Wieners of the Week

(with apologies to Sophie Rosalind, who is expecting the currently-under-the-radar John Mayer to feature, which he does not: but he is still Wiener Emperor.)

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A Wienery Winery - De Bertoli have a space on their label for 'Wine Type.' On their Merlot it says 'Family Selection'. Hmmm. Seems like a weird thing to write on a wine label. Seems a little...wienery.
"Even Little Timmy will enjoy this full-bodied Shiraz!"
To be fair, the merlot itself was quite drinkable.

People who describe wines as 'drinkable' - of course it's drinkable! It's a fucking liquid! When Winecritic McStuffyNuts says a wine is "highly drinkable" what he really means is, "This wine is neither poisonous or frozen".

Unhelpful Helpers - those people who offer to do something nice for you and then never get around to doing it. Ever. Until it is completely unhelpful and you wish they'd never bloody offered in the first place.
Say, hypothetically, that you happen to mention you need cream cheese.
"Oh," they say, "I'll pick some up on the way home from work! No bother!"
You say "Great!" and are highly appreciative and begin to imagine taking your breakfast bagel to a whole new level and yet that night they return from work and the cream cheese does not appear.
"Sorry," they say, "I forgot."
"Don't worry about it," you say, "I can get some."
"Oh, no no no! I'll get some tomorrow."
But when they come home the next night, there is still no cream cheese. But they still insist that they are going to buy it! And this goes on for YEARS in a horrible recurring dream of cream cheeselessness until eventually you start to feel like Horrible Cream Cheese Nagger and then one day go, "Oh for fuck's sake I will get it myself" and then you come home and slam the cream cheese down on the bench and they're all offended because they were just trying to do something nice for you.
Never take these people up on their offer to feed your puppy while you're away. You will come home and he will be so, so thin.

Wheeled Shoe Girl - I was at the mall today. Malls tend to make me ragey anyway because there are far too many people and they are all enormous wieners and somehow they are all walking exactly where I am trying to walk.
One mallwiener - teenage girl - whizzed past wearing those shoes with the wheel in the heel: I kind of like the shoes (I am a sucker for novelty value, as evidenced by my wardrobe and romantic history), but she had a haughty look on her face which said, "My daddy owns this mall, and I am mall royalty. I am a gliding shoe princess, get out of my way."
Madam? Madam, get that superior sneer off your face, you are wearing novelty footwear.

The Official Rugby World Cup Everything - I can understand the RWC having an official beer, an official clothing brand, an official sports drink. But the "Official Watch of the Rugby World Cup?" The "Official Car of the Rugby World Cup? Come ON. Somehow "Land Rover: RWC Sponsor" seems so much less silly than "HOLY CRAP this is the car you totally need to be in when you are playing and/or watching a game of rugby, because that is apparently what people do now."

Although I note that Dole is a sponsor. OFFICIAL BANANA OF THE RUGBY WORLD CUP?!

Wool fetishists - Just when I thought I'd stumbled across all the weird fetishes on the Internet (that originally said 'come across' but I thought it best to change it), my Bestfriend Andrea emailed to tell me about wool fetishes and HAHAHAHAHA OH GOD.

This is why your nana knitted all those jerseys. Because otherwise your granddad would've made her knit him this!

Ladies and gentlemen, your literal wiener of the week.

Airport wieners - specifically, those holding up the boarding queue, when we are all trying to get on the plane. I was stuck behind a family once - mum, dad, two small boys - who were halfway to the gate when they suddenly remembered the pre-flight bathroom check and stopped in their tracks, taking up the entire aisle, to make sure everyone was plane-ready and wouldn't do a Depardieu during the safety demonstration.
Mum: Has everyone been to the bathroom? Michael, have you been to the bathroom?
Michael: I don't need to.
Dad: Are you sure? There's a bathroom just over there.
Michael: I don't need to go!
Mum: Aaron's been to the bathroom.
Aaron smirks.
Mum, pushing Michael in the direction of the bathroom: Go on, go quickly now.
Michael, resisting, loudly: There is a TOILET on the PLANE!
Quite.

The British Association of Dermatologists - not so much wienery as poorly thought out; their website is www.bad.org.uk. Which makes me wish they were the British Association of Dermatologists And Skin Specialists.

0800 numbers you can't call from mobiles - It's annoying when, as a customer, you ring a company's 0800 number and are told to hang up and call a landline, which will charge you. I understand on customer service lines where there could be queues and long calls, but when it's a large company (I am looking at you, IRD) and it's a fully automated line you're calling to confirm your details (I am looking at you again, IRD) and the company can probably afford it (you are losing this staring contest, IRD) it is bothersome.

Although that does lead me to my bonus Not Wiener: whoever is behind BNZ's Twitter account.

I bank with BNZ because they have great home loan rates and are the only bank with FlyBuys - ha ha, no, I bank with them because they used to have a small pig as a mascot and I am exactly financially savvy enough to find that really appealing. (This becomes important to the story later, like the horribly insignificant character the CSI team interview first who then turns out to be the murderer in the last 10 minutes of the show.)

I tweeted about 0800-WIENERLINE. I said it was especially annoying when it was companies like the IRD and BNZ. And BNZ tweeted straight back to say they did in fact have an 0800 number I could call from a cell!

I said I liked to think the tweet was sent by a small ceramic pig... and they said "Absolutely. Here's me at my desk, working hard" and sent me a picture of a small ceramic pig tucked up behind a keyboard.

And now I have a bit of a crush on my bank.
Perhaps, after all, it is I who is the wiener.