Irrational.

Irrationality is a peculiar word.

You can attach the word 'irrational' to so many contrasting and different verbs and nouns.

Allow me to canvas two such pairings that have recently affected me.

Let's start with this one: 'irrational actions'. 

I have a friend. She's broken up with her boyfriend a number of times. It may have been twice. It may have been three times. I'm not even sure what you, I or she would count as breaking up anymore.

All I know is that they keep getting back together.

(As an aside, he's a bit of a mega-jerk. Not that that really concerns me at all. I never see him, and nor do I want to. Ever. And he'd probably best not see me. If you know what I mean).

While I too repeat mistakes, often with full knowledge that it will not all end well, it just seems a bit dumb to keep going back to the guy if you have to do it SEVERAL TIMES right? Something must be fundamentally flawed if you have to break up and make up that many times.

And something, or somethings, are fundamentally flawed. I just don't have the heart to tell her. I'm sure she would know, if she opened her eyes and stopped kidding herself. But you know, love makes us blind, and all that.

So that's 'irrational actions' covered so far.

That leads me seamlessly on to my next 'irrational' pairing. 'Irrational annoyance'.

I experience this a lot. I'm by no means a genius, but often this annoyance stems from fools. I just don't suffer fools very well. You know, people that don't make sense, or are just generally bad people, irk me quite easily.

Which, I think, is not so irrational.

Irrational annoyance would be me despising the overuse of the phrase 'like a boss/baws/bors'.

Picture of man sitting on a motorbike. "Like a baws!!!!111!!!"

Picture of girl with face paint. "Like a baws!!!!!111!"

Status update of a guy at a hotel. "Like a baws!!!!111!!"

Someone walking their dog. "Like a baws!!!!111!!"

Far out. Overused, inappropriate, thus, not funny or amusing.

Or 'swag'. I'm not even going to go into that one, because pretty much everybody already has.

Back to my story. Well, all of this is my story. Or at least, my re-telling/telling of it. But back to the story that we were halfway through.

When said friend related her story about her nth breakup with same boyfriend, I listened. Literally, for hours. Literally listened too, because I have no idea what to say to someone in that situation, especially over the phone. "There there"? "He was a jerk anyway, you'll get over it. You did with the other four boyfriends"? "Let's go smash his face in"?

She clearly still liked him at that point, so obviously the "Let's go smash his face in" or "He was a jerk anyway" doesn't really work.

It works even less when they eventually get back together. Which is what happened.

So thank goodness I didn't go bashing her (momentarily) ex-boyfriend, verbally or otherwise. My father taught me well, at least with this trick. He always says to me (because, for some reason, I always get calls about people having problems with their supposed better halves):

Son, don't go bad-mouthing their (what could very well turn out to be temporary) ex-boyfriend/ex-girlfriend. If (and most likely when) they get back together, your name will get bandied about, and in no nice way either.*

*Obviously in Cantonese. With a bit of embellishment by me. But the general gist is the same. 

Anyway, I'm annoyed by the whole business. I can think of a few reasons why, none of which may be correct.

1. Time was wasted. It wasn't a ball of fun either. I don't mind people calling me. In fact, I often welcome it. But it just seems so dumb, for some reason, when I get called for, not exactly advice, but opinion I guess you would call it, and then it just kind of all gets ignored.

2. She knows that there's something fundamentally wrong with this whole saga. That's why she wouldn't tell me they'd gotten back together before I kind of prompted it. This also annoys me because I also like good news. Sometimes (or often) more so than bad news. If you can call this good news. It is for her anyway. Why in such a rush to tell me about supposed doom and gloom, and so tardy to tell me about what's supposed to be good news? Do I seem like a person that thrives on pessimism and sadness? If I do seem like that, for the record, I'm not. I like good news. And good stuff in general.

3. As canvassed above, her (now current, as of this moment, as far as I know) boyfriend is a bit of a mega-jerk. What's more, she left a perfectly nice guy that I got along with a few boyfriends ago because of a reason that I don't find to be a reason at all.

So there you have it. Irrational. We all are, to a certain extent, and at certain moments. I can think of at least roughly five irrational things that I've done this week. I just don't like it very much when I'm on the receiving end of irrationality. Not sure if that's rational or irrational, and at this stage, I don't very much care.

Word of the Day: Irrational