RE: OT Pet Peeves (Full Version)

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Treetop64 -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 2:46:52 AM)

Leaf blowers. Hate those damn things.

I live across the street from a care home, and the minions who work there often feel the need to come out in the afternoon or early evening to blow a few leaves and acorns around for the next few hours. I have fantasies of boldly walking across the street with a sledgehammer, snatching the noisemaker from the minion's grasp, throwing it on the ground, and duly beating the thing into a smoking pile of junk before cooly returning to my residence to enjoy some peace and quiet...




Zap -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 12:16:12 PM)

I really,really like this thread.




Lecivius -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 1:15:55 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Treetop64

Leaf blowers. Hate those damn things.

I live across the street from a care home, and the minions who work there often feel the need to come out in the afternoon or early evening to blow a few leaves and acorns around for the next few hours. I have fantasies of boldly walking across the street with a sledgehammer, snatching the noisemaker from the minion's grasp, throwing it on the ground, and duly beating the thing into a smoking pile of junk before cooly returning to my residence to enjoy some peace and quiet...


Call the cops. Believe it or not, that is considered Disturbing The Peace. Then THEY will come to YOU <evil laugh> [sm=00000055.gif]




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 2:29:40 PM)

More on car commercials. This year I think I saw one Kia commercial that talked about features and benefits. All the rest are about how great the car looks. The truth is they look like crap, and like each other. Cars flying through the air like that one with the guy who has his lips glued wide open talking about "excitement!" in front of what looks like a skateboard park with cars ramping into the air with grinning idiots in them. How about the "That's not a Buick!" with the old lady in the passenger seat looking at the glovebox saying "Ohh Myyyy!" Is the glovebox full of fudge brownies? Or the "It's good to be bad" commercials. Wha? And it's pronounced jagwar, not jag-you-are, Brits.




Lecivius -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 3:35:08 PM)

I saw a KIA commercial this morning that had a lady baking a pie. I just sat there for a minute thinking Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?!? [&:]




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 3:57:32 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Lecivius

I saw a KIA commercial this morning that had a lady baking a pie. I just sat there for a minute thinking Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?!? [&:]


Yeah, wtf? Why wasn't it a hamster baking a pie?




witpqs -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 4:13:48 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert


quote:

ORIGINAL: Lecivius

I saw a KIA commercial this morning that had a lady baking a pie. I just sat there for a minute thinking Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?!? [&:]


Yeah, wtf? Why wasn't it a hamster baking a pie?

Ooh! Remember that Superbowl commercial a long time back for a .com shortly before the big .com bust? It was a cannon shooting a hamster at an opening in a wall but it kept missing and splattering the hamster on the wall. They spent massive money to get noticed and didn't tell anyone who saw their advertisement what product they provided![sm=crazy.gif]




Symon -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 4:42:28 PM)

Telemarketers.

[image]local://upfiles/43462/6ACE35965A8148879337EEEFF6CFA4DF.jpg[/image]




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 5:28:35 PM)

Here's another peeve. Angus beef. What's the big deal? Did our lives change when fast food co.s started selling it? Losing perfectly good breeds because of this fad that was not started by consumers will lead to inbreeding. Some sellers say on their labels that the meat contained therein is 100% Angus. That's impossible for them to know and the American Angus Association certifies that beef is Angus if it appears to be "51%" (give or take ???) Angus. Here's what the test boils down to, if it has no horns and has a largely black coat, it's certified. In other words there is no real test. Anyone thinking marketing gimmick?

Similarly, tomatoes. If you're not growing them yourself the ones you can buy today have little taste. They bred them to not bruise in shipping and to stay ripe for a longer period, not to taste good. If you are growing them yourself put mosquito netting over them and pollinate them by hand so that the insect pollinators do not bring the crap tomato pollen to your crop. When I was growing up in farm country the tomatoes were amazing. Sigh. My brother and pretty much all the kids his age during the summer would hand harvest corn, riding in tractor pulled wagons. They weren't farmer's kids but USAF kids and city kids. The farmers really needed the help and the kids didn't cost much.




bomccarthy -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 8:38:48 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

Anyways, time to move on to my next pet peeve. Car commercials. (A sentence made of two nouns? How do you diagram that? If you don't know what sentence diagramming is/was, be thankful. The CIA considered using it on Al Qaeda instead of water boarding.) About three years back you would never see a car commercial that didn't have the car being sold moving in slow motion sideways. When I drive I like it when I point the front wheels forward the car goes forward, not sideways and not in slow motion. Surely they didn't sell any cars that year? Did government regulation allow that sort of car? [&:]


Now that’s part of a genre for selling performance. It’s called drifting – the figure skating of the automotive sports world, or how 16-year-old boys (and those with the same level of maturity) think you drive when trying to get around a corner faster than anyone else. Seriously, the winner of a professional drifting competition is selected by a panel of judges.

Car commercials from the 60s and early 70s didn’t feature four-wheel drifts on pavement because with flexible frames (compared to today), crude suspension designs, solid rear axles and skinny tires the typical American muscle car from that era looked hilariously sloppy when it broke traction on pavement – not the image the manufacturers were trying to sell. Hal Needham and the Dukes of Hazzard realized this and put all their drifting action on dirt roads.

Most performance car commercials produced in the past 10 years take their cues from the first BMW “film”, directed by Guy Ritchie and released in 2001 (if I recall correctly): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88b_gqlkcMg A 9-minute commercial spot featuring Clive Owen and an obnoxious backseat passenger in an M5, this spot was unique in its time as the first major car commercial available only on the Web. Filmed on a weekend morning in downtown LA, the spot depicts how well an M5 would handle outrageous driving on city streets. It didn’t appeal to the average Camry driver, but BMW didn’t sell its cars to Camry drivers (it was just beginning to make trucks, er, SUVs).




bomccarthy -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 8:47:23 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

More on car commercials. This year I think I saw one Kia commercial that talked about features and benefits. All the rest are about how great the car looks. The truth is they look like crap, and like each other. Cars flying through the air like that one with the guy who has his lips glued wide open talking about "excitement!" in front of what looks like a skateboard park with cars ramping into the air with grinning idiots in them. How about the "That's not a Buick!" with the old lady in the passenger seat looking at the glovebox saying "Ohh Myyyy!" Is the glovebox full of fudge brownies? Or the "It's good to be bad" commercials. Wha? And it's pronounced jagwar, not jag-you-are, Brits.


Be honest -- you're really Lewis Black, aren't you? You're just using polite language for this forum. You did a great show in D.C. a few years ago.

Here's another car rant -- when did it become proper to pronounce Porsche with one syllable? I am inclined to blame Jeremy Clarkson for this.




wdolson -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/17/2015 10:08:04 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Treetop64

Leaf blowers. Hate those damn things.

I live across the street from a care home, and the minions who work there often feel the need to come out in the afternoon or early evening to blow a few leaves and acorns around for the next few hours. I have fantasies of boldly walking across the street with a sledgehammer, snatching the noisemaker from the minion's grasp, throwing it on the ground, and duly beating the thing into a smoking pile of junk before cooly returning to my residence to enjoy some peace and quiet...


The only leaf blowing in our neighborhood is around dinner time on Fridays. A bunch of our neighbors use the same lawn service and they are the only ones who use leaf blowers. Our lawn guy uses an old fashioned rake.

What was far more annoying was a neighbor we had a few years back. He had a monster truck with a diesel engine and it sounded like he had removed or tampered with the muffler. On cold mornings he would start his truck about 4:30 AM and leave it idling in the driveway for at least 1/2 hour before driving off. The thing was so loud I could hear him accelerating from every stop sign for many blocks as he made his way down the hill. My SO got a dB meter and measured 80 dB at her pillow. She was going to contact the city with a noise complaint, but the guy moved.

I could usually get back to sleep until he left, but she's a lot more noise sensitive when sleeping than I am. I'd usually woke up again when he left though.

They also had a small dog who would cry in distress too. The house has an upstairs deck and the dog was locked out there for about 8 hours once with no food or water. They took off and left him. We called animal control and they said nobody was home but they would be back the next day if the dog was still there. They got home about 2 AM and let the poor dog in.

The dog got out several times too. I'd briefly talk to his daughters or wife when taking the dog back and they seemed very beaten down. I seem to be the one who catches the dogs in this neighborhood when they get loose. Dogs instinctively love my SO, but they seem to come to me too.

The current neighbors in that house have a bazillion kids (I honestly am not sure how many they have it's at least 4, but I think more like 6 or 7, they range from approaching school age to almost middle school). One of the kid is learning the trumpet and is not very good at it. They are far more quiet than the guy with his monster truck.

Bill




wdolson -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/18/2015 12:38:21 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

Here's another peeve. Angus beef. What's the big deal? Did our lives change when fast food co.s started selling it? Losing perfectly good breeds because of this fad that was not started by consumers will lead to inbreeding. Some sellers say on their labels that the meat contained therein is 100% Angus. That's impossible for them to know and the American Angus Association certifies that beef is Angus if it appears to be "51%" (give or take ???) Angus. Here's what the test boils down to, if it has no horns and has a largely black coat, it's certified. In other words there is no real test. Anyone thinking marketing gimmick?

Similarly, tomatoes. If you're not growing them yourself the ones you can buy today have little taste. They bred them to not bruise in shipping and to stay ripe for a longer period, not to taste good. If you are growing them yourself put mosquito netting over them and pollinate them by hand so that the insect pollinators do not bring the crap tomato pollen to your crop. When I was growing up in farm country the tomatoes were amazing. Sigh. My brother and pretty much all the kids his age during the summer would hand harvest corn, riding in tractor pulled wagons. They weren't farmer's kids but USAF kids and city kids. The farmers really needed the help and the kids didn't cost much.


Most fruits meat is true to the plant/tree it came from regardless of the pollen source. Is it different for tomatoes?

Home grown fruit in most cases is superior to anything you can get in the store. Especially stone fruit. Growing up in Los Angeles we had a Santa Rosa plum tree in our back yard that produced the most fantastic plums imaginable. When I moved to Seattle I found some in the store and tried them, they were a massive disappointment, they had been picked way too green.

The trees will grow in the Northwest, but the springs are too cold for bees when the trees bloom, so they don't produce as well. I had one in Seattle and it produced some every year and one year when we had a very early spring, it was loaded. When we moved to Portland, I put one in here too. It was a spotty producer, but I'd have a week or two of ambrosia on a pit every summer. I planted another couple of plum trees 3 years ago to try and help with cross pollination. Then 2 years ago I started getting mason bees every spring. They operate in colder temperatures than honey bees and they did a wonder pollinating the older plum tree. It's set a ton of fruit the last three years. Last year we lost a lot of the crop to a hail storm in May (rare around here), but the remaining plums got massive. 2 years ago I was giving hug bags of plums to the neighbors every day. One neighbor liked them so much he planted two of them himself.

Now this year the younger trees are producing too and one of them appears to be a big producer. In a few weeks I think I'm going to have to prop up some branches or they will break.

We have outstanding soil here. This property was a dairy farm for about 70 years before it was sub-divided. The soil several feet down is still about 50% manure. The trees root into that and take off (I have a bunch of other fruit trees too).

I frequently look at fruit trees when I pass the bare root trees in the store just to check out what they have. I always look to see if they have a Santa Rosa plum. In my 27 years in the Northwest, I have only seen Santa Rosas twice in nurseries and it was when I was actually looking for one to plant. Odd that.

If anyone lives in a climate where its warm enough for the bees to be out in early March and some space, I recommend a Santa Rosa plum tree. When tree ripened, they are quite possibly the best fruit in the world. That opinion is shared by about 90% of the people I give the plums to.

Anyway, I don't do much with tomatoes. I don't like raw tomatoes and my SO is allergic to raw tomatoes. I do grow Romas and make homemade marinara sauce. Both of us like the homemade stuff better than anything we've found store bought. My tomato vines have set some fruit already, but they aren't done blooming yet.

Bill




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/18/2015 5:25:13 PM)

I used to grow big beefsteak tomatoes but they don't seem as acid as they used to be. Could be I'm just getting old I suppose. Old people start turning back into kids and eat stuff like Chef Boy-ar-dee and candy and crap like that. [:D] St. Louis moved south a few years back as far as planting zones go. The summer before last I think there was a stretch of six weeks where the temperature topped 100° F every day. A lot of things I used to grow won't anymore. Okra is wooden no matter when you pick them. I've tried two years in a row to grow rhubarb, it comes out of the ground and just withers. I have a friend who gave up on tomatoes too. Hot peppers grow fine (I particularly like the jalapenos) and I have some blackberry plants going. Roses still grow well (some hybrids). I used to grow squash and zucchini, might try that again. Most herbs do fine or at least in spring and fall. Tomatillos do ok.




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/18/2015 7:42:20 PM)

Another pet peeve doesn't come to mind right now so I'll post a joke.

What does an Inuit wear when relaxing in the igloo?

An eskimono.

What does an Inuit wear when reading a book while puffing on his pipe?

An eskimoking jacket.




wdolson -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/19/2015 2:41:50 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

I used to grow big beefsteak tomatoes but they don't seem as acid as they used to be. Could be I'm just getting old I suppose. Old people start turning back into kids and eat stuff like Chef Boy-ar-dee and candy and crap like that. [:D] St. Louis moved south a few years back as far as planting zones go. The summer before last I think there was a stretch of six weeks where the temperature topped 100° F every day. A lot of things I used to grow won't anymore. Okra is wooden no matter when you pick them. I've tried two years in a row to grow rhubarb, it comes out of the ground and just withers. I have a friend who gave up on tomatoes too. Hot peppers grow fine (I particularly like the jalapenos) and I have some blackberry plants going. Roses still grow well (some hybrids). I used to grow squash and zucchini, might try that again. Most herbs do fine or at least in spring and fall. Tomatillos do ok.


Last summer we had the Blob off our coast which was a large pool of stagnant surface water that got warm and didn't move for about 9 months. It looks like it's reforming this year. It caused an unusually warm summer last year, especially the evenings.

Since about 2005 the Northwest has generally been cooler than it was from 1975-2005. We had one summer where we didn't have the first day over 70 F until around mid-June and we only had something like 2 days over 90 F. The springs were also very wet and cold.

I read a weather blog written by a professor at the U of Washington. He's pointed out the Blob is a phenomenon never seen before. The weather off the Pacific the last two winters has been so weird, there is no historical data to compare it to. Another weird thing is east of the Cascades precipitation levels have been normal or above normal, but over the Cascades and west precipitation has been barely normal or below. We had an early spring this year and it's a lot warmer than usual for June. The blueberries are already ripening and we usually don't see them until mid-July.

It looks like we're going to have a bumper crop of everything this year.

And around here, nobody tries to cultivate blackberries. There is no point, they grow wild in such abundance you can eat your fill just about anywhere. We have two massive blackberry patches one about 50 feet south of our property and another about 40 feet west.

Bill




witpqs -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/19/2015 4:45:35 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: wdolson


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

I used to grow big beefsteak tomatoes but they don't seem as acid as they used to be. Could be I'm just getting old I suppose. Old people start turning back into kids and eat stuff like Chef Boy-ar-dee and candy and crap like that. [:D] St. Louis moved south a few years back as far as planting zones go. The summer before last I think there was a stretch of six weeks where the temperature topped 100° F every day. A lot of things I used to grow won't anymore. Okra is wooden no matter when you pick them. I've tried two years in a row to grow rhubarb, it comes out of the ground and just withers. I have a friend who gave up on tomatoes too. Hot peppers grow fine (I particularly like the jalapenos) and I have some blackberry plants going. Roses still grow well (some hybrids). I used to grow squash and zucchini, might try that again. Most herbs do fine or at least in spring and fall. Tomatillos do ok.


Last summer we had the Blob off our coast which was a large pool of stagnant surface water that got warm and didn't move for about 9 months. It looks like it's reforming this year. It caused an unusually warm summer last year, especially the evenings.

Since about 2005 the Northwest has generally been cooler than it was from 1975-2005. We had one summer where we didn't have the first day over 70 F until around mid-June and we only had something like 2 days over 90 F. The springs were also very wet and cold.

I read a weather blog written by a professor at the U of Washington. He's pointed out the Blob is a phenomenon never seen before. The weather off the Pacific the last two winters has been so weird, there is no historical data to compare it to. Another weird thing is east of the Cascades precipitation levels have been normal or above normal, but over the Cascades and west precipitation has been barely normal or below. We had an early spring this year and it's a lot warmer than usual for June. The blueberries are already ripening and we usually don't see them until mid-July.

It looks like we're going to have a bumper crop of everything this year.

And around here, nobody tries to cultivate blackberries. There is no point, they grow wild in such abundance you can eat your fill just about anywhere. We have two massive blackberry patches one about 50 feet south of our property and another about 40 feet west.

Bill

Not true at all. It happened in 1976/77, just for example. Here a factual look at The Blob:
https://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/2015/04/21/north-pacific-update-the-blobs-strengthening-suggests-its-not-ready-to-depart/




wdolson -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/19/2015 8:22:40 AM)

The only reference to 1976/77 was a question whether we'd see another pattern like that year, not that there was a Blob then. He also references the Ridiculously Resilient Ridge, which is another western weather phenomenon we don't understand because we haven't seen it before.

These things are probably all things that have happened before, but we only have had the technology to study the world this closely for a very short time. I think the first weather satellite was launched in the late 60s and the ARGO system has only been online for about 10 years.

To some extent I think we're like somebody who bought a blood pressure device for home use and now we are panicking about every tiny variation in blood pressure because we can take it 20 times a day instead of once a year at the doctor's. My sister is a Geologist and I've had an interest in the subject for many years. Part of the subject is the study of climate over millions of years instead of the decades we have been really studying it in depth. Climate is a very complex topic and we're just beginning to understand how it changes in the micro sense. Geology and other long term records show it does change quite dramatically on the macro time scales.

Bill




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/19/2015 8:01:45 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: wdolson


These things are probably all things that have happened before, but we only have had the technology to study the world this closely for a very short time. I think the first weather satellite was launched in the late 60s and the ARGO system has only been online for about 10 years.


Bill


Remember how long it took to discover the jet stream? It played havoc on bombing raids to Japan. If they understood it they could've flown at a lower altitude til they got closer. The air crews were getting called liars. And then there was the "stendec" incident.




wdolson -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/19/2015 11:11:05 PM)

I believe the jet stream was discovered in the 1930s by a Japanese scientist. However, it was not well understood in the 1940s. We still have some things to learn about the jet stream.

Then there is plate tectonics. In the early 20th century a Geologist named Alfred Wegener observed that the continents seems to fit together and thought maybe the continents moved around. The rest of the Geology community thought he was a nutter until the 1950s when evidence was found that he was right. It's now explained quite a few things about how the Earth works.

We still have a long ways to go before we fully understand how all the systems on this world work. We've made huge strides in the last 60 years, but we still have a long ways to go.

Bill




rustysi -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/20/2015 7:26:55 PM)

OK, new pet peeve...


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert

Another pet peeve doesn't come to mind right now so I'll post a joke.

What does an Inuit wear when relaxing in the igloo?

An eskimono.

What does an Inuit wear when reading a book while puffing on his pipe?

An eskimoking jacket.


...the gorns' jokes!!![:D]




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/20/2015 9:22:14 PM)

Einstein couldn't believe it when those things classified as nebulae (not all nebulae mind you) were galaxies, some with millions to billions of stars. He had no idea.




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/20/2015 9:30:33 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: rustysi

OK, new pet peeve...

...the gorns' jokes!!![:D]



I promise I won't tell the one that goes 'what do you have when an eskimo, his wife and sister in law are under a polar bearskin and they're still shivering?'. You know, the one where the answer is 'eskimo pie'? No, I promise I won't tell that one. And don't anyone make any man on husky remarks.




rustysi -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/20/2015 10:08:51 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: geofflambert


quote:

ORIGINAL: rustysi

OK, new pet peeve...

...the gorns' jokes!!![:D]



I promise I won't tell the one that goes 'what do you have when an eskimo, his wife and sister in law are under a polar bearskin and they're still shivering?'. You know, the one where the answer is 'eskimo pie'? No, I promise I won't tell that one. And don't anyone make any man on husky remarks.


[:D]




m10bob -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/27/2015 2:02:38 PM)

Game related pet peeve..:

When creating a naval fleet, we expend points to obtain a good leader for the fleet, only to lose that leader once the fleet docks.
(In real life that leader would have been a 2nd "bighat" aboard a particular ship, and he often stayed with that same ship when his ships sailed again.)

Perhaps expending points to make a "flagship" would allow retention of the ranking admiral??




Non-game pet peeve:.....I try to not buy any product a child or dog has suggested I purchase..
(Except for goats...I like the Directv goat and "Rick the goat" on another commercial..)[:'(]




Lowpe -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/27/2015 2:55:21 PM)

Methinks the Gorn needs a new opponent, so he can show us swift and merciful again.

Had my first cherry tomato from the garden yesterday, picking blackberries, blueberries, cucumbers daily now. Asparagus, Spinach has come and gone, but still lots of lettuce.

Something got in and ate some low hanging green beefsteaks. Vegetarian Gorns, I wonder?




m10bob -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/27/2015 3:00:36 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

Methinks the Gorn needs a new opponent, so he can show us swift and merciful again.

Had my first cherry tomato from the garden yesterday, picking blackberries, blueberries, cucumbers daily now. Asparagus, Spinach has come and gone, but still lots of lettuce.

Something got in and ate some low hanging green beefsteaks. Vegetarian Gorns, I wonder?



Slices of Irish Spring soap tied near your plants in socks son stakes should keep varmints at bay..

Do NOT try mothballs..the toxins are not healthy for people..




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/27/2015 3:19:08 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

Methinks the Gorn needs a new opponent, so he can show us swift and merciful again.

Had my first cherry tomato from the garden yesterday, picking blackberries, blueberries, cucumbers daily now. Asparagus, Spinach has come and gone, but still lots of lettuce.

Something got in and ate some low hanging green beefsteaks. Vegetarian Gorns, I wonder?



No, we bait our hooks with those.

When I was in the scouts we were fishing from a dam. Nobody caught anything and we ran out of bait. This one kid put a booger on his hook and immediately caught a catfish! [:D]

If you tie a booger in a bow, what do you have?


sknot.




geofflambert -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/27/2015 3:22:23 PM)

I got a merit badge in sknot tying.




Lowpe -> RE: OT Pet Peeves (6/27/2015 3:24:06 PM)

Please, get a game already. Then at least all this would be in your AAR.[:D]




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