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Fashion. Don’t get any of it. Now and then I see someone wearing something that’s particularly flattering to their body & demeanor, and I think - oh, that must be what everyone was aiming for. Problem is, most people missed it by a mile and it baffles me that they’d want to spend a lot of money doing so.
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Crime shows. I think they’re making people crazy - or at least, mothers of small children are losing their perspective. So many of them won’t let their kids play in their own backyards anymore.
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Vera Bradley handbags. Unless they’re for old ladies.
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Expensive playclothes for kids. Why bother?
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Fox News. Regardless of the content, it’s just too noisy and disjointed.
You’re not alone, man.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve peed in stalls whenever possible (I can be terribly pee-shy at urinals), and it just always seemed logical to me, if there’s toilet paper available, to use that to dab off the excess instead of shaking it all over the place.
Besides, it’s disconerting when you shake (b/c there’s no available stall, and you can’t/don’t want to wait), think you’ve got it all, and tuck back in only to have a drop of johnny-come-lately run down your thigh. :eek: So…not…amusing.
fishing. I just don’t get it.
Why not just go for a nick hike and enjoy the outdoors? Or just sit quietly, do nothing, and enjoy the outdoors. Or just stand still for hours on end, do nothing, and enjoy the outdoors.
Why do you have to hold a silly pole while you are doing nothing anyway?
umm, that should be a nice hike…
Fishing = cooler full of beer
Hiking = no cooler full of beer
Not a real hard one to figure out. 
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Corporate-Speak Lackeys. People that want to reach out. People that have views on who is, or is not, a team player. People that want to loan me a book about cheese getting moved. My immediate instinct is to slam a stake into the hearts of these shitbags.
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Blackberries. No, put it down. I know, I know. You’re connected. But you know what that looks like? Your leash. You want to be the man up in this piece, learn a simple truth: when you’re important, people wait for you. If you can’t ride the elevator and walk to your car or have a drink downtown without answering your email, then you’re someone’s dog. My goal is to reach such heights of importance that in order to communicate with me, people have to chisel the message onto a slate of imported Italian marble and have it lugged to my location on the back of a suffering coolie who carries an emergency supply of frankincense and myrrh to appease me lest my reaction to the marble slate be a poor one. Blackberries and all they stand for are anathema.
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How People Can Find Men Attractive. Don’t get me wrong, thank goodness people do. But still. Ehh. I mean, I take care of myself, I look good. I trim, I tan, I bathe, I get the calluses carved off my feet and have even been known to exfoliate. Girls like it. But…shiver. Nothing about a dude suggests something I would want to get a little naked with. Mmm, stubble. Barf.
Fishing, if done, right, gives you and a couple dozen of your closest friends a cheap and tasty dinner afterward.
Oh, fishing is the best. I also like to hike, but fishing is different. It doesn’t just involve standing with a pole, either. I like to hike along a remote stream and cast into pools and rapids. It’s an interaction with the fish and the stream and the environment as a whole. Eating fresh fish is nice too, but isn’t the reason most people fish.
Back to homework. A teacher here said that it teaches skills and values or something. I have a Masters degree and still say that I never learned “good study habits” from doing homework. While I think having a long-term project to work on at home is a good thing, the daily worksheet or questions at the end of the chapter thing are a waste of time and interfere with family life. Every time I see a kid at a bus stop with a backpack full of books I think, thank God I don’t have homework anymore!
True. So, so true. Then, I earn < $50K/year, and I haven’t known what a paid day off was in more than a decade, so maybe I’m just jealous.
Goodie–less competition for me! (Not, mind you, that it’s doing me much good these days. Or, sadly, that it ever has.) 
And yeah, man, I loooves me some stubble on a man! Uhhh, getting all hot and bothered right now just thinking about it. Gotta go!
(And in this evening’s market report: Shares of Kleenex have shot through the roof!)
I don’t understand making sandwiches on croissants. It’s such a rich buttery bread-that richness destracts from the flavour of the fillings and makes the whole thing taste off for me (not to mention I can’t smell the calories). I feel it’s like eating a sandwich on a pastry.
I used to not understand buying books because the library is free (yes, I read, am a bookworm etc.) but I am horrible at returning books so I figure I may just as well buy rather than pay the inevitable fees. Also, I’ve come to like the look of them hanging around on shelves. It is totally smugly and pretentious but I don’t care.
As for the rest, I indulge in several of the omghowonearth’s consumerist behaviour pointed out here, including designer clothing, hideous purses, paying for expensive haircuts, owning a cellphone, blahblahblah etc. etc… It’s pretty much as you’ve all guessed, I’m spiritually bankrupt and soul-dead. Also, jewellry is shiny and I think I might have magpie DNA in me somewhere.
Libraries are good if you like to read the same kind of stuff that most people in your area do. They’re not so good if you don’t.
Re: the Blackberry thing- we know what we look like, but frankly, some of us aren’t doing it to try to look important. In fact, some of us are low enough on the hierarchical ladder that people expect us to jump when summoned, and ask “how high?” on the way up. If a supervisor or one of TPTB want to contact you, they expect you to be contact-able. And they expect you to respond immdeiately, not later when you get back to the office, or after you’ve finished dinner with your family at the restaurant.
So just remember that it’s not always the user who is trying to project an image of self-importance. It’s possible that the user knows how they look when they use it, hates the electronic leash, and would prefer to drop the blasted thing down a storm drain, but would face hell from the boss if they did.
I’m just sayin’.
I’ve always assumed the reason most people fish is because they like to kill stuff. Or at the very least don’t mind killing stuff. It’s the reason I can’t understand the appeal. Sitting around doing nothing, I can get. Killing stuff=fun activity you do by choice? Don’t get it.
I love to read but loathe libraries. For one thing, I don’t like giving the books back… but mainly, the books at the library are REVOLTINGLY DIRTY. I’ve found what can only be boogers in the pages before. And food smudges. And stains I don’t want to ask about. I feel like I have to wash my hands every 10 seconds just from handling one. Gross. gag
This seems more like a ‘things that annoy me/people who aren’t the same as me and thus annoy me’ thread than anything, but one thing I genuinely do not get: UK people, why not wash the soap off your dishes? Is wasting water really that detrimental? Can’t you taste soap on your food afterwards? It doesn’t annoy me or put me off, it just really confuses me!
About the library thing, I used to use the library a lot more before but I have pretty distinct tastes and the local libraries never have what I want, like, ever. Great for research, not so much for pleasure. The stuff they did have I borrowed so many times that I figured, hell, why not buy it and save myself the trip next 50 times?
I guess I don’t get people who throw books they don’t want away rather than sticking them in a library slot, but that goes back into the ‘people who are different from me’ category.
Preach it, sister!
Catching fish is fun by itself, but the act of fishing can be extraordinarily relaxing and a great way for people to bond. Some of my most happy memories are going fishing with my grandfather; we didn’t always catch fish, but we both enjoyed it- I liked learning about how to do it and spending time with him, and he enjoyed teaching me, and spending time with me. When I was a teenager, it was just spending time with him, and hanging out on the water. My brother and I do the same thing- we just hang out and fish- it isn’t high pressure, it’s away from the daily grind, and it’s more connected with nature than anything else I do.
(now I’ve made myself tear up at work… great!)
laid.
Don’t worry, Opal, a lot of em get away, too. Even worse, though, is all the mosquitos I kill!
(I draw the line at killing anything that can smile at me.)
Oh yeah, another one. People who turn eating meat into a moral issue about murder but are fine with dairy products. Ever see what dairy cows’ lives are like?The meat cows are lucky because at least they die fast.
So going by that theory, I should eat nothing but veal? 