I had this happen to me years ago. I had a car riding my ass as I drove into town. I was already driving 5 over the limit and didn’t want to get a ticket. The car behind me crosses a double yellow line and blows by me only to turn left a block away. Then I see another car doing the same thing. “Where’s a police officer when you need one” flashed in my mind. It turns out the second car WAS a police car. I drove by slowly with my window down laughing. I’d wager money the driver was drunk.
It’s funny for me reading these driving gripes, I’m sure behaviour like that would have annoyed me too when I was living in the UK.
But right now I’m in china, where the standard of driving is atrocious. Nobody checks if a road they are turning into is clear, you can go through a red light as long as there’s no cross traffic yet, if someone misses their turn on the freeway: no probs just reverse back etc etc
If fucked-up driving made me irate, I’d be irate 24/7. I’m not saying that makes it OK of course; just that as a matter of sanity-protection I have to file driving stupidity in a different part of my brain, far away from my consciousness.
Ellipsis written as ". . . " rather than “…”
Talking about tiny…
Ah, brings to mind one of my peeves: folks who drive decommissioned Crown Vic police cars. For God knows what reason, these are sold (at auction, I would guess?) with equipment like the hyper-bumpers and spotlights still on them. I saw one where the township police department logo was just lightly whitewashed over.
I always do the “there’s a cop, drive perfectly” thing when I see them. Not that it’s necessarily a bad thing to check my driving, but some nutjob could buy one of these cars, throw a siren light on the dash, put together a uniform, and pull people over and murder them very easily.
Better than … or …!
Queue (US “line”) laggards in general, in front of me: they drive me mad, too. Just close it up, for the sake of all that’s holy !!
How funny. I can’t stand it when people crowd me in lines at the grocery store. I don’t get stabby, but I’ve been known to get a little passive-aggressive elbow-ey.
Today I unleashed verbal fury (through my closed up car window) at the lady who crossed the street diagonally. For the love of all that is holy, walk the path that is the shortest distance, especially if you go slow.
People who say ‘I’ when it should be ‘me’.
Telemarketers.
People who call me before 10am or after 9pm. Especially when they call me back 15 minutes later from a different number.
I mourn the decease of “whom.” Sigh…
I work as a store cashier, and even having our hand held devices at the register is forbidden. I once had a guy who was supposed to be bagging for me during a very busy time go to the corner and start texting. He got fired.
What about customers who can’t stop talking and/or texting for the two minutes it takes me to ring you up. I’ve had to say “next customer” three times to get their attention, and repeat myself to get payment!
If you cannot stop on the device for two minutes, you have a real problem.
I have been known to give verbal commentary to the other people waiting in line.
For some time now, local news personalities have changed from reporters to scolds. Each time some plucky cub reporter lectures me to “allow more time” or “watch my speed” or to “please stay off the roads” I get more irate. One of the local dipshits has now produced a sliding scale alongside his weather report to tell me whether I need shirtsleeves, light jacket, heavy coat, gloves, etc. PerkyMcweatherTits has managed a graphic guage-like display to warn me of impending dangers to my hairdo as well (from wind I suppose).
To the idiot reporters: The day old pullin needs life advice from 20-something journalism majors will indeed have newsworthy cold… in hell. So just stick to reporting the news. I can figure out how to handle it.
Bolding mine.
Bravo!! That was perfect.
And 'twas a darn good rant overall as well. I think TV is recognizing that most people see most of their TV at a glance in public places with the sound turned off. e.g. in bars, restaurants, waiting rooms, etc. I know 99% of my TV watching takes place while reading a magazine or reading / writing here.
The folks who actually *watch *TV are either indigent stay-at-homes or the elderly. Neither of whom buy what the advertisers are selling.
So as a result the only way they can actually transmit info is by catchy graphics that can be absorbed in a glance. Which means, as *USA Today * pioneered, graphics with almost no actual information content. A picture of a simple conclusion with no support. This also suits the ever declining attention span of the viewership at large.
MICE!
Lane splitting makes a lot of sense from the motorcyclist’s point of view. As a longtime rider, I can attest to the fact that cars do not see motorcycles a lot of the time. Smart bikers ride as if they can’t assume any of the drivers on the road actually notice them. So in a stop-and-go freeway situation (or worse, at stoplights), it’s quite possible for a car to come driving up to the stopped traffic and stop behind the car in front of them–completely oblivious to the fact that there’s a bike between them and the car. Sadly, I believe one of our very own Dopers lost someone in an accident like this a year or two ago.
So no, splitting isn’t stupid. It’s smart, and it’s safer. What’s stupid is the bikers who insist on doing it at unsafe speeds (you’re supposed to stay within, IIRC, 15 mph of prevailing traffic speed, and it’s not at all smart to do it when traffic is moving at a reasonable rate) or erratically. The trick to smart lane splitting is to pay attention to what’s going on around you.
Baker’s father was killed that way. That is by being crushed from behind because he wasn’t splitting lanes where he’d have been safe.
There was also something about the driver who hit him trying to change a CD.
Something else that make me unreasonably stabby is when people misuse the following words:
Penultimate
Grandiloquent
Tortuous
Enormity
Discomfit
Bemuse
Enervate
Casualty
Meretricious
Noisome
Nonplussed
Ironic
.
I don’t know why those words seem especially subject to getting either mistaken for other words, or just used wrong, but they are some of the most sorely abused words in English. I would have added “literally” to the list, but I’ve given up on it. My brother and I argue, because he hasn’t you. He even has a T-shirt with the correct definition on it.
Not on topic but following this comment, currently pay $25 for a packet of 25.
basically every time I light up a cigarette I’m setting fire to $1.
I don’t know if it’s still around, but several years back I used to see one of these around Downtown Portland, with the anarchy symbol painted on the doors. I thought that was a hoot.