I’ve always been athletic and played a lot of sports, and I love volleyball. Was pretty good at it, but stopped mostly because of the attitudes.
Go to play somewhere, and if you’re not doing things exactly their way they can treat you very badly. They often won’t try to help you, just roll their eyes and bitch about you when they think you’re not listening.
I’ve not run into this in most other sports. Usually I find people are eager to help a beginner, or a somewhat skilled player who is a newcomer to an area or league. Not so much in volleyball - if you don’t play to their expectations, they don’t want anything to do with you.
Volleyball is a nuanced game, but I think devotees end up thinking too much of themselves.
RenFaire “actors” who need to tell you in depth about their character - the bastard son of the Duke of Chamberlain who was sexually abused by his priest but is now one of the favorites of the king…
1: Clueless hobby dieting. I’m not knocking everyone who is really trying to lose weight, I’m talking about the type who is constantly gabbing about the latest fad diet, a running commentary of what she ate that day and the nutritional composition thereof, who seems to be an expert on all things diet and exercise, who endlessly dispenses advice about what you should eat and do, yet somehow has managed to stay exactly the same size and shape for the past 20 years. The type who announces loudly “I’m just having the salad, because I’m trying to lose weight, which is why I’m having the salad” and then she orders the salad with grilled beef and ranch dressing on it. Yes, I used the pronoun “she” twice, and I stand by it.
2: Bicyclists are 50/50 whether you’ll get an OK person or a raging wanker. Not only do you get the exercisier-than-thou thing but also a continual “same road same rules” lecture. When you ask them if they can do any tricks, they sorta do a blank stare and ask if you mean upgrading their own shifters or whatever.
3: Home renovators/decorators/aficionados of house porn in general. Dear sweet fuck. I do not live in your house. I have never seen your house and probably never will. If you invite me over, then I will revel in your lesbian woodworking glory. If not, I really do not give a fuck. I paint my walls beer-colored so they will never need repainting.
Have any of you ever been around a group of guys playing or talking about Warhammer or Warhammer 40,000? They are some of the most obnoxious, socially devoid, and smelliest people around.
And please, please, don’t invite someone over to watch you play a game. I’ve a friend who thinks other people are fascinated by watching him play some complicated strategery thing.
My brother in law collects Smith and Wesson J (or K) frame revolvers. They all look exactly alike to me. Martini probably would, like everyone else, be bored to tears if he heard me going on about developing the perfect .308 load for my Remington 700VLS to give me a 2 inch group at 500 meters and why I took a ultra fine whetstone to the sear.
Yeah, “gun collectors” are a very diverse group with very little in common. But anyone whose hobby is history related is far more interesting to my than sports or game nuts. Home theaters are amazingly dull to me, but I consider that kind of an extension of the audiophile phenomena.
SCA is pretty tedious. Great concept, but the people I’ve met that do it are worse than Trekkie’s.
Star Wars geeks, on the other hand, are interesting and socially adept.
I’ve actually walked into a comic shop to make a purchase, noticed a Warhammer convention going on and immediately did a 180 degree turn and walk right out. It’s either that or spend a half hour scrubbing the Dorito and stale Mountain Dew smell out of my skin.
If I may be indulged with a brief O/T question, and if Martini doesn’t mind answering, how do you go collecting those type of weapons under Australia’s gun laws?
Hahaha, I remember that clearly. It was the greatest thing I have ever read, because the crazy didn’t stop there. No, no, The Countess kept piling it on.
I keep trying to tell myself "Your exciting breakthrough after a dozen years research is everyone else’s snoozefest… Your exciting breakthrough after a dozen years research is everyone else’s snoozefest… "
… but sometimes I don’t listen to me, and I suddenly look up in horror at a pair of eyes that have glazed over and a head that’s rhythmically nodding “Ahah… ahah” and I realise I’ve done it again.
Good God, Yes. Fantasy Footballers win, because not only is it a boring hobby to hear about, but it seems to be a very stressful one to engage in. They pay money to buy into a league, obsess over stats in order to draft “their team,” pay a fee whenever they want to make a “trade,” and obsess over the stats for every player. It’s not a hobby, it’s a second job. There’s a couple of guys at work who I’d love to ask, “When was the last time you actually enjoyed watching a football game, as opposed to frantically scribbling down numbers?”
I’ll also join in with the audiophile-haters. I’ve gone to electronics stores and hung out in the Little Room O’Speakers. And you know what? The speakers that cost a couple hundred dollars and the speakers that cost a couple thousand dollars sound almost alike. There might be a bit of improvement in the really expensive speakers, but not nearly enough to justify spending 10 times as much money on them. The Law of Diminishing Returns definitely applies to audio equipment.
Don’t worry, Cazzle. I believe you truly suffer from a form of OCD. My mom suffered from the same disease. After 30+ years, I finally fine-tuned my ability to smile, nod my head, feign interest, and recite the alphabet backwards all at the same time.
My wife is an audiologist. Because she has studied and understands such things as the physics of sound and the physiological capabilities of the human ear, I’ve asked her about some of the specifications that you see in audio ads. For example, I’ve asked her about such things as “plus or minus 0.00005 dB total harmonic distortion*” (among other claims made in the ads) and she just laughs. Sure, she says, you can measure that under controlled conditions using specialized testing equipment, but the human ear simply can’t distinguish that. Or many of the other claims made in the ads. They may well be true claims, and the documentation may be there to back them up, but the human ear can only do so much. The Law of Diminishing Returns is an accurate description since at some point, the audiophile human who owns that ear is paying for capabilities that, while measurable by special equipment, he or she simply cannot hear.
This is just an example figure that I made up because I cannot remember exactly what the figure was. However, my wife has made her observations on figures that have actually been published in audio equipment manufacturers’ advertisements, and her comments based on the claims made in those advertisements are accurate.
Yep we are bad news. I had dinner with the neighbors that dive and kept thinking to myself “how many times have I told this story”. Yep, we are the worst. The same stories get told again, and again.
I’m not being sarcastic. I had dinner with the neighbors that dive and kept thinking to myself “how many times have I told this story”.
