Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, October 31, 2005.

Are you a slow-to-anger person or can you explode at any given moment? It typically takes me awhile to reach a pitch. The one exception that I can think of is working on computers.

Put me in front of a computer, and I can go zero to pissed in 4.2 seconds. Not only that, but my anger has an almost unlimited reach -- quickly I'm passed the issue at hand and I'm raging against the heavens. Recently I bought an external hard drive to backup my work computer automatically. Good idea. Always backup your important stuff up. So I researched the drive, got the one I needed, followed the directions, set it up, and this is what happened to me about ten times:

"Dum-dee-dum-dee-dum. I am happy. My wife is beautiful. God has blessed me. I have four dollars. La la l---- What?! WHAT?!!! WTF???!!!! THE BACKUP HAS FAILED?!!! THE DISK HAS AN ERROR???!!! STUPID ROTTOM PIECE OF #@%$$ HARD DRIVE!!! I'M JUST TRYING TO BACKUP MY WORK INFORMATION! I'M JUST TRYING TO DO THE RIGHT #*&%$# THING! WHY MUST I BE PUNISHED?!!! WHY DOES THE UNIVERSE HATE ME?!!!" And so on... I returned that drive and got a new one. It seems to be working. I think it is, anyway. I don’t check too closely because I don't want to be mad again.

But as in the case of the recent hurricane seasons, it has taken me some time, but three things have managed to make their way to the top of my angry list. First, the infamous President Bush quotes shortly after Katrina, "We just never saw in comin'" followed by his tour of the region and his compliment to then FEMA director Mike Brown, "Brownie, you're doin' a heckava job." Partisan as it may sound, that revealed to me a level of, of, -- what's the word? I don't think there is one. Let's go with "out-of-touchness" -- that was staggering.

Next are the floating casinos in Biloxi, Mississippi that got destroyed. Floating casinos on the gulf coast. Hmmmm. That to me is like allowing gambling in Kansas only if the casinos are in really large mobile homes.

And finally, and directly related to this week's comic, you saw the folks in Florida after Wilma went through waiting in line for water. And they were grousing that the lines were too long and they only got a little water and the government failed them and -- hey! -- could you maybe plan ahead just a little bit? Honestly! Why not have bottled water stashed away at all times and then maybe the government could concentrate on just the extremely poor and extremely unfortunate without nimrods like you choking the line!

I thought of me standing out in my front yard in winter wearing nothing but my underwear. The CNN reporter shoving the microphone in my face, "Yeah, Bonnie, we just never saw this comin'. I've lived in Michigan for 33 years now and sure it gets cold sometimes, but I just never figured I couldn't do exactly what I want to do all the time and not pay the consequences. Now I'm frostbit to the knees and I expect the government to supply me with prosthetics tomorrow."

Geez Louise....