# What were you THINKING? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 13, 2023, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532 "2023-10-13T19:36:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 394
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2026, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8251 "2026-09-18T23:59:57Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > > [@Alessan](#): > > > > Sorry, but the algorithms that decide what music I listen to never played that one for me. > > It’s more like, everywhere you went it was playing, it was a big popular hit at its time. > > Of course, that’s a USA-centric viewpoint. I don’t know if he has international appeal. > > I’m also biased because he’s a local Seattle guy so I see him show up on TV all the time. He’s also a big supporter of local sports teams. There are probably other centrisms that apply to that song (i.e. Thrift Shop, since my copy-pastes didn’t pick up the name), such as generational or maybe regional. One thing that the internet can do for us is to help us realize how different other peoples’ experiences are to ours. My experience is that I have no idea about that music, and I don’t know if I ever heard it or not. If it was playing somewhere I was, I didn’t notice or pay attention. I don’t care or mind if folks want to talk about it, certainly, but they shouldn’t assume too much. I just looked up the song and watched a little bit of the video (not enough to make any sense out of it). Aside from being a song that was apparently popular 14 years ago, I’m pretty sure I never heard any of it anywhere. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8252 "2026-09-19T00:03:09Z")
I think this video shows some of Macklemore’s strong stance on Palestine. And I really like the anti-Trump and anti-Elon stuff. Definitely NSFW though. [YouTube: **MACKLEMORE - fucked up (official video)**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sn9EKC9nqU4) It’s age-restricted due to language so it won’t play inline. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8253 "2026-09-19T02:15:28Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > > [@Alessan](#): > > > > Sorry, but the algorithms that decide what music I listen to never played that one for me. > > It’s more like, everywhere you went it was playing, it was a big popular hit at its time. I just pulled it up in YouTube, because i don’t notice names of music. But nope, I’ve never heard it. And I’d never heard of Macklemore, either. I recognize that I’m pretty out of it musically, so maybe he is incredible popular. But he’s not on the radio stations i listen to. 🤷‍♀️ And i think it will be awhile before his style of music makes it to elevators near me. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8254 "2026-09-19T06:03:15Z")
_Thrift Shop_ is in no way Macklemore’s most representative or best song, it’s a bit of a novelty hit. _[Same Love](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlVBg7_08n0)_ was everywhere that same year, and that’s one of the best things rap has ever produced. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8255 "2026-09-19T10:47:56Z")
As someone with a tech background, the thread “Printer issue: Is it the printers, or my computer?” in FQ is frustrating as hell and I bet the folks here who do or did tech support would be even more frustrated. Posters are trying to help but the OP consistently provides terse non-informative answers if the OP even answers at all. This is on about the same level as the aforementioned “Help! I deleted the internet!”. I don’t expect everyone to be technically knowledgeable. But if you’re asking for help, FFS try to be cooperative and answer the damn questions. This is not a matter of technical expertise, it’s a matter of basic comprehension of the fucking English language and the ability to communicate basic information you’re being asked for.. The OP had two different printers that didn’t work with their computer, and instead of engaging in efforts to help, went out and bought a third printer, which also didn’t work – an outcome that was almost guaranteed. Almost as certainly as the answer to their problem was trivial, if only they’d provide some useful information. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 11:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8256 "2026-09-19T11:22:02Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > The OP had two different printers that didn’t work with their computer, and instead of engaging in efforts to help, went out and bought a third printer, which also didn’t work – an outcome that was almost guaranteed. Almost as certainly as the answer to their problem was trivial, if only they’d provide some useful information. Some people, and I’m not meaning this to be insulting, really don’t grasp that sort of, for lack of a better phrase ‘troubleshooting logic’. Years ago, I got a phone call at work, but she was breaking up so much I had to hang up. She called back a few times and it was the same thing. Eventually she called from a different number and it was fine. When she did get through, she asked me if I’ve been having phone problems today, to which I told her that I’ve been taking calls all morning and those few calls from her cell phone were the only ones that did that. Her reply was “Strange, you’re the third person I’ve talked to today that couldn’t hear me”. I had to explain to her that it’s HER phone that’s the problem, not everyone else’s. > [@wolfpup](#): > > But if you’re asking for help, FFS try to be cooperative and answer the damn questions And, for me, I mean the most basic of questions like ‘what does the error say?’ or ‘see if the internet works on a different computer’. Just some easy questions so I know what I’m walking into, what tools I need to bring with me, if this is something I’m even capable of fixing. For a real world example that I encountered many times in college (90s). I’d get a call from a friend in another dorm asking me to come over and look at their computer because they can’t save anything. I ask what the error is and they say ‘can you just come over and look at it’. Fine, whatever. I go over there, ask them to repeat what they did and, almost without fail they’d hit save, the error popped up, they’d clear it and say ‘see, it doesn’t work’. And when I hit save and didn’t clear the error so we could read it, it was nearly always "No disk in drive, please insert disk into drive a:". I could’ve fixed that without getting out of bed. Hell, YOU could’ve fixed it if you’d just read the error. ---
**Author:** ![scudsucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scudsucker/32/14101_2.png) [@scudsucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scudsucker)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 11:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8257 "2026-09-19T11:26:26Z")
Anecdotally, I once worken in a large open office, reasonably close to the printer. I worked out the protocol (it may have been Internet Printing Protocol (“IPP”), it was loooong ago) for me to send commands over the LAN to alter the messaging on the large printer. So I could send custom messages from my PC to be displayed in the printer’s small screen, and then delete them… it whiled away a few lazy minutes of the day making the printer give greetings, insults, hugely complex instructions or just grumpy printer complaints about how overworked and under-appreciated it felt. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8258 "2026-09-19T12:27:51Z")
This thread is reminding me of a phrase I learned here years ago “Put down the chocolate-covered banana and step away from the European currency systems.” ---
**Author:** ![Die\_Capacitrix](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/die_capacitrix/32/9_2.png) [@Die\_Capacitrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Die_Capacitrix)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8259 "2026-09-19T13:07:25Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > t’s more like, everywhere you went it was playing, it was a big popular hit at its time. In the past year the song “Golden” from _K-pop Demon Hunters_ is playing everywhere. I only know that because I saw the film. If I hadn’t seen the film, I probably wouldn’t have recognized it, and it would merge into all the other music I don’t know. About three months ago, Apple Music decided I should listen to “Can’t Hold Us” from the same album as “Thrift Shop”. I wanted to hear more and now listen to the entire album (The Heist). If you had asked me a year ago about Macklemore, I wouldn’t have even known he’s from Seattle. He was very young at the time I moved away from the area. Since I started listening to The Heist, I learned a bit about him, because I was curious about the lyrics. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8260 "2026-09-19T15:22:52Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > As someone with a tech background, the thread “Printer issue: Is it the printers, or my computer?” in FQ is frustrating as hell and I bet the folks here who do or did tech support would be even more frustrated. Yep. As the couple dozen posts by current and former techies starting here yesterday demonstrates: 😁 > [@LSLGuy](#): > > Village idiot **nwh** has just produced an incomprehensible thread about some printer problems they’re having. It’s turned into a dialog between several people earnestly trying to help and **nwh** providing 3-word answers to it’s-not-clear who about it’s-not-clear what. I’m sort of proud that I avoided taking the bait. > > Some people are too stupid to help. It’s clear there was no THINKING in whatever they’ve been doing at home to address their problem, nor in their OP or any subsequent post. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8261 "2026-09-19T16:04:51Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > > [@solost](#): > > > > Desktop IT support is as much detective work as it is hardware and software knowledge. > > Amen. I have been saying this for years. A bit late, but I have to add that just like in police detective work, some people like to cooperate, while others are unwilling or unable to do so. The best exhibit being the printer thread we are talking about. I really laughed my ass off when she posted that she actually had bought a third printer that promptly also didn’t work 🤦‍♂️. Idiot. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2026, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8262 "2026-09-19T16:09:18Z")
Yeah, what a surprise. ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8263 "2026-09-20T12:32:56Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > I really laughed my ass off when she posted that she actually had bought a third printer that promptly also didn’t work 🤦‍♂️. Idiot. Ha, reminds me of a tech support story I heard awhile back: an employee calls their offsite tech support and says their computer won’t turn on. The tech support person asks the first, most basic question: “is the computer plugged in?”. “I can’t see behind my desk— it’s too dark back there”. Tech support asks “do you have a desk lamp or something you can point behind your desk to see the plug area?”. “That won’t work. The power’s out”. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8264 "2026-09-20T12:48:59Z")
Hey, my laptop works when the power is out! Why shouldn’t my desktop? ---
**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:** [September 20, 2026, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8265 "2026-09-20T12:52:44Z")
Where I worked the desk tops all had battery backup, in particular the ones that ran critical systems. It’s not that crazy. Of course that wasn’t the case in that oft told apocryphal story. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8266 "2026-09-20T12:57:23Z")
Actually, compared to e.g. 20 years ago we now spend a lot of our hours interacting with battery-powered devices. Enough so that getting and keeping them charged is a routine background task we do mostly unconsiously. But a side effect of that change is that interacting with wall-powered devices becomes the exception, not the norm. A couple months ago I was home and we had a power failure mid afternoon. There’s plenty of natural light in my small apartment, so I only noticed the failure immediately because a UPS started beeping. Over the course of the next few minutes of puttering around the house doing whatever, I was repeatedly surprised that e.g. the light switch in the closet didn’t work. Neither did the washing machine. Between my phone and tablet that were working fine, there was this odd cognitive dissonance: my tablet works, so why not my washing machine? Sort of a “Fool me once shame on you; fool me twice shame on me.” situation. Plus “Fool me repeatedly every couple minutes and maybe there’s some underlying psychological habit worth exploring in more detail.” Which was the point of sharing this anecdote. ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8267 "2026-09-20T12:58:31Z")
We had battery backups for the desktop computers at a place I worked at too, but if I recall they were only good for about 10 or 15 minutes of power. Long enough to make sure you save your work and power your computer down properly in the event of an outage. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8268 "2026-09-20T13:06:32Z")
I wish we’d had that when i worked in NJ. We had a very dirty power supply, with lots of little surges and the occasional flicker. I lost stuff all the time. It did forge the habit of “save early, save often”. But once, i even lost a hard drive, which probably seized when something kicked it at the wrong moment. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8269 "2026-09-20T13:28:16Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > There are probably other centrisms that apply to that song (i.e. Thrift Shop, since my copy-pastes didn’t pick up the name), such as generational or maybe regional. One thing that the internet can do for us is to help us realize how different other peoples’ experiences are to ours. My experience is that I have no idea about that music, and I don’t know if I ever heard it or not. If it was playing somewhere I was, I didn’t notice or pay attention. I’m not acquainted with it at all; I don’t spend a lot of time in places where top 40 radio is playing. When I do, most pop music isn’t distinguishable to me because the radio is always backgrounded and the songs merge into a general haze. On occasion one breaks through. For some reason, I kept hearing S. Colvin’s “Sunny Came Home” all through the year 1998 (but _only_ 1998). A Korean grocery I used to shop in had just one mixtape, so I heard Fastball’s “The Way” a lot, two decades after its release. Once, waiting for my car to be inspected, even though the radio was turned down, the song “Havana” broke through the fog into my conscious attention. The reason: the luscious Cuban _son_ sound stood out from the general Yanqui mass of mediocrity and hooked into my audio sensibility. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2026, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/8270 "2026-09-20T13:28:56Z")
Then there is the reverse of stupid customers, where “tech support” is handled by non-technical people reading scripts. My mother lived in another state for a year. When she came back, she restarted her phone service and I happened to be visiting from Japan. She could call out with her landline, but not receive phone calls. She had two phones and they both had the same problem. I figured that when they turned her telephone service back on, someone simply forgot to check the box on their screen to allow incoming calls. It’s all software settings of course, because in the old days any connection would have allowed incoming and outgoing calls. Try explaining that to a “technical support” person who only reads scripts. I explained the problem and any actual tech would have understood what I was saying. But the “technical support” person only has a script and didn’t understand what it actually meant. She tried to help me “troubleshoot”. “Have you tried unplugging the phone and plugging it in again?” “Yes. I know that the phone is good and the wiring is good because I’m using the phone to call you.” No comprehension. I asked a couple of times for a senior tech, but she wouldn’t transfer the call. I told her to write down the specific problem and what I thought was the cause. Finally, a senior tech returned my call so explained the problem and what I thought was the problem. The initial “technical support” person had mangled my message, and he verified that the setting was the problem and fixed it. Something that should have only taken a few minutes turning into a 30-minute call and a wait for several hours. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532.md?page=393) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532.md?page=395)