Things that infuriate you well beyond their actual importance

In My Humble Opinion
1221

Since I just encountered it for umpteenth time, I’ll get it off my chest while the memory is fresh.

When I use the search option on my “smart tv”, the resulting thumbnails appear, with the search title above it and cursor blinking after the last letter. I start punching the ‘down’ button on the remote and wonder for a nanosecond “what the fu?” when it doesn’t move. You actually need to navigate from whatever the last thing you clicked on. I remember why I did it the first time; we’re conditioned to follow the blinking line. What infuriates me is that I keep falling for it.

1222

Pretty much every streaming app. Please quit auto-starting programs you think I will like. Please let me remove shit from my continue watching, especially since most of it is shit the app auto-ran that I don’t want to watch. Yes, I watch Chicago Med. No, I do not watch Chicago Fire or PD. I like my medical mystery of the week; I do not like watching cops be shitbags, and Chicago fire is like high school.

Prime/freevee watch list cross-contamination is a real problem, too.

1223

I have a really GOOD one … (blood is boiling)

fuck … yes, I said it … FUCK appliance producers for their Electricity-Efficiency-ABCDEF-Stickers from hell …

they are the size of a good postcard or two, are made of crappy paper and affixed with glue like it needs to sit there for the next 90 years or the world will come to an end.

bonus-fuck-you’s for: putting those ABCDEF stickers on brushed stainless steel panels, where it is really imposible to get off, without marring the brused finish…

why in hell can’t they use minimum-adherence-plastic-peel-off-foil stickers??? are we back in 1971 or so?

so, take my heart-felt: Fuck-you-very-much!

1224

If it’s really that bad, you should complain to the FTC. The labels are supposed to not fall off easily, but should be removable with water.

https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-16/chapter-I/subchapter-C/part-305/subject-group-ECFR1c4254e9007a744/section-305.13

Adhesive labels. All adhesive labels should be applied so they can be easily removed without the use of tools or liquids, other than water, but should be applied with an adhesive with an adhesion capacity sufficient to prevent their dislodgment during normal handling throughout the chain of distribution to the retailer or consumer. The paper stock for pressure-sensitive or other adhesive labels shall have a basic weight of not less than 58 pounds per 500 sheets (25″ x 38″) or equivalent, exclusive of the release liner and adhesive. A minimum peel adhesion capacity for the adhesive of 12 ounces per square inch is suggested, but not required if the adhesive can otherwise meet the above standard. In lieu of a label with adhesive backing, manufacturers may adhere the label with adhesive tape, provided the tape is affixed along the entire top and bottom of the label.

1225

I could, but wont …

I am fairly certain that - should they respond - they would argue that they have no juristiction in LatAm countries.

(but thx! for your effort and talent to dig that stuff up.)

1226

I think everyone in any industry (though creative is worse, in my opinion) has done this. You are not alone.

I have a small counter, it may get technical, but I did, in the end, win.

So I worked for a startup online casino. I’m a software engineer, I was the only one there. We had a database guy, and a designer, but the website was mine.

I had two bosses, brothers. One, and I use fake names, of course, Bob, was everything a casino boss needs to be. Intelligent, charming, would stab you in the face if he thought it necessary. The other, Tom, was the anthisesis: meek, unused to power, fussy and insecure.

So we build this website. Theft of content was rife in the casino world - why pay a lawyer to write terms and conditions, when you can just go to a competitor and copy/paste?

Tom was paranoid about this.

So one way to disable copy/paste in a browser is to disable the “right click” menu, that has a quick way to choose the option. There are about a million reasons not to disable the right-click menu, and I have not even tried in more recent years. It was, like many “features” at the time, a bad idea.

Anyway. Tom was concerned about copy/paste theft of content that had already been copy/paste stolen. It was up to me to implement the solution. But I used Firefox, and I regularly used the “right click” menu for a bunch of work related things and I did not want to see it go. Besides my selfish reasons, there are real reasons why the thing exists in the first place.

I tried to explain this to Tom, but no. He would not understand. Just refused.

I disabled right click. It’s not great, but hey, he is the boss.

A couple of days later, I get called into Tom’s office. It turns out that he, like no one else in the entire world that I knew of, actually used the right click menu for forward/back navigation. So my change has disturbed his usual habits. Can I fix it?

Well, I am not employed by or contracted to the International Brotherhood of Browser Developers, but, fuck yes, I can fix it. Just not in the way that is an actual fix.

So, OK. I am a software developer. We solve software problems. I could not solve Tom’s problem, but I could make the software behave as if it had solved his problem.

What I did was first, a little bit of code that made the right click behave unusually in Internet Explorer. Instead of a browser menu, it would now display an image of my choice. And my choice was a screenshot of the right click menu.

But crucially, I photoshopped it. Now all the options he used (back, forward etc) were available (though, faked via javascript) and the ones he did not want were “disabled” or at least appeared “disabled” on the image.

So now, he got his familiar right click menu, he could resume his personal browsing style, he thought his site was safe from content theft, I got a bonus.

Everyone left happy.

Though, it took a bunch of bitching, moaning and beer with colleagues to arrive at this strategy, it worked out well in the end.

1227

Oh yes. Bought a putty knife yesterday. Why in gods name does it need stickers on both sides of the blade that are impossible to get off.

How much information do you have to share for a fucking PUTTY knife? If you can’t figure out how to use it, back away from the project slowly.

1228

You could also try a chemical solution. I believe acetone or some form of Goof-Off product could remove a label and the sticky stuff under it.

1229

I’ve developed a big unsightly freckle on my chest. The dermatologist has checked it, and it’s nothing to worry about. But it’s about the size of a thumbprint, and it’s in a place where it shows if I wear even a modest V-neck shirt.

I know I’m an old lady and oughtn’t to worry about one unsightly skin thing, as I have plenty of other moles, warts, and skin tags. But the other stuff doesn’t show and this one does. It’s annoying beyond its actual importance! Bleh.

1230

Pure alcohol should work, too. At least that’s what I used back when I still used to buy CDs for stickers/price tags and glue residues on the cases.

1231

Yeah to both. My aggravation is really, I’ve got a job to do, stop trying to give me absolute bullshit work. So I ignore the stupid stickers. Still pisses me off though.

1232

yeah i hear you!!!

… gimme stupid things to do … my life is empty without spending a better part of an hour for this!

.

https://i.postimg.cc/C1wxrKCC/image.png

.
opposing thumb for reference

1233

Ha! I have one that developed on the end of my NOSE!! I’ve used all manner of dark spot fading creams. Nothing has worked. Concealers don’t work. The only reason it’s a little lighter now is because it’s winter and I’m not out in sun. UGH!

1234

I’d suggest buying a scraper of some sort, maybe a putty knife.

1235

Are these the solutions for the skin freckle posts?

1236

More than a little infuriating. Smoke alarm low battery beeps. On a smoke alarm you can’t find.

Found it. In a drawer. Battery had not been removed. ARRRRGGGGG.

1237

That is particularly frustrating in technical discussions.

Whenever I have a weird technical issue, such as a problem with a database, I go searching and eventually end up at a StackOverflow article that may or may not solve my problem.

Many of the postings are like this: “Why would you want to do that?” and “That is a terrible way of doing it, and I would not hire someone who would do so.”
I get what they are saying: they are thinking it’s an X-Y problem, where the poster is asking for one thing but really needs another.

But the answer to many of the common questions and criticisms is going to be similar:
“I’m trying to solve a problem in a production system. This is the way it was designed. No, I can’t take it all apart and rebuild it the correct way. Please help me use the pieces I already have to solve the problem.”

Better yet: “I’m struggling with a vendor-provided system. I have no access to the code and cannot change their database. We are several versions behind, so the vendor is not going to help us on this one. Please help me with what I have available.”

Back in my Navy Nuclear Power days, when we were in training, I would often speculate things like “what if they added a check valve here so that the system does this instead of that” and the instructors would shut me down, saying “You are redesigning the plant. We can’t do that.” The point was clear: work with what you have.

I seem to recall a YouTube video where I saw a guy set up PCM audio recorders in multiple places in his house, then he took the audio files and used them together to triangulate the source of the annoying beep,

1238

A bit over the top for me. Since the damn thing was beeping anyway, I could just burn down the house.

1239

If they are, I’ll try 'em!

1240

Have you tried L’Oreal Bright Reveal- it works on my dark spots.