The Random Rant Thread 2010

  • Thread starter Thread starter Gearoid
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Gearoid said:
I just hate the morning to work routine via public transport. To counteract it and to restore some individuality, I do the opposite to the lemmings. If they are all rushing off the train I ll wait until last. On the way into the city rather than walk into the back of people I cross over to the empty footpath at the other side.
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The tube.

A reason to get up an hour earlier to avoid the crush.
 
Turtle's fan said:
Negotiating through Liverpool Street station with the following:
People who stop dead in front of you for no reason.
People who wander all over the place sending texts.
People who are too idle to carry their bags and drag those small wheelie things that you can't see as they are too small. Why bother??
People who wait until they're at the barrier and decide to start looking for their tickets.

Unseamed vein here. Don't start me off about the actual travelling...
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People who rush to get ahead of you, then either stop or walk slower than you do.

People who rush past you to get to doorways first, then stop.
 
redhead said:
People who rush to get ahead of you, then either stop or walk slower than you do.

People who rush past you to get to doorways first, then stop.
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People who get off the train/tube and then just stand there debating which way to go.

People who admittedly may be crammed in the middle of the doors, but then just stand there while everyone else tries to get off.

People who think it's fine to dig their elbows into your ribs when they are sitting next to you as they read their broadsheet.

Women who sit onthe outside seat of a two, with the table down and their makeup spread all over it in the hope it will stop anyway wanting to sit next to them. If most of them think a thin spread of foundation and a bit of eye liner is going to make any difference at all, they are sadly deluded.
 
krizon said:
See, DO's not just a pretty face, y'know...

Yes, Reds, a bob was a shilling, and you never said 'bobs' for plural, so a bob or ten bob, but not ten bobs, while ten shillings was all right! 10s was in note form, too. 2s 6d was half-a-crown. A tanner was sixpence, which was half a shilling, and there were also farthings, all in the last half of the last century.
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I remember it well - except the farthings, which had been phased out by the time I was born. I used to get a threepenny bit as my pocket money and had my first ever bet on Highland Wedding in the Grand National using 2 weeks' pocket money.

One of my favourite bracelets has 10 sixpenny bits (tanners) on a chain, so I am wearing 5 bob's worth, or 25p worth, of money. The bracelet cost a fair bit more than 25p, though!

Wasn't decimalisation a rip-off? (I suppose any change in currency would be, as demonstrated by the complaints from our Irish forumites when they switched to the Euro.)
 
People who move to the 'countryside' and then moan constantly about muck on roads, tractors on roads, mud on their vehicles, plus want street lighting in their village....yadayadayada - just feck off back to the suburbs, why don't you all ?
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O'er, good one!
That reminds me of another one, people who complain when we spread slurry! We had complaints last year from folks on the new housing estate which is next to one of our fields. You want a scenic countryside view? Deal with it!
 
People who stop to answer their mobiles whilst in the middle of checking out at the supermarket, then proceed to have a conversation rather than saying "I'm busy, call me back". Such people nearly always have massive shopping loads and make the cashier wait whilst the queue behind grows bigger.

What's wrong with switching off and letting the caller leave a message?

Or is it a need to show everyone else how busy/popular they are?

Everyone (just about) has a mobile now, so there's nothing to show off about. (I recall a neighbour getting his mobile a few years ago and making a great show of leaning on his car in his drive, talking loudly. Imagine his annoyance when I walked out to my car and the mobile in my bag went off - and I answered on an older set than his! :D)
 
redhead said:
Wasn't decimalisation a rip-off?
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Was and still is. I remember many, many items that had gone from their old price in pennies to the new price in pence within a year or so.

I remain convinced it was the catalyst for profiteering throughout the business sector. We all got used to the sudden rise in prices so they kept pushing them up, profits became profit margins, etc etc.

I look at some groceries and I think, "How on earth can they charge that money for so little stuff?!" Look at bread, for instance. How much flour goes into an 800g loaf? How much would that flour have cost at wholesale bulk prices? 2p? 3p? How can it end up costing over thirty-bob??

I can understand how it can cost over £1 for a litre of petrol. I understand that billions of pounds go into search and research. I understand the government taxing it. What I don't understand is how companies can charge the same price (or more) for a litre of water!
 
Rip-off mortgage lenders and insurance companies.

My buildings insurance renewal came in at £650. I can get it for £260 (inc contents!)if I go to a comparison website.
 
Gareth Flynn said:
I seem to remember that going surprisingly smoothly.
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The changeover itself may have, Gareth, but there were many complaints about prices being rounded up or just raised under cover of the conversion, just as there was during decimalisation years ago.

As Desert Orchid points out, after decimalisation it wasn't long before everything almost doubled in price because of the confusion caused by having to convert to old and new money, e.g. 6d old = 2.5p new. A Mars bar used to cost us sixpence, or2.5 new pence, which soon became 3 new pence within weeks of the change. Our 10 new pence pocket money (1 shilling, old) didn't go half as far after the first 12/18 months.

After 10 years no-one thought anything of paying 50p for a loaf of bread - (= 10 shillings = half of a pound) but it would have been unthinkable to pay even a half of that before decimalisation.
 
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10 new pence was 2 shillings.
Don't forget that decimalisation coincided with rampant inflation, so it wasn't quite the rip off that people think it was.
 
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Gearoid said:
I just hate the morning to work routine via public transport. To counteract it and to restore some individuality, I do the opposite to the lemmings. If they are all rushing off the train I ll wait until last. On the way into the city rather than walk into the back of people I cross over to the empty footpath at the other side.
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Would have done the same if I could. Used to dread the walk from Connolly to Spencer Dock. Virtually constant roadworks compounded the misery as well.
 
You could add further gaiety to the morning's routine, Gears, by strapping on in-lines and smoothly cruising round the lemmings, performing a few triple salcos or just sailing past demonstrating a perfect arabesque. You could then really show off by doing this backwards towards your goal. People would stand slack-jawed in shock and awe - why, you might even receive offers to join Circe du Soleil. Alternatively, why not dress up to celebrate TGIF - perhaps one morning a highwayman, complete with old pistol, maybe even borrowing BRAVE INCA to gallop into town? Another morning, Daffy Duck, or inside the controls of a life-size Tyrannosaurus - anything to jolly along the working day.
 
Safety matches.

WTF is safe about them exactly? For a start they're bendy, so you have to grab them near the top, and they are prone to having sparking bits flying off them, or jamming under your fingernails.

Oh, that's right.............they won't combust in your hip pocket if a) you're a big enough arse to keep them there, and b) you're a big enough arse to keep falling over.

Safety schmafety - they should be banned.......little bastards.
 
Being e-mailed pictures of disasters, starving kids, or dying animals, to prove that whatever's wrong with you, there's something worse going on somewhere. I - and most people with a functioning cortex - feckin' know that! How does that help?
 
Love Everlasting said:
When that realisation dawns that you've wasted 6 weeks of your life that you will never get back :(
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Look at the bigger picture. It could have been 6 years. In the big scheme of things six weeks will seem like nothing. They won't have been wasted if you've learned a lot from them.
 
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