Passive aggression is a plague in the Pacific Northwest. Good luck dealing with it. They're not going to change. Only you change and my best suggestion is find people who don't behave like this to spend your time with - anything else is nothing but an exercise is masochism.

And be clear...When asked, "What do you want," maybe give an answer with something specific instead of: "I don't know. Something different." I'm not going to guess what 'different' is.