Methods for Maddening™:

7 habits of highly annoying people

Volume 3: Advanced Annoying

            Now that you have completed the first two levels, you are ready to step into the third tier of professional pestering.

            Method 5:

            Adopt an annoying habit.  This one takes a great deal of time and patience to accomplish successfully.  Some habits, like chewing gum, are easy, but snapping gum, which is over thirteen times as annoying as merely chewing, can take months of practice to refine to a level of maximum annoyance.  Taking up bad eating habits, especially for those raised to eat politely, can also be difficult.  Try starting slowly, with a minor habit such as picking your teeth dramatically, and then progress to more difficult habits to learn, such as leaving your elbows on the table and smacking your lips.  Finally, you can take bites that are far too large and chew with your mouth open.  Do not limit yourself to these suggestions, but open your mind to possibilities as they present themselves.

            It is important to be sensitive to others, so as to exploit their weaknesses.  Find out what habits specifically enrage people you are around frequently.  Aunt Sally hates when people scratch their ears?  Start scratching!  Herman at the gas station hates when you leave the pump handle sideways?  Do it more often!  The clerks at the post office prefer bills?  Go get some pennies!

            Cultivate situations where you can use your newfound skills.  Take a cruise on a small ship, because people will be trapped with you for a week or more.  Stand on lines, regardless of what the line is for, and invade the personal space of the people around you.  Bathe less frequently.  Practice the phrase “Are you going to eat that?”

            Method 6:

            Take up an annoying instrument.  If your talents are not musical, all the better.  If you can actually play the instrument, use pirated Annoying Music Man CDs and the loudest possible stereo.  You can assault the aesthetic and physical senses of your victims at the same time.

            Take up accordion.  Play it as often as possible.  Bring it to the few parties that you are still invited to.  Bring it to school or the office.  Smuggle it onto an airplane or train to provide music to your fellow riders.

            If an accordion is not sufficiently annoying for you, the next step up is a set of bagpipes.  Because the sound of bagpipes carries further than that of an accordion, you can annoy more people at once.

            For the maximum in wide-area annoying, strafe the ears of the entire city with a calliope.  A calliope is like a really loud pipe organ, and is often found in a circus or carousel.  It is powered by compressed air.  Its volume can be increased by increasing the air pressure, and its high notes can be heard for miles.

            If you are trying to pester on a shoestring, buy a kazoo, which may be easily concealed in a pocket or purse.

            You are now an advanced annoyer.  To progress to imperial-level irritation, read Volume 4: Pernicious for Perpetuity.