What are yours? For me, it’s loud noises/people, inconsiderate people, and people who complain without offering a solution to what they are complaining about or asking for help on the matter.

People who call slings 'Slingshots'

>:(

That one is a bad one Jackinati :D

Oh! How could I have forgotten that one! That annoys me so much! You want to correct them, but after correcting them a couple times you don’t want to do it again and seem nit-picky. I have a friend that I just can’t get to remember the difference, so he keeps calling slings, slingshots.

yeah that is annoying.....
i had something to say to someone on the slingshot subject but cannot find the discussion.  it was on having one as a survival tool and he was insightful enough to note if u nicked the bands u were done.  while he is correct, i wanted to share something that can be done thus making one's slingshot still usable.

I have been using slingshots since 2012,  they are only good in short term situations. Yes the band's get nicked, abd break. But u can get bands, and tubes that have up to a 40 lbs pull. Sling a sling bow for example.  Plus the bands don't store very well, as the latex or rubber,  breaks down rather quickly. 

But onto the subject,  a pet peeve of mine that what was said is one, but also drivers who cabt drive very well. I get horrible road rage, when people don't drove correctly.

elastic tendons, or ligaments, like yellow ligaments, from deer can be chewed, slightly boiled and used and are good for about eight yards.

oh yeah and one of mine...being asked the same question repeatedly by the same person....

The use of the word 'more' when it's completely unnecessary.

'yeah that is more bigger'.
NO ! It is simply bigger.

Americans who refuse to understand that the word 'caramel' is not pronounced or spelt 'carmel'.
I tend to shout at the computer on that one :whistle:

We all believe we are the world's best drivers and everyone else on the road is a moron who should not have a licence.
My driving peeve is people who have absolutely no clue how wide their car actually is.
If you had a mic in my car I suspect that the phrases: 'Oh come on you could get a bus through there !'
And: 'How bloody wide do you think it is, it's a poxy (substitute any small car here) bloody ford escort !'

Would be recorded almost every day :-)

I don't mind language changes (language is fluid and evolves) but I have to be honest I can't stand the American pronunciation of herb where they drop the h.

It's not 'erb!

carmalised 'erbs !
AAARRGGHHHHHHHHHHHH
lol

One mispronunciation I've seen a lot of British people talk about is aluminium. Eh... It's a cultural thing I think. If you are an American and have no British accent and you say "aluminium" most people here will look at you funny. Not sure when we made that switch but hey it's here to stay.

One pet peeve, when you are trying to change lanes and the person in the next lane speeds up to stop you even though they were a hundred meters back or more. Im in an ambulance a lot. You would be surprised how freaking selfish people can be when driving an ambulance with a patient in the back. It's crazy.

alu-mi-num - yeah that one doesn't bother me so much.
It's wrong, but somehow nowhere as annoying as carmel.
But then i spend more time on food forums than on engineering forums :-)

So, nobody has picked the fact that just about the whole world is now starting every single bloody sentence with the word: so

Once you realise and start to notice - damn it's annoying :-) 

I do it ALL the time. I've been trying to cut down but it's so easy to start with "So..."

I’m guilty of overusing so also.

Kick wrote on Mar 22^nd, 2018 at 10:00am:

I don't mind language changes (language is fluid and evolves) but I have to be honest I can't stand the American pronunciation of herb where they drop the h. It's not 'erb!

I was an herbalist for about 25 years and in all that time I never heard anyone pronounce it as spelt. We were erbalists  :P
There are thousands of erbs growing on this planet. I've only met one Herb. He was a short stocky fella :D

hey quit picking on us americans for our pronunciation...heck with our public school system it is a wonder we can even talk at all...

well if you didn't insist that you spoke 'english' - us english people might stop whining about the fatc that you clearly don't.

I say 'Might' - we do like to winge :-)

My pet peeve is my brother's puppy.  She's about six months old and has a habit of following my dogs back to my house when we end our walks.

I walk my dogs way out in the hay field so when they do their dooty, it's no where close to my house.

As soon as Bimbo gets to my yard, she squats.  And I have to get a shovel and scoop it up and toss it out of the yard.

Bad Bimbo!  Bad girl!  She looks at me like I'm the crazy one, she isn't pooping in her yard, so what's my problem?

Her name isn't really Bimbo but she comes when I call her that.   ;D

    These days I find myself obsessed with tRump and tRumptards.  Our current political situation irks my soul.  My pet peeve is people who are too lazy/stupid/ignorant  to fact check and automatically chant "fake news" at any story they don't care for. Getting old sucks too. It's a sin what old age does to our bodies.  Time is a cruel S.O.B.

Back scabbards. Especially when people draw swords from them in books or video games.

RM, you have probably heard the saying, "if you are going to get old, you better be tuff". Never thought I would have to be tuff 24 7 :-?

Did I already mention the incorrect use of the word 'yet' ?

No idea where it came from but damn it's annoying.

Things like: 'we hadn't done it yet'
The yet is not only not needed it turns the statement into gibberish.

I suspect when more ane yet combine: 'we hadn't done it more yet.'
I may well explode :-)

That’s incorrect? I thought it was alright as “We haven’t done it” makes it sound like you have no intention to do something, and “We haven’t done it yet” shows you intend to do it.

we haven't done it yet - is fine. It's present tense.

It's when it's used for something in the past that it's wrong.
I actually struggle to make up examples - as I can't think the same way these people do lol
And it's just so absolutely wrong and jarring - my brain just won't do it lol

Next time I hear one I'll make a note.
It's a fairly recent thing - last couple of years probably.
And yes, mainly americans but it does seem to have infected a few brits as well.

Language is like a virus, if you use something enough it infects other people who start using it as well.
Not so much language evolving, as getting a nasty disease :-)

but perhaps sometimes diseases are necessary.  meaning take ww2 germany for example.  the allies kept cracking their codes.  so even though it was too late and germany had already starting collapsing on the eastern front, towards the end of ww2 the s.s. came up with a brilliant idea that actually worked for the little while it was in use, though it was too little, too late....they started using german slang, in the form of an early version of rap songs and played over the air waves to communicate with each other.  good thing the war was already practically over because we had a hell of a time trying to figure out what they were meaning after they stated that.  they change words often and even had slang for that.   so changing a nation's language, usually slang,  in a way others have a hard time following can be a national security thing...even the american government has it's own versions of slang just in case.

ps.  i predict that as england allows for more and more migration into it's borders, their language will start changing rapidly and to the extreme.  america is a melting pot....many different people and languages melt into one, thus bringing many of the changes to speech and culture. 

English has already changed and mutated and adapted and Britain has always been a melting pot despite the claims by the idiots and racists. Britain was occupied by Rome for a Hell of a long time and all those "Roman" soldiers didn't come from just the one city in what is now Italy.

Don't forget the Saxons, Danes, Normans, French and Norwegians. 

Or the Celts, for that matter.

Exactly. The history of Britain is a history of migration, invasion and trading. Britain has never been "pure" and is all the better for it.

RS wrote on Mar 21^st, 2018 at 6:41pm:

elastic tendons, or ligaments, like yellow ligaments, from deer can be chewed, slightly boiled and used and are good for about eight yards.

and here is something some of u who claim science  minds can test:

the slingshot goes back millenia.  the band above is how many made them back in the day. 

the philistines had another method that made their bands superior to those around them who used the above method.  the animal does not matter as long as it is big enough to get the band off of. (the philistines used horses, mules but mostly dogs.) but the philistines would kill the creature, let it sit for three or four days, then remove the ligaments and do the above process. 
accordingly their bands were almost twice as powerful due to this process...but does still stink some...no matter what we could not get the smell out on replication

now the last process that was not used but DOES make them even better than the philistine method without the stink, is simple...when doing the slight boil as told at first, use olive oil instead of water...and the dead decay method does not add anything to it and it is about twice as good as that way.   

yes, these were also found in old texts that you nor any modern scholarly historian will never have access too but it does not matter because they were written coded for secrecy so even if they had them they'd prolly not know what they were reading..so then, here is what u can do: try them out for urself and see the result urself...in the name of science, history and truth of course.  we already read it, deciphered it, and put it the test.  the result showed just what the text said..so see for urself

i gotta go to bed, good nite.

Kick wrote on Apr 10^th, 2018 at 10:16am:

English has already changed and mutated and adapted and Britain has always been a melting pot despite the claims by the idiots and racists. .

At least this Ad Hominem makes sense, in that you're attacking the person using a negative label rather than addressing the substance of their non-standard views before discussion, in order to shut down views that oppose urs...it is a tactic the fearful use who do not wish to have their ideas challenged because they are afraid of being on the losing end, fearing their view lack substance to support it..

iow's, it is like, "this is what i say and if any say otherwise they are ignorant and racist.  now all admit i am right as not to be those things."

sorry but that argument alone in no way makes ur case right, or even sensible. :-/

brittian a melting pot? ..being invaded and unable to defend their borders from hostile invasion did melt a few cultures throughout history into their culture, and the language changed...just like it is going to do again.  brittian does not have the same dialect it had even three hundred years ago.  so ur arguement just proves my point...everytime said event took place anywhere, that culture evolved and changed...religions, languages, arts, ect.. as far as better for it...only time can tell such a thing. i hope they are, but that is just a prediction without bases  even historically you cannot prove england is better now because of the before mentioned things, than it would have been without them...that is speculation without anyway to verify.
and yes the history of britian is one of acceptence of all, no racism or superiority there.....unless u count the irish, the scots, pre-revolutionary america and anyone who wasn't brittish..or the fact the majority of slave plantations in the southern usa were brittish corp. owned..

On a different note I am having toast and jam this morning for the first time in several years.

How's that for a smooth segue from a thread that totally is not about to burst into a flame war? Yes, I thought it was pretty good myself.

I like jam but I have to say I prefer just a good old piece of buttered toast. Some might say it's plain but if it's made right it's gorgeous. I stick to Weetabix for the mornings but the great thing with toast is that you can have it whenever. I think this segue is going well.

Umm rs I'm not sure how any of your last posts have anything whatsoever to do with pet peeves.
Unless you mean them to say that your pet peeves are anyone who doesn't agree with you or accept the so called historical facts you present as gospel. When they're clearly stuff you've just made up.

You are, however, rapidly becoming one of my pet peeves :-)

There are ligament powered 'slingshots' of a kind. Based on the same principle as larger siege weapons.
Not sure if they are actually historical or just something joerg sprave invented (probably the latter)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbNdk4_aIok

I guess it is possible that someone in antiquity processed natural rubber and made slingshots with that.
But the longer you leave ligaments to rot - the lower the elasticity. So if slingshots did exist - they weren't made using ligaments. A reason for letting ligaments rot could be that because they stretch more easily, you can use less as a binding wrap. they would still shrink as they dried, just not quite as much. 

sounds like a challenge...well then test it...we already know u are wrong.  so there is that.  not only so, u do realize on top of that having roulette giving gamblers better odds than craps is just unnatural and wrong. so that alone puts anyone view's who comes from those places in question.  "no borders, no borders" then u stripe up ur craps table with silly border making even a good seven, foul....just totally crazy.  pleasse explain that one sir.   >:(

as far as being a pet peeve of our's...fine.  so since ur knowledge of certain subjects is lacking u choose to call others liars.  i cannot help ur ignorance's or the information u have never learned.  but do know not all of us share said illness.  no mind weaker than one who sticks his head in the sand and screams is not is not when they have not taken the time to test it themselves.  u see no it doesn't...it has to to with oils and acids in the initial break down in decay.  we made statements based on records, trial and error...u say 'is not because i did not know it."  and that is a pet peeve, so i do have one after all ...good day sir and thank u for raising my self awareness.

Kick wrote on Apr 11^th, 2018 at 10:46am:

I like jam but I have to say I prefer just a good old piece of buttered toast. Some might say it's plain but if it's made right it's gorgeous. I stick to Weetabix for the mornings but the great thing with toast is that you can have it whenever. I think this segue is going well.

Here's the thing with Americans, we often are clueless to what's going on in other countries. Hang with me here because there is good reason for this. We have a country here at least the size of Europe with all sorts of competing cultures and I have about as much knowledge of a guy in Boston's daily life as I do in Germany or the UK.

So where are you going with this Morphy you might be asking? Well, I had no idea what a "Weetabix" was until looking into it. Now I am thoroughly enlightened on the subject and it gets added to a fairly lengthy list of foods I would like to try someday.

So tentatively this is going somewhere on the list between surströmming and balut. Both of which are several pages above Vegemite which scares me to death.

slingshots were not made commercially until the 1850s, when Mr. Goodyear started mass producing vulcanized rubber. 
Just an FYI.

Oooo another thing you might like to try which seems to have appeared out of nowhere and is suddenly incredibly popular is oat "milk". I don't know if it's made it out there but at least in Finland and Britain it's been selling like mad and is delicious with Weetabix. I can't count the number of times I've gone to stock up and its been sold out. The best one is Oatly Barista (made for coffee so really creamy) but there's also a store band one which really good.

https://youtu.be/dvvgwVpQ_dc

Another new one for me. I pretty much only drink almond milk when I drink milk so this is a good substitute. Easy to make and probably less expensive than Almond milk .

I didn't realise it was that easy to make. Might have to have a go sometime though will need to get a blender...

people showing up for work, but don't >:(

walter wrote on Apr 12^th, 2018 at 3:52pm:

people showing up for work, but don't >:(

Teenage workers at fast-food places are the absolute worst. >:(

walter wrote on Apr 7^th, 2018 at 7:53pm:

RM, you have probably heard the saying, "if you are going to get old, you better be tuff". Never thought I would have to be tuff 24 7 :-?

   I really shouldn't complain because I'm still a lot more functional than many people  I know my age or even younger.  But it's no fun to watch your fingers and toes start to twist at strange angles.  Shrinkage really sucks too. I used to be just a hair under 6'5".  No more... I'm about 6'1" now.  Why do we have to shrink?  The biggest difference is stamina. I'm still strong and flexible but my stamina is gone and I can't find it.  Like I said, I shouldn't be complaining.  I have it better than a lot of others. But getting old is a bite in the shorts. You guys will hate it too.

    Here are two more of my pet peeves.  First, why do they put stickers on my fruit?  Like I wouldn't know this is an apple?  Big freakin' DUH! Putting a little sticker on each and every piece of fruit sold costs money and consequently increases the price of the fruit.  And it's not enough they spray my fruit with carcinogenic insecticides that are difficult to wash off.  Now I have sticker glue to contend with.  Stickers on my fruit really pisses me off.
   My other one is Rock lyrics that repeat the same key phrase over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.  Like we are stupid to remember the song unless they drive it into our brains a thousand times.  Though they all do it to some degree, here are some that I find particularly irksome.
The Boys are Back in Town by Thin Lizzie. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQo1HIcSVtg
If You Don't Know Me by Now by Harold Melvin and the Blue notes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbaSh8i5eyE
Where is the Love by Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcHPNUN-U8E
No Roots by Alice Merton.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUdyuKaGQd4
      I don't really give a rat's ass the first four hundred times she tells me that she's got no roots but her home was never on the ground and I really don't care the next ten thousand times. So you got no roots. Why should I care?  Why should I have to hear it countless times?  Is having no roots such a great thing that you would have to say it over and over again for four minutes? Grow roots or don't grow roots, b*tch! I don't care! Give me a break!

https://youtu.be/EvuL5jyCHOw

For that very reason I can't listen to Lenny Kravitz. This song drives me crazy.

Honestly the lyrics for that song generally are pretty annoying:

"I wish that I could fly
Into the sky
So very high
Just like a dragonfly

I'd fly above the trees
Over the seas in all degrees
To anywhere I please"

I'm pretty sure 4 year olds could come up with more compelling lyrics.

Saying that, this song is a favourite of mine :D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4OscceBWe0

My 3yo makes up entertaining lyrics all the time  :)

I am not a fan of Kravitz,  but at least his stuff is better then most of the music out there now. There is some wacky music out now, and with society today. Everything is so whiny.  I just heard of a music study the other day. POP and rock music, are about 30% more sadness then back in the day.

You sound like an old man vetryan  :D
People were saying the same things about the Beatles and Elvis!

I am only 31, but lived enough and seen enough to last 2 or 3 lifetimes. Nothing wrong with the Beatles,  but I am not into Elvis.  Lol. But.it's true, I can't belive 1/2 of the music that is out, is actually considered music. 

I often tell my friends "My farts sound better than most of today's music. At least a fart can be entertaining from time to time!"

I'll choose a Kravitz song over modern day Hip Hop or Rap because at least, annoying as I find the reptitiveness of the lyrics, the music itself still qualifies as music. I know that's painting a large genre with a broad brush. But somewhere early rap which was mostly party music and really not bad at all took a turn for the worse.

Exhibit A: This has 96 millions views.

https://youtu.be/1NyMSWqIJDQ

96. Million. Soak that in.

Not a Kanye West fan by any means but this song is actually pretty good.

https://youtu.be/PsO6ZnUZI0g

Or so I thought until I realized everything about this song I really like started with Daft Punk and finished with some very clever producing. Kanye's addition to it was just something to endure or ignore.

So... Ya another Pet Peeve of mine I guess would be modern hip hop/rap. Not sure what happened to it.  :-?

As a quick aside, Daft Punk are fantastic.

I think one reason music seems so terrible now is just that there's so much more of it. Back in the olden days there would be a handful of records released in a month, now, thousands are released a day. Music is much cheaper and easier to make and release so anyone can do it, whether or not they have talent or original ideas. The music everyone ends up hearing is designed to appeal to the largest group possible. It used to be each group would have their own tastes and so it was easy to market to those groups and be guaranteed sales. You want to sell a punk record? Advertise it to punks. You want to sell a rock record? Those guys with the long hair will like it. Nowadays, because of the internet mostly, everyone is open to listening to different genres and doesn't just stick to one genre so the record companies have to make bland, unobjectionable, easily digestible music that both kids, grandparents and everyone in between will at least tolerate. All the interesting creative stuff has been pushed to the sides. It's definitely still there and that's where the internet comes to the rescue in that you can find all sorts of weird, interesting stuff without going anywhere near any Top 10's or music awards but it is that bit harder to find.

I would like to see Rap or Hip Hop that is really fresh and not guided by the modern big record companies. And without the degeneracy which I suppose makes me sound about 100 years old.  Usually when big companies get involved the SHTF.

Look at the early Maroon 5 music.

https://youtu.be/MHU6vvsTnbI

"This Love" had that fantastic blend of rock, jazz and funk.
Great song. Now, in an attempt to be seen as *good* to more they have lost what made them great.

LOL! This was penned about 20 years ago. I wish I could remember the name of the rapper:

“Whatever happened to the time when it was all about the rhyme, and the beats on the streets got your rep?
Now today’s people only rap for money or the fame.
Tell me, what ever happened to respect?”

Some pet peeves never change ;D

Haha...ya it all switched when I was in 7th grade. I remember that vividly. 20 years ago was 98 and gangsta rap was absolutely in full swing by then.

There has always been good music being made somewhere. Sometimes you have to dig harder for it.

I am often annoyed by the endless use of the word "like" in between words for no reason at all. Despite my efforts to avoid using the word incorrectly, I find myself using it on occasion without thinking.

"Hey, like, do you want to like, go see that new movie that like just came out?"  >:(

AlexZaamii wrote on May 27^th, 2018 at 5:50pm:

I am often annoyed by the endless use of the word "like" in between words for no reason at all. Despite my efforts to avoid using the word incorrectly, I find myself using it on occasion without thinking. "Hey, like, do you want to like, go see that new movie that like just came out?"  >:(

Like, You are so right!  Like, literally!

When people tell you to practice slinging more often without knowing how much you actually do :P

   Bud Light Lime and Orange.  It's Bud Light with orange or lime peels in it. The premise here is that you take lousy, weak, baby piss beer and put pieces of garbage in it to somehow make it better. No thanks.

I take issue with the fact that you consider Bud Light to be beer ;D

  Watching supposed survival experts (nincompoops)  on Naked and Afraid attempt to catch snakes.  They will try to spear it, which is difficult because snakes are thin, squiggly, tough, and consequently VERY difficult to spear.  They will try to bash it which is almost useless because snakes have very simple nervous systems.  They can endure a tremendous amount of crushing and still remain mostly effective.  I've seen snakes run over with cars still cruising along as if nothing happened. 
   There is only one way to catch any snake, venomous or constrictor.  Find a big forked stick.  Pin the snakes head with the fork.  Cut its head off.  Simple. I could do this as a child.  Why don't these adult "survival experts" know how to do this?  Dorks!

I have been snake bit several times and well, sometimes there isn't a forked stick around when you really could use one. I used a rock to kill the first rattlesnake that bit me. The cowboys I rode with used their ropes to crush rattlesnake skulls.

   I watch a lot of MMA and some Boxing.  I also have some experience with unarmed combat. I hate seeing a fighter who paws with his jab, using it as a range finder.  The purpose of the jab is to knock your opponents fillings out of his teeth.  Don't throw a jab unless you mean it.  Also, the jab is very underused, especially in MMA.  It should be a primary weapon used to do damage, keep your opponent from being able to set anything up, and the setup for most of your offense. Follow a double or triple jab in and things open up.
    Here is Larry Holmes who arguably had the best jab ever.  Learn to jab like Larry.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRKOBVih4uk

walter wrote on Jun 27^th, 2018 at 10:07pm:

I have been snake bit several times and well, sometimes there isn't a forked stick around when you really could use one. I used a rock to kill the first rattlesnake that bit me. The cowboys I rode with used their ropes to crush rattlesnake skulls.

I've gone through that once and it is not fun. Can't imagine multiple times. Just curious, how does one crush a rattlesnakes skull with rope? I've heard of that before but never understood it.

Lariats are twisted very hard, 30-35', with a loop at one end and a knot (usually) at the other. Instesd of twirling the loop end, spin the knot end forward and walk toward the snake until the knot will hit it on the head. I watched 3 brothers do this. BTW, we all carry side arms, but the rope is much more fun :) One shot with a blunt tipped arrow would make my day.

---

That's amazing. Learn something new every day. I wonder if that goes back to a time when conserving ammo was considered a bigger priority?

Before herders had guns. There are rattlers in Mexico.  South America? Spain? I don't know.  Horses, cattle and ropes go way back. Rattlesnakes often bite horses on the nose when they are grazing. The nose swells, causes the air passage to close. Horses can not breathe through their mouth, so too often... dead horse >:(

   I've been bitten by Constrictors countless times.  Some pretty huge ones, in fact.  Every once in a while I'd accidentally pi$$ off my Albino Burmese, Clarence, and he'd chomp on me.  The bite looked much worse than it was.  It would be a bloody mess but not deep at all.  Snakes are hard wired. They do what they do. Every time I've been bitten I was doing something stupid.   Though I've handled a few (very few) I've never been bitten by a venomous snake and that's  just fine with me.  It's not on my bucket list.

    Here's one that gets me much angrier than it should... when you're making fried eggs and a yolk comes out of the shell already broken.  Like, what the hell?

Boiling eggs and the shell cracking, leaking egg white into the water. Infuriating.

Kick wrote on Jul 31^st, 2018 at 3:16pm:

Boiling eggs and the shell cracking, leaking egg white into the water. Infuriating.

YES!

    Christmas commercials generally piss me off.  Christmas commercials and music before Thanksgiving piss me off a great deal.  I know I'm not alone in this.
    In the early 70s when I was in my late teens I worked as a porter (janitor) for Sears.  They started playing their Christmas music right after Labor Day. Constantly. By the time Christmas rolled around, almost four months later, I couldn't stand Christmas music.  I think there should be a law against Christmas before Thanksgiving.

Hallmark channel has been showing Christmas movies since the beginning of October. For the love of God, why?

I feel like they ruined Christmas for me somewhat with the constant Christmas music. I used to love those songs but some of the radio stations I listen to play 24/7 Christmas music for months coming up to Christmas. Seriously? It makes no sense.

Still love A Christmas Story. They can't ruin that for me. 😁

Can’t ruin A Christmas Story?!  You’ve obviously never seen the sequel. Boy did they ruin it!
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt2281069/

NooneOfConsequence wrote on Nov 3^rd, 2018 at 6:34pm:

Can’t ruin A Christmas Story?!  You’ve obviously never seen the sequel. Boy did they ruin it! https://m.imdb.com/title/tt2281069/

Next you'll be claiming they made a 4th Indiana Jones. I'm not falling for that.😁

we've actually got a new channel appeared that is just called christmas.
Some bloody awful films on it too :-)

I guess now halloween has happened christ,as is now legit.

Me I'd limit all advertising until the week before - when i do all my shopping lol

Morphy wrote on Nov 3^rd, 2018 at 6:59pm:

NooneOfConsequence wrote on Nov 3rd, 2018 at 6:34pm: Can’t ruin A Christmas Story?!  You’ve obviously never seen the sequel. Boy did they ruin it! https://m.imdb.com/title/tt2281069/ Next you'll be claiming they made a 4th Indiana Jones. I'm not falling for that.😁

Let’s see... Shia LeBoeuf, aliens... nope. There was definitely NOT a 4th Indiana Jones movie.

NooneOfConsequence wrote on Nov 5^th, 2018 at 9:06pm:

Morphy wrote on Nov 3rd, 2018 at 6:59pm: NooneOfConsequence wrote on Nov 3rd, 2018 at 6:34pm: Can’t ruin A Christmas Story?!  You’ve obviously never seen the sequel. Boy did they ruin it! https://m.imdb.com/title/tt2281069/ Next you'll be claiming they made a 4th Indiana Jones. I'm not falling for that.😁 Let’s see... Shia LeBoeuf, aliens... nope. There was definitely NOT a 4th Indiana Jones movie.

Phew... Scared me there for a second.  :)

Advertisements stuck in the middle of videos piss me off to no end.  I boycott the products. If we all did the practice would stop. JS

My biggest one is. If someone asks me for help. I start helping. Then they push me out if the way to do it themselves.  Then why ask me to help in the first place?

Passengers that continue to give directions to where you are going when you have been clearly going there without there help the entire time. Do they think you've just been guessing the whole time hoping they will chime in at any moment?  ;D Haha. I really don't understand that mindset.

The other one is really specific. One of my fellow survivalist/primitive skils friends talks to me about bows and slings at times. He will send me a video or a text and I'll say something like "So when are you going to start on primitive weapons? You should make a bow, it's fun." The response will invariably be something like , "You need at least a X, Y and Z to make a bow and I don't have those tools." In the past I would try to encourage him with "Naw your good, you could make one even with just a hatchet and a knife. No problem." But no. He's watched several YouTube videos. He's an expert now.  ;D

Thing is he's super sharp, very smart guy.  But he has a hard time understanding for some people this is not a passing hobby. We might actually know things he doesn't.

People who text you then don't answer your response, even if it's right away. Like what the hell?

Talking about texting, people liking texts on iOS annoys me. Gives a notification as if they sent a message but they didn’t, just sent a like. Anyone else?

Drakolith wrote on Nov 28^th, 2018 at 11:19am:

Talking about texting, people liking texts on iOS annoys me. Gives a notification as if they sent a message but they didn’t, just sent a like. Anyone else?

Yes! Just frickin’ respond to the text already! It’s not Facebook... come to think of it, it was dumb on Facebook too.

Canned pasta products like Chef Boyardee canned ravioli or Franco-american SpaghettiO's. Soggy noodles that have been sitting in a can for months or years in sorry catsup water. My late wife used to love them. Good God, how do people eat that poopy?!  Boxed spaghetti takes just minutes to cook and pasta from scratch isn't all that hard to make. I would literally rather eat dog food than canned pasta. UGH!!

I am old and miserable with many pet peeves.

people who answer statements with questions.

me: the sky is blue.
them: is that right ?

Or any of a dozen responses that are all questioning what you just said.
Damn that's annoying !

People who answer yes/no questions with a vague ambiguity.

Me: would you like a cup of coffee ?
them: are you having one ?

it's a bloody yes or no question, did I say: "would you like a cup of coffee, just be aware I won't actually make you one unless I want one myself and I had a cup about 10 minutes ago, so it's unlikely I will actually make you a cup of coffee. Not sure why I even bothered asking. "

I've more or less trained my mate to just say yes or no.
Anything else and I don't make him one :-)

Miracle Whip.  It has no right to exist.  Horrible stuff.

---

    Awards shows.  TV, music, and  movie people get all dressed up and tell each other how great they are for a couple of hours.  I'll pass.

Rat Man wrote on Feb 26^th, 2019 at 10:40am:

Awards shows.  TV, music, and  movie people get all dressed up and tell each other how great they are for a couple of hours.  I'll pass.

And they'll shove the thing full of adverts. I've heard the Oscars as a show is dying and it doesn't surprise me at all. Anyone that does care can just check Twitter or some news website after the show is over and the thing itself is so long! Absolutely pointless waste of time and, as you said, just serves to stroke egos that are already massive.

   I live in a land of ignorant, lazy slobs. There is litter everywhere in New Jersey.  Other places not that far from here are nothing like this. I've been throughout New England and there is virtually no trash there.  Of course they have a deposit on bottles and cans there which helps but that's just a part of it.  I don't know why but people are just slobs around here. Every day I walk past the public trash cans around my little Lake Renee. Every day there is trash just a few feet from those cans thrown on the ground. It's like that all over the state. The wind almost always blows west to east here. Unfortunately we are on the east end of the lake.  There is always an endless supply of trash blown to our shore. I mean LOTS of trash. The little woods near me is full of trash.  There is trash all over our beautiful Pinelands. I could go on.
    I don't know why there are so many slobs per square mile here.  If you're heading south from New  England it seems to start as you approach New York City. From there south it's the Land of the Slobazoids. It doesn't seem to peter out until you get well into Maryland.  I have no theory as to why people are such pigs around here.  It certainly pisses me off.

    The water that initially comes out of squeeze bottles of mustard and catsup that gets all over your bread and makes it soggy.

Catsup?  CATSUP???! Did you really just mis-spell ketchup in the pet peeves topic?!  You’re a brave one Rat Man! LOL ;D

I am with you on that one "Kick"
I don't mind it to much if given its correct French pronunciation.

Rat Man wrote on Mar 10^th, 2019 at 7:03pm:

I live in a land of ignorant, lazy slobs. There is litter everywhere in New Jersey.  Other places not that far from here are nothing like this. I've been throughout New England and there is virtually no trash there.  Of course they have a deposit on bottles and cans there which helps but that's just a part of it.  I don't know why but people are just slobs around here. Every day I walk past the public trash cans around my little Lake Renee. Every day there is trash just a few feet from those cans thrown on the ground. It's like that all over the state. The wind almost always blows west to east here. Unfortunately we are on the east end of the lake.  There is always an endless supply of trash blown to our shore. I mean LOTS of trash. The little woods near me is full of trash.  There is trash all over our beautiful Pinelands. I could go on.     I don't know why there are so many slobs per square mile here.  If you're heading south from New  England it seems to start as you approach New York City. From there south it's the Land of the Slobazoids. It doesn't seem to peter out until you get well into Maryland.  I have no theory as to why people are such pigs around here.  It certainly pisses me off.

Up in maine it's a ton of lazy people.  I just had a conversation about this at work last night with a coworker.  At home this locals are hard workers, but at their place of employment they are lazy. I work matience,  and am constantly cleanly up after grown adults. Not talking big spills, but little little poopy, for example the employee breakroom.  Meets messy people

youtube videos and television shows that are people being filmed 'reacting' to things they are watching on the tv or youtube.

WHY ?????????????????

Curious Aardvark wrote on Apr 1^st, 2019 at 6:59am:

youtube videos and television shows that are people being filmed 'reacting' to things they are watching on the tv or youtube. WHY ?????????????????

I think the best are  the elderly or children reacting to certain music.  I find it hilarious.  For example 80 yo people listening to heavy metal music, like slipknot. Facial expressions and reactions are classic.

When you're reduced to watching other people watch videos - you seriously need a hobby !

I feel like that some days

Is it much better to be having a discussion about reactions to people watching videos of people reacting to YouTube videos?
Slingers react to Youtubers React... it could be the next big hit on YouTube!  LOL

it's a list of pet peeves - 'reaction' media is one of my pet peeves :-)

I have no problem with listing it... I just find it very meta :)

NooneOfConsequence wrote on Mar 30^th, 2019 at 11:29pm:

Catsup?  CATSUP???! Did you really just mis-spell ketchup in the pet peeves topic?!  You’re a brave one Rat Man! LOL ;D

I rarely if ever misspell anything.

---

  It might be an age thing.  When I was a kid it was always spelled catsup. I think ketchup is a modernized version of the word.

Bugs that fly down your throat.

black flies in your ear; rattling and bouncing around in the inner ear >:(

Blackflies are awful. I'm very happy they don't make it as far south as Jersey.  Such a tiny thing yet they draw blood.  Down the Shore in the Summer we have Greenheads... a vicious, vile bug. Their bite stings almost as  much as a bee sting.  Greenheads are big, mean, and can bite you through clothing.  If you don't really clobber them when you swat them they just laugh at you and swat you back.  They seem to love insect repellent.  Often your only option is to leave.

People who hang their toilet paper rolls backwards. WTH is wrong with you? Below is the only way to hang a toilet paper roll. The other way is obviously backwards.  Are you blind?

---

WHAT!? Rat Man... I agree with, I think all of yur pet peeves but this... this is wrong. Plain and simple  ;D

   Previews that give away the whole show or movie.   Like, you just showed me all of the best scenes.  Why watch it now?

   Old Westerns when someone gets shot in the shoulder.  They blow it off like it was nothing. "Shucks, it's just a shoulder wound.  You'll be fine in a few days."  If you take a 45 slug to the shoulder you won't be fine in a few days.  You could bleed to death or die of shock or infection.  Chances are that shoulder will never be the same again. A 45 is no joke.

Edit:  the same thing often happens in war movies.  "Are you OK?"  "I'm just hit in the leg. I'll be fine."  In the real world that leg is badly mangled and will most likely never be the same again.

I like; it's a long way from the heart :-?

Germaphobes;
    They amuse more than annoy me but I feel they bear mentioning here.  They run around with their hand sanitizer, wipes, and sprays and believe they are much healthier than the rest of us.
     The air you breathe is full of germs.  The food you eat, everything you touch, drink, etc. is covered in and full of germs.  There are billions of germs in your body at any given moment. Get real. Yes, we should wash our hands after going to the bathroom, bathe or shower regularly, change our underwear, take out the garbage, etc..  Beyond that you're sucking seawater and looking very foolish.

you're showing the backwards way to load toilet roll. Obviously it's meant to hang down the front NOT the back :-)

I will remedy this in other people's houses, oh yeah lol

Rat Man wrote on May 12^th, 2019 at 1:14pm:

Germaphobes;     They amuse more than annoy me but I feel they bear mentioning here.  They run around with their hand sanitizer, wipes, and sprays and believe they are much healthier than the rest of us.      The air you breathe is full of germs.  The food you eat, everything you touch, drink, etc. is covered in and full of germs.  There are billions of germs in your body at any given moment. Get real. Yes, we should wash our hands after going to the bathroom, bathe or shower regularly, change our underwear, take out the garbage, etc..  Beyond that you're sucking seawater and looking very foolish.

One thought I always find mind blowing is that we are actually walking ecosystems. Not only that but our body weight is made up more of "foreign" cells than our "own". I used quotation marks because the prevailing theory for the existence of mitochondria (the powerhouse of the cell...) is that they're an ancient bacteria that got absorbed into some early organisms and just... stayed there. It could be argued that they aren't "supposed" to be there and it's just a happy accident that they stuck around, have been beneficial and been passed on. Then there is all the bacteria in your gut which has been found to influence people's behaviour and mood. Should we include our gut bacteria when we say "I"? Existential crisis here I come!

Kick wrote on May 12^th, 2019 at 3:23pm:

Then there is all the bacteria in your gut which has been found to influence people's behaviour and mood.

I guess most people who had a longer antibiotics therapy can tell a story about that, regarding mood as well as ... mode of operation of your gut ...  :-X



Rat Man wrote on May 12^th, 2019 at 1:14pm:

Germaphobes;

which may contain the annoying species of antibiotics-overusers... It's not just silly, it's outright dangerous for you as well as for the public health.

one phrase that fills me with horror on the gut bacteria front is: 'faecal implants'.

And yes it means exactly what it says.
Apparently it's one way to 'import' another persons beneficial bacteria into someone else's gut.

I think I'll stick to live yoghurt :-)

Teg wrote on May 12^th, 2019 at 4:47pm:

Kick wrote on May 12th, 2019 at 3:23pm: Then there is all the bacteria in your gut which has been found to influence people's behaviour and mood. I guess most people who had a longer antibiotics therapy can tell a story about that, regarding mood as well as ... mode of operation of your gut ...  :-X Rat Man wrote on May 12th, 2019 at 1:14pm: Germaphobes; which may contain the annoying species of antibiotics-overusers... It's not just silly, it's outright dangerous for you as well as for the public health.

   My late wife Marie, rest her soul, was a chronic overuser of antibiotics.  Every time she caught a cold or anything else she'd take them.  I tried to convince her that when she caught something that actually required antibiotics they wouldn't work on her because of her constant use of them.  Like most wives of course she completely ignored my good advice.

I'm a nurse and my girlfriend is studying microbiology with a particular interest in immunology so we're SUPER careful with antibiotics. They're also cracking down a lot on handing antibiotics out over here in Finland. When I hear that in parts of Asia you can get them wthout a prescription and everyone takes them for the slightest sniffle... Terrifying. I've seen people with MRSA and other resistant infections. It ain't fun.

Curious Aardvark wrote on May 13^th, 2019 at 6:29am:

one phrase that fills me with horror on the gut bacteria front is: 'faecal implants'. And yes it means exactly what it says. Apparently it's one way to 'import' another persons beneficial bacteria into someone else's gut. I think I'll stick to live yoghurt :-)

Ugh! Acidophilus is good enough for me.

Curious Aardvark wrote on May 12^th, 2019 at 1:28pm:

you're showing the backwards way to load toilet roll. Obviously it's meant to hang down the front NOT the back :-) I will remedy this in other people's houses, oh yeah lol

LOL. I have been known to turn the roll around in other people's houses too. 

Kick wrote on May 13^th, 2019 at 12:39pm:

I'm a nurse and my girlfriend is studying microbiology with a particular interest in immunology so we're SUPER careful with antibiotics. They're also cracking down a lot on handing antibiotics out over here in Finland. When I hear that in parts of Asia you can get them wthout a prescription and everyone takes them for the slightest sniffle... Terrifying. I've seen people with MRSA and other resistant infections. It ain't fun.

     Due mostly to agricultural runoff there is a good amount of antibiotics polluting our rivers, lakes, etc.. here in America. This is VERY bad.  It doesn't take a genius to figure out the consequences. 

okay back to the subject at hand.

This one is probably quite specific to the 3d printing industry.

I'm always looking for different and cheaper filament spools. A quick glance around this end of my workshop shows 30 or 40 reels of various kinds in various states of usage. Steve will tell you, organised I'm not !
I reckon about 2/3rds of them do not have manufacturers labels on the reels.

All filament is different, some is amazing stuff, some is a bit iffy and good only for dodgy test prints. It would be really useful to know who made it and what it was.
That way I could re-order the good stuff.

Why this isn't done I don't know.
But it is really annoying when you use a filament that performs brilliantly in a particular printer and you have no idea where it came from or who made it. 

   Here's one of my pet peeves.... I think of something great to post on slinging.org then the next time I'm at my computer I can't remember it.  I had a great pet peeve in my head earlier.  I should have written it down but I was sure I'd remember it. I don't.  Eventually it'll come back to me.  My crappy short term memory is more the result of Lyme Disease damage than old age.

    Now instead of Bud Light with garbage in it there's Bud Light Lemon Tea.  It's brewed with garbage (lemon peels) and aged on tea leaves to bring you a weak, baby piss beer that tastes vaguely like lemonade.  I'll pass. 
https://untappd.com/b/anheuser-busch-bud-light-lemon-tea/3146597

There's a billboard advertising that beer on one of the major intersections near our house. I keep thinking it has to be just tea. Who would drink lemon/tea/beer?  Then again Chelada Modelo is pretty popular, so who knows.

Pet Peeve- You're trying to fall asleep. You're exhausted from a long day and just about to drift off and then you hear it: "bzzz" A small mosquito buzzes you and then is gone. There's no ignoring it. All you can think of is it sucking your blood all night long, even though you know this is ridiculous. Now you have to get up, turn the lights on and hope it comes into view enough for you to find it. 20 minutes later you are still trying to find it. It's going to pay. Mosquitoes will tell each other of it's fate in hushed tones for many years to come. This is personal. 

Another one involving sleep. You are trying to fall asleep but for whatever reason you can't. You have to be up especially early tomorrow and you know if you fall asleep *right this moment* you can still get a good 7 hours. All is well. But you can't stop thinking. For whatever reason, tonight of all nights you simply cannot stop the mental chatter. You refuse to take a benadryl knowing this will make you tired tomorrow morning. So you lay there, in misery. 3 hours later you realize it's just not going to happen. Now you have to take something or you will get no rest at all! But instead of getting 7 hours of sleep with a little grogginess from the benadryl now you are taking it with 4 hours left and your going to be zonked out of your mind for the whole morning. Touche, universe, touche.  ;D

Morphy wrote on Jul 15^th, 2019 at 4:19pm:

20 minutes later you are still trying to find it.

I don't know how many summer nights I've gone mosquito hunting in my room. One managed to hide for 1,5 hours (it was behind a painting). Sometimes I let them suck blood so they become heavy, fly slower and are bigger easier to see and clap into a pulp.
The most satisfying kills are when they come close enough, you hear them land on the pillow and then smack them with the cheek.

P.S. pet peeve : when I grab a mosquito mid air and open my hand to check its doom and it flies away unharmed no matter how much I squeezed it. always remember CLAP them don't grab them.

    A mosquito at night is a good pet peeve.  There's something about that sound.  ZZZzzzzzeeeeewwwWWWW.  It's burned into our ids like a race memory.  It's amazing how one tiny insect can ruin a night's sleep.

   If anyone feels that this topic is inappropriate and is offended by the following I will remove it. Maybe.  Breast implants.  Fake boobs.  I hate them.  Some of the most beautiful, sexy women I've ever been with were small breasted.  Two of them talked about getting implants.  I begged them not to.  Implants ALWAYS look fake and, pardon my frankness, they  just don't jiggle the same way.  Or feel real.  Breast implants on a woman wouldn't necessarily be a deal breaker for me but they would be a major disappointment. 

   People who decide they don't like a particular food without trying it.  My army buddy Al is one of them.  "Al, try this."  "I don't like it."  "Have you ever had it?" "No but I don't like it."  "How do you know?"  " I just don't like stuff that looks like that." This is an actual conversation I had with him BTW.  I am the exact opposite.  If there's something I've never eaten before I absolutely want to try it. 

I was like that until I was about 18-20. Around there... It started to change when I went on a cruise and tried escargo for the first time. Those snails tasted like the finest steak I've ever had. Now I'm like you RM. If it's new and I haven't tried it, I will always try something at least once. The world is filled with interesting food and I would hate to miss out on something that might end up being a favorite.

    Chiggers.  One of the most miserable things on earth.  When I was a kid we didn't have them around here.  I didn't notice them in South Jersey until the early 80s.  Now we have them big time.
    Wednesday while walking Max through the woods I picked them up.  I must have at least five dozen bites on my legs. The only thing that I've tried that works for me is Witch Hazel.  I picked some up yesterday after trying several other treatments suggested by friends.  Though I still itch some it feels like the worst is behind me. 
     For those who don't know, a chigger is a microscopic mite that burrows under your skin causing little red pimples that itch LIKE HELL.  Below is a picture of what chigger bites can look like. 
    I hate them much.

---

LOL, lived in the SE for a while... hot humid summers chiggers and ticks I moved ;)

I thought that was fire ants at first. Forgot all about chiggers. I'll have to try witch hazel if they ever get a hold of me again.

    It seems that chiggers are always in large groups.  I've never seen anyone getting just one bite.  It's always a gaggle of them.

Fortunately for you Morphy, the fire ants have eaten most of the chiggers near Houston.

NooneOfConsequence wrote on Aug 7^th, 2019 at 11:55pm:

Fortunately for you Morphy, the fire ants have eaten most of the chiggers near Houston.

I wish it was the same here,fire ants and chiggers seem to get along just fine,I have the bites and stings to prove it

NooneOfConsequence wrote on Aug 7^th, 2019 at 11:55pm:

Fortunately for you Morphy, the fire ants have eaten most of the chiggers near Houston.

Speaking of that my first year here after moving from Cali. I stepped in a fire ant hill bare foot without realizing it. I hadn't lived in Houston since being a kid and this hill was hidden
In tall grass. What a miserable experience. Now whenever I see fire ant hills on the property I give them a warm welcome with gasoline and a match.

Morphy wrote on Jul 26^th, 2019 at 4:48pm:

I was like that until I was about 18-20. Around there... It started to change when I went on a cruise and tried escargo for the first time. Those snails tasted like the finest steak I've ever had. Now I'm like you RM. If it's new and I haven't tried it, I will always try something at least once. The world is filled with interesting food and I would hate to miss out on something that might end up being a favorite.

The following is off topic but it won't be the first time:
    The first time I tried escargot was in a very good local restaurant that no longer exists called Pufferbelly.  They were cooked in garlic butter in something that looked like a miniature cupcake tray.  It was love at first taste.  They sort of reminded me of a very excellent seafood.

Yes sir. On that cruise I learned many things. One, escargot is delicious and two caviar is gross. Three , a dessert with rum in it is still rum and will get you buzzed. But ultimately just because something is expensive does not mean it's good. Who knows though, maybe I would like it these days. I am a huge fan of sushi.

     The first time I had caviar was at a friend's wedding about forty years ago.  It was love at first taste.  I've had it a few other times since at company parties. As most of you now I'm way too cheap to ever buy it myself. I have eaten the fried roe of many different kinds of fish that I've caught also. It is always excellent.  Morphy, now that your palate is more mature and educated I'd suggest you try it again. 

I was driving down the highway today and saw a black SUV tailgating a Camero. As they drove by I noticed the black SUV was actually a police vehicle. He was tailgating probably 3-4 feet away from the rear bumper of the car. No lights on, no emergency just a bored cop power tripping on some random citizen. I maintained my speed along with them and in a minute he switched lanes (no blinker of course) and rapidly sped up and around the Camero to get in front of it.  The Camero was running a mile or two below speed limit for obvious reason. I really can't stand cops like this. They will be the first one to pull you over for the most minor infraction yet rarely follow traffic laws themselves and often times seem to get off on messing with people.

Chiggers you can actually use clear nail polish, to get rid of em. Wipe the polish on your legs, it actually suffocates them. From what i have been told.

Morphy we have a ton of those in NJ. Up in maine i havent noticed as many. but the border patrols can get like that sometimes.

Morphy wrote on Sep 1^st, 2019 at 3:37am:

I was driving down the highway today and saw a black SUV tailgating a Camero. As they drove by I noticed the black SUV was actually a police vehicle. He was tailgating probably 3-4 feet away from the rear bumper of the car. No lights on, no emergency just a bored cop power tripping on some random citizen. I maintained my speed along with them and in a minute he switched lanes (no blinker of course) and rapidly sped up and around the Camero to get in front of it.  The Camero was running a mile or two below speed limit for obvious reason. I really can't stand cops like this. They will be the first one to pull you over for the most minor infraction yet rarely follow traffic laws themselves and often times seem to get off on messing with people.

Absolute power corrupts absolutely...

    Once I was driving down one of our New Jersey highways, 295, in my Cable TV work van.  I was in the passing lane passing some slow moving vehicles. I looked in my rear view and there was a car glued to my rear bumper as close as I've ever seen someone tailgate before. I spend up and put on my turn signal to indicate that I was getting over into the middle lane so he could pass me.  I expected this would get the jerk off of my ass but he stayed glued to my rear bumper.  We were traveling much to fast for me to safely give him a break check.  I got past the slower traffic, pulled into the middle lane, and flipped the jerk the bird as he passed by.  To my surprise it was a state cop. He was so close to my rear bumper that I couldn't see his strobe lights (which weren't on).  The shelf in my truck blocked my view of them.  He pulled up next to me and gave me the evil eye.  From the shocked look on my face he must have figured out that I had no idea he was a Statey.  He sped off and left me to stuff my heart back into my chest.  Had he given me a ticket I would have fought it in court no matter how useless such and endeavor might have proven.  He was driving recklessly for no apparent reason.  Anyway it ended well..

   Every year around this time I do my Yellowjacket rant.  Yellowjackets are a type of wasp.  They are to the best of my knowledge the only other creature on earth besides man who realize their own mortality.
    For most of the year they are generally benign unless you disturb their nest.  Come late Summer and early Autumn they know their days are numbered.  They eat their own young, destroy their own nest, and go on a stinging orgy.  They will sting anything they can before they die.  Sometimes that's me.  Late Summer and early Fall Yellowjackets are a pain in the arse.
     I have been stung countless times by all different sorts of bees, wasps, hornets, etc..  Usually it's no big deal.  For some reason Yellowjacket stings are particularly painful for me and the pain lasts longer than with other stings.  Also in about a week  my skin around the area of the sting will all die and peel off.  Yellowjackets in the Fall suck.

Judging by Arse i assume you are a British new Jersey ite

Rat Man wrote on Sep 1^st, 2019 at 2:24pm:

Once I was driving down one of our New Jersey highways, 295, in my Cable TV work van.  I was in the passing lane passing some slow moving vehicles. I looked in my rear view and there was a car glued to my rear bumper as close as I've ever seen someone tailgate before. I spend up and put on my turn signal to indicate that I was getting over into the middle lane so he could pass me.  I expected this would get the jerk off of my ass but he stayed glued to my rear bumper.  We were traveling much to fast for me to safely give him a break check.  I got past the slower traffic, pulled into the middle lane, and flipped the jerk the bird as he passed by.  To my surprise it was a state cop. He was so close to my rear bumper that I couldn't see his strobe lights (which weren't on).  The shelf in my truck blocked my view of them.  He pulled up next to me and gave me the evil eye.  From the shocked look on my face he must have figured out that I had no idea he was a Statey.  He sped off and left me to stuff my heart back into my chest.  Had he given me a ticket I would have fought it in court no matter how useless such and endeavor might have proven.  He was driving recklessly for no apparent reason.  Anyway it ended well..

Technically, at least in America, you can say or offend a cop in any way you choose and they can't legally do anything. A police officer is not legally allowed to be offended by a citizen. Now of course, we know in the real world they can and will find all sorts of false reasons to cite you if you do, but you were within your rights to do so. I'm glad it ended well for you though.

Eudave wrote on Sep 1^st, 2019 at 3:09pm:

Judging by Arse i assume you are a British new Jersey ite

My father was half British.

Rat Man wrote on May 13^th, 2019 at 12:44pm:

Curious Aardvark wrote on May 12th, 2019 at 1:28pm: you're showing the backwards way to load toilet roll. Obviously it's meant to hang down the front NOT the back :-) I will remedy this in other people's houses, oh yeah lol LOL. I have been known to turn the roll around in other people's houses too.

---

correct :-)
lol

    Fortunately we've learned much since 1891.

    Toilet paper roll positioning is one of the most polarizing debates in our society.  Both sides are certain that they're right and see placing the roll opposite of their preference is blatantly, obviously wrong. When I see it in the over the top position it looks stupid and annoying to me, as I'm sure the under position looks to the other side.  It has always been this way and always will be.  The question is why?

Rat Man wrote on Sep 16^th, 2019 at 12:34pm:

The question is why?

the right way, shown above, is right because the toilet paper is just hanging and not touching the wall or anything else ,also  a smaller length is hanging and you have better access to it. if I put it backwards then it will rest on the recess of the wall. with the right way you can also pull at almost any direction without friction whereas with the backwards way there will be friction if pulled downwards.

P.s. I'm also annoyed, every time i see it backwards i correct it

    I know I mentioned chiggers earlier.  For the second time this Summer I am chiggered.  This time it's my ankles.  They are ground meat right now.  I hate chiggers.

Extreme heat, humidity, chiggers and ticks >:(

    I've mentioned this before.  When I was growing up we practically lived in the woods.  There were no chiggers here in Jersey then.  I never saw any until the mid eighties.  I don't have any data to support this theory but I very strongly suspect that global warming has allowed chiggers to extend their range farther north, reaching us here... unfortunately for my ankles.

    People with two last names.  Jennifer Love Hewitt. Abercrombie Destinkerwitz-Defenfailer.  Why would somebody need too last names?  How pretentious.  Like one isn't enough. So when people with two last names marry do their children have four last names? 

I knew someone with the last names Gunter-Zak which honestly is a pretty cool name :D

Proper pet peeve.
Phoebe rolled in fox crap wednesday - I was peeved :whistle:

   This has been mentioned before but they're playing Christmas commercials on TV already, three weeks before Thanksgiving.  That's surely enough to piss off the pope.  If I was made emperor, king, dictator, or whatever my very first law would be absolutely no freakin' Christmas commercials until after Thanksgiving under penalty of death by slow torture!!!! Ho ho freakin' ho!

I agree.  I work pt at a grocery store up here. Right after Halloween.  Christmas candy was replacing it.

As a European, I'm now ok with Christmas stuff appearing. Before Halloween though? Definitely death penalty. I mean, really Halloween 24/7 365 days a year, but between the END of Halloween and Christmas day? Acceptable.

Rat Man wrote on Nov 3^rd, 2019 at 4:04pm:

This has been mentioned before but they're playing Christmas commercials on TV already, three weeks before Thanksgiving.  That's surely enough to piss off the pope.  If I was made emperor, king, dictator, or whatever my very first law would be absolutely no freakin' Christmas commercials until after Thanksgiving under penalty of death by slow torture!!!! Ho ho freakin' ho!

Hallmark channel is doing Christmas movies all year long now!!

slingbadger wrote on Nov 4^th, 2019 at 6:38am:

Hallmark channel is doing Christmas movies all year long now!!

I don't to write off an entire country, but the US seems more and more like a dystopia the more I hear about it...

    Fake laughter and canned laughter.  Sports shows are some of the worst offenders when it comes to fake laughter.  Some has been ex jock says something not the least bit funny and it's a big yuck fest.  "Good one, big guy! Yuck, yuck, yuck!" 
    Even when I was a child I found canned laughter strange and annoying.  It's like "You're to stupid to know when to laugh at these inane lines so we'll push a button telling you when this crap is funny."  Though I've been exposed to it my entire life I still find the whole concept of canned laughter totally odd. 

Kick wrote on Nov 4^th, 2019 at 6:42am:

slingbadger wrote on Nov 4th, 2019 at 6:38am: Hallmark channel is doing Christmas movies all year long now!! I don't to write off an entire country, but the US seems more and more like a dystopia the more I hear about it...

Yeah. It’s the worst place in the world... except for everywhere else!  ;D

Social media tough guys. Thy are decked out in camo and rant and rave about killing terrorists, but aren't willing to join the military.
Same thing with people who cover their trucks with bumper stickers about the same subject. If you want to be part of the solution, join up.

still phoebe - she rolled in it a couple days later as well :-(

And amazon boxes. Do they deliberately find the least appropriate sized of packaging for the small items ?

Had a small led light strip delivered yesterday, the box was large enough to serve as the coffin for a small child.

slingbadger wrote on Nov 5^th, 2019 at 6:31am:

Social media tough guys. Thy are decked out in camo and rant and rave about killing terrorists, but aren't willing to join the military. Same thing with people who cover their trucks with bumper stickers about the same subject. If you want to be part of the solution, join up.

    I agree totally, sb.  There is nothing more pathetic and cowardly than a Facebook tough guy.  Everyone is tough through a keyboard and monitor.
    Personally I would never put anything political on any of my vehicles.  By doing so one makes his/her vehicle a target.  Especially now, with America so completely polarized over the putrid orange slug.  I'm not afraid to speak  my mind but I don't openly invite trouble.

Curious Aardvark wrote on Nov 1^st, 2019 at 10:42am:

Proper pet peeve. Phoebe rolled in fox crap wednesday - I was peeved :whistle:

Around here there is always deer crap.  All of my dogs have loved it. Not only do they roll in it but some of them have (God forbid) eaten it.  Crap from ungulates in general seems to hold a special fascination for dogs.  Nasty.

Hares abound around our area and my girlfriend's family dogs stay with us now and then and love it. Los of little round sweets for them. They don't just enjoy hare poo though. Goose, dog, even human if they're "lucky" enough to find it. Later, after the walk, they'll get all confused when I push them off when they try and lick my face...

When i worked in animal care.  We used to call rabbit poop. 'Dog friendly chocolate '  ;D
Since getting our flock started. Our dogs LOVE, chicken and especially LOVE the turkey poop

You guys are all making me very glad I have a cat. ;)

people cancelling important things at the last minute. >:(

Used to have a Rhodesian Ridgeback who would try to lick our pet rats behind for any urine droplets. She would lick and then stand with her head up and make a tik, tik, tik sound as she swirled the aroma around in her mouth. Like watching someone sip a 25 year old single malt Glenlivet. Lol. Dogs are so gross.

When someone asks me what do you think about whatever and I give my opinion, but they don't agree and begin to argue. They asked for my op. How can it be the wrong answer  :noidea:

Related to that, people that ask questions not because they want to hear your opinion, but because they want an excuse to express their opinion to you.

Speaking of asking for opinions... what do you think about when someone only acknowledges what you just said for the purpose of changing the subject to what they really want to talk about?  @ walter, I hope you have an opinion on this so I can argue with you ;D

I do, but now wise enough not to share it :P

   Fights on TV or in movies.  Big guys will be smashing each other in the face with bare fists and there are no marks at all or if there are they're gone the next day.  If you get caught by a right cross square in the face you're going to look bad for a while. 

The "reply-all" clickers in huge mailing lists  :D

Teg wrote on Nov 19^th, 2019 at 1:53pm:

The "reply-all" clickers in huge mailing lists  :D

The number of times I would get replies to emails that were sent out to the entire nursing student body at uni that just said "Thanks for the info!" because someone 1. would be replying to an email that didn't need a reply 2. didn't understand that Reply All means REPLY ALL. Infuriating to have my inbox filled with so much spam.

people who repeat the last thing you say.

we have 2 friends who do this.

I always figured if they ever talked to each other it'd be the world's longest echo :-)

Telemarketers.  The sons of bitches should be illegal.  I suspect some day they will be.

Car commercials where people give each other new cars for Christmas.  Have any of your friends or family members ever given or gotten a new car for Christmas? Me either.

Rat Man wrote on Dec 8^th, 2019 at 1:17pm:

Car commercials where people give each other new cars for Christmas.  Have any of your friends or family members ever given or gotten a new car for Christmas? Me either.

"I was thinking... I've seen you hinting all year that the one thing you would really want for Christmas is a large monetary drain that will require long term maintenance and upkeep and you didn't want any say in the colour or make so... I bought you a car without having a conversation about it to maintain the fleeting surprise of my gift!"

Quote:

"I was thinking... I've seen you hinting all year that the one thing you would really want for Christmas is a large monetary drain that will require long term maintenance and upkeep and you didn't want any say in the colour or make so...

'I'm pregnant !'

:whistle:

   I see chefs on TV do this all the time.  They'll want to add a hot pepper to what ever they're preparing.  They'll cut open the pepper to chop it up but first the scoop the seeds out and throw them away because they don't want to make the dish hot.  Like DUH!

    This isn't a pet peeve of mine but some people are deeply offended by pineapple on their pizza. I can understand this because pizza is something to be passionate about.  I like almost anything so I'm fine with Hawaiian Pizza.  I can't think of any sort of pizza I don't like.

Microsoft Help;
      Some good friends got me a new computer for Christmas.  It's an HP laptop like my old one. The old one has two bars under the fingerpad  that in conjunction with the fingerpad allow me to copy and paste text and move files around .  The new computer has no such bars. There is nothing under the fingerpad. 
  So I asked Microsoft Help "How do I move files around on my desktop?"  To me this seems like a very simple, straightforward question in plain English.  Help answered everything but.  Then it tried to send me on a wild goose chase through Helpland. 
    This infuriated me. I started using computers in the early 80s.  In all of the countless times I've used Microsoft Help it has never once answered my question or helped me in any way.  It's like a long standing joke between Microsoft and their customers.  Writing a program so comprehensively useless has to be a conscious effort.
    Does anyone know how to move files, copy, and paste on newer HP computers that don't have the two bars at the bottom of the keypad?  Thanks.

Edit:  Yesterday I found a piece of paperwork with the packaging that explained how to use the fingerpad to achieve the functions once provided by the missing bars. It involves double tapping and using multiple fingers simultaneously.  Why couldn't Help tell me that?

most people get a cheap wired or wireless mouse - sooo much easier than the touchpad.

And microsoft 'help' is almost as big a joke as losing microsoft 'support' for an operating system, being a bad thing :-)

Also by 'bars' do you mean the left and right buttons ?
They are still there, you just press the left and right corner of the pad down instead of easy to discern buttons.

Loss of support means no new security updates. That’s bad if you are using software for your business and can’t upgrade the OS!  A lot of laboratory equipment has this problem.

Curious Aardvark wrote on Jan 16^th, 2020 at 11:00am:

most people get a cheap wired or wireless mouse - sooo much easier than the touchpad. And microsoft 'help' is almost as big a joke as losing microsoft 'support' for an operating system, being a bad thing :-) Also by 'bars' do you mean the left and right buttons ? They are still there, you just press the left and right corner of the pad down instead of easy to discern buttons.

Yes, you are correct. Thanks.  None of my literature said anything like that.

lol - always ask an expert :-)

curious ardvark and Kick.
i agree whole heartedly ,even having lived in the states for 47 years it irks me. its herb or erb as in the french pronouciation . carmel drives me nuts ..i was an under buyer in Selfridges food hall many yeasr ago ..young women asked for apples ..i asked what fro as in eating or cooking  ,she said for carmel apples..lucky we were young ,and she was cute, it took me for ever to work out what she wanted to do with them.  then i explained we make toffee apples ....quite different things

:-)

Every time someone passes on the right when you're driving (or the left if you drive in a left handed country) once in front of you they go under the speed limit. Always.

Driving. I hate driving. I hate cars. Mercifully, Helsinki has fantastic public transport so I haven't driven a car for more than a minute in about 7 years. I hate the responsibility of being in control of a big hunk of fast moving metal that could kill someone in the blink of an eye and I HIGHLY resent the fact that, no matter how good a driver I am, all it would take to turn a trip to the shops to a trip 6 feet under, is some idiot that felt they really had to check that latest Instagram post whilst supposedly being in control of a machine that can turn your bones to powder. Cars are terrible and I hate them.

  Unfortunately here in America public transportation generally leaves much to be desired.  Being cheap as I am I've often considered getting rid of my car.  Insurance is brutally expensive in New Jersey and most of the nation. But doing so would make me practically a hermit.  Unless one lives in a major city a car is just about a necessity. 

Hey I live in southwest Australia, there is no public transport so you have to drive a car. I also hate driving

I actually like driving.  I just wish there were no other cars or traffic lights around while doing it. :D

I've got a bunch of driving related pet peeves.  It drives me crazy (no pun intended) when:
[list bull-blackball]

People start breaking as they approach a traffic light that's green.  It's almost as if they are trying to get a red light.

Traffic lights that change to red when there is no one coming the other direction.  It seems that they just want you to sit and wait for nobody.  It's 2020, am I the only one who thinks this shouldn't happen any more?

Drivers who are moving slower than everyone else, but won't get out of the passing lane.

You're sitting at a green light, but can't go because there's someone in front of you waiting to turn left and facing a line of oncoming traffic.

Traffic lights turn red just as you reach them.  When literally one more second of the green light would get you through.
There are probably others, but that's what comes to mind at the moment.  Actually thinking about, maybe I hate driving too. ;D

wow I thought me hating driving was something strange .

   I actually like driving.  I hate what it costs though.

the circumstance that I would love driving would be in a desert , abandoned highway/city . There are too many cars in the streets!

Rat Man wrote on Jul 18^th, 2018 at 2:34pm:

I watch a lot of MMA and some Boxing.  I also have some experience with unarmed combat. I hate seeing a fighter who paws with his jab, using it as a range finder.  The purpose of the jab is to knock your opponents fillings out of his teeth.  Don't throw a jab unless you mean it.  Also, the jab is very underused, especially in MMA.  It should be a primary weapon used to do damage, keep your opponent from being able to set anything up, and the setup for most of your offense. Follow a double or triple jab in and things open up.     Here is Larry Holmes who arguably had the best jab ever.  Learn to jab like Larry. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRKOBVih4uk

      
   Just a  few more thoughts on the jab.  After the backfist it is the fastest punch you can throw if you do it correctly.  You should never load up on your jab or telegraph it.  Just shoot it out there. It should be like cracking a whip. The idea is to connect before your opponent is able to block it. 
     And because you don't load up on it throwing the jab won't tire you out.  Even when you're starting to run out of gas you can still jab effectively. 
     Getting popped in the face constantly throughout a fight can greatly dishearten and discourage your opponent.  A strong jab will take the wind out of an opponents sails and open up many other possibilities for you.
     Out of all the boxing matches and MMA fights I see on TV and the few rare street fights I see these days almost no one utilizes the jab enough.  95% of all fighters would be better if they correctly jabbed more. 

Sarosh wrote on Jan 27^th, 2020 at 5:05pm:

the circumstance that I would love driving would be in a desert , abandoned highway/city . There are too many cars in the streets!

   There are definitely too many cars on the streets.  Especially in New Jersey. 
     The worst traffic I ever saw or had to deal with in my life was in Seoul, Korea in the 1970s.  You had the Stone Age meeting the worst of the 20th Century.  Ox carts, Kimchee Cabs, no rhyme or reason, entire families of farmers running hand in hand across eight lane highways and being wiped out, way too much volume.  It was like the Wild West on wheels.  It was a hell of a place to be a Traffic Accident Investigator.

Edit:  When driving across the country I noticed the traffic around Chicago was pretty extreme.  Plus it seemed to take forever to get around it. 
    The traffic around New York City is pretty bad too.  It's a combination of the volume and the fact that most NYC drivers are aholes. 

   Our older members will relate to this... what I call old people injuries.  These are mystery injuries that pop up on their own with no apparent rhyme or reason. 
    Currently my rigtht ankle has had me hobbled for a week.  I didn't twist it, bang it, kick anything, etc..  As best I can deduce I strained it walking Pandora at the off leash dog park six days ago.  There was nothing unusual about our walk  but this is the only physical thing I did around the time it started hurting. 
    The timing couldn't be worse because everything on earth (including my bowling alley) is closed due to the virus and now I can't walk the dogs.  I am going stir crazy. 
    In the overall scheme of things this is small potatoes.  It will pass.  This is something else you guys have to look forward to as you get old. 

   Here in America two of our discount supermarket chains are BJ's and Sam's Club.  Their prices are good, especially if you buy in bulk but they require you to pay yearly dues.  That's right, you have to give them money to shop in their store.  For real.  To me that seems bass ackwards.  If anything they should be paying me to shop in their store.  If they were the only such discount food markets I could see it... maybe.  But I do better at Save A Lot than either BJ's or Sam's and there is no yearly fee there.  Also there's Aldi's that requires no dues.  It will be a cold day in hell before I pay someone for the privilege
of shopping in their store.

Aldi’s is great. Love that store

Morphy wrote on May 26^th, 2020 at 11:46pm:

Aldi’s is great. Love that store

They recently opened a new one right up the road from me. I'll have to check it out. Do you bring your own bags like Save A Lot?

Plastic bags are no more in Australia. Bring your own bags always.

Rat Man wrote on May 27^th, 2020 at 8:50am:

Morphy wrote on May 26th, 2020 at 11:46pm: Aldi’s is great. Love that store They recently opened a new one right up the road from me. I'll have to check it out. Do you bring your own bags like Save A Lot?

Yep bring your own bags. The prices are great as is the quality of products at least in the ones around here. I think you’ll like it.

Morphy wrote on May 27^th, 2020 at 9:04am:

Rat Man wrote on May 27th, 2020 at 8:50am: Morphy wrote on May 26th, 2020 at 11:46pm: Aldi’s is great. Love that store They recently opened a new one right up the road from me. I'll have to check it out. Do you bring your own bags like Save A Lot? Yep bring your own bags. The prices are great as is the quality of products at least in the ones around here. I think you’ll like it.

I did shop at an Aldi's once many years ago. I remember liking it but it wasn't really close to where I lived and there were other decent discount markets nearby.  I'm due to go shopping in a few days. I'll give it a try.

Mersa wrote on May 27^th, 2020 at 8:55am:

Plastic bags are no more in Australia. Bring your own bags always.

That's great. I wish we'd do that in America.

    This is off topic but I did try Aldi yesterday.  I went there with the intention of comparing it to Save A Lot.  Once inside I realized that wasn't possible. Apples and oranges.  They are two completely different types of markets.  Aldi is a relatively small place.  It's more of a big convenience store while Save A Lot is a full blown supermarket, be it a small one.  Consequently Aldi can't possibly match Save A Lot's selections and prices.  That said, for what it is I liked Aldi just fine.  If I needed just a few quick items I'd go there.  For a full shopping order I'll stick to Save A Lot.

   "Due to heavy call volume wait times will be longer than usual."  This alone is enough to piss one off.  For what they charge they should be able to hire enough people to man the phones.  But then they have to rub salt into the wound.  A recording in a saccharine sweet voice tells you, "We thank you for your patience.  Someone will be with you shortly."  For the ninth time.  WTF ON EARTH MAKES YOU THINK I HAVE ANY %%^(@!+=! PATIENCE?  I am big, old, mean, miserable, violent, and have no &*%$#@()ed patience whatsoever!!!!   I'd like to rip your eyes out and (*^$#@@!* you!  That's how (*%#$^ed patient I am!!!!

Yes. I am not sure what they could say that wouldn't incite more rage, but "Thank you for your patience" is not it.

Rat Man wrote on May 12^th, 2019 at 1:14pm:

Germaphobes;     They amuse more than annoy me but I feel they bear mentioning here.  They run around with their hand sanitizer, wipes, and sprays and believe they are much healthier than the rest of us.      The air you breathe is full of germs.  The food you eat, everything you touch, drink, etc. is covered in and full of germs.  There are billions of germs in your body at any given moment. Get real. Yes, we should wash our hands after going to the bathroom, bathe or shower regularly, change our underwear, take out the garbage, etc..  Beyond that you're sucking seawater and looking very foolish.

Edit:    It's amazing what a worldwide plague will do to change one's perspective. 

;D ;D ;D

"Sorry I called 911 I had a nose bleed but it stopped now. It's not an emergency or anything but do you think I should go to the hospital just in case? It's 2 am I hope I didn't wake you."

"My doctor won't refill my pain meds can you take me to (insert hospital 40 miles away)" "No ma'am we can only take you to these two hospitals in our district. We can't live the city without 911 services." "Oh I can't go to those hospitals they won't refill my pain meds any more either." "It's 3 am hope I didn't wake you."

"Sir, sir, SIR you have MULTIPLE stab wounds and are clearly in shock. You have falling blood pressure, no audible respiration's on your right side and dull percussive sounds. All indications show you are having a massive hemothorax and could die if you don't go with us." "Naw, I got this, I'll just have a beer and walk it off."

"What's the last thing you remember before crashing ? "Well I had crushed up a bunch of OxyContins and put them in a straw to snort. I was driving down the highway and took a big hit and that's the last thing I remember." "Ma'am I'm sure you will be glad to know your baby in the back seat was not injured." "Huh? Oh good."

Oh my I could go on and on.

If we're going into medical field work grumbles...
"Hi could you help me? I need to phone my mother so she can come and pick me up and take me to the train station. Do you know where I can find her number?"
This is the 4th time you've asked C_____. You're 87 years old and your mother has been dead for 40 years. You don't have anywhere to go except to the dining room. Food is coming in 10 mins.

It's always fun seeing the students or cover workers unfamiliar with our residents hear E____ start screaming for help for the first time. The way she screams you'd think she was on the floor with a bleeding head wound. They always look super shocked and concerned when I react by sighing and slowly lifting myself out of my seat in the break room and casually strolling to her room to find her, as always, sat perfectly fine in her armchair. Everything for her is a catastrophe so I've found trivializing her worries actually helps calm her down rather playing into her belief that she needs me to come running in to save the day. Somehow I'm still her favourite.

Then of course they'll also hear A____ who will also be screaming but with more expletives and in a way that sounds like she's the one doing the attacking. We then have to explain she's just shouting at the TV or at the hallucinations she tries to drown out with her TV and radio at full blast. It's at this point they start looking around as if they've only now realised what a mistake it was to come here. Then C____ will barge her way into the break room to ask if we can phone her mother.

What is this all over the floor? It's sort of fluffy... Oh. It's the inside lining of a diaper that's been torn out and thrown around the room. Again. Please R_____, this is the third time we've changed it today, stop ripping it up, the entire bed is soaked. Again.

"Where am I?"
You're in _______, you live here now because you couldnt look after yourself alone at home.
"Älä puhuu paska, mä haluan mennä kotiin nyt heti!"
(I'm interested to see what Google Translate does with that :D )
You've been living here for 5 weeks now...

    That's really sad, Kick.  I hope I never end up like that.
     Here's one that many will identify with... canned laughter. (You can add canned applause to that too)  Even as a small child I found canned laughter very weird and annoying.  If these inane lines you've written were actually funny would you have to tell us when to laugh?  Or are we so stupid we don't know when it's time to laugh?  Throughout a really bad sitcom the laugh button might be pushed many dozens of times.  It's not funny. Why are fake people laughing?  It's really not funny and all of the fake laughter in the world won't make it so. Just stop it please.

Rat Man wrote on Nov 29^th, 2020 at 8:13am:

That's really sad, Kick.  I hope I never end up like that.

Yeah. There's a fair few times in my job where you have to put how you're feeling to one side and try to find the humour in it. I won't be getting into any debating right now, but I was in favour of euthanasia in specific circumstances before I started working where I do (we put down dogs and other animals when they've had enough, why not humans?), having now worked for 5 years I am actively in favour of bringing euthanasia legislation into law. The people I've talked about above are (or were) in better condition than most on our ward. Those people slowly degenerating are particularly sad. One thing I've learnt is that death is never as quick as the movies make it out. It can be an instant or happen quickly in the night but it can also take weeks. Yes. Weeks. As Bette Davis said: "Getting old ain't for sissies".

Kick wrote on Nov 29^th, 2020 at 10:07am:

Rat Man wrote on Nov 29th, 2020 at 8:13am: That's really sad, Kick.  I hope I never end up like that. Yeah. There's a fair few times in my job where you have to put how you're feeling to one side and try to find the humour in it. I won't be getting into any debating right now, but I was in favour of euthanasia in specific circumstances before I started working where I do (we put down dogs and other animals when they've had enough, why not humans?), having now worked for 5 years I am actively in favour of bringing euthanasia legislation into law. The people I've talked about above are (or were) in better condition than most on our ward. Those people slowly degenerating are particularly sad. One thing I've learnt is that death is never as quick as the movies make it out. It can be an instant or happen quickly in the night but it can also take weeks. Yes. Weeks. As Bette Davis said: "Getting old ain't for sissies".

I couldn't agree more. 

The term 'chainmail'.  I get that it's a modern creation because people don't talk about armour regularly anymore, and it's more descriptive to help people know what you're referring to.  But a chain is a sequence of connected metal links.  Mail is a mesh armour formed by interlocking metal rings, sometimes in fairly complex patterns.  While they are both typically made from metal rings, mail is not made from chains.

Waiting on father SITHmas  >:(

Mersa wrote on Feb 3^rd, 2021 at 9:19pm:

Waiting on father SITHmas  >:(

On a related note, Finnish customs! As well as my missing SITH sling, I have another package which arrived in Finland in November. I finally got the customs notification last week that I need to pay to get it released. I'm fine with paying (it wasn't even that much) but now it STILL hasn't arrived and it's been 3 months since I bought it!

Just for a pouch loom and maru dai mirror the other day. Seems like it took at least 2 months to get here. It was Russia and Covid-19 and not exactly a small package either so it probably sis take that long .

“Pouch loom”...

That’s no way to talk to your mail-order bride Morphy

I so want to post a picture of a crocheted mono-sock but better not.

    Movie credits; I hate them.  Maybe I care about who wrote and directed the film and I certainly want to know the actors who portrayed the main characters but do I really need to know who the 4th lighting director is or the 3rd makeup artist?  I can look these things up on IMDB if I'm curious.  Think of all the movies you've watched and all of the time you've wasted waiting for credits you don't care about to end. 

Rat Man wrote on Feb 4^th, 2021 at 1:29pm:

Movie credits; I hate them.  Maybe I care about who wrote and directed the film and I certainly want to know the actors who portrayed the main characters but do I really need to know who the 4th lighting director is or the 3rd makeup artist?  I can look these things up on IMDB if I'm curious.  Think of all the movies you've watched and all of the time you've wasted waiting for credits you don't care about to end.

Well, at least they're at the end now.  Funny watching Mary Poppins and almost everyone is listed at the beginning.

   Throwing away viable food is a pet peeve of mine.  Why do people eat just the florets of broccoli and cauliflower when the entire plants are edible.  People often throw away the greens of root vegetables like turnips and radishes.  Throwing away the stems and scooping and discarding the gills of mushrooms is nuts.  And peeling potatoes makes no sense because there's more nutrition in the skins then in the rest of the potato.  The seeds of any type of squash are edible.  These are just a few of many examples.  This goes back to me being cheap but wasting food irks my soul.

People that aren’t grateful for heartfelt gifts regardless if they are crap or not. I don’t like ungrateful people. Swallow your pride, it’s the thought that counts.

Morphy wrote on Feb 7^th, 2021 at 3:56pm:

People that aren’t grateful for heartfelt gifts regardless if they are crap or not. I don’t like ungrateful people. Swallow your pride, it’s the thought that counts.

   My sibs and I were raised old school.  No matter what we got we'd have to act happy under penalty of death.  The worst thing for us kids was getting clothes for Christmas or birthdays.  Mom HAD to get us clothes for school anyway.  Every so often we'd open a present from some aunt or uncle and it would be the dreaded clothes.  "Oh, joy."  I don't know if kids still feel the same today but to us it was a total waste of present space. 

Rat Man wrote on Feb 10^th, 2021 at 12:13am:

Morphy wrote on Feb 7th, 2021 at 3:56pm: People that aren’t grateful for heartfelt gifts regardless if they are crap or not. I don’t like ungrateful people. Swallow your pride, it’s the thought that counts.    My sibs and I were raised old school.  No matter what we got we'd have to act happy under penalty of death.  The worst thing for us kids was getting clothes for Christmas or birthdays.  Mom HAD to get us clothes for school anyway.  Every so often we'd open a present from some aunt or uncle and it would be the dreaded clothes.  "Oh, joy."  I don't know if kids still feel the same today but to us it was a total waste of present space.

I’m actually still like that. I love shopping for things like new hiking boots but couldn’t care less about clothes for the most part. 90% of the time I’m in work attire or a hoodie and jeans.

Clothes shopping consists of grabbing anything that looks like it matches throwing it in a cart, trying it on as fast as humanly possible and leaving just as fast. God forbid my wife comes with me. I love her to death but just no.

    When I was a very young man fashion meant something to me.  Since my mid twenties my clothes have been much more about function than form. 

   Lazy jerks who don't shovel their sidewalks or clean their cars off after a heavy snow.  It seems that at every seventh or eighth house the walks aren't shoveled.  I realize that some of the houses might be occupied by a handicapped person or someone who is too old to shovel.  But there aren't enough incapable people to justify the amount of unshoveled sidewalks.  Dammit, I'm sixty six and ten days after major surgery I shoveled my walks and driveway after a fifteen inch snow so I don't want to hear any bullshit.  Get off your lazy arses and clear your sidewalks.  Also, in this sue happy country if you don't shovel your sidewalks and someone slips and falls in front of your house you might just end up in court.
     And after a heavy snowstorm you'll see some jerk driving around with two hundred pounds of snow on his car.  This can be very dangerous to the person driving behind said car.  He can be temporarily blinded or if the snow has had a chance to thaw and refreeze it can take out his windshield.  My state of New Jersey has probably the thickest lawbook in the country.  Many of the laws are superfluous and stupid but we have one that I strongly agree with... that a driver is directly responsible for any damage, injury, or death caused by snow and/or ice coming off of his car. 

     The forty pounds of dog poop that was hidden by the snow that you have to clean up after the snow melts. 

   I appreciate the beauty of nature as much as anyone.  I've always been up for camping, fishing, canoeing, kayaking, hunting when I was young, whatever.  In the army I spent literally months at a time outside and loved it.
    I watch a lot of outdoor shows.  In each and every one that involves people living in the wild this quote always comes up.  "I love living out here because I'm free to do what I want."  YOU'RE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FREAKIN WOODS!! WHAT THE )U(^%$$ CAN YOU DO? 

Rat Man wrote on Mar 24^th, 2021 at 6:12pm:

I appreciate the beauty ofnature as much as anyone.  I've always been up for camping, fishing, canoeing, kayaking, hunting when I was young, whatever.  In the army I spent literally months at a time outside and loved it.     I watch a lot of outdoor shows.  In each and every one that involves people living in the wild this quote always comes up.  "I love living out here because I'm free to do what I want."  YOU'RE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FREAKIN WOODS!! WHAT THE )U(^%$$ CAN YOU DO?

Oddly enough in shows like Alone that seems to be the number one thing that gets to people. So many people give up a chance at half a million dollars and publicity that can be worth far more than that just because they cant take the endless days filled with nothing but themselves.

I read a story about a guy that was a fugitive from the law. He ran into a forest area and dug into the side of a hill (IIRC). He had a perfect hide out and no one could ever find him. Until a year or two later when he just stopped caring about hiding because the boredom was so bad.

I feel like this is similar sensory overload to what we have with food. In modern society we are used to such a wide range of flavors and foods its possible to get appetite fatigue and simply not eat anymore when you are restricted to just a very few things. Ive gone through this myself and its a weird situation. Likewise we are used to always having something to occupy our mind that if we had to live simply like you mentioned it would just about drive us crazy.

Dog poopy in a bag, hanging in a tree !

xud9a - call me zud 👍 wrote on Mar 25^th, 2021 at 9:03am:

Dog poopy in a bag, hanging in a tree !

YES! Hate this. So much.

1. People who dont give credit where it's due. Even if you dont care for someone, if they worked hard on something and accomplished something amazing, swallow your pride, be a man and give them a pat on the back and a "well done".  If the response is "Well it couldve been better" or worse a constant "Ive done better so..."  it makes you seem like a very small person.



2. Also, people that hold grudges for small things. Life is too short. If someone is beating an animal or child and you want to hold a grudge after laying them out I get it. But if someone says something that strikes you wrong be open about it and move on. Dont let it fester. And more importantly dont be so damn sensitive.

I used to be this way years ago but now Im the opposite. Now I might say "@#$% that guy" and then the next day be having an open conversation with them. I think its healthier to let things go but thats just me.

Kick wrote on Mar 25^th, 2021 at 10:13am:

xud9a - call me zud 👍 wrote on Mar 25th, 2021 at 9:03am: Dog poopy in a bag, hanging in a tree ! YES! Hate this. So much.

I agree.  That's just downright rude.

   MonSatan (Monsanto) created the weed killer Roundup.  It turns it Roundup kills people almost as well as it does weeds.  There are currently 20,000 cases in litigation against Monsanto by people with cancer from Roundup. Already two billion dollars in damages have been paid out with ten billion proposed.  As bad as this is it's not what pisses me off.
    To this day Roundup is still on store shelves and PEOPLE ARE STILL BUYING IT.  How (*^%$)&%%$ing stupid can human beings be????

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhRKbOkFMvM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfFdeL4DiGE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-T3qKl6y-c

    People get paid obscene amounts of money for thinking of this garbage.  The first is supremely crass, the second profoundly inane, the third exquisitely aggravating. Anytime a commercial annoys me to this extent I boycott the product.  If everyone did this such commercials would go away.

Edit:  Here's one more I could live without.
https://www.ispot.tv/ad/td_0/always-what-the-gush-moments

Forewarning, this is not in reference to anything that has happened on this forum.  Just something I've come across a few times in the past couple weeks.

There is a post on a forum, and the first person responding to it feels the need to quote the original post.  So the forum thread shows the entire original post twice, pictures and all.  If you are the first person responding to a forum post, you don't need to quote it.  Everyone will already know what you're replying to.

This was a short rant too.  All done.  :D

joe_meadmaker wrote on Jun 13^th, 2021 at 5:48pm:

Everyone will already know what you're replying to.

Not enough people use Mark and Quote. Instead of taking the one part they want to reply to (like I've done :D), they just use Quote which then has that annoying effect of lengthening every post.

    Someone got paid millions of dollars for thinking of this.  Why?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44YYT0mmjSo

@Rat Man - With stuff like that I try not to blame the person who thought it up.  Everyone can have dumb ideas from time to time.  But the guy who said "Yes, I like this idea. Let's do it!", he needs a good smack in the face.

You say that but... It got shared to, of all places, a forum based around slinging and was now seen by someone as far away as Finland. That's reach. The advert worked :D That is to say, it's not about convincing someone of a product but getting recognition and brand awareness.

Yes, Kick. Sadly such inane stupidity works.  Always has.

    Tailgating has to be the dumbest things on earth.  I generally drive slightly above the speed limit. If there are no other vehicles around me I'll drive about six mph over the posted limit.  Unless I'm in a school zone, in which case I always drive the posted limit.  If I'm with a group of vehicles on a highway I'll drive whatever speed the group is going, no matter how fast.  This has served me well.  When I was an MP we wouldn't make a traffic stop until a driver had exceeded the speed limit by 10 mph. 
    Anyway, every once in a while someone behind me will decide that I'm driving too slow.  So to speed me up he or she will drive right up on my rear bumper.  Though I'm too old for road rage fights it's not impossible to anger me to that point.  But what I usually do is take my foot off the gas and gradually drop down to the speed limit. If that doesn't convince the driver to my rear to back off I'll drop down to five mph under the speed limit and there I'll stay. 
    I think that most people have the exact same reaction.  Some will give the offending driver a brake check.  I've been known to do this but these days I try to be more mellow.  Consequently, tailgating makes absolutely no sense.  It ALWAYS makes the front driver go slower, not faster.  Yet people will always tailgate

I was having a driving lesson and some guy was right on my back bumper. I was driving the speed limit because, ya know, it was a driving lesson. My instructor was getting more and more annoyed with this arsehole so just turned and said to me "Look, you shouldn't do this but this guy is being a prick" he reached over and stuck the hazard lights on and very lightly touched the brakes to start slowing down the car. Guy behind quickly pulled out around us and sped off. My instructor turned off the hazards and muttered "Dickhead..."

Tail gaters are literally hitler.

So let me mention the opposite. I used to work in a small mountain town in Utah. As you drove through different parts of the town and places in between the speed limit would go up and down drastically.

One day I was running late for work and trying to get there in good time. There was a karen in the car in front of me who hadnt sped back up to normal levels because she obviously missed the sign or didnt know the area. I sped up a little so she could at least pull off to the side or just take a closer look at the road signs.

But no. That apparently was too much. She slowed down. It was her job to teach me a lesson. Even though she was dead wrong. I sped up more but it was impossible to pass and she just hit the brakes more. Finally I slowed down and after a minute she felt she had taught me my lesson and pulled over. So smug...holy crap it was so infuriating.

Im usually pretty patient with people but the combination of her being wrong, stupid and smug made me want to scream.

   It should be perfectly legal to shoot on sight people who drive twenty mph under the speed limit. 

It has to be close to the same danger as driving 20 over.  Especially when people do it at night or on winding roads.

   Technically a cop can write someone a ticket for driving drastically under the speed limit but they never do. 

Air quality alerts:  Especially during the Summer we get air quality alerts with our weather forecast.  These alerts tell us when the air isn't fit to breathe.  OK, and??????   I haven't had a gas mask since my army days.  I don't own an oxygen tent.  So what do I do with this air quality alert?  Stop breathing for a few days until it's over? 
DUH!

You need to start a business where you fill up compressed air tanks on good air days and then sell them to people on bad air days.  ;)

    Chiggers.  I know I have bitched about them more than once here.  In 2019 I got chiggers twice.  At that point I decided the woods near me was off limits except during cold weather.  And that worked well for me. I hadn't had chiggers since.
     The day before yesterday I was walking one of the dogs... I don't recall which.  I decided to take a little detour through the woods.  I figured it would be safe because I wouldn't be going deep into the woods... the path I chose was just  maybe fifty yards from the street running parallel to it.  And the path was wide with very little brush on it.  So I went for it.  I never stopped or slowed down and wasn't in the woods for more that four or five minutes.  It didn't seem possible that I could get chiggers that way.  But I did.
      I have them on both legs, ankles, feet, my left arm, and body.  There is nothing else to say.  I will suffer for a few more days and from now on avoid the woods COMPLETELY until the colder weather. 

We went out mushroom hunting in the woods a couple of days ago. I was thinking there would be no more mosquitoes. A bit on each hand that are still itchy and raised up. What was worse than that was that the mosquitoes have been replaced with mooseflies. Horrible disgusting little buggers. My wife's uncle asked me to check the back of his shirt once we got back to the summer cottage. He had around 6 crawling around on him. One hit my ear but didn't bite me and my wife had numerous crawling around in her hair. Horrible.

Oh and the dog had 8 ticks on her.

So this is an odd one, but it's been bugging me  all week.

Last Saturday some numpty pranged a brand new 21 reg Lexus hybrid SUV on the bypass.
We're talking 50grands worth of vehicle.

I'm guessing the car had been nicked, otherwise insurance would have recovered it the same day. And keyless entry is so easy to copy that only new cars can be nicked these days.

And for some unknown reason it stayed in the pull in where we enter the dog walks, until yesterday.

So we're looking at at least 5 grand in alloys and tires another couple in the catalytic convertor and God alone knows what the battery pack and engine would fetch.
The bonnet is too bent to close fully, so no real breaking in was necessary to strip the engine.

And nobody touched it !
Not even a broken window.

Now I admit we're not in a city or town, but come on there must be some nere-do-wells around.
It's on the main trunk road literally thousands of cars and trucks go past everyday.
And nobody touched it !

Instead of mugging or burglaring or conning some poor Sod, they could have  just put on a yellow jacket and stripped the car of everything of value.

It's a plain fact that if you put a fluorescent jacket on, you can do anything and nobody will bat an eyelid.
Not only that, but nobody can ever describe someone they saw in a yellow jacket. You just see the jacket and never really register the person wearing it.

But nope, nobody touched any part of the car.
Well it disappeared sometime yesterday, so either the police got round to telling the person it was nicked off, or some enterprising individual took it away on a recovery vehicle :-)

And I know it should make me feel all fuzzy and warm that I live somewhere so crime free.

But swad is a hotbed of drug dealers and drugs gangs.
We have no local police station, so drugs and county lines gangs are all over the place.
We've had a couple drug related murders this year, so we do have more than our fair share of scumbags in the area.

Now if they'd only take up some honest criminality, that car could have meant at least one less drug dealer in the area for a year or so.

So there you have it, my pet peeve this week is that nobody stripped an abandoned car.

The market for drugs is larger than for car parts though :D I do wonder if it's harder to sell car parts these days. So many companies are wanting to lock down repairs to their garages that I can imagine car parts are only going to be used by those company garages that would ask awkward questions and don't even need to buy parts of random people anyway.

Good point, hadn't thought of that.

But surely wheels and tires are a bit more universal ?
I've bought a wheel off eBay, so there's definitely a market.

As it turns out I wasn't the only person who thought it was a poor show by the local lowlife, lol

Not sure if dog walkers are just natural cynics, but I've met a couple of people who had the same opinions

   Two things:  Why do gnats have to fly right in your face?  No other bug does that.  I couldn't begin to count the number of gnats I've accidentally swallowed in my lifetime.
    And as many of you know I prefer cooler weather.  The older I get the more so.  When I was a kid it would be cool by now.  We'd be into real Fall.  It's going up to 86 F (30 C) today.  It looks like real Fall weather won't arrive until some time in October.  I am jonesing for cold weather.  I hate having to wait longer and longer for it each year. 

Edit:  Real Fall didn't arrive here in  New Jersey until November this year.

Rat Man wrote on Sep 18^th, 2021 at 1:36pm:

Why do gnats have to fly right in your face?

Yes!  I've often wondered, with the whole world out there to fly around in, why is it right in my face that the stupid bug wants to be?

It's because, like mosquitos, they home in on sources of carbon dioxide.
And where does the c02 in a human come from ?
Your face :-)

Unlike the blackfly in canada, that get into every single orifice !
And bite like a bastard.
Definitely the most evil insects I've personally encountered !

The midges in scotland are bad, but mere amateurs in comparison to the canadian blackfly. 

My current peev is that the sun is coming through the window in front of me, bouncing off my t-shirt and making the monitor really difficult to see lol

I think I'll go have lunch instead :-)

Curious Aardvark wrote on Sep 19^th, 2021 at 8:58am:

It's because, like mosquitos, they home in on sources of carbon dioxide. And where does the c02 in a human come from ? Your face :-) Unlike the blackfly in canada, that get into every single orifice ! And bite like a bastard. Definitely the most evil insects I've personally encountered ! The midges in scotland are bad, but mere amateurs in comparison to the canadian blackfly.  My current peev is that the sun is coming through the window in front of me, bouncing off my t-shirt and making the monitor really difficult to see lol I think I'll go have lunch instead :-)

   In that Chiggers aren't insects, they're Arthropods, I'll give you that Blackflies are the most evil insect.  They can make you run for your life.  Greenheads are up there among the worst also.  Ask anyone who is familiar with the Jersey Shore.  Greenhead bites sting like hell and draw blood, they are big, can bite you through clothing, they seem to like insect repellent, swarm in big numbers, and if you don't smack them really hard they'll get up and smack you right back.  They are truly vile bug.

https://bitingflytrap.com/blogs/news/5-facts-you-didn-t-know-about-greenheads

chiggers can't fly.
So you know, wellies will prevent chigger bites (probably) but nothing short of a full hazmat suit will deter blackfly :-)

Damn - giant, super fast horseflies - yeah those greenhead buggers sound bad !

Our horseflies tend moe towards stealth mode, and you don't know you;ve been bitten till the buggers leave. Then it hurts.

You can keep the greenheads :-)

What you want is a tennis racket with fine mesh, and: Serve !

For the most part  the American medical system

Badmitten racquets work well on deer flies. Smaller than moose and horse flies. VetRyan must know about them now that he is living in Maine.

Curious Aardvark wrote on Sep 20^th, 2021 at 11:55am:

chiggers can't fly. So you know, wellies will prevent chigger bites (probably) but nothing short of a full hazmat suit will deter blackfly :-) Damn - giant, super fast horseflies - yeah those greenhead buggers sound bad ! Our horseflies tend moe towards stealth mode, and you don't know you;ve been bitten till the buggers leave. Then it hurts. You can keep the greenheads :-) What you want is a tennis racket with fine mesh, and: Serve !

      FYI Wellies won't protect you from Chiggers.  They'll climb over the top and get down inside your Wellies and bite your ankles anyway.  Also they are interested in more than just your feet and legs.  They will bite you everywhere.  And their bites will itch for four or five days and scar for months.  That said, we're still in agreement that at least for the short term Blackflies are worse... slightly.  Both are bugs from hell. 

    There are plenty of Deerflies here in Jersey too.  During very hot Summers they get really bad. 

walter wrote on Sep 21^st, 2021 at 8:27pm:

Badmitten racquets work well on deer flies. Smaller than moose and horse flies. VetRyan must know about them now that he is living in Maine.

Yes we do. They sell em everywhere up here, fly swatters, that look like tennis racquets but u press and hold a button.  Its electrified. $5. So much fun. Catching em and frying em. The bigger they are, they will start popping and catching on fire, smell bad. We got black flies, green flies. Deer flies,  moose flies. They get bigger towards the end of season, and hurt more. We do have sections of seasons where we have to bring out our completely mesh suits just to tolerate outside.  Including the mosquitos., they will come out during the winter on a 40 degree day

Junk mail:  I get probably several hundred pounds of it per year.  I already shop at discount stores and super markets like Save A Lot, so I don't want or need the coupons.  I don't eat out at restaurants due to Covid so all of those advertisements are useless.  I don't need new windows, or anyone to cut my trees, or a new roof, or a new heater, or a warranty on my car, I don't want solar panels, I don't want to sell my house, I'm not going to switch to your bank or insurance company, I can't afford a new car or truck, I don't want you to spread chemicals all over my lawn, I already know who I'm voting for, I can clean my own gutters, I don't need life insurance or insurance on my appliances, etc., etc..   I almost never read junk mail but it's always there.  What a tragic waste of trees and energy. 

Edit: junk mail isn't a total waste.  I use it to line the bottom of my snake's aquarium and to start my backyard fires in the colder weather. But the vast majority of it goes into the recycling bin.

     When you're opening a can of sardines, or any other zip top can for that matter, and the tab breaks off in your hand before the top is opened.  I'm sure this has happened to everyone here.  It never fails to conjure up my best curse words. 

Rat Man wrote on Nov 16^th, 2021 at 4:42pm:

When you're opening a can of sardines, or any other zip top can for that matter, and the tab breaks off in your hand before the top is opened.  I'm sure this has happened to everyone here.  It never fails to conjure up my best curse words.

Somewhat in the same vein, we get oat milk and one of the brands (made for coffee so really creamy and delicious) has the stupidest lid design in the world. With oat milk you have to shake it up to stop it settling and a few drops get caught in the seal design so, if you don't open it very carefully and are prepared, you are guaranteed to get drops of oat milk everywhere every time you open it. It's so annoying because other designs exist, work great and don't get oat milk everywhere!

    This is more another source of amusement than a peeve but many of my neighbors have huge tractor type riding mowers.  This in itself is no big deal but most of the yards in this neighborhood are very small,  like a quarter to a half acre.  Many of these people barely have room to turn their mowers around. 

When someone starts a new thread without looking to see if it’s already been brought up before.  People who do that are big jerks.

   People who think New Jersey people all talk with a Brooklyn accent.  TV perpetuates this myth with shows like Jersey Shore.  In my entire life I have never met a native Jerseyite who spoke with a Brooklyn accent.  Not one.  Ever. In south and central Jersey we speak with a Philadelphia accent. 
     On a side note I grew up thinking there was no such thing as a Philadelphia accent.  We didn't have an accent; everyone else did.  I left the area for three years when I joined the army.  When I returned one of the first things I noticed was how thick a Philadelphia accent my father had.  I'm like "Dad, when did you start talking differently?"

    Fine print.  Recently while trying to fix a computer glitch I had to find its serial number.  I finally located it after much difficulty.  An ant would need glasses to read it.  My eyes have never been great but with my glasses I can see reasonably well.  I had to use two magnifying glasses and even then I could barely see the number and wasn't sure I was reading it correctly.
    Often instructions on medication bottles are written in the same microscopic print.  Most of the time you're attempting to read these instructions you're in a great deal of pain.  There is nothing like trying to read the dosage off of a bottle of headache medicine while you have a splitting migraine. 
   Why not just make the print a size that normal human beings can read?

    My late wife Marie loved the show NCIS and all of its offshoots.  Having been an MP the show drives me crazy.  NCIS stands for Naval Criminal Investigative Service, emphasis on Naval.  I the army we had MPI or Military Police Investigation.  They are both the next step up from the military cop on the street.  They take investigations one step farther than the street cop has time for. 
    The Posse Comitatus Act bars federal troops from participating in civilian law enforcement except when expressly authorized by law.  In other words unless we're under martial law NCIS has no authority whatsoever over civilians. None. Yet ever week there they are on that idiotic show violating the Posse Comitatus Act, enforcing civilian law.  Every single week. 

Mushy apples.

Powdered Wigs.  Does anything on earth look more idiotic?  I did some research to find out how the practice of wearing powdered wigs started.  It seems that in the 1400s there was a Syphilis outbreak in the Western world that left people with irregular hair loss.  Consequently people began wearing wigs.  Since only the rich could afford wigs they soon became a status symbol.  Fair enough.  But why were people still wearing them three hundred years later?  God only knows.  Bad fashion is bad fashion no matter the century.  I prefer irregular hair loss. 

---

As a hair disabled man I am going to bring powdered wigs to America as the newest fad. Hair has been the fad for the last several hundred thousand years. Its time people let go of this chidish trend and got powdered wigs. Thats what women really want. They are just too shy to admit it.

@RatMan I'm sitting here chuckling to myself that you feel so strongly indignant about something that occurred hundreds of years ago... Mostly because I feel the same way about many other very inconsequential things. Lol.

But you are also right. Nothing looks more terrible.

Morphy wrote on Apr 21^st, 2022 at 1:24pm:

As a hair disabled man I am going to bring powdered wigs to America as the newest fad.

I fully support this.

"Pies" with only a top crust.  A pie is incased in crust.  Putting a piece of baked pastry dough on top of a bowl of stew doesn't make it a pie.

Well Ratman, I agree about pie.  Pie is encased in crust -- top bottom and sides.  Classic British "picnic pies",  steak& kidney, real shepherd's pie, real cottage pie, etc,  Not the ones with just a layer of mash or puff pastry on top.

Tarts are topless, with sides, not flat like pizza or flatbread with stuff scattered on top. 

Fake Curlys.  After Curly's death Shemp filled in for a while.  This was fine because Shemp was one of the original Stooges and he was great.  Then the powers that be decided they needed a new Curly-like character.  There was Joe Besser and Curly Joe Derita.  They both sucked.  Curly couldn't be replaced.  They should have left it at that.  I guess Curly Joe was less obnoxious than Besser but they were both awful and to this day I won't watch any Stooge episode with fake Curlys in it. 

---

Rat Man wrote on Feb 1^st, 2023 at 1:21pm:

Curly couldn't be replaced.

100% spot on!

Yoko Ono.
     First, let me say that there is something to be said for pulling the wool over someone's eyes.  Take the Kardashians... please!  Here is an entire clan with no talent at anything whatsoever who got rich and famous on marketing alone.  Though I have never watched one episode and never will I respect their ingenuity. 
      Dak Prescot.  Here is a slightly better than average quarterback, a Black Tony Romo if you will, who managed to somehow convince senile Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to give him elite quarterback money.  Bravo!! Excellent scam!!
       Then there's Yoko.  Why does she irk me when characters like those mentioned above don't?  Because she fooled no one but herself and John Lennon. She fancies herself a misunderstood musical genius.  To the rest of the planet she's a screeching banshee without a hint of talent. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpX1wBrCymo

Yoko Ono didnt belong in the 60s. She was way ahead of her time. That's the kind of craziness you would expect to see in our current year.

Morphy wrote on Aug 5^th, 2023 at 1:38pm:

Yoko Ono didnt belong in the 60s. She was way ahead of her time. That's the kind of craziiness you would expect to see in our current year.

Imagine if Tiny Tim was just getting his start now. 

    I found this... Yoko actually singing and not bellowing like a Billy Goat on LSD.  She has an adequate but not great singing voice. Until I saw this I didn't think she knew what a tune was. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaizNVbic_k

When you click on a YouTube (or whatever) video that is "documentary" in nature, but the speaker/narrator is mispronouncing the name of the person, place, etc.  My first thought is always, if you can't even pronounce the name of the thing, why should I trust anything you're telling me about it?

Now there is the caveat that words can be pronounced differently depending where you're located.  Or sometime the person may have looked for the pronunciation of a word and just found incorrect information.  But I still usually end up clicking off the video.  The most recent one that triggered this thought was a video on Myth Busters.  The speaker mispronounced Jamie's last name.  Clicked to another video immediately.

joe_meadmaker wrote on Aug 14^th, 2023 at 8:15pm:

When you click on a YouTube (or whatever) video that is "documentary" in nature, but the speaker/narrator is mispronouncing the name of the person, place, etc.  My first thought is always, if you can't even pronounce the name of the thing, why should I trust anything you're telling me about it?

Yep. Definitely agree.

I've grown up with the Finnish and Yooper pronunciation of sauna (s-ow-na), so the other pronunciation (saw-na) has always annoyed me a bit. But I guess how you pronounce sauna would depend on where you live.

And then there's pronunciation in JRR Tolkien's books. The most common mispronounciations seem to be for the names Smaug or Sauron. The Silmarillion or Return of the King appendices have a pronunciation guide if I'm not mistaken.

That also reminds me of a college graduation I one saw. I forget where it was, but the person reading names was mispronouncing a lot of them, even common and easy names.

Cable companies like Comcast who offer fantastic deals to new customers but give absolutely nothing to those who have been with them for forty years.

Absolutely agree.  And it's doubled down when you're in an area where Comcast is the only option.  So there's no direct competition to switch to.

joe_meadmaker wrote on Sep 10^th, 2023 at 11:50pm:

Absolutely agree.  And it's doubled down when you're in an area where Comcast is the only option.  So there's no direct competition to switch to.

A few years ago I was paying $248.00 a month for just Cable TV and a DVR with no pay channels.  I can remember paying ten bucks a month for Cable TV.  I knew nothing about streaming but ex-roomie Mike did.  He set me up with a FireStick.  I dumped Cable TV but kept Comcast internet because there is no other option here.  Also for thirty bucks I bought a digital antenna mostly so I could get my Eagles games for free. 
   So right now I have the antenna and the FireStick with Prime, Discovery + and Paramount.  Since I still get Comcast internet I get their X-box for free which opens up another world.  And since I have a Roku Smart TV I also get Roku TV. 
    I have ten times what I could possibly watch for less than half of what I was paying before.  To heck with Cable TV.

Edit:  Paramount+ now includes Shotime so I get that too.

I went through a similar thing.  When I first bought my house, I got signed up for Comcast with the awesome entry deal.  Free HBO for 2 years and everything.  After two years the bill went up $20.  I called and asked them if that's where it would stay.  They told me that after another year it would go up another $20.  I kept the Internet because I don't have any other options, but cancelled all the TV services.  I have a digital antenna to get the local stations.  But I'm not signed up for any streaming TV/movie services.  YouTube is basically my television.

YouTube has lots of great content.  I use it for all of my music plus it has great documentaries.  And of course much more.  I stubbornly refused to upgrade to YouTube Premium because I had been getting it free since the beginning.  I tried Premium on a free special and have never looked back.  In that it's something I use constantly it's well worth the money. 

Why would anyone in their right mind want to do that to perfectly good Irish Whiskey? 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iA8CrWOMN1U

That's pretty much the thing now.  Fruit and other flavors in beer, spirits, seltzers, etc.  For better or for worse, that's what people are buying.

joe_meadmaker wrote on Sep 20^th, 2023 at 9:16pm:

That's pretty much the thing now.  Fruit and other flavors in beer, spirits, seltzers, etc.  For better or for worse, that's what people are buying.

The only thing I might want in my whiskey is a little ice.

   Boxed macaroni and cheese with powdered cheese.  The only good thing I can say about it is that it's cheap.  It always tastes literally like cardboard whatever the brand. 

Real macaroni and cheese with real cheese is always the best, but I still prefer the powdered cheese to the velveeta-like cheese.

Rat Man wrote on Sep 21^st, 2023 at 4:48pm:

The only thing I might want in my whiskey is a little ice.

I'm with you there.  For whiskey (or whisky :)) I usually do neat or an ice cube just to chill it a bit and tone down the flavor with a little water.  I usually pull the cube out before it's melted though.

Anything else (like vodka, rum, or gin) I'll mix.  I actually just had a gin and ginger ale for the first time in my life last weekend.  Just one of those things I never tried.

Eino wrote on Sep 21^st, 2023 at 7:32pm:

Real macaroni and cheese with real cheese is always the best, but I still prefer the powdered cheese to the velveeta-like cheese.

I was raised on Velveeta.  Believe it or not I like it.

Everyone knows by now that stupid commercials annoy the fudge out of me.  Here's Jersey Mike's.  Their claim to fame is that their meats are sliced "fresh" right in front of you.  In the first place, every deli I've ever bought from in my entire life has sliced the cold cuts when ordered.  Secondly,  how does slicing something in front of you prove it's fresh? That hunk of meat could have been sitting in the display case for nine months for all you know.  DUH!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzfhvO-2MP4

Agreed.  Slicing in front of you certainly doesn't prove it's fresh.  Another thing is if they slice the meat while you're there, that means you have to wait for them to do that.

Quick story about another sandwich chain.  I was at a Jimmy John's one time.  The guy at the counter and the two guys who made the sandwich had a little race going on.  Once an order was put in, the guys making the sandwich tried to have it ready before the guy at the counter had me rung up.  And they did it.  I don't think it was a regular thing, just something for fun they were doing that day.  But that would be something to promote.  'Your sandwich will be ready and waiting before you get your change'

Speaking of inane commercials, here's Cascade's "dare to dish differently" commercial.  Here they twist their premise that running your dishwasher uses less water and energy than hand washing into sounding like running your dishwasher half full is somehow more economical. 
    Running your dishwasher when it's half full will use twice the water and energy as running it when it's full.  DUH!  They're not interested in conserving anything.  They're interested in selling you twice as much Cascade. 
    The sad thing is that across America there are probably countless millions of brainless morons who now run their dishwasher half full and believe they're somehow saving money by daring to dish differently. 
     I hate stupid commercials. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W522p9vLjHI

joe_meadmaker wrote on Sep 21^st, 2023 at 7:37pm:

Rat Man wrote on Sep 21st, 2023 at 4:48pm: The only thing I might want in my whiskey is a little ice. I'm with you there.  For whiskey (or whisky :)) I usually do neat or an ice cube just to chill it a bit and tone down the flavor with a little water.  I usually pull the cube out before it's melted though. Anything else (like vodka, rum, or gin) I'll mix.  I actually just had a gin and ginger ale for the first time in my life last weekend.  Just one of those things I never tried.

   Speaking of doing bizarre crap to whiskey, here's Screwball peanutbutter whiskey.  That sounds ghastly.  I think you'd really have to hate whiskey to do that to it.

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What you need is a nice chocolate porter or stout.  One that's really chocolaty.  Then drop yourself a shot of that whiskey in and you've got a chocolate-peanut butter boilermaker!

I did that once with a caramel whiskey.  It tasted pretty awesome.  Definitely tasted way better than it had any right to.

    It's probably me.  I guess I'm a purist when it comes to whiskey. 

   Yes, this has already been mentioned.  But it's a biggie.  Christmas commercials.  On their own they're obnoxious enough.  But starting them three weeks before Thanksgiving is over the top.  There really should be a law against it... no damned Christmas before Thanksgiving under penalty of beheading.  I'll bet 90% of America would vote for that.  So far I've heard Amazon and iphone Christmas commercials.  The onslaught begins.

We have a major radio station here in Houston that plays nothing but Christmas music for it seems like a month and a half before Christmas. Thats too much. I enjoy Christmas music but 2-3 weeks before Christmas should be max.

Holidays are just too commercialized nowadays.

Rat Man wrote on Oct 7^th, 2023 at 12:54pm:

Everyone knows by now that stupid commercials annoy the fudge out of me.  Here's Jersey Mike's.  Their claim to fame is that their meats are sliced "fresh" right in front of you.  In the first place, every deli I've ever bought from in my entire life has sliced the cold cuts when ordered.  Secondly,  how does slicing something in front of you prove it's fresh? That hunk of meat could have been sitting in the display case for nine months for all you know.  DUH! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzfhvO-2MP4

This has nothing to do with pet peeves, but last week during the Eagles/Cowturds game a friend brought me a Jersey Mike's Italian hoagie.  It wasn't the best hoagie I ever had but it certainly was good.  B+ to A-.... well crafted sandwich.  But their commercials are still stupid. 

Pee pads:
Say you just got a new puppy.  One of the first things you'll want to do is housebreak him, for obvious reasons.  Including my current crew I've had eleven dogs so I know about housebreaking them.  Though some dogs are more stubborn than others it's usually not that difficult a process.  Take the pup outside MANY times a day. When he does his business outside praise him lavishly.  When he goes in the house it's not necessary to rub his nose in it and hit him.  That's the old way.  Show him the spot where he went and let him know verbally that you're displeased.  Then immediately take him outside.  When he first wakes up in the morning get him outside quickly.  If he looks like he's even thinking about going then get him outside.  In the beginning you'll be taking him out dozens of times a day.  Dogs are generally smart.  He'll pick it up in a few days.  There will be a few missteps but he'll quickly get it.
     I don't understand pee pads.  I think their use is insane, yet many people use them.  By using them you're telling your pup that it's OK to go inside while you're trying to teach him to never go inside.  What am I missing?

Biting your own tongue.  I can think of few things that make me angrier. 

   Vicks Pure Zzzs.  Why bother with bedtime stories or songs.  Why bother parenting at all.  Just give your children drugs every night of their lives to get them to sleep. 
    Vicks will defend themselves by saying that Melatonin isn't a drug.  Below is the dictionary definition of a drug.  Melatonin IS MOST DEFINITELY A DRUG.  "Well, it's all natural!"  So is opium.  Please don't drug your children to get them to sleep. 

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