it

Here's one more thing to add to the "Things that annoy Dust" list. It really gets on my nerves because it keeps me from understanding people. It makes me look stupid sometimes when I don't understand what it is. This thing simply must be addressed. If this paragraph annoys you, then you know what I mean.

I get frustrated by the use of pronouns without antecedents and by the overuse of the word "thing." Why, may you ask, would this annoy me? Because, I may answer, I am a literal person who does not usually make the assumptions necessary to know what "it" is or who "he" or "she" or "they" are. I can hear entire an discussion without having a clue as to what it is about.

Golden sometimes tells me something like, "I am thinking about calling them about that thing that they asked us to do." Sometimes I can put two and two together, but I am too slow to parse that sentence properly. I tend to give a lot of blank responses during those conversations.

I commit an opposite crime that annoys Golden just as much. Rather than using "it" or "thing" to describe a word that I can't remember, I pause for an uncomfortably long period of time until I can think of the word I want. Golden typically walks away and does something else while I try to work out what the exact right word is for what I want to say.

What can I say? It's one thing about me she just doesn't like.