Hey, where do you live? Juneau or further south in the Inside Passage?
So anyway - this is late 1985; Mamma O, Sis and I are packing up to move out of the house I grew up in to a condo two towns over. My sister’s next-door neighbor friend, typical New England trailer folk type, is hanging out being annoying as usual. Suddenly she looks at the walls where we’d just taken some pictures down and exclaims:
“Ohmigod, these walls look so bare without anything on them!”
At least 3 times a week, when I go in for my hydraulic lunch at Hooters, after ordering a Heinie, they ask, “Would you like to eat anything?”
posted by olentzaro:
Hey, where do you live? Juneau or further south in the Inside Passage?
another one i was asked (a tourist points to a rock quarry)him: “what do they mine there”
me: “that’s a rock quarry”
him: “so they mine rocks?,wheres the money in that?”
Fortunately, I was not the person taking this call.
I was monitoring a call where a technician was attempting to help a customer install some software. The CD was in the CD ROM drive, but when the customer went to My Computer and doubleclicked (“click it twice really fast please”) the D icon, he got “device not ready.”
First, the tech checked to make sure that D was, in fact, the right letter for that drive…it was. Then he had the customer try right clicking (“right click, with your right mouse button”) and choose Explore. Same error. Next, he asked the customer to open the CD ROM drive, and check to make sure that the CD was inserted correctly, “shiny side down.”
The customer then said, “What is down?”
Fortunately, the technician taking the call managed to answer “the DIRECTION, down” while I was saying “Duck feathers!” and giggling madly.
Corr
Would you prefer “ice is inherently slippery”? I would caution you that once you start interpreting the words that come out you rule out a number of otherwise stupid utterances. (The response to “you know what I meant” can always be “then say what you mean.”) And, as one who has engaged in speedskating in the past, I can assure you he should have asked, and probably meant to ask, how hard the ice was. (The harder the ice the faster it is, to a point, but it also becomes tougher to hold a line on turns.) Though he may have meant to ask whether the ice was too hard to hold the turn, it wasn’t what he DID ask.
How is this for another one of my (least) favorite utterances: Person has just lost everything in a fire or hurricane or tornado and is standing on the street weeping. Just then a reporter walks up to them and asks: “How do you feel?” Pretty dumb question if you ask me.
A button-down is a shirt with an Eton collar. You won’t find a lot of blouses that have a zippered front. Generally, the only tops that have zippered fronts are tassled leather halters like the ones worn by biker women. Maybe not appropriate. You know, this sort of thing.
I once hit a deer. Questions I was asked during the following days:
People, these are some STOOPID questions.
When I was a waitress in a pizza joint I frequently was asked: “How big is a twelve-inch pizza?” It’s so hard not to answer that snidely. You have to let them save face if you want to get a tip.
I used to have a blond cow-worker who fit the stereotype to a T. One day she decided that she’d get into a politcal discussion with me and parroted back to me something that must have been said by her husband. She was complaining about immigrants coming to the US and after listing “her” reasons why she thought it was wrong, she said that she didn’t even understand why they wanted to come to the US.
Rather then try and explain the complexities of immigration, I said, “Its pretty obvious why they want to come here. Generally, they don’t have houses or make a lot of money in the country they live in.”
Her response? “Well, if they don’t have houses, then they don’t need to make a lot of money.” :eek:
I swear, if I’d had a ball peen hammer, I’da hit her!
Ok…this was a counselor at the camp I had attended for about 5 years not too long ago. She, being from an area where there aren’t any jews, was interested in what a “jewish name” is. In order to figure this out, she went around my bunk, asking people their last name, and if it was a jewish last name.
“Cohen” … “Is that a Jewish name?” … “yes”
“Liebowitz” … “Is that a Jewish name?” … “yes”
“Christiansen” … “Is that a Jewish name?” … “I’ll let you guess”
Not the brightest light on the chandelier (I could tell other stories, but some of the better ones she made us promise not to tell to anyone), but she was really nice, and fun to be around.
Have you ever had the experience when someone asks you a yes-or-no type question, you say “no” and they yell WHAT DO YOU MEAN, NO?
Which part of “NO” don’t they understand? The “N” or the “O”?
At an overlook about 300 feet above sea leavel on the Palos Verdes Peninsula (Southern California) looking out over the ocean to Santa Catalina Island (about 26 miles offshore):
Adult from a car with Ohio license plates: “Wow, is that Hawaii? We must be up pretty high.”
True. And not a bad idea.
Not “High Hitler”, but “Hi, Hitler”. He thought all those Germans were just waving “Hi”. Really!
I’m sure that some other pool employee was tasked to help him to his car. :D:D
Once I went to buy a car by myself without my husband’s help. I really wanted to show my knowledge in the process. ( I need to say that I am definitely full fledged blonde and proud of it, it keeps me humble 
I checked the car out and chatted with the dealer. Told him I liked the way the Fiat had the ‘built in crowbar.’
He almost choked and said,“you mean the ‘built in rollbar’”
“Yeah, that’s what I meant.”
Went to another car dealer and kept my mouth shut and bought the car.
embarrassed!!!
I had a guy call into my customer service line once. He said he was from Arlington, and I said, “Arlington, Texas, right?” He said, “Texas? What’s that?” I said, “It’s a state in the United States,” and he said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Now, I’m not sure this is exactly what happened, but this guy actually LIVED in Texas and had never HEARD of Texas, and possibly had never heard of the United States! That has to top my list of dumb customers.
I was in high school, at some point during our SexEd class the teacher kept referring to a doctor as the “Vagina-cologist”, in reference to, I assume, the gynecologist.
The teacher was a female BTW. How she ever got the job teaching SexEd is beyond me 
a group of us are at a pizza place:
waitress: what can i get you?
us: we’d like a large thin crust, pepperoni, sausage, extra cheese, and we’d like mushrooms on half of it.
waitress: which half?
us: (pause…) the left half.
waitress: ok. :rolleyes:
------------------------------------------------------------ this one is from me- i’m a red-head, but have more than my share of blond moments!
me: (adding ingredients for a recipe i’m making) hey! what’s 1/2 of 2/3’s? i’m cutting this recipe in half.
my dear friend: 1/2 of 2/3’s? that’s 1/3.
me: what? you’re telling me that 1/2 of 2/3’s is 1/3? how…oh, duh, never mind, forget i asked. (shuffle back to kitchen, red in face as well as hair):o
Yesterday we were all watching the news about the attack. My supervisor (biggest airhead I think I’ve ever met) came into work as we were watching TV.
Supervisor: What time did they hit the WTC?
Me: One plane hit one tower just before 9:00, a second plane hit the other tower just after 9:00
Sup: Oh, good! So no one was in the first building!
Me: Uh…there were probably thousands in the buildings.
Sup: Why?
Me: Because most people start work at about 9:00, so they were there to start the work day I guess.
Sup: But the plane hit before 9:00
Me: Yes…but there were people there to start work.
Sup: But why were they there?
Co-worker: Because they work there!
Sup: But they didn’t have to start until 9:00
Me: A lot of people get to work a few minutes early. I start at 8:00, but I’m usually here by 7:45.
Sup: Really?
Me: Yes!
Sup: Oh…I didn’t know that people would get there early.
Me: Well they do.
Sup: So why didn’t they leave when they saw the plane coming?
That’s when I left the room. Maybe I was more frustrated than usual because of the tragedy, but her stupidity was driving me nuts.