# Opal, what the fuck is your problem? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 16, 2008, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368 "2008-12-16T06:10:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 12
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/221 "2008-12-16T19:52:49Z")
> [@Flip\_Pancake](#): > > Sorry to bump this with a hijack, but it sounds like a bout of [trypophobia](http://ezinearticles.com/?Fear-of-Holes---Trypophobia&id=1629724). > > And no, [you’re not alone](http://www.unusualphobias.com/clusters.html). I read the first couple of items on that list, and had to quit reading. I am feeling a little verklempt that not only am I NOT the only person in the world with this thing, but it has an actual name. Thanks. Seriously. (It’s funny, but after it’s been “triggered,” say, by the photo linked earlier in this thread, I’m more sensitive to it for a while. Like right now, even the word “clusters” is wigging me out, and normally it doesn’t bother me.) K, sorry for continued hijack. ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/222 "2008-12-16T19:55:54Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > She didn’t say anything about what anyone else should call them. Way to get the point. I was just using a little poetic license to say that her objection to the term was misplaced and and a bit over the top. And right up until post #7 I thought the thread was just a little light-hearted jabbing until she went all “close this fucking absurd thread.” ---
**Author:** ![Hi\_Neighbor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hi_neighbor/32/494_2.png) [@Hi\_Neighbor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hi_Neighbor)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/223 "2008-12-16T19:56:06Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > I’ve never been pitted, but I suppose I’d read a little, but five pages of this? At this point, it’s not even about her anymore. Yes, it’s not about her anymore. It’s about that damned picture! ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/224 "2008-12-16T19:56:52Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > I’ve never been pitted, but I suppose I’d read a little, but five pages of this? At this point, it’s not even about her anymore. > > I don’t know, this seems like it’s about more than just this thread, but more of a pattern of how she responds. Which I’ll accept–I haven’t really paid much attention to her in that regard. If she does have a pattern of it, I guess I could see how maybe this was the last straw, but I hadn’t noticed it myself. **I’m just bemused that a thread on buckeyes became so much more.** But only because **OpalCat** decided to bring it there. **Dio** just started the much needed Pit thread. Her behavior in this regard has been more than tiresome, at this point. I see this thread more as a Public Service Warning. ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/225 "2008-12-16T19:58:32Z")
> [@Anaamika](#): > > I didn’t say a thing about her responding to it. Merely reading it. Moreover, she never responds to any criticism of her. Diva. > > And she is one of the SDMB punching bags? She’s always been a real heroine around here. I thought people loved her. Point taken. I overlooked her statement in the original thread that she wouldn’t be reading it and though I am certain she truly is, I’m just as certain that you’re right about her diva-ish attitude. She’s probably sniffing indignantly at each post criticizing her, but considering the way the criticism is being couched, I can’t say I would even blame her for that. A lot of the people in this thread are being assholes, and it’s even coloring my own posts when I’m ostensibly defending her. As for being a heroine, I think this thread proves otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![chowder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/977dab/32.png) [@chowder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chowder)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/226 "2008-12-16T20:05:44Z")
> [@Hi\_Neighbor](#): > > I love how embedded in this thread are people’s reactions to that picture, spaced out intermittently. > > Also, I really can’t stand the word “embedded” right now, thanks to that picture. Well then try “Embiggens”😃 ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/227 "2008-12-16T20:07:23Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > Way to get the point. I was just using a little poetic license to say that her objection to the term was misplaced and and a bit over the top. It’s hard to “get the point” when you say something quite different from what you actually mean. -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![arseNal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecae2f/32.png) [@arseNal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/arseNal)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/228 "2008-12-16T20:08:41Z")
> [@cmyk](#): > > [QUOTE=ntucker] > Almost 100% agreement with **cmyk** I’d like to change my mind and agree with this. [/QUOTE] (recursive head asplosion) ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/229 "2008-12-16T20:11:39Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > It’s hard to “get the point” when you say something quite different from what you actually mean. > > -FrL- It’s even harder to get the point when you take every fucking thing literally. Remind me to never offer you analogy. ---
**Author:** ![Mtgman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5a626/32.png) [@Mtgman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mtgman)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/230 "2008-12-16T20:14:18Z")
So, a person so hung up on their own ideas of how things should be expressed that she’s become a board legend(c.f. the “a list can’t have only two items” meme), acts in exactly the way she has here for about a decade, and in less than twenty four hours there’s a five page pit thread about it? What’s next, a thread about **tomndebb** being patient and slightly supercilious? Or **Bricker** taking a contrarian position to irritate liberal posters? **Bryan Ekers** being a smart ass? Live and let live. It’s not a big deal. She’s a unique and beautiful snowflake, with jagged edges, just like everyone else. Let him without sin cast the first stone. Enjoy, Steven ---
**Author:** ![ShelliBean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f9ae1b/32.png) [@ShelliBean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShelliBean)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/231 "2008-12-16T20:17:44Z")
We’ve been living and letting live. Now we’re just venting. Tomorrow we’ll go back to living and letting live. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/232 "2008-12-16T20:18:07Z")
The woman is hyper-batshit about Vegetarianism. Some years ago there was a thread about whether or not a Vegan should buy leather shoes if they bought them used like in a thrift store. When some people thought that it was ok, she flipped a digit and compared it to buying a used book bound with the skin of Jews killed in Nazi Germany. When people got all offended she just couldn’t understand why because it was “just an analogy.” She quit the boards for good over that if I remember right. If only. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/233 "2008-12-16T20:18:25Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Obviously Opal does. She’s the one who raised a stink about it. And as far as I can tell, she’s the ONLY one who cares. You really shouldn’t say embarrassing things like this. I didn’t find her responses in the ring or buckeyes threads nearly as egregious as everyone else apparently. There was one I remember about credit cards that I thought she was being unreasonable and petulant. I agree that she has a tendency to explain in great detail and in a very condescending way why every solution won’t work for her Very Special Case and Unusual Circumstances. And I would like to apologize on behalf of all of us mental defects who do not follow sports or states’ nicknames and therefore do not know the history of the term buckeye and are forced to parse it merely on our understanding of the word buck and eye. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/234 "2008-12-16T20:18:28Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > She didn’t say anything about what anyone else should call them. Rather, after being told she should call them “buckeyes,” she explained that she won’t be calling them that, and why. > > -FrL- Nobody told her what she “should” call them. She was told the name of a recipe. She’s the one who had to make a big deal out of it. Who cares what she personally wants to call them? Who asked her? What’s wrong with a simple “thank you?” ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/235 "2008-12-16T20:21:12Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > It’s even harder to get the point when you take every fucking thing literally. Remind me to never offer you analogy. Nothing in your post was anything relevantly like an analogy, and nothing marked anything in your post as intending to be anything other than an accurate representation of Opalcat’s comments. Later, you called it “poetic license,” but there’s nothing in the _post itself_ that marks it that way. The post itself appears to simply be a mistaken description of the comments in question. The description is mistaken in a way that is quite common esp in contexts like the Pit, so its fairly natural to interpret your post that way. Remind me never to offer you a writing job. -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/236 "2008-12-16T20:26:14Z")
> [@Hi\_Neighbor](#): > > Yes, it’s not about her anymore. It’s about that damned picture! Someone could merge pics of the two on photoshop … probably a bad idea all around, though. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/237 "2008-12-16T20:26:51Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Nobody told her what she “should” call them. She was told the name of a recipe. She’s the one who had to make a big deal out of it. Who cares what she personally wants to call them? Who asked her? What’s wrong with a simple “thank you?” To say “You’re in X, they’re called Y’s here” is to have implied (and so, in the usual, extended sense of the word “tell,” to tell one) that one should call them Y’s. I don’t believe you don’t know this. To simply be telling the name of the particular recipe offered, they would have need to say something like “Here’s a recipe, though it calls them ‘buckeyes’” or even “People in Ohio call them ‘buckeyes.’ Here’s a recipe.” Or “I see you’re from Ohio. I bet if you asked around about ‘buckeyes’ you’d find a recipe. Here’s one.” Those are all ways to simply tell the name of the food, without implying Opalcat should call them that. But “You’re in Ohio, dear,” _means_, in contexts like this, “Heads up, you’ve failed in some way to act as someone in Ohio ought.” It’s a reference to the same kind of sentiment expressed by the saying “When in Rome…” -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/238 "2008-12-16T20:30:00Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > The woman is hyper-batshit about Vegetarianism. Some years ago there was a thread about whether or not a Vegan should buy leather shoes if they bought them used like in a thrift store. When some people thought that it was ok, she flipped a digit and compared it to buying a used book bound with the skin of Jews killed in Nazi Germany. When people got all offended she just couldn’t understand why because it was “just an analogy.” She quit the boards for good over that if I remember right. If only. Interesting. But it’s a _good_ analogy! (ducks) 😉 -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![Mtgman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5a626/32.png) [@Mtgman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mtgman)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/239 "2008-12-16T20:31:33Z")
The funny thing is that both **OpalCat** and **devilsknew** have been grown-ups about this and reconciled and moved on. The sound and fury in this thread notwithstanding, the issue, if ever there was one, seems to have been resolved to the satisfaction of the involved parties. Enjoy, Steven ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2008, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368/240 "2008-12-16T20:34:51Z")
> [@Mtgman](#): > > The funny thing is that both **OpalCat** and **devilsknew** have been grown-ups about this and reconciled and moved on. The sound and fury in this thread notwithstanding, the issue, if ever there was one, seems to have been resolved to the satisfaction of the involved parties. > > Enjoy, > Steven Opal hasn’t reconciled anything or even acknowledged devilsknews post. All she’s done is announce that she’s going to unsubscribe from the thread and flounce away. That’s not “grown-up” behavior, that’s a petulant child. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368.md?page=11) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/opal-what-the-fuck-is-your-problem/477368.md?page=13)