Mara Wilson vs. Indiana
Actor and writer, California
I’ve lived most of my life in L.A. and New York, but I have always loved the Midwest states. Except for one: I hate the state of Indiana. Like a lot of petty grievances, this one started in high school. In tenth grade, I was in a competitive high-school show choir in Burbank, California. Our school was largely considered to have some of the best choirs in the country, and I was very disappointed when we came in last at Nationals. But then I noticed something: All of the winning choirs were from Indiana, and all but one of the judges was from Indiana. One of the competition hosts was from Indiana. All of the girls who made snide comments at us in the elevator were from Indiana. Was this just a giant conspiracy by the Hoosiers? And what the hell was a “Hoosier,” anyway?
Even after I stopped caring about show choir, my grudge continued to grow. I realized that not only had I not met any kind people from Indiana, but seemingly, neither had anyone I knew. My grandmother, who never spoke badly of anyone, had some unkind words for people she’d met while traveling in Indiana. The snottiest girl at my high school went on to Indiana University. It got darker when I learned, while doing a history project, that the KKK’s 20th-century resurgence had started in Indiana. It had thrived there from the 1910s to the 1930s — right around the same time my midwestern Jewish grandparents were born.
When I went on a tour of the Midwest with the Welcome to Night Vale podcast, I was willing to be proven wrong. But I wasn’t. Michigan, Ohio, and Illinois had pretty lakes and rivers, legendary music scenes, good restaurants, and friendly, funny people. Indiana had none of those. In fact, the only thing I remember about Indiana were flat, empty fields, crisis pregnancy centers, and ads for “Live Lingerie Modeling.” I’m sorry, Indiana, but for now, my grudge continues.
S.E. Cupp vs. her former gynecologist
CNN commentator, Connecticut
I stopped seeing my gynecologist because she asked me if I wouldn’t mind referring another network host to her because “she was her favorite.” Apparently, my vagina wasn’t good enough for her, so I took it elsewhere.
Courtney vs. the local Circle K cashier
Writer, Arizona
There is a woman named Mary who works at my local Circle K gas station and who treats everyone awfully, not just me. She acts like everyone is a criminal. The tenth or so time she glared at me like my ID was fake — I’m 46, with four kids and a professional job — she made my enemies list. I once waited 20 minutes in the store so I could have a new cashier. I will drive three miles each way out of my way to avoid her. I don’t care who knows that Mary and I have beef and will always have beef. Is it petty? Yes. Am I too old for such nonsense? Also yes. Can I let this go? No. I tried. I can’t.
Vincenza vs. the menacing preschool parent
Communications agency owner, New York
One of the other parents at my kids’ day care was really mean and weird to me outside the school this past August. My kid hit his kid in the hallway leaving school, very gratuitously and out of nowhere. They’re toddlers. It does happen. They’re learning! I apologized to the dad and his daughter, but my son didn’t say sorry. The dad’s reaction was so insane and over the top that it changed the entire game. He was waiting for me outside and he got really in my face, super menacing, in front of our kids. He didn’t yell, but he got really quiet and terrifying and threatening about what would happen if I didn’t “get my kid under control.” I was kind of in shock. In my experience, adults don’t usually talk to each other or escalate that way with acquaintances.
A few months later, he did eventually apologize, and I accepted it. But now we just glare at each other at drop-off and pickup every day. The one time we did get stuck alone at the playground, we didn’t speak for a solid 20 minutes while our kids played together. Running into him constantly heightens the tension and keeps the grudge active. Birthday-party invites are coming up. I think I’m going to invite them to ours just to be the martyr and make them decline.
Guy Branum vs. the doctor who made him cry
Comedian and writer, California
There is a doctor who I went to once who refused to talk to me in any way about my problem. He wouldn’t talk to me about anything but bariatric surgery and made me cry. I hate him and fantasize about his demise.
Nate vs. his dog-hating neighbor
IT professional, Massachusetts
I have a grumpy MAGA neighbor who flipped out in August because one of my dogs stepped on his property while I walked them down the street. He came out yelling at me, holding up his phone to document the interaction while he ranted that my dogs were “ruining” his property. This is a rural road with no sidewalks. There’s nowhere else to step when cars come by but on people’s property edge, and everyone is fine with dogs. Except this guy.
I told him I’d keep the dogs off the property and tried to go about my day while he kept on yelling at me. I told him to fuck off and he told me he was calling the cops. I told him to go for it. Half an hour later, the most embarrassed deputy I’ve ever seen knocked on my door and said my neighbor filed a complaint. I laughed, the cop laughed, and we went about our business. He sent the cops to my house because my very friendly, chill dog walked on the edge of his lawn! Didn’t poop, didn’t pee, didn’t bark or lunge. That’s too much of a dick move to let go.
I have to drive by his house to get to work. I leave very early in the morning, and now as long as it’s dark and there isn’t snow on the ground, I nudge the steering wheel and put the passenger-side tires on his lawn.
Dan vs. his trash-talking ex-boyfriend
Oscar-winning film producer, California
My first real boyfriend, years after we broke up, publicly maligned a Broadway show that I produced. There was a Facebook group for theater geeks, and a lot of the members were people who run community theaters around the country. When the show put up its closing notice, someone posted that they were sad to hear it was ending, as they heard it was pretty good. He commented, “Well, it was pretty.” It’s fine that he didn’t like it, but trashing it on social media after I invited him to see it as my guest was inexcusable. I’m not an especially revengeful guy, but I just ignore him now and never respond to any of his messages.
Margaret Sullivan vs. Patrick Mahomes
Guardian U.S. columnist and Columbia University professor, New York
The moment the Buffalo Bills won their playoff game in January against the Baltimore Ravens, l got a text from a football-savvy friend. He knew that the win came with a dark side: In order to get to the Super Bowl, the Bills would need to beat the Kansas City Chiefs and their extraordinarily talented star quarterback. His text was brief: “Mahomes, again.” Yes, Patrick Mahomes, again. And again. And again.
For those of us in the Great Buffalo Diaspora or those who still live in my western New York hometown, it’s hard not to carry a grudge against Mahomes. He seems like a nice enough guy — gracious and all of that — but, for us, he is a problem. As he proved to be in the Bills’ loss to Kansas City just one week after we beat the Ravens. It was the fourth time Mahomes and the Chiefs had triumphed over Josh Allen and the Bills in the playoffs in the years since the two had become starters. This pattern gets old. And disappointing. Even heartbreaking.
Seeing him and the Chiefs lose so badly in this year’s Super Bowl was a step in the right direction, but my grudge lives on. I don’t wish him ill. I just wish he would pack up his Super Bowl rings and go away.
Margot vs. her nasty former boss
Tech worker, New York
When I worked at a bank, I had a terrible boss who was trying to make partner. She was a micromanager who was also extremely mean and always found fault in people. I once made a PowerPoint using a default color palette and she said, “This purple is very fancy,” and insisted that I change all the purple to black. It looked terrible. She also semi-regularly made people cry in meetings. I left that job in 2017, and every two years, when the new partners are announced, I check to make sure she hasn’t been promoted. She hasn’t been! The fact that she was a terrible person who transparently wanted this and still has not achieved it? A delight!
Elizabeth vs. the editor-in-chief of her college newspaper
Editor, New York
I still have a grudge against a girl I went to college with who ran the school newspaper. I came on as a copy editor and writer and she was the editor-in-chief. She was in a different sorority from me, and we knew each other from journalism classes and through Greek life. At one point in the semester, our two sororities started having some drama, and I got roped in. Eventually, it led to me pouring a beer on this girl’s best friend after she was tweeting nasty things about me from across the bar. After that, I magically wasn’t offered to return to my job at the newspaper the next semester. She couldn’t even look me in the eyes as she told me whatever bullshit reason she gave me.
I have kept a close eye on her career and life since then. She was always Miss Hard-core Journalist in college but never worked a single day of her life in a newsroom. I, however, have worked in several and have since gone on to write for national publications. I’ve never forgotten how petty she was and now I can smugly look at her failures as a journalist and laugh.
Monica Lewinsky vs. an unnamed famous diva
Activist and writer, California
It started when I was 5 years old. I was an adorable kid (if I do say so myself) in a luggage store with my dad when I spotted my mom’s favorite performer. I found the moxie to approach the world-renowned diva and ask her for an autograph for my mom — her birthday was upcoming — but she refused me. My grudge picked up again 20 years later in 1998, when she complained to her talent agency that if they did any work with me, they’d lose her as a client. Then it flared up yet again 15 years later when I saw her at a party. She remarked with exactly the kind of snark you’d expect, “You must be someone’s plus-one.” And when I stammered that, no, I had been invited, she retorted with, “Hmmm. I guess they just let everyone in tonight.”
Ryan vs. that former classmate who still owes him $5
Publicist, New York
Once, around 2002, I let a high-school classmate borrow $5 at the mall. I’m pretty sure it was to buy a soda. I believe we were there to watch another classmate perform in a very local American Idol–style talent search. But she never paid me back. She said she’d give it back to me the next day, and I didn’t want to be a pest, so I let it be. The longer it went, the weirder it got to ask. We graduated in 2004! I’d never tell her that I still remember this, but sometimes I just cling on to random things. Now she’s a journalist, so I see her name from time to time and it’s like a little dig each time.
John vs. the guy who out-gifted him
Writer, New York
When I was 26, we had a big evening planned for my girlfriend’s 21st birthday with a lot of her friends. There was one guy who I knew had a crush on her. I didn’t consider it a big deal because I trusted my girlfriend. But his present for her was a vintage porcelain doll with costuming. Apparently, she’d seen it in a store window when they were out running an errand together, and he went back and bought it for her. It was a wildly extravagant gift and way more than she’d expected. It was a bigger gift than I’d gotten her. When he gave it to her at the party, she was blown away. She hugged him and was at a loss for words. I discussed it with my best friend not long after, and he said that the guy should’ve recognized that this was a potentially inappropriate gift to buy for another guy’s girlfriend. He should’ve told me about it and offered to split the cost with me or something.
When I told my girlfriend that this gift definitely meant this guy had a thing for her, she said she knew what the gift meant, but hugged him anyway because she didn’t know what else to do. We broke up about a year later. Eventually, she told me that one of her friends confessed his love for her literally three days after she and I had broken up. It wasn’t hard to guess who it was.
Years later, I ran into him in the men’s room while seeing a play. He saw me, recognized me, and muttered, “How are you doing?” as he passed by. As soon as it registered who he was, I felt this surge of adrenaline and I actually got so wound up I couldn’t pee when I got to the urinal.
Crystal vs. people with bad escalator etiquette
RuPaul’s Drag Race U.K. season one contestant, London
If you know me, you might expect my grudge to involve some notorious alt-right troll, but frankly, I already settled that (😎). My gripe is with something much more mundane: people who stop at the end of an escalator. I’m often traveling with a giant suitcase full of glamour, and I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve nearly become intimately familiar with the internal mechanics of a train-station escalator because some dum-dum thinks the end is a good to place to stop and have a look around. Babes, MOVE! Not to be dramatic, but it genuinely makes me lose a bit of faith in humanity’s capabilities for self-awareness and consideration. Other honorable grudge mentions? People who don’t hold the door open for you, and people who pace back and forth on the sidewalk while on the phone.
Andrew vs. the principal who refused him a mint
Instructional designer, Pennsylvania
I have a one-sided grudge that has endured for over 30 years because of a breath mint. Every year at school before Thanksgiving, there would be a turkey lunch. Then, after we would line up to be dismissed back to our classrooms, the principal wished everyone a good day and gave us a mint—one of those chalky things that used to be by the hostess stand. When she got to me, I held my hand out like everyone else. She started to put it in my hand then stopped. She told me she got a call that I was being mean at the bus stop and she didn’t want to reward that with a treat. I was confused and tried to protest, but she moved down the line. I even racked my brain for who she might have confused me with, thinking it could be my brother, but he was in a different school. No mint for me. Maybe 25 years later, I saw her at a Starbucks. She may have recognized me, but I gave my best Resting Bitch Face. I contemplated taking her drink or saying something, but just left.
Taylor vs. the kid who pushed him in day care
Attorney, Iowa
When I was 3 years old, we were playing hopscotch at day care. It was my turn to go, and as I was starting to jump, this kid shoved me out of the way. It caused me to hit my face against the edge of a metal table, essentially Jokering me. I had to be rushed to the hospital for stitches. I was carried in gushing blood. As I was being stitched up, the day-care lady was standing by me and I asked what happened to him. She told me that he was in her office watching Barney & Friends. Something in me snapped and my little 3-year-old hand reached up to grab her shirt by the neck and pulled it down and I screamed, “Barney!?! That’s not a punishment!”
I stopped being his friend and sitting with him at lunch, but then we went to different kindergartens. He had curly hair, and I have had an irrational distrust of men with curly hair my entire life because of this.
Betsy Klein vs. Taco Bell
CNN White House producer, Washington, D.C.
Taco Bell removed my beloved Cool Ranch Doritos Locos Tacos from the menu, and I have never gotten over it. They had the perfect salty, garlicky, tangy, crunchy exterior to balance the interior of ground beef, lettuce, and cheese. I would serve them at my wedding if I could. It feels like a misguided decision to keep the Nacho Cheese flavor when Cool Ranch is clearly the superior Dorito. But I’m still a Taco Bell loyalist. Not mad, just disappointed.
Ewan vs. the principal that made him stand for the Pledge of Allegiance
Graduate student, Washington
I got an attorney to send a cease-and-desist letter to my eighth-grade principal while in a fight with her. To give some context, I am a nonreligious, autistic American leftist. I had sat out of the Pledge of Allegiance in school ever since I watched The Colbert Report while in fourth grade and saw Colbert talking about a kid who sat out the pledge in protest. I never got in any trouble for it until one morning in eighth grade. My school principal came in, saw that about half the class was sitting out the pledge, got visibly angry, and said, “New rule: Everyone must stand for the pledge.”
Naturally, I got very angry. Later that day, I looked up the law, which has established that nondisruptive free speech applies in school. My mom and I had a meeting with my principal, but she responded, “My school, my rules.” So I contacted the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which set me up with a pro-bono attorney. He sent a cease-and-desist letter to both my principal and my school district. A few weeks later, he forwarded me a letter from one of my school district attorneys saying that I was right and they were forcing my principal to back down and apologize. My principal was clearly furious with me, but there was nothing else she could do about it.
The rest of the school year, if I was walking the halls and saw her, I would walk the entire length of the school to avoid her. Even when I was in high school and went back to see some of my old teachers, I would still actively avoid her. I sprinted several blocks one time when I saw her in the parking lot.
Kathy Griffin vs. cheapskates
Comedian currently touring with “My Life on the PTSD List,” California
My grudge is against cheap asses. Like, pick up the check once in a while! Whether it was in the old days when I was totally broke or now when I’m more than okay, it just didn’t sit right with me to have other people always pick up the tab. And for God’s sake, don’t be that person that we all have to stare at after we’ve all put our money on the table. Don’t be that person that acts like you didn’t notice that this is the 28th time in a row that I have paid. You heard me. 28th. Time. In. A Row. I take cash, check, or Venmo. I’m cheap! I can be bought. Hell, just make me a nice batch of Rice Krispie Treats.