uncertain terms that you will by pass her and deal directly with the home owner, thus losing her, her commission in the process, if she ever calls your husband again.

Some may see this as a sign of weakness, me? Nope I see it as playing to my strengths. You do not what to get on the wrong side of my wife, oh she may look all cute and cuddly but beating deep inside her chest is a block of ice so cold that every now and then I have to turn the penguins away from the door as their ice caps are melting. When she feels someone is playing her, well it ain't pretty and my sons ain't going to know what's hit them when they are older and getting up to what all teenage boys do believe me, but I love her for it even more. She is the go to person and by god my way would have seen me arrested, her way? Well let's just say I got an apology from the estate agent. Brilliant wasn't it.

So ranting over for a while, but go on tell me what's annoying you and I'll put a top ten together for the absolute best ones.