StickyKeys, FilterKeys, ToggleKeys
If you're like me, you hate a lot of inanimate things.  One of the things I hate is when my computer does things I don't tell it to do.  For example, every new installation of Windows XP comes with the accessibility options "StickyKeys", "FilterKeys", and "ToggleKeys" enabled.  These are completely stupid and useless features that pop up a dialog box when the user holds down the shift key for more than 8 seconds or makes some other sort of strange keyboard entry.  In my opinion, these "features" shouldn't be enabled by default.  You say, "They're easy to turn off, you idiot," but I say, "Check again".  The Accessibility Options Control Panel applet show 3 unchecked check boxes, which tells me that these functions are disabled.  Wrong!  Try again.  Those checkboxes mean nothing apparently, because the real functionality is enabled or disabled by clicking on the Settings button for each function and unchecking the "Use shortcut" box.  I find it annoyingly ironic that the "Accessibility" features of Windows aren't very "accessible". 

So anyway, here's the solution.  Download this registry file (via Joho).  Double-click on it (or open it) and say yes to adding it to your registry.  Now, reset or logoff/logon your computer.  Everything should work now.  Obviously, you could just manually disable each of the accessibility functions (without resetting), but this is another way to do it. #technology

Big deal (1)
I work with a lady who constantly makes an extremely big deal out of extremely small things.  It's really stressful to be around her and/or to listen to her.  Every little thing she does is completely blown out of proportion as she quickly waddles around and yells profanities.  Somebody forgot to fill out their time sheet absolutely perfectly, so she had to go over to him and yell at him to make sure it wouldn't happen again.  What made it even worse was that he's a foreigner and doesn't know the English language too well.  So not only was the big-deal lady difficult to understand because she was yelling about insignificant and unimportant things, but her unprovoked tirade was getting lost in translation.  My question to her is:  What's the big deal?  Calm down lady.  It's not a matter of life or death.  The problem will get fixed.  It's not that big of a problem to begin with.  And using profanity in the workplace isn't that cool.  It's normal in some jobs and in some circumstances, but it's not really that acceptable in everyday speech concerning non-joke topics. 

The other "big deal" this lady makes happens in the morning, usually around 9am.  The people in my office area don't turn on the lights for the first few hours, and this is fine by me.  Everybody just walks into the dark room and assumes it's dark for a reason.  But not this lady.  She walked in the other day and tore up and down the cubicle aisles cursing and mumbling about how lazy we were for having the lights off and how we should just stay home if we're too tired to work.  She's the kind of person who ruins a person's day. #business