I went and tracked down the link after I made this comment. I'm not sure if I use the same strategy as you...a lot of the time, I don't really need to. I'm not easily annoyed, and my annoyance set-point is pretty malleable if I want it to be. Generally the way I go about liking someone is by having at least one in-depth conversation with them, whether about science or politics or their romantic life or drama at work. Once I convince myself that they're not a shallow, robotic automaton after all, once I can convince myself that they're like me, it feels natural to empathize rather than judge when they do something annoying... But like I said, this has come fairly easily to me. (Not to say that I don't ever feel annoyed at people, or complain about them to friends and family. I do, more than I should. But when I'm actually in the room with them, I can almost always get along civilly and even enjoy myself.)