# Discussion thread for the "Polls only" thread (Part 1) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 28, 2022, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380 "2022-09-28T11:33:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 256
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5104 "2023-06-26T02:24:58Z")
I just used my horn this evening. I was at a light, and it was green, and the car in front of me was just sitting there. I tapped the horn and it started moving. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5105 "2023-06-26T02:28:54Z")
Yeah, that pretty much describes my (relatively rare) horn use, **thorny.** I had Covid just once. It was like a bad head cold for a few days, and then I got steadily better, fortunately. I don’t think I’ve had an ethnic food yet which I didn’t like, but I particularly enjoy Indian food. We have a decent-sized yard. I mow the perimeter to get around various obstacles, and then alternate, week by week, mowing either in smaller concentric squares or parallel lines. ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5106 "2023-06-26T02:37:30Z")
I miss the old Dalat in Raleigh. I have yet to find another Vietnamese restaurant that comes close. My parents would take us there like every three or four weeks. My mother kept trying to matchmake me with the owner’s daughter. She didn’t like my girlfriend (a common theme, it turned out). Dammit, now I want crepes. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5107 "2023-06-26T02:44:22Z")
I read once of a Vietnamese restaurant called Pho King Awesome. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5108 "2023-06-26T02:47:45Z")
Noice. ---
**Author:** ![gkster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gkster/32/14107_2.png) [@gkster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gkster)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5109 "2023-06-26T03:54:47Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > > [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > > > I understood there to be an unspoken “(to the best of my knowledge)” qualifier on the COVID question > > OK, have voted accordingly. Yes, there should have been an AFAIK/to the best of my knowledge specified in the COVID poll, but I’m brain-fogging and coughing and short of breath after testing positive for the first time yesterday. I think I might have had it in February 2020–bad cough which lasted 2 weeks, congestion, headache, slight fever, but there’s no way to know. This time I had a cough, sore throat, headache and fever, and thought it might be just a summer cold or flu. Just in case, I took a home rapid test (negative) and so was a bit taken aback when I went to urgent care and tested positive there. I’ve been knocked out for 3 days but feeling better with Paxlovid. I figured that it was just a matter of time before I caught it, in spite of being vaxxed and triple-boosted. Two friends at work died of it in 2020. My 3 siblings have had it, as have several of my nephews, nieces and in-laws (all vaxxed and boosted). And my son has had it 3 times, in February, September and December 2021. His first time was bad, the 2nd was mild and the 3rd was asymptomatic; he found out when he was required to take a random test. It’s a bit surprising to me that so far 46% of respondents say they haven’t had it; I thought the number would be more like 35 or 40%. ---
**Author:** ![Bayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bayaker/32/3454_2.png) [@Bayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bayaker)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5110 "2023-06-26T11:56:43Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > I understood there to be an unspoken “(to the best of my knowledge)” qualifier on the COVID question “To the best of my knowledge” is the way I answer a lot of these polls. For the Covid poll, I took the position that I never got ill from it, therefore I didn’t _have_ it. I could be walking around right now with a common cold virus, but I don’t _have_ a cold. My mother carried TB her whole life, but she never _had_ tuberculosis. I have never eaten Nutella, therefore I have never eaten it with a spoon. At my previous house I used a push mower and always did the concentric (wouldn’t that be spiral?) method. I did my own kinda-sorta time/motion study and decided it took less effort to round out the corners and keep walking with the concentric method than to stop and do a 180 at the end of every row. As a kid I probably watched _Cheaper by the Dozen_ too many times on rainy Sunday afternoons. I also liked to see recognizable shapes emerge as the grass is cut. You can start with a basic rectangle, and due to trees, bushes, flower gardens, etc., have the shape morph many times as you mow. Most frequently the shape of Colorado quickly became Kansas, then Nebraska, then Alabama, Tennessee. Vermont, New Hampshire, and finally a very diminutive Idaho. Yes, I _am_ easily amused. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5111 "2023-06-26T14:10:31Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > I read once of a Vietnamese restaurant called Pho King Awesome. 😉 I’m sure there are tons of pho-king puns out there. I know of one called What the Pho. mmm ---
**Author:** ![NinthAcolyte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ninthacolyte/32/13676_2.png) [@NinthAcolyte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinthAcolyte)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5112 "2023-06-26T14:17:41Z")
As a late-bloomer kid/teen who didn’t really experience much physical/sexual attraction, I would have said Betty without hesitation. I didn’t understand why anyone would be attracted to a vain, pushy, kind of bitchy girl. As an adult lesbian, _I get it now_. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5113 "2023-06-26T14:22:07Z")
What I’m going to do on the highway with the traffic jam coming up depends on several factors. If I know the area well, I’m going to take the next exit and work my way around it. If I don’t know the area well enough to feel confident of doing that, and I was going to stop for a meal somewhere enroute anyway or am otherwise not in a hurry, I’ll take the next exit, find somewhere to eat and/or hang out, and hope the jam clears in the meantime. If I don’t know the area at all and am worried about being late somewhere, I might get off at the next exit and call the place I’m going to; or I might stay on the road and hope. If I stay on the road, I’m probably going to hang on to the middle lane, because from the middle lane one has some chance of getting to any of the others, and I probably won’t know whether the jam’s caused by a blocked lane up ahead and if so which lane is blocked. If whatever info told me about the jam also told me that a specific lane is blocked, then I’m going to try to get out of and stay out of that lane. And I suspect that @Mean_Mr.Mustard left France out of the poll just because the number of maximum poll options didn’t allow fitting everybody in (which might also be why “Indian” and “Chinese”, for instance, got one option each; though in some areas that’s just going to be how the restaurants are usually identified.) ---
**Author:** ![gkster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gkster/32/14107_2.png) [@gkster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gkster)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5114 "2023-06-26T14:23:30Z")
New Paltz, NY (a college town) has iPho and Pho Tibet. The latter is decorated to look Tibetan with posters on aiding Tibet. It has a dozen Tibetan menu items which we’ve ordered a few times and they’re never available, so we call it Pho-ny Tibet. ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5115 "2023-06-26T14:38:48Z")
For eons I’d hear guys say something like, “well, it was Mary Ann for me, not Ginger”, as though it were some remarkable act of individualism. I mean yes, Ginger was the Marilyn Monroe figure, but they were both lovely women. But Ginger for me. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5116 "2023-06-26T14:40:50Z")
– wait a minute, I’m apparently not reading the lead in to polls very well. I just noticed “Excludes grief you caused by dying.” (No, that doesn’t change my vote!) ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5117 "2023-06-26T14:48:24Z")
If you stay in the middle lane you will **definitely** experience a major slowdown. Picking either the left or right lane gives you a chance of avoiding a lot of that. Make your choice depending on the situation. ---
**Author:** ![DCnDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dcndc/32/2842_2.png) [@DCnDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DCnDC)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5118 "2023-06-26T14:52:40Z")
My daily first person research and observation on the capital beltway and I-95 suggests that in most highway traffic jam situations, the right lane is actually the fastest. I’ve experimented with sticking in each lane, and every time I’m to the left I see a truck in the far right lane that ends up WAY ahead of me by the time traffic starts moving steadily again. I’ve done the super-aggressive “climbing the ladder” and that truck in the right lane still ends up ahead of me. So I’m now a strong believer in the far right lane. Leave a way bigger gap to the next vehicle than you normally would and maintain a slow but steady speed, like 10-15 mph and you will likely never come to a full stop, and watch all those people who went to the left slowly disappear in your rear view mirror. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5119 "2023-06-26T15:27:22Z")
The college poll definitely needs an “Other” answer. What about those of us with multiple degrees and/or those who attended multiple colleges? ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5120 "2023-06-26T15:46:31Z")
I s’pose I should explain my dissing of French cuisine. Yeah, I’ve heard of it. But I was thinking more along the lines of casual dining. You know, the Mexican Fiesta joint down the road where you can get a combo plate or a giant burrito, or Tony’s/Luigi’s/Sal’s where you get a heaping bowl of pasta. French cuisine seemed too artsy fartsy for my poll. mmm ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5121 "2023-06-26T15:55:13Z")
Feel better soon, **gkster**! ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5122 "2023-06-26T15:55:21Z")
> [@DCnDC](#): > > Leave a way bigger gap to the next vehicle than you normally would How does one accomplish that in the middle of a traffic jam? Somebody else is going to pull into that space. > [@silenus](#): > > The college poll definitely needs an “Other” answer. What about those of us with multiple degrees and/or those who attended multiple colleges? What about those of us who think we shouldn’t have gone to college at all, or should have gone a couple of years later? What about those of us with mixed feelings, who did get something out of college, but wonder whether we would have been better off taking a different degree, which would have required going somewhere else? What about those of us who really think we should have done something else, but the something else didn’t become readily available until ten or twenty years later? ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2023, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380/5123 "2023-06-26T16:05:19Z")
“Casual French” is pretty much a dining-option oxymoron, I’d say (least in the U.S.). In heavy traffic I tend to pick whichever lane is moving fastest at the outset and then stay there, unless it becomes really obvious that I picked unwisely. Then I’ll move. As to the “leaving a child very briefly in the car” question, I would do so _if and only if_ I could lock the car behind me, could see the car the entire time and was certain I would be away for a very brief time, like a minute or so. I understand this might not be legal everywhere. I loved my college (Oberlin) and my major (poli sci) and my minor (history). No regrets whatsoever. I have no strong feelings on the Betty/Veronica or Ginger/Mary Anne questions. They’re all attractive women in their own ways. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380.md?page=255) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discussion-thread-for-the-polls-only-thread-part-1/972380.md?page=257)