10 on the 10th: 05.2021

 

Howdy, sweet potatoes, thanks for stopping by for 10 on the 10th:  05.2021.  As I type this Mother’s Day is coming to a close.  I am just out of the hot tub after a nice soak complete with informal charcuterie board and a glass of wine.  To be perfectly honest, we were heading up to our room to watch TV when it dawned on me that I had finished this post.  So here I am to share with you my 10 things I hate (or really dislike) to do.  Hope you’ll put on your thinking caps and respond to this prompt in a comment below.

10 on the 10th

You can check out last month’s 10 on the 10th post, here.  And take note of next month’s theme so you can start thinking about it now.  We will be answering 10 questions about summer.  I’ll share those questions in an upcoming post.  Be thinking of the things you love best about the season.

 

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10 on 1oth:  05.2021

Before I started making my top ten list, I decided to do a  little research about things people dislike doing most.  According to this article on mentalfloss.com, America’s most hated chore isn’t…

cleaning the toilet

doing the dishes

or putting away the laundry.

It’s dusting the bedroom!!  I would never have guessed that.  How ’bout you?  Dusting isn’t that big a deal for me.  But you wouldn’t be able to tell it by looking at the layer of dust covering the dresser, chest of drawers and night stand in my room!!

I have polled friends on Facebook about their top 2 things they hate or dislike and will share their answers at the end of this post.  Before we get to that list, here are my top ten.

10 Things I Hate (or dislike) to Do

In no particular order, because the order changes on any given day…or moment…

First Three:

• Getting the oil changed in the car.  Because they always try to sell me a new engine, 4 new tires, a brake job when all I want is 5 quarts of fresh oil and a clean filter.  I dread going to have my oil changed.  Every time I swear that PC will have to do it after the next 3,000 miles.  And then I reach that milestone, resolve to be very strong and go to Lube-n-Go by myself again.  Only to learn my serpentine belt is shot, and I need new shocks.
• Buying a bathing suit.  There is nothing redeeming or enjoyable (to me) about buying a bathing suit…except maybe the possibility that said suit might see the beach and ocean waters – with me in it.  I don’t want to try them on because I don’t want to see how I will look in the bathing suit.  But I don’t want to buy one without trying it on because I need to see how I look in the bathing suit.  With bathing suits, there is – at least for me – the need to size up 2 sizes.  Making an already unpleasant task even more stressful.  And for some reason, I never ever ever look like the size 0 model does in the very same suit.  Why is that?  Looking at buying this one for our birthday beach trip in July.

• Cooking dinner, answering phone calls, cleaning the kitchen almost simultaneously.  All these fun activities take place at the same time every evening.  The dinner hour or dinner 90 minutes, from about 4:30-6:00 pm, is super stressful.  First of all, I am preparing dinner.  Which isn’t necessarily stressful unless I am fixing a new recipe.  During this time I call my mom for the second time each day.  Her time zone is 2 hours ahead of mine so dinner time in El Paso is when Mom is getting ready for bed in Lexington.  The telemarketers are at their most annoying at this time when they probably assume everyone is coming home from work.  My daughters often both call about that time, and PC calls on his way home from the office.  Then in 10 minutes we gobble down the dinner that took 45 minutes to prepare.  Followed by 30 minutes spent cleaning the kitchen.  Super stressful time of feeling pulled in 40 different directions.

Second Three:

• Sorting the recycling.  Before you guys get upset with me, I do totally get why we need to recycle.  I love Mother Earth.  Right now, the collective human race is not being a good steward of the planet we call home.  I get it.  But…yup, there’s a big BUT…I struggle so with trying to figure out if something is recyclable.  The paper towel I wiped dry the kitties’ food bowls.  Recyclable or not?  The clear, light weight produce bags from the grocery store.  Bread bags.  Kitty food bags.  Ziplock bags I have rinsed out.  I get so nervous and anxious trying to figure out whether something is recyclable or not.  For the love of all things holy, why in the world are Walmart bags not recyclable?? Why can Brennyn recycle glass and we can’t??  Received this handy dandy recycling guide in the mail on Saturday.  Going to have it tattooed on my forearm.

• Listening to messages on my phone.  Yes, my friends, we are the only folks in America who still have a land line.  Which means telemarketers leave messages on my home and cell phone.  Lucky me.  I have double the messages to wade through.  And I positively hate to have to listen to 42 telemarketing messages to get to the message from my mom.
• Going to the dentist.  An evil necessity.  One I recently endured.  Have had several pretty awful experiences with extractions, root canals and infections.  For which I have had to pay exorbitant bills afterward.  And I don’t even have nice teeth to show for it.  Crooked teeth. Horrible overbite.

Finishing the List:

• Making small talk.  Have often wondered if I am somewhere on the autistic spectrum.  In the book The Good Sister by Sally Hepworth, my current book club title, readers are introduced to Fern.  A character after my own heart.  Quirky.  One who avoids social interaction at all cost.  Someone with whom I can completely relate.  She’s a librarian with the sensory overload issues sometimes experienced by people with autism.  I don’t have sensory problems but struggle to talk with people.  While I can do it, I don’t like to and don’t feel confident at it.

• Packing for a trip.  Taking trips makes me nervous.  Packing for trips makes me more nervous still.  Most of the trips I take are to see my mom.  And in selecting my clothes for those visits, I want to look cute, wear bright colors and make Mom proud.  But weather in Kentucky is especially fickle.  Like the year we had a snow storm during a mid-March visit for which I had packed short sleeve shirts and shorts.  I usually wind up taking too many dressier things and not enough kickin’ around clothes.  In the photo below my sister and I were captured by the Walgreen’s security camera wearing Mom’s coats and hats and gloves because we hadn’t packed snow storm worthy clothing.

• Driving at night.  Driving in the rain.  Driving at night in the rain.  Or snow.  As anyone who loves me will tell you, I have had more than my share of car wrecks.  Most of them my fault.  So driving under the best of road and weather conditions is even iffy for me.  Driving at night with rain…potentially very dangerous.  One time, driving home from college, I could have sworn I saw a dragon in the middle of the road.  It was in the middle of the night, after a day of semester exams and there may have been rain falling.  I was sick with a head cold and doped up on cough medicine.  Looking back, I don’t really think there was a dragon.  Probably just a hallucination or maybe a bad dream.

And…

• Sewing.  I don’t do it.  Have taken sewing lessons and had my own sewing machine.  No bueno.  Even having to sew on a button gives me pause.  Do I like whatever garment it is with the missing button to go to the effort of replacing the button?  Hemming.  Nope.  So glad that raggedy hems are on trend.  My mom sewed beautifully and was a chemist.  I didn’t get either of those traits.

Bonus

There is one thing I grumble about most.  But it isn’t something I hate doing.  It is just something I hate about other folks.  About what seems to have become the great American way of doing things.  Or not doing them!

• No one does things the right way any more.  No one tries their best.  Most of the people who were part of the “Greatest Generation” have died. They were a generation of Americans with a strong work ethic and sense of patriotism.  Many lived through the Great Depression and appreciated the value of having a job, work.  Doing their best at that job because if they didn’t, there were plenty of others looking for work who would.  The Greatest Generation raised the Baby Boomers.  My parents belonged to the former, and I belong to the latter.  I take real exception with the way nearly everyone these days looks to do things with as little effort as possible.  We do just enough.  Rarely more than that.

I could write a book about that.  Every time someone comes out to the house to repair something, it’s the same story.  Nothing’s built to last.  And few people do things right the first time anymore.

Will climb off my soap box now.

You’re welcome.

Your Turn

So, what would be on your list of things you hate for 10 on the 10th: 05.2021?  I polled my online book club and some Facebook friends and here are their responses.  Do any of these resonate with you?

Friends and Family Dislikes

• porta-potties
• salmon patties
• lobster
• split pea soup (I can’t get paste the color and consistency)
• olives
• emptying the dishwasher
• getting ready for bed when you’re too tired to do so
• waking up to an alarm clock
• unproductive meetings (maybe teleconferencing, too??)
• exercising
• dieting (mentioned twice)
• staining the deck
• cleaning the bathroom
• mopping
• ironing
• texting “yah” and “peeps” – very specific dislikes!!
• liver
• playing board games
• being the state assessment test coordinator at school (state assessment tests, too??)
• completing progress reports
• shelving the 500s section of the library (my librarian sister and me)
• having to wear a mask to read to kindergarteners who are having to sit at their desks
• needing so many different computer passwords for things
• folding king-sized sheets (impossible)
• changing sheets on a California king
• doing dishes and cleaning toilets
• vacuuming, cooking, grocery shopping and laundry, putting away clean clothes
• feeling stressed
• being in a hurry
• feeling like your job is not worthwhile
• unpacking from a trip
• emptying Tupperware that’s been in the fridge of its mystery contents

What’s the Deal with Dusting

But the task most hated by my friends is DUSTING!!  With 5 mentions.  I had no idea.  Maybe I can work a deal with some of you who hate to dust.  I’ll dust for you if you sew on my buttons and hem my jeans.

Hope you will link up your 10 on the 10th 05.2021 post with me or leave a comment about some of the things you hate doing most.

Today begins the spring cleaning around here.  Which will incorporate a lot of dusting, mopping and laundry.  Wish me luck!!

Thanks for popping in.

Hugs and kisses,