Showing posts with label stupid people. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stupid people. Show all posts

Monday, October 3, 2011

Things that rub me the wrong way...

...My new hiking/work shoes.  They WILL break in, I hope, but man, a giant blister AND no arch support after 3 hours of wearing (and only 45 min of that was walking) does not bode well for me...

...Chlorine rubbing out the fabric of my very expensive swim suit.  I am far too broke to spend $80 on a racing suit every 12 months.  I know this doesn't seem like much in a year, but this is the 2nd suit that's getting all stretchy and puckery and translucent...

...Kerbs on my car tires.  At least once a year I somehow misjudge distances, and today I scraped the CRAP out of my front right rim...

...UHaul employees.  I rent once a month, sometimes once every two weeks for the last 5 years from the same location.  Could you PLEASE make some sort of a notation on our account, so I don't have to give you my address, phone # and listen to your rules EVERY TIME??? Really, there should be a frequent customer program at UHaul...

...My Nook not recognizing the book I am supposed to read for next week's book club...

Monday, June 20, 2011

Why do gyms make me angry?

Right, so going to the gym should be a cleansing, invigorating and ultimately stress-reducing experience, right?  At least for me, that's usually the case.  Plus, I only stick to the pool, where the proportion of crazy is usually less.

So why am I annoyed by people there?

1. Dear guy drenched in CK1 - it's not 1994.  It never will be again.  Plus, you are not 19.  It's simply embarrassing for a man in his 30s to wear that much cologne, no matter the brand.  And you know what happens to cologne from your body when you jump in the pool?  It flavours the water.  No shit.  You should try swallowing the water that splashed when you jumped in.  It was like CK1 soup out there.

2. Dear lady rubbing your body with lotion - I am happy you are so very comfortable with your body.  But next time maybe you should do it with your crotch away from me?  I don't like staring at people's pubes 12 inches from my head.  Every time I see nude women walking about the locker room without actually making to get dressed, I get flashbacks of being in public bathhouses when I was little, and I cringe.  Also, you are too skinny, and not in a good way.

3. Dear gym management - I am glad you've finally installed a swim suit spinner.  Trouble is, it's the size of my trashcan, and weighs just as little.  Would it hurt you to either a) secure the damn thing to the ground or b) put up a sign that says "please hold the spinner down as it is bound to take flight under influence of centrifugal force"?  Also, try to empty out the plastic cup the spinner drains into every once in a while.

I can go on, but I am done bitching for the day.  Gym memberships (especially ones with swimming pools in the middle of an urban area) are fucking expensive, and I expect some level of reciprocity on the part of both other patrons and management.  At least the towels are clean.

Thursday, May 13, 2010

Wed Lost In Translation I

Please imagine the following scene.  You walk past a very large shop window, which displays signage "Parquet Floors - Laminated Flooring" in letters about 3 feet tall.  You open a door with a sign "Floor coverings sold here", walk between two displays of hard wood flooring remnants, and open another door.  THAT door has a sign "Flooring Showroom", and the entire room is FILLED with displays of hard woods, plus the floor is covered with laminate examples.  Each item has a price tag, and in the corner you see a man wearing coveralls and five-o-clock shadow, staring into a computer.


Did you imagine this well?  Now imagine the kind of person you need to be, when having walked through all of this, you ask in all seriousness:


- Hmm, is this the bank?
- Do you sell toilet paper?
- Do you carry radiators, or do those (seen) along the walls belong to the store?
- I need plumbing fixtures, size XXX.  What do you mean "you don't have any", we bought them here!  Where am I supposed to buy them now???
- Everything you carry here is crap, do you have anything better?
- Can I buy coveralls like yours here?


You can also run past the remnants, past the shop clerk, past the displays, past the bathroom, hit the back wall and scream "How the hell do I get back out to the street???"


* * *


Представьте, что вы проходите вдоль огромной витрины с надписью «Паркет-Ламинат» метровыми буквами, открываете дверь с наклейкой «Магазин напольных покрытий», проходите между двумя рядами распродажи остатков паркетной доски, открываете дверь с надписью «Магазин паркета», входите в помещение, все стены которого зашиты образцами доски, а на полу лежат образцы ламината, всё с ценниками, за столом у монитора сидит небритый мужик в спецодежде. Представили? А вот теперь представьте, кем нужно быть, чтобы, пройдя сквозь всё это, спросить что-то типа:

— Э-э-э, это Сбербанк?
— А у вас туалетная бумага продаётся?
— А у вас батареи продаются, или это ваши вдоль стен?
— Мне нужны фитинги размера ***. Что значит «нет», у вас покупали! А где есть?
— Одно говно везде продаётся, нормальное есть чё?
— А у вас такие курточки, как на вас надета, можно купить?

А ещё можно забежать внутрь, пробежать мимо продавца, мимо стеллажей с товаром, мимо туалета, мимо вешалки с одеждой, упереться в стену и оттуда орать: «Как мне на улицу-то попасть?» Кругом! Бегом — марш! Запе-е-е-вай!

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Wed Joke 10

Once I was in a book store, not far from the Moscow train station, and needed the clerk's help.

- Hello, do you happen to sell the Bible?
- Let's look it up on the computer...who is the author?

I went through multiple answers in my head: "the Jewish people", "a collection of works by multiple authors", "God."  I could not decide, which one was the best, so I managed "Hmm, well, it's just Bible..."

* * *
Однажды я зашёл в книжный магазин недалеко от Московского вокзала и сразу направился к консультанту:

— Здравствуйте, у вас Библия есть?
— Сейчас посмотрим по компьютеру... А автор кто?

В голове пронеслось много ответов: «собрание сочинений различных авторов», «иудейский народ», «Бог». Не выбрав лучшего, я выдавил я из себя: «Эм, ну, это просто Библия».

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Wed Joke 9

I work as a receptionist in a dentist's office.  For a new client, I need to fill in a patient's place of employment.  I ask:

- Where do you work?
- Who, me?

The man turns right and left wildly, wondering if HE is the one being asked a question.  Obviously, there is not a soul left or right of him, and even behind him.

- Yes, you.  I know where *I* work, do you know where you do?
- I do.
- So where do you work?
- Who, me?

* * *

- How can I help you?
- I need a dentist.
- I understand, you are in a dental clinic.  We offer tooth cleaning, cavity fillings, tooth removal, crowns and prostetics - which would you like?
- Well, I need a dentist!

* * *

Работаю в регистратуре стоматологической поликлиники. Для заполнения карты нужно указать место работы пациента. Спрашиваю:

— Где вы работаете?
— Кто, я?

Мужчина дико поворачивается на 90 градусов в разные стороны и смотрит, его ли спрашивают. Чудо: ни слева, ни справа, ни даже позади него никого нет.

— Да, вы. Я знаю, где я работаю, а вы знаете?
— Знаю.
— И где же?
— Я, да?

* * *

— Что вы хотели?
— Мне бы к стоматологу.
— Это понятно, вы пришли в стоматологическую поликлинику. Лечение, удаление, чистка, протезирование?
— Ну, мне к стоматологу!

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Wed Joke 8

A book store that sells educational materials. A customer, accompanied by her high-school-aged daughter, asks:

- Our physics class required Mendeleev's Table of Elements, do you have one?
- Of course, we have it. What size would you like?
- I don't know, it's for a physics class!
- Well, here's one, look at it. Maybe you'd like a larger format?
- "The Periodic Table of the Chemical Elements"...Young lady, what are you giving me??? This is a CHEMISTRY table, but we need a PHYSICS one! What else have you got?

They rifled through all the available tables, and went to another store...

* * *

В магазин канцтоваров и наглядных пособий заходит покупательница с дочкой-старшеклассницей:

— Нам по физике задали таблицу Менделеева, у вас есть?
— Конечно, есть. Вам какого формата?
— Не знаю, по физике задали!
— Вот такую посмотрите. Может быть, вам побольше?
— «Периодическая система химических элементов»... Девушка! Что вы мне даете?! Это — таблица по химии, а нам нужна по физике! Покажите, что там ещё есть.

Перерыли все таблицы и ушли в другой магазин.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Wed Joke 7

Cable television reps drive me up the wall. And it's not so much the fact that they call at all hours of the day, but the reaction I receive when I tell them I don't have a TV. I did not have a TV when I lived in the dorms, and now I easily get by with torrents and streaming Internet.


- Hello, my name is Sergey, I represent XYZ Cable Services, are you watching television?
- I don't have a television.
- Are you sure you don't have one?
- Quite sure.
- (expressing sorrow for me) Oh, how do you manage now?..


* * *


Задолбали провайдеры кабельного телевидения. Достало не то, что они звонят, а их реакция на сообщение о том, что у меня нет телевизора. Да, я отвыкла от зомбоящика в общаге и спокойно обхожусь торрентами.

— Здравствуйте, меня зовут Сергей, компания «*****», вы смотрите телевизор?
— У меня нет телевизора.
— Точно нет?
— Точно.
— (сочувственно) Как же вы так...

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Wed Joke 4

Found on the Russian website They Drive Me Up A Wall (rough translation):

I was recently highly entertained by a local TV station. During the nightly news there is a segment they call "business information", but in plain Russian - it's advertisements. So the other day a newscaster informs us (all the while smiling pleasantly):

- And now please enjoy some useful information, which you will surely need, if not right now, then definitely in the near future!

This is followed by a commercial for a local full-service funeral parlor. Could you have imagined anything less?

***

Порадовали наши местные телевизионщики. В новостной программе у них есть блок «деловой информации», по-русски — рекламы обыкновенной. Так вот, сидят две ведущие в студии, одна с приятной улыбкой вещает:

— А теперь вас ждет блок полезной информации, которая если и не сейчас, то наверняка пригодится вам в скором будущем!

И запускают рекламу ритуального агентства. Ну это надо было додуматься, а?

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Wed Joke 3

7 pm, a news radio station. The land line rings:

- Hello, is this WXYZ radio?
- Yes.
- Can you tell me where the Farmers' Market will be?
- What Farmers' Market?
- Well, you know, potatoes, beets, etc.
- I haven't a clue.
- What? You've just announced about the Farmers' Market!
- You know, I was just reading the news, and can assure you we did not announce a Farmers' Market.
- No, you did! I just saw it on TV!
- (Pause) Then why are you calling us?
- I called the TV station, they are not picking up.
- Well, it's after 5 pm, they probably went home already.
- Hmm. You are probably right... (Pause) Listen, are there any women nearby?
- No. What, you want to meet some?
- No, they always know where there is a Market!

Работал на новостном радио. Звонок на рабочий телефон в 19:00:

— Здравствуйте, это радио «*****»?
— Да.
— Скажите, где ярмарка будет?
— Какая ярмарка?
— Ну там картошки купить, свеклы.
— Понятия не имею.
— Как? Я же слышал, как передавали, что будет ярмарка!
— Вы знаете, я вёл выпуск новостей, и могу точно сказать вам, что мы этого не передавали.
— Нет! Вы не передавали! Я по телевизору смотрел!
— А почему вы нам звоните?
— А я туда звонил, там трубку не берут.
— Уже семь часов вечера, и рабочий день закончился.
— Хм. Тоже верно... (Пауза.) Слушай, а рядом с тобой женщины есть?
— Нет. А вам зачем — познакомиться?
— Нет! Они просто всегда знают, где ярмарка!

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Wed Joke

Read on the Interwebs today (presented as a true story)

Russia's president Medvedev was visiting a certain Siberian city. About two hours before the presidential cortege was to travel down main street (appropriately titled Oil Workers Street) someone discovered that one of the theatres had a billboard announcing the next production. It was to be a children's story, with the following title being featured quite prominently:

"We wait for you, oh happy gnome!"

According to the onlookers, the billboard was torn down in record time, obliterating all traces of its existence.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Pool Madness!!!

I am full of sadness and rage today. I am going to channel my rage into bitching about people in gyms.

I went to the gym today for the first time in a while. It’s good for working emotional turmoil out of my system. I’ve been entirely too slothful for the last two months. I swam. I tried to make that a good experience. It wasn’t, because other swimmers have got no manners.


If you’ve spent any time in lap pools in your life, you will recognize the accepted etiquette:


When two people share a lane, they each swim on either side of said lane at their own pace.


When a third (fourth, fifth, tenth) person needs to use the lane (the pool was exceptionally full today), they choose a lane that suits their own speed of swimming the best, and they ask the two people already in the lane if they may join and proceed in circles – true laps, going counter-clockwise.

This is done by lowering your arm in the water when the person on the left nears the end of the pool to get their attention, and asking if they mind swimming in laps. I’ve never seen anyone refuse – until today.


When the woman on the left in the lane I picked agreed to swim laps, we had to wait for the guy on the right to be apprised of this. He stopped, we told him, and he said “no” and swam away! It’s international etiquette, for fuck’ sake! And you can't just force the lap, because it will cause an accident.


So they stayed alone in their lane, and I joined three other women in another lane. The last lane had 5 men at this point. Another guy came in and waited a long time to join the empty lane, and was greeted by the same refusal from the asshole. It was kind of insane. But we were making it work, the four women, we all had a similar stroke, and were generally courteous.


For the first 400 yds or so.


Rule number two of lap swimming – keep your pace similar to others in your lane, and allow for even spacing. With four people, there should be one person turning at each end, when two people are roughly at 12 yds. If you are too slow, you wait at the end to let a faster swimmer pass. If you are too fast, you slow down until you can pass at the end.


NONE of this was happening. There was one woman who kept barreling through, almost running into two other women multiple times. There was the second woman who swam excruciatingly slowly, and never stopped to let others pass. I kept trying to keep my distance, but inevitably kept running into the slow woman.


The speed demon finally had enough, and left. The lane got a bit easier, but we still had three people swimming in the same direction, as if we were connected by a rope.


To add insult to injury of this annoying swim, when I got out of the pool, I found that someone had taken my towel. It’s not mine, it’s the gym’s, but that meant I had to shlep through the locker room out to the towel shelves on the main floor to get a new one.


Read tomorrow: creepy people in gyms.

Monday, August 20, 2007

The Internets

This is about the Internets.

I was bored a few weeks ago, and scrolled through a bunch of random blogs – you know how on Blogger there’s the “Next Blog” button? And it takes you to someone’s blog at random?

I felt a little bit like that commercial “You have reached the end of the Internet”, because a couple of times I was directed to the same blog over and over.

Do you remember when in the early 1990s there was a button on Yahoo, I think, where you could see the “New” webpages as they were being added daily, and the Internet was so small, like a public school library? And all of a sudden it’s the Library of Congress? Except much bigger and in every language under the sun?

Anyway, here is what I discovered cruising Blogger – people use the hosting service in the weirdest ways. Maybe this is indicative of the blogosphere in general.

1. Personal diaries. By far the most common use, no? Sometimes sarcastic commentary. Wondering about the purpose of live. That’s sort of what I am doing, I guess. Common cultural ground. It’s funny to read music references on people’s blogs, and think “yep, they are 30 yrs old”, and be right after looking at the profile. But that’s a different post.

2. Family updates. The number of stay-at-home moms blogging is staggering. I get it, you are at home, and everything is a new experience, and your child is the most precious thing under the sun, and you found a good way to keep the grandparents updated. But do you have to blog about poop? Can't we just see pretty pictures?

3. Political rants. Less common than you’d think. Mostly liberal.

4. Travelogues. Some are abandoned, created solely about one trip in 2005. Some are sad – two midwives working in Uganda in a hut with no resourses. The one I really enjoyed is a guy on some sort of religious mission teaching ESL in South Korea. Soooooo sheltered.

5. Pages in Japanese. Can’t read those at all.

6. Pages in Spanish. Don’t know Spanish.

7. Pages in Italian. Ditto.

8. Pages in Dutch. Or Swedish. Or some other Scandinavian language. Can’t read that either.

9. Pages in Portuguese. These often have to do with various soccer teams.

10. Pages solely dedicated to a sport – auto racing, baseball, etc.

11. Pages in French – these I can actually understand somewhat.

12. Porn. You’d think it wouldn’t exist on Blogger, but when I first came across a page selling undergarments (how cheap do you have to be? You can’t pay $8.95 for your own web address?) I thought porn wouldn’t be far off, and I was right. Also, people trying to sell you web services and jewelry. Once again, WHY use Blogger? Cheapskates.

13. Religious freaks. God is great, and you should feel that way too.

14. And the one that made me want to call child services. Unfortunately, I will never find this page again, and I did not think to copy the URL at the time. A diary of an anorexic/bulimic girl, detailing her struggle with food. Probably not more than 18, living someplace in Europe. Complete with photographs of women (models) she finds attractive, and some pics that could have been her. Very scary, because only concentration camp victims are that thin, and there is NOTHING sexy about your spine sticking out. It made me very sad, because if nobody helps this girl, she will die. She would beat herself up for eating 500 kcal a day. She would triumph when the only thing she ate all day was an orange. She referred to her disorders as Ana and Mia, like they are her friends who are helping her through the day. Her blog tagline was “beautiful dolls…cause the prince always rides off into the sunset with the thinnest princess.” It makes me afraid to ever have a daughter.

Friday, July 20, 2007

Summer pet peeves

I have been in Harry Potter land - after the movie I realized I had absolutely NO idea as to what happened in "Half-Blood Prince", and I am getting "Deathly Hallows" on Sat at 8 am (yay Amazon! I think I will be sad to not have these random morning deliveries,) so I am speedily re-reading. And the funny thing is, you how you read something a second, third time, and you know where the plot is going, and remember the characters, etc? Well, not me! I am reading the book and I think "when did this happen? and why is Harry being so dense?" as if I'd *never* laid my eyes on it before, which is disturbing, 'cos I totes read it two years ago. Every once in a while I get flashes of recognition for small plot points, but they are very far in between.

So since I am kind of busy, here's a post I wrote last week:

I am not generally prude. I work in theatre. I am not often surprised by nudity or compromising situations, and found myself discussing dildo design at dinner tonight. Since I currently can’t think of a good blog topic that has to do with dildos, but have been wanting to post this screen caption forever, I am just going to do it:


That’s from The Libertine. Crappy movie, that. Even Johnny Depp is not excellent. On the other hand, everyone in that film is a snappy dresser, leaving no room for my pet peeves. I have a ton of pet peeves that deal with appearances. I’ve mentioned a couple of these in my earlier Summer post, but I think this deserves a closer look.

People often wear ill-fitting clothes clearly without thinking about what others might see. I’ve been guilty of that in the past, as I am sure we all have (umm, 1980s, anyone?) but mostly because I did not care. At dinner last night my entire thought process was thwarted for good 3 minutes by a lady who paraded past us to the maitre d’s desk to find out the wait time, and paraded back at the same rate. My friend SB was rendered speechless as well. Why? Because this woman’s girls (as Stacy London would note), which were at least a D-cup, were trying to escape her very open v-neck sweater, quite dangerously. In fact, I was kind of afraid that her breast would fall out at my feet and roll down the hallway, as it was being basically bisected in two by her bra cup right above the aureolae. As some bits of this woman were tan, and some were not, her breasts also caught light at a funky angle, drawing extra attention to flesh that should have been covered. Now, do you think she was getting dressed at home and thought “well, this bra doesn’t really fit me anymore, so maybe I’ll get some action if I just bare as much as I can?”

On the same note, a news item appeared today:

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German bus driver threatened to throw a 20-year-old sales clerk off his bus in the southern town of Lindau because he said she was too sexy, a newspaper reported Monday.

"Suddenly he stopped the bus," the woman named Debora C. told Bild newspaper. "He opened the door and shouted at me 'Your cleavage is distracting me every time I look into my mirror and I can't concentrate on the traffic. If you don't sit somewhere else, I'm going to have to throw you off the bus.'"

The woman, pictured in Bild wearing her snug-fitting summer clothes with the plunging neckline, said she moved to another seat but was humiliated by the bus driver.

A spokesman for the bus company defended the driver.

"The bus driver is allowed to do that and he did the right thing," the spokesman said. "A bus driver cannot be distracted because it's a danger to the safety of all the passengers."

But hey, at least she was mostly dressed. Not so much some others I’ve seen this week. I’m not even going to expound on girls in dresses and skirts that are so short they should be worn over pants – too easy. People wearing white – do you NEVER look at yourself in the mirror before leaving home? Do you not KNOW what happens to white cotton when lit from behind by strong afternoon sun? Sure, white is all light and summery and deflects the harmful rays, keeping you cooler, but…we have this fabric in theatre called “scrim”, which basically is a specific cotton weave. When you light it from the front, it’s opaque. When you light it from the back, it disappears, revealing whatever is behind. This is what happens to your skirts, ladies in white cotton. The thinner your skirts are, the more I can see. In certain situations this would be a good thing, but not on strangers, and not in Boston – not exactly the capital of pretty people. My high school graduation dress was fairly see-through, and my conservative grandmother insisted I buy a slip for under it. Boy, was she right. There is a video that shows my graduating class in all its see-through glory in the morning sun. The same exact thing happened with my college graduation (what IS it about schools I attend and white?) And my dress was only transparent to where you could see a slight shadow where my body ended and the skirt began.

Yesterday I saw a girl who wasn’t wearing any undergarments under her white skirt – kind of gross in the first place, or maybe she was wearing a dark g-string, either way there was a dark triangle visible. I think I need darker sunglasses to remedy this issue. In the same intersection I saw a man in white pants with – you guessed it – no undergarments. How do I know that? He dressed to the left, and if there were boxers involved, the pants were so tight I should have seen man-panty lines. So for people wearing white until Labour Day, here are some rules:

1. Briefs for men were invented a long time ago. Make use of them.

2. Undergarments should be worn at all times when in public! These consist of slips, bras, and panties. Unless you are planning on some tryst al fresco with your boyfriend/girlfriend in the extremely immediate future, or are returning home from same. In which case I salute your fascinating sex life, and STILL don’t want to see it.

3. When undergarments are worn, they should be nude or white. Black, red, polka-dotted, whatevs are NOT acceptable under white clothes. Unless you are having your period, in which case you shouldn’t be wearing white anyway.

4. Tight-fitting clothes only look good on people with zero body fat. Tennis payers look GREAT in stretchy white. So do dancers and faithful yoga practitioners. Size 14 women – not so much. Thankfully, the only men I see in tight white garments are Red Sox fans, and that’s a whole different shade of fugly.

5. Watch where you might sit! Grass stains on your ass as you walk down Boylston st makes me wonder if you were involved in #2 above. Same for general dirt stains. White is hard to keep clean, I know, but do try!

6. Unlike some people I know, I don’t actually have a problem with people wearing white when it’s not summer. But all of the above rules apply.