Don’t You Hate Headlines That . . . : . . . don’t get to the point? Or shopping carts that refuse to cooperate? They’re called pet peeves, and everyone has them. An Orange resident has compiled dozens of them into a 96-page cartoon book.

Pet peeves.

Everyone has them, says Dan Vincent of Orange--”those little things you see every day that irritate you to no end.”

Ever try eating with plastic ware and the tines on the fork break and impale your tongue? What about that supermarket shopping cart that refuses to pull free from the other carts? Or owners of expensive cars who park at an angle and take up two spaces in the parking lot? Not to mention noisy leaf blowers. Or

worse: You finish a glass of water and then notice that there’s a glob of day-old milk at the bottom because the glass wasn’t rinsed.

Vincent has dozens of them, which he has compiled into a 96-page cartoon book, “Pet Peeves” (Peppertree Productions; $5.95).

The peeves, which are illustrated with Vincent’s own pen-and-ink cartoons, run the gamut--from “that gross glob of dried ketchup that forms at the top of those squeezable ketchup bottles” to “women who shave off their eyebrows and then draw them back somewhere on their forehead.”

And, of course: “Any guy who still thinks that tying a sweater around his neck is in fashion.”

Vincent, 38, has been making his living tending bar for 13 years. He works at the Saloon, a small pub on South Coast Highway in Laguna Beach. But at heart he’s a cartoonist, happiest bellied up to a drawing board.

“It’s just a natural talent,” he says of the hobby he’s been doodling with since childhood. “I never had any schooling for it.”

Over the years, Vincent has developed comic strips that he has sent to the syndicates. But the replies were basically much the same--that his strips were “a nine out of 10,” he says. “I was always on the borderline.”

Vincent got the idea for his “Pet Peeves” cartoon book a year and a half ago, while attending traffic school.

“It was one of those comedian classes that keep you from falling asleep basically,” he says.

At one point, the comic-instructor broke the class into two groups and had them list their 10 pet peeves about driving. You know: People who leave their turn signals on for miles. Women who put on makeup while driving.

Just like a cartoon character, “a light bulb went off in my head,” Vincent recalls.

He went home and began illustrating the list of peeves the class had come up with. And the more he thought about doing a book of them, the list kept growing.

He felt so good about the “Pet Peeves” idea, he said, that he decided to publish it himself. With financial backing from a friend, he created Peppertree Productions (so named after Peppertree Lane, a pedestrian walkway near the Saloon).

The regulars at the pub even contributed a few peeves of their own. “People,” Vincent observes, “are always complaining about this and that.”

More than a few of the pet peeves in the book are Vincent’s own.

“Oh, yeah,” he says, “things you pick up around the house, and the kids . . . and you remember back when you were a kid. Like when your tongue gets stuck to the (frozen) sled rail, or when your dad cuts your hair and he literally shaves your head.”

“Pet Peeves” is available at Upchurch-Brown Books and Chicken Little’s Emporium in Laguna Beach and the Villa Park Pharmacy. It also can be ordered by writing to Peppertree Productions, P.O. Box 3853, Orange, Calif. 92667 ($8 includes shipping and handling).

He’ll also be signing copies of his book from 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday at Upchurch-Brown Books, 384 Forest Ave., Laguna Beach.

Vincent plans to take “Pet Peeves” nationally. But he won’t try doing that until after he sells out the 2,000-copy first printing: “I’m going to prove to those book (distribution) companies I can sell 2,000 copies on my own.”

But “Pet Peeves” won’t be the end of it. Vincent already has enough new material for a sequel, “More Pet Peeves.” And he’s thinking of doing yet another version devoted to the holidays--Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter. As he says: “Who doesn’t have a gripe about the holidays?”

The current book even includes an entry blank for people to send in their pet peeves, which may be used in upcoming editions (with a small credit line, of course).

“I basically want to be known as the Pet Peeve Guy,” Vincent says. “People are actually coming (into the bar) and doing that. Now I get, ‘Hey, I got one for your next book!’ ”