What trivial problem would you think they could invent a remedy for?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I think they could solve the problem of the bar of soap that dries on top but gets really gooey on the bottom. Something simple, perhaps, like a rocking soap dish that would flip the bar over from time to time and it would dry evenly.

Or the problem of champaigne corks. Champaign is expensive enough that its bottles should have pressure release valve caps, so you could drop the pressure gradually without pouring foam all over. Perhaps the solution is as simple as a robot like that one on Futurama, with a cupboard in its chest. You put the bottle in there, where the chamber is pressurized, the cork removed with a corkscrew arm, and then the chamber repressurized. Wah la.

What other minor problems are there waiting for a solution?

2

They tried inventing a dictionary for people who spell words like viola as Wah la, but it didn’t work.

3

I think there’s still a long way to go in making undergarments that fit and support better. For instance, I’m slightly larger on one side, making bra sizing a bit tricky. When I’m in just a bra, you can totally tell that one side is ill-fitting. (You can’t really tell when I’m wearing shirt, unles you’re really looking for it. But I’m uncomfortable.) Most women aren’t perfectly even, so why not sell a realistic “padder” for “evening out” purposes? I would wear an extra pad on one side if it were undetectable (made of silicone, perhaps?) and made bras fit me better.

Yes, this is a minor problem, but I think having a small section of “even-outers” in every lingerie store would turn out to be profitable.

4

Probably because viola is pronounced vee-oh-luh.

Perhaps you meant voilà?

5

… or a magnetic soap holder? These have been around for ages, and do a pretty good job of keeping the soap from turning to mush.

6

Hard drive failures.

Short of actual mechanical problems, most “failed” hard drives are OK. All the data is still there, but something (probably) minor in the FAT or Boot Sectors gets corrupted and the whole drive is ruined (short of extremely expensive Data Recovery s/w). You’d think someone would have come up with a way to make the FAT/Boot more robust/redundant.

Come on Bill, do something useful with all your billions and get to work on this.

7

Needed invention: Ventriloquist underpants that make farts sound like they came from the other side of the room.

8

I rent a lot of cars.

Can’t they just put all gas tanks on one side or the other? Why do some makers do it on the left while others do it on the right?

Shoelaces.

I have a pair of sneakers to exercise in and I have a pair to wear to work – both of them Nikes 'cause I like the things.

But what the **** is up with the laces nowadays? Did they change the shoe-tying process sometime in the past 35 years when I wasn’t looking and then never sent me the memo? Because that’s the only reason I can figure why, whenever I buy or try on a pair of shoes (or laces), I’m left with like a foot and-a-half worth of laces on each side.

I look at them feeling slightly foolish, like the old fart realizing he doesn’t know what half the **** on the remote even does. I wonder if I’m somehow abnormal – as if my size 10-medium foot was anything but, that it was actually so narrow that I was ending up with an unplanned-for extra amount of laces… or maybe, maybe it’s that my legs are short, in some bizarre way that is completely unnoticeable to anything or anyone other than my shoelaces. I wonder if it’s the shoe on the display – maybe they give them long laces because… hell, I don’t know “because that’s how shoes are”.

I only know that, in the past decade, when I’m done tightening my laces I invariably have laces extending all the way up above my shin. On each side. And I’m all confused and ****, thinking it doesn’t make a damn lick of sense, hating my poor, invisibly-abnormal feet and legs, wondering what the **** is up with the stupid things.

I mean, I can’t figure it out – what are you supposed to do with the extra laces? Do people tie their shoes differently now than when I was a kid? Is the extra 1.5 feet on each side supposed to … hell, I don’t know – is it supposed to be double-laced? Double-tied? I even once tried lacing the things through that loop above your Achilles tendon – I didn’t even need my wife to confirm the complete dorkiness of that idea.

It’s not that I need to know how to solve the problem, I just can’t figure out WTF they were thinking when they decided to put an extra 3 feet of laces in every Nike?

Surely this is an easy problem to fix? Instead of putting 7 feet of laces in each shoe, only put 4.

9

Quite true. And it begins with a “v” that sort of sounds like a “w” so it’s truly one of those words you have to know how to spell to look it up.

10

Amen, brother!

I have huge fricking feet and I still have a ridiculous amount of lace left over.
And who decided to start making the damn things round instead of flat so you have to re-tie them 10 times a day?

11

The two needed inventions that come immediately to my mind are better ways to look after and fix teeth, and better, cheaper, faster, easier permanent hair removal methods. I mean, come on - stick a needle or two in your mouth, then drill, then stuff crap in the hole? Is that seriously the best we can do at this point in our societal development? And the dentist stuff is even worse! ( :smiley: )

12

Something to let you more easily carry the drinks when you get take out. When I go for a couple of burgers, fries, and Cokes, the cashier hands me a couple of paper cups for the drinks. What am I supposed to do with those? Don’t they stop to think that when I get home I’m going to have to handle keys, as well as everything else I normally take back and forth to work, and the bag of food…so how on earth am I going to handle two loose, full, drink cups? It’s as if they assume that when you order to go, you’re going to always eat it in your car. But if you’re just going to sit there in your car, why wouldn’t you want to eat it inside?

13

A way to get around the foaming champagne is to twist the cork out. You don’t even have to do it slowly; the key is that by twisting the cork out, don’t release the pressure all at once. The cork still makes a satisfying pop, without the annoying foam.

I think all spray bottles should be shaped so that the sides of the bottle’s base slope toward the center, so the straw that draws the liquid up will awlays be positioned to get the last of the good stuff out even when the level is really low. 409 is the absolute worst about this – I swear at least 1/8 of the bottle is left and the straw can’t draw any of it up. Arrgh!

14

See, I told you it didn’t work. :stuck_out_tongue:

15

My trivial peeve: Room service and the mess it creates in the hallways of nice hotels.

Why hasn’t anyone come up with a dumb waiter system in hotels? Who the hell wants to get dressed to answer their door when ordering a romantic breakfast in bed? It seems to me, hotels could build mini-elevators that connect the basement service areas to the rooms. They’d send food up - and allow guests to return their dirty dishes back down without having to leave them in the hallway.

16

Penn Jillette came across a problem a female aquintence had, so he invented the Jill-Jet.

17

One day, someone will figure out a way to stop you losing (a) your glasses and/or glasses case and (b) your TV remote and © keys. That person will make a fortune. That person will make Bill Gates look poor.

18

OK…but how on earth will you get the damn bottle to sit upright in your cabinet? :confused:

19

Presumably, the base would be flat, but the inside would be shaped, with the glass thicker at the edges than in the middle. Like so:



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20

Does it come with a fart-smell teleportation device?