My husband will try that trick just to see how long I’ll keep up my end of the argument. The man’s lucky I haven’t strangled him in one of his obtuse husband moments.
I once had a 30 minute argument with a supposedly intelligent person who believed that the evolution of “they” as the singular gender generic pronoun was orchestrated by the feminists and the extreme left. He just could not get that language is bigger than that, the extreme side keeps trying to make up words instead, and that the change is actually organic and natural. It may stop or it may become perfectly acceptable within the next 10-20 years. No one knows because politicos don’t control language at it’s most basic level.
Them: Okay, so I want to come there for Thanksgiving. What’s the snow situation going to be like? (I work at a ski resort.)
Me: Well, our opening date is slated for Thanksgiving, but I can’t tell you what the snow situation will be, it’s too far off. Normally we open then.
Them: Don’t you make snow?
Me: Yes, we do, we have extensive snowmaking. But even that is partly weather-dependent. I can tell you that we plan to be open that day, barring any weather issues.
Them: Last year you opened late!
Me: Unfortunately, yes. Believe me, if I could have made it snow, I would have. But I can’t tell you what’s going to happen this year. Every year is different. Right now, the opening date is Thanksgiving.
Them: Are you going to open on Thanksgiving or not?
Me: I sure hope so, sir. Right now that’s the plan. That’s all I can tell you. Normally we open then.
This is extra frustrating right now because this year of all years we could really use a heavy snow year to bring in people. But I can’t make it snow! I don’t want to tell them a definite opening date when the whole thing really depends on when it fucking snows. And if we end up opening a bit late then I look like the liar. (“She said you’d be open!!!”) As if I could make it snow.
Buried somewhere in the reviews of many products on amazon.com is someone who has reviewed Amazon as a service, rather than the specific product they purchased. :rolleyes:
My boyfriend tries this too, until I make it clear that I’m not putting up with that bullshit. Acting stupid on purpose is one of my biggest pet peeves, and he knows this. If someone is actually that ignorant, then I’ll stick it out, but if I know you know better, forget it.
Before I started this tech support job, I worked armed security in an urban cell phone store. Believe me, they needed it. I saw this conversation more than I ever needed to. Usually, once the customer started to get upset and swearing, all I’d have to do was wander over and stand just where they could see me on the edges of their field of vision. They’d get the idea real fast.
Real simple, folks. You’re paying N for X. When you use X+Y, you get charged N+M. Don’t want to be charged that? Limit yourself to N.
Translation (heard straight out once to a very rude and demanding customer): THEN SHUT THE FUCK UP ONCE IN A WHILE.
I get a lot of the following;
Cx: I have problem X.
Me: The Solution is Y.
Cx: I don’t want to do Y.
Me: Sorry, that’s the solution to this particular problem.
Cx: I demand to speak to someone else / I demand a different answer.
Me: No. (fully empowered by company to say this and make it stick)
Cx: I refuse to accept your answer and want to speak to your supervisor.
Me: I am the supervisor. If you’re not willing to do Y, then we can’t help you.
Cx: Help! Help! I’m bein’ repressed!
I’m really sorry you don’t get it, but we don’t have magic wands to resolve your technical issues. We can’t just invent new ways of doing things because you’re too stupid, lazy or self-entitled to do anything. I can assure you that even if the Pope or President Obama called, we’d give them the same answer, and someone would have to perform the steps we’re telling you. The only difference with those folks is that they have people to do it for them.
Doing Apple support;
Cx: I demand you replace my product TODAY!!!
Me: Well, you’re 250 miles from an Apple store and Fedex doesn’t pick up and deliver 2,000 miles away on the same day, so I’m sorry, but that’s not physically possible unless you’re willing to drive all the way to that store.
Cx: I refuse to accept that! blah, blah, blah.
Cx: My product isn’t working.
Me: Ok, how is it not working?
Cx: I don’t know, I don’t care, and I’m not going to do a goddamned thing to fix it. YOU fix it right now!
Me: As I’m in a different state and don’t have a magic wand, I don’t think I’ll be able to do that.
Cx: JUST FIX THE DAMNED THING RIGHT NOW!!!
Of course, I stll remember back in 1991 when I was climbing out of the Cliff Palace at Mesa Verde and the extremely large woman in front of me was struggling hard to climb out, loudly complaining about how they needed to put in ESCALATORS so that people like her could get up and down easier. :smack:
Medina Azahara is an archeological site near Córdoba, in Spain. It’s a walled-in city-palace, clearly built by someone who was more afraid of visitors than interested in being a good host (there is only one path, which had doors every few meters). The floor is very rough, my mother had problems navigating and had to lean on me a couple of times. The entrance is at the top of a hill and you have to go down a long flight of stairs. It is not disabled-adapted at all and any attempt to make it so would mean destroying half the place.
We were there in May. The guy who sells drinks at the door said it’s the best time, “before the heat sets in.” That day’s high was only 40C, that’s some 110F.
When we were sitting in the shadow of some trees, waiting for the bus back to the city after our visit, we saw the following family:
mother, waddled, flip-flops,
father, normal weight, flip-flops,
her father, in a wheelchair, able to hop/walk aided, suffering from both bone problems and gout, in his stocking feet,
mother’s sister, normal weight, stilettos,
teenaged boy, half a foot taller than everybody else and growing, flip-flops which kept coming out and shooting all over the place,
tween boy, sneakers.
The little boy took one look at the stairs and said “mom, I don’t think this is a good idea.” He got outvoted, of course. The family went down the first flight of stairs with dad and the teenager carrying grandpa, then rolled him down the concrete ramp, then down another flight of stairs, a run along a short length of bumpy flagstone path (my bum was hurting in solidarity with grandpa), then they realized that they could not turn the here-went-a-gate corners with the wheelchair open. The kid tugged at his brother’s pants and dragged him to the map while the grownups discussed logistics. The big brother looked at the map, went pale, went paler, pulled his aunt over and they managed to convince the rest to turn back.
Of course the mother was saying “I don’t know why don’t they fix this place, it could use some air conditioning too!” Well, you could use a brain, but it’s not compulsory to get one.
Man: I don’t see where to drop this off.
Me: What did you need today?
Man: I need to get pictures developed.
Me: I’m sorry, sir. We don’t develop 35mm film at this store.
Man: It’s not film, it’s a memory card. I want the pictures developed. Where can I drop it off?
Me: Oh, well you can come over here to one of our kiosks and place your digital order.
Man: I don’t wanna do that. I want you to do it.
Me: I’m sorry sir, that’s not how it works here. With the volume of digital pictures that can be stored on memory cards, unless you’d like each photo printed, it’s the customer’s decision on how to place their order. I’ll be happy to help…
Man: I just want to leave my card with you and come back later and pick up my pictures.
Me: Sir, I apologize but I cannot take responsibility for your digital media. If you would like to stick around just a few minutes I can help you get your order going…
Man: We’re going in circles here. (Me: ???) You’re saying you don’t develop pictures?
Me: Technically, no sir. We don’t. We do make digital prints.
Man: So I can leave this with you and come back and get my pictures?
Me: No Sir. I can’t assume the responsibility for your…
Man: Fine. (leaves)
Me: Bwuh?
Heard in my office shortly before I left for new pastures (partly due to conversations like this).
The manager is in charge of the entire e-business programme for a large council in the UK; the underling had aspirations of being a senior manager in public sector IT.
Manager: Humph… the techies have just told me the servers have fallen over again.
Underling: How do you mean fallen over?
Manager: You know, “fallen over”.
Underling: What, like they’ve actually fallen over?
Manager: Yes, “fallen over”, like I said.
Underling: So they’ve fallen off the shelf or something?
Manager: Yeah, they’re always falling over, especially when we’re adding new features.
Underling: You’d have thought they’d use screws or tape or something, or even just rest them on the floor.
Manager: I have suggested it in the past, but no-one’s done anything about it.
And on the flipside of that, I’ve noticed more than a few feedback reviews on Amazon Marketplace sellers that are actually reviewing the product. :smack:
Another case of people not getting it - I contribute to a blog which partly relies on user suggestions for topics to cover (stuff on Google Maps). When browsing through the list of suggestions, as well as the usual obvious spam and nonsense, it’s amazing how many are from people that seem to think they are either bookmarking stuff for their personal use, or showing a particular site to their relatives, or… what, I don’t know, but it’ll be stuff like “Aunt Maud’s house - we leave on the 27th”, or “This is the camp site, can’t wait” or whatever.
A friend of mine moved from Georgia to Florida. Georgia has state income tax, Florida doesn’t. I asked my friend if he was getting a promotion or a raise to move there. He said “No. I’m keeping the same pay, but Florida doesn’t take out state income tax from my check, so it 's like getting a raise.”
Um… you DO realize that the state still has to collect revenue don’t you? You’re likely paying a higher sales tax and who knows what else… ?
I can’t remember exactly how this came about, but we were paying a restaurant bill or something with my (not at all decrepit or stupid or out of touch, so there’s no excuse here) mother-in-law. Conversation betwixt husband and his mother goes;
“Oh here, I’ve got my Visa Debit”
“That’s not debit, it’s Visa”
“It’s a Visa Debit”
“Visa’s not debit, it’s credit. It’s Visa”
“No it’s not”
“Yes it is!”
“Mum, what I have in my hand, here, right now, is a Visa Debit card. It says on the card, look - Visa Debit”
“But it’s Visa. I got a Visa in the Cretaceous Period / nineteen-forty-plonk / whatever, and that was for credit”
“Mother. Visa used to be just for credit cards, but now they’ve expanded their services to include debit cards as well. Like Boots used to be a chemist and now it sells electronics and sandwiches and ass-waxers”.
blank look
“But this is Visa!”
Now we use “but this is Visa!” as discussion shorthand for “you are being an obtuse fool”
A short movie starring Me and Obtuse College Student, during Any Given Semester:
Me: Where is your rough draft? It’s due today.
OCS: I didn’t know it was due.
Me: I’ve said it in class.
OCS: I wasn’t here.
Me: It’s on your syllabus.
OCS: I didn’t look OR I lost it.
Me: I would have given you another one if you had asked or emailed.
Variation:
OCS: I wasn’t here last week. What did we do?
Me: We did what was in the syllabus.
Repeat above obtuseness, OR:
Me: You have the textbook and the syllabus, right?
OCS: Yeah.
Me: Then you could have kept up with the work even while you were absent.
OCS: Oh, yeah.
One more:
Me: We missed you at the library today.
OCS: I didn’t know we were supposed to go there. I went to the classroom late and I saw the sign, though. But I didn’t know where the library was. OR I found the building, but I couldn’t get in.
Me: I told everyone they have to enter from the north side. I specifically said you can’t get in on the other side, and the library isn’t on that side anyway.
OCS: Oh, yeah.
In the early 80s, my family took a trip to the Statue of Liberty, to see it before they closed it for a multi-year renovation. My brother and I were the only ones to climb to the observation deck. It was a narrow, steep spiral staircase to the top, and given the number of people climbing, it takes a long time, and moves in stops & starts. From about 30 steps up, the middle aged overweight woman behind me started complaining to me that I was stopping so much. I told her it wasn’t me, the whole line was stopping. She decided that meant that my brother (who was 15 at the time and ran track) was the one stopping, and demanded he and I step aside and let her pass. She complained “My doctor said I shouldn’t stop after I’ve started walking”, to which I replied “Then maybe you shouldn’t have decided to climb all these stairs?” She bitched at me for the entire walk up, and down.
