Thursday, April 14, 2005
RANT :: Observations of an Awakened Geek
Wow. Who knew that there were so many people that are dead in the skull being allowed to run free in this country? Well I do, for one. Haven't you ever taken a look at the people around you? I mean REALLY taken a good hard look and seen them for what they are: braindead sheep. You see them everywhere you go, surrounding you in everything you do. The next time you go out driving, look at the mooks on either side of you. Do they ever look back at you? Do they even make so much as a pretense of looking in the mirrors, or are they simply staring blandly ahead, gabbing on their cellphones or putting on their makeup while madly changing lanes (without using blinkers, I might add)? How about in the grocery store? Don't you ever take notice of all the oblivious gravy-brained mooks as they read the Nutrional Information panels on a box of cereal, trying to determine if a bowl of it will cost them too many Atkins Diet points?
During my workday as a sales monkey in a computer store (no, it's not Best Buy or any of those other bigbox places), I see an endless procession of people that come in, looking for parts for their computers they purchased for multiple hundreds, and sometimes, thousands of dollars. Most of these people have no clue what it is they're looking for. No problem, that's what I'm here for. What I can't abide are the fools that need something as simple as a set of burnable CDs, and get all bound up inside, agonizing over those speed numbers on the packaging.
"How fast does your CD burner go?" I ask them, trying to keep it as simple as possible.
"..." says the customer with a blank stare, slack-jawed.
"Is there a little number on the front of the drive? Like 32x or 52x?" I ask hopefully, doing my best.
"What's that?" they ask.
"It's a little number on the front of the drive."
"What's a drive?" comes the question that puts that little kink in my gut. Oh God, another one of THOSE.
"You know, the thing on your computer where you push the button, and little drawer comes out and you put your CD on it?"
"What's a CD?"
"The thing you're trying to buy, actually. Look, you use them all the time when you install a program or play a game or burn a CD"
"Yeah but I wanted you to show me all that stuff. I've never used a computer before."
"Okay, well don't you want to learn a little bit about it before you jump into something a little bit more complex like burning a CD?"
"No, I just want to copy illegal movies and edit video. Dell sold me a $4,000.00 computer for this, but it didn't come with any instructions."
"Hmm, well here's the number for a local training center. I suggest "Using Windows 101" before you go any farther."
"But I wanted some CDs. Don't you have any?"
"Well yes, right here, we have a large selection of many brands."
"What's this funny thing right here?" (Pointing to the "52x" label)
"That's the disc's maximum capable burning speed."
"What's a CD?"
And so the circle continues until I find a way to walk off and hide in a back room so I can cry for the next hour.
Now I understand that not everyone is going to know much about computers, but holy crap, $4,000 on a machine you don't even understand how to use? What the hell!
I see this level of moronic stupidity in all aspects of daily life, not just computers. People who buy Hummers, for example, or H2s for the tragically hip. These are the people that spend a crapload of cash for these beasts, trick them out with those stupid rims that keep spinning for hours after they've stopped, gotten out and gone inside to watch the game, as well as flashy rainbow-speckled paint jobs. These same people are also usually the first ones to complain about the price of gas nowadays. These same people who wouldn't be caught dead in the corner store just a minute's walk away, instead opting to drive ten miles to the nearest mega-mart for a loaf of Uber-Health(tm) Poser Cut Pumpernikel Bread. In the Hummer, mind you, not a super-efficient sensible getaround car like an Accord or something. These are also the people who buy those urban assault vehicles, having no experience whatsoever with anything larger than a Chevette, and attempt to drive it like a Chevette, putting everybody else in mortal fear for their lives. (Did you know that if you get killed in an accident with a Hummer, you automatically go to Hell? Fact.)
Speaking of Hummers and driving in general, I read an article in one of the biggie newspapers in Detroit, the Free Press. There is a column in the paper regarding driving around our fair city. The column today was centered around the freaks that wait until the last possible second to merge when a lane ends or in construction zones, despite multiple warnings miles back about the impending merge. The article also contains shoutouts from locals regarding the topic at hand. I find one in particular most laughable.
A gentleman named Dave Dixon sent in: "You are completely off base with your view that one should do the right thing and merge early," he writes. "Any traffic engineer could confirm that the most efficient method for moving traffic is to utilize all lanes until the merge is required. Those idiots who try to block the merge lane miles early should be ticketed, not those who keep moving. ... Please check your facts before encouraging stupid behavior and unnecessary road rage. While I like your column, you missed on this one."
Well Dave, obviously you're not from around here. You see, the wise and respectable thing to do is to get over early. The "zipper" method of using all available lanes until you are forced over might work in other cities, like say Piggott, Arkansas, but it just won't fly (or drive) here. Your method is plausible only if the people who already got over let someone at a dead stop at the merge point get over, and in so doing back up the freeway for miles due to the folks who will wait in line, stopped for a moment, then yank over to the next lane, slowing THAT one down, and so on. People don't notice or don't care about what other drivers are about to do, either because they are trying to get somewhere, or because the road is about to force them into it. Because of this, it's not much of a surprise to see people causing accidents by not letting someone merge without coming to a complete stop on the freeway(!!) So yeah, Mr. "I Know How Traffic Engineers Would Think". You can kiss my ass. I do not recognize the fake science of "traffic engineering". It's about as legitimate as a Hallmark holiday. Like Boss's Day.
Also while I'm referring to this mook, let me go over that one a moment: "Traffic Engineer". Excuse me? They have engineers for that? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! What a-hole made THAT one up?! Look, there are sciences that study the flow of things, and how they interact with other surfaces/substances. There are aerodynamics engineers who study air, and hydrodynamics engineers who study water. How can you possibly create a "science" out of TRAFFIC, for God's sake? The simple fact of the matter is that while a hydrodynamics engineer is studying the flow of water over a boat hull, he never witnesses a bit of water that decides to make a sudden right-hand turn across the flow because it missed its chance to get over long before. You can't make a science of studying something that revolves around the semi-intelligent, completely self-absorbed people on the move, especially here in Detroit.
You see, if people drove like air and water flows, there wouldn't be a need for signs. We would simply drive through tubes (planned and built by engineers) and hope that they designed the system so that when we came out, we would be where we wanted to be. Since life is a little more demanding of us than allowing us to rely on chance to get places, we're forced to let people make their own decisions which, apparently, was a bad idea. There should be more guardrails and walls to direct traffic. Well sure, we have those now, but they are there less to help direct traffic than as to pointlessly save the lives of fools who enjoy courting fate (and a Darwin award). People are sheep, and idiots to boot. They need other people to tell them where to go, because nobody keeps a map in their glovebox anymore, and they certainly don't check Mapquest before they leave home. They expect someone else to tell them how to get there. Do you honestly believe GPS is all that necessary in cars these days? How in the hell did we ever get around before that? I spent fifteen minutes on the phone with some dumbass the other day, trying to explain to him how to get to our store. Instead of it being sufficient to describe the major nearby crossroads, he wanted me to take him turn by turn to our door, waiting patiently while he WROTE IT ALL DOWN WORD FOR WORD!! OMG!! Turns out the idiot lived had TWO WHOLE BLOCKS away from us for ten years, and he STILL didn't know the area. Yeah, *sheepish shit-eating grin* indeed.
Now that I've gotten that all off my chest, I would like to take a moment to thank a random soccer mom in a Chevy Behemoth (she DID have a load of kids, so she's justified in owning that frigging monstrosity) who took the time to actually roll down her window and give me an emphatic happy wave of thanks when I let her into the lane in front of me. She passed my driver's side, then paced the open slot in front of me, turning on her blinker while waiting for me to back off instead of forcing her way in. Such courteous driving always earns my respect, and I diligently pissed off the fag behind me by slowing down just a tad so she could get in. So the dude behind me with his hand on the horn gets the finger, and the nice lady in front gets a smile and a wave in return. We need more kickass drivers like you, miss.
Although we could probably do without the Chevy Behemoth for a while.
Deadweasel drives like a bat out of hell, but always uses his blinker.
During my workday as a sales monkey in a computer store (no, it's not Best Buy or any of those other bigbox places), I see an endless procession of people that come in, looking for parts for their computers they purchased for multiple hundreds, and sometimes, thousands of dollars. Most of these people have no clue what it is they're looking for. No problem, that's what I'm here for. What I can't abide are the fools that need something as simple as a set of burnable CDs, and get all bound up inside, agonizing over those speed numbers on the packaging.
"How fast does your CD burner go?" I ask them, trying to keep it as simple as possible.
"..." says the customer with a blank stare, slack-jawed.
"Is there a little number on the front of the drive? Like 32x or 52x?" I ask hopefully, doing my best.
"What's that?" they ask.
"It's a little number on the front of the drive."
"What's a drive?" comes the question that puts that little kink in my gut. Oh God, another one of THOSE.
"You know, the thing on your computer where you push the button, and little drawer comes out and you put your CD on it?"
"What's a CD?"
"The thing you're trying to buy, actually. Look, you use them all the time when you install a program or play a game or burn a CD"
"Yeah but I wanted you to show me all that stuff. I've never used a computer before."
"Okay, well don't you want to learn a little bit about it before you jump into something a little bit more complex like burning a CD?"
"No, I just want to copy illegal movies and edit video. Dell sold me a $4,000.00 computer for this, but it didn't come with any instructions."
"Hmm, well here's the number for a local training center. I suggest "Using Windows 101" before you go any farther."
"But I wanted some CDs. Don't you have any?"
"Well yes, right here, we have a large selection of many brands."
"What's this funny thing right here?" (Pointing to the "52x" label)
"That's the disc's maximum capable burning speed."
"What's a CD?"
And so the circle continues until I find a way to walk off and hide in a back room so I can cry for the next hour.
Now I understand that not everyone is going to know much about computers, but holy crap, $4,000 on a machine you don't even understand how to use? What the hell!
I see this level of moronic stupidity in all aspects of daily life, not just computers. People who buy Hummers, for example, or H2s for the tragically hip. These are the people that spend a crapload of cash for these beasts, trick them out with those stupid rims that keep spinning for hours after they've stopped, gotten out and gone inside to watch the game, as well as flashy rainbow-speckled paint jobs. These same people are also usually the first ones to complain about the price of gas nowadays. These same people who wouldn't be caught dead in the corner store just a minute's walk away, instead opting to drive ten miles to the nearest mega-mart for a loaf of Uber-Health(tm) Poser Cut Pumpernikel Bread. In the Hummer, mind you, not a super-efficient sensible getaround car like an Accord or something. These are also the people who buy those urban assault vehicles, having no experience whatsoever with anything larger than a Chevette, and attempt to drive it like a Chevette, putting everybody else in mortal fear for their lives. (Did you know that if you get killed in an accident with a Hummer, you automatically go to Hell? Fact.)
Speaking of Hummers and driving in general, I read an article in one of the biggie newspapers in Detroit, the Free Press. There is a column in the paper regarding driving around our fair city. The column today was centered around the freaks that wait until the last possible second to merge when a lane ends or in construction zones, despite multiple warnings miles back about the impending merge. The article also contains shoutouts from locals regarding the topic at hand. I find one in particular most laughable.
A gentleman named Dave Dixon sent in: "You are completely off base with your view that one should do the right thing and merge early," he writes. "Any traffic engineer could confirm that the most efficient method for moving traffic is to utilize all lanes until the merge is required. Those idiots who try to block the merge lane miles early should be ticketed, not those who keep moving. ... Please check your facts before encouraging stupid behavior and unnecessary road rage. While I like your column, you missed on this one."
Well Dave, obviously you're not from around here. You see, the wise and respectable thing to do is to get over early. The "zipper" method of using all available lanes until you are forced over might work in other cities, like say Piggott, Arkansas, but it just won't fly (or drive) here. Your method is plausible only if the people who already got over let someone at a dead stop at the merge point get over, and in so doing back up the freeway for miles due to the folks who will wait in line, stopped for a moment, then yank over to the next lane, slowing THAT one down, and so on. People don't notice or don't care about what other drivers are about to do, either because they are trying to get somewhere, or because the road is about to force them into it. Because of this, it's not much of a surprise to see people causing accidents by not letting someone merge without coming to a complete stop on the freeway(!!) So yeah, Mr. "I Know How Traffic Engineers Would Think". You can kiss my ass. I do not recognize the fake science of "traffic engineering". It's about as legitimate as a Hallmark holiday. Like Boss's Day.
Also while I'm referring to this mook, let me go over that one a moment: "Traffic Engineer". Excuse me? They have engineers for that? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! What a-hole made THAT one up?! Look, there are sciences that study the flow of things, and how they interact with other surfaces/substances. There are aerodynamics engineers who study air, and hydrodynamics engineers who study water. How can you possibly create a "science" out of TRAFFIC, for God's sake? The simple fact of the matter is that while a hydrodynamics engineer is studying the flow of water over a boat hull, he never witnesses a bit of water that decides to make a sudden right-hand turn across the flow because it missed its chance to get over long before. You can't make a science of studying something that revolves around the semi-intelligent, completely self-absorbed people on the move, especially here in Detroit.
You see, if people drove like air and water flows, there wouldn't be a need for signs. We would simply drive through tubes (planned and built by engineers) and hope that they designed the system so that when we came out, we would be where we wanted to be. Since life is a little more demanding of us than allowing us to rely on chance to get places, we're forced to let people make their own decisions which, apparently, was a bad idea. There should be more guardrails and walls to direct traffic. Well sure, we have those now, but they are there less to help direct traffic than as to pointlessly save the lives of fools who enjoy courting fate (and a Darwin award). People are sheep, and idiots to boot. They need other people to tell them where to go, because nobody keeps a map in their glovebox anymore, and they certainly don't check Mapquest before they leave home. They expect someone else to tell them how to get there. Do you honestly believe GPS is all that necessary in cars these days? How in the hell did we ever get around before that? I spent fifteen minutes on the phone with some dumbass the other day, trying to explain to him how to get to our store. Instead of it being sufficient to describe the major nearby crossroads, he wanted me to take him turn by turn to our door, waiting patiently while he WROTE IT ALL DOWN WORD FOR WORD!! OMG!! Turns out the idiot lived had TWO WHOLE BLOCKS away from us for ten years, and he STILL didn't know the area. Yeah, *sheepish shit-eating grin* indeed.
Now that I've gotten that all off my chest, I would like to take a moment to thank a random soccer mom in a Chevy Behemoth (she DID have a load of kids, so she's justified in owning that frigging monstrosity) who took the time to actually roll down her window and give me an emphatic happy wave of thanks when I let her into the lane in front of me. She passed my driver's side, then paced the open slot in front of me, turning on her blinker while waiting for me to back off instead of forcing her way in. Such courteous driving always earns my respect, and I diligently pissed off the fag behind me by slowing down just a tad so she could get in. So the dude behind me with his hand on the horn gets the finger, and the nice lady in front gets a smile and a wave in return. We need more kickass drivers like you, miss.
Although we could probably do without the Chevy Behemoth for a while.
Deadweasel drives like a bat out of hell, but always uses his blinker.
Comments:
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You know what, I can't get pissed off about pickups, because they are single-purpose vehicles, and they don't often cost insane amounts of money to have. SUVs are supposed to be SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES, yet you have companies like Chevy and Cadillac that try to make luxury rides out of them.
I've been here before, and I will say it again. Plain and simple, people are too damned stupid to be able to just go out and buy something that huge simply because they can afford it. It simply infuriates me that these big pieces of garbage have become the "in" thing to have, and now everyone with money, whether they know how to drive already or not, is getting a freaking Escalade or H2. These people don't NEED it, and what's more, often can't handle it.
You will see a dedicated truck junkie buying a Dodge or a Ford and putting lots of money into tricking it out with risers and big rims and all that stuff. THOSE truck guys aren't hurting anyone with their hobbies, and they are too few in number to worry about their driving habits with their monsters. But then again, since THEY built the damned things, they can usually drive the living piss out of their machines.
So now you have the automakers seeing a trend for the unusual, and you start seeing bigger and Bigger and BIGGER with each model year. Look! GM just unveiled their biggest truck yet! Bigger than the Excursion for God's sake! Shit, even International Harvester has gotten into the act and unwrapped a big rig that the average Joe can drive without a permit(!!!!)
Tell me there Mr. Man, in your quite sensible smaller SUV, just how safe are you and your kids (my nephews) going to be feeling when some rich kid's parents get him a shiny new IH Monster for his 16th birthday? Can you honestly say that he should be able to have something like that?
I mean FUCK, if this keeps up we'll have people buying their own trains planes and tanks so they can have something unusual and unique, and therefore "better than the guy next door".
For some reason you focused, once again, on the whole SUV aspect of the article, and completely missed the point of the rest of it altogether. Seems to me you might have a bit of a sore spot there yourself! :)
Anyhow, my point HERE is that it's bad enough we have to deal with people who are incredibly and unbelievably selfish and self-centered in their driving habits. Do we really want those same people driving behind the wheel of a vehicle that:
1) They more often than not don't have any experience driving, and
2) Are susceptible (sp?) to bouts of road rage/impatience/not enough caffeine.
Trust me, I don't like the Geo line of vehicles, but I do appreciate something lower to the ground. While the rest of those tall fags are slowing WAY down to go around a 60MPH curve because their ride is top-heavy, I'm zinging right by them and getting where I got to go much more safely because I can suddenly see around me again. You don't know how sick and tired I am of having nothing more to warn me of an impending stop on the freeway than the brake lights of an SUV in front of me, driven by a person who's a bad driver and brakes very late to boot.
Oh sure, I could get a big SUV so I could see around, and then pay out the fucking nose for gas (which I can't afford more than ever now), and then STILL have to deal with all the SUVs that are bigger than mine, because I couldn't afford more than a GMC Jimmy.
Screw all you rich fucks with your Escalades, Hummers, Excursions etc. You people need to really learn what it's like to have to work for something for once. Maybe if you had to budget your check every week just to afford to keep going to work, you just might sell that big thing and get something that makes more sense. Oops. I'm sorry, was that not PC of me? Too bad. Fuck off.
BTW, as I said in the article, I have no problem with people that buy SUVs and put them to the use for which they were intended. That woman I let in had a monster of a truck, but every seat had a kid in it. JT, your family has two of them, but they are put the fullest use they ever could, with the kids and the house projects going on. Justified. I've seen people with Escalades, but they had magnetic signs advertising the landscaping business, and the truck was towing a HUGE trailer. Justified.
You jackholes driving an H2 just to go park in front of the nearest 7-11 in town and boom your bullshit sound system? Fuck you. I hate you, and I hate your piece of shit truck. Why don't you just go back to ricers? At least the rest of us could tell how much of an idiot you were by the size of the wing on your Civic.
Jealousy? Nah. I just wish that, since a motorcyclist has to get a permit to ride a vehicle that behaves so differently from cars, people who have those monster SUVs should also have to permit to drive them. The smaller trucks that actually have a purpose and make sense are exempt, because they are, after all, built on car chassis, so they will handle pretty similar.
You can't tell me an Excursion feels the same to drive as a Jimmy or a Colorado. I know, I've driven an S-10, a Jimmy, a Yukon (and later the Denali version, sheesh), and test-driven an Excursion. Once you get past the original Yukon, it just gets to be so much hell to keep from running smaller guys over. If I have trouble with it, I know little Mr. fancy-pants "Look What Daddy Bought Me" isn't going to last too long before becoming a candidate for vehicular homicide.
Ack. It's late. Time to call this one off.
/end Rant II
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I've been here before, and I will say it again. Plain and simple, people are too damned stupid to be able to just go out and buy something that huge simply because they can afford it. It simply infuriates me that these big pieces of garbage have become the "in" thing to have, and now everyone with money, whether they know how to drive already or not, is getting a freaking Escalade or H2. These people don't NEED it, and what's more, often can't handle it.
You will see a dedicated truck junkie buying a Dodge or a Ford and putting lots of money into tricking it out with risers and big rims and all that stuff. THOSE truck guys aren't hurting anyone with their hobbies, and they are too few in number to worry about their driving habits with their monsters. But then again, since THEY built the damned things, they can usually drive the living piss out of their machines.
So now you have the automakers seeing a trend for the unusual, and you start seeing bigger and Bigger and BIGGER with each model year. Look! GM just unveiled their biggest truck yet! Bigger than the Excursion for God's sake! Shit, even International Harvester has gotten into the act and unwrapped a big rig that the average Joe can drive without a permit(!!!!)
Tell me there Mr. Man, in your quite sensible smaller SUV, just how safe are you and your kids (my nephews) going to be feeling when some rich kid's parents get him a shiny new IH Monster for his 16th birthday? Can you honestly say that he should be able to have something like that?
I mean FUCK, if this keeps up we'll have people buying their own trains planes and tanks so they can have something unusual and unique, and therefore "better than the guy next door".
For some reason you focused, once again, on the whole SUV aspect of the article, and completely missed the point of the rest of it altogether. Seems to me you might have a bit of a sore spot there yourself! :)
Anyhow, my point HERE is that it's bad enough we have to deal with people who are incredibly and unbelievably selfish and self-centered in their driving habits. Do we really want those same people driving behind the wheel of a vehicle that:
1) They more often than not don't have any experience driving, and
2) Are susceptible (sp?) to bouts of road rage/impatience/not enough caffeine.
Trust me, I don't like the Geo line of vehicles, but I do appreciate something lower to the ground. While the rest of those tall fags are slowing WAY down to go around a 60MPH curve because their ride is top-heavy, I'm zinging right by them and getting where I got to go much more safely because I can suddenly see around me again. You don't know how sick and tired I am of having nothing more to warn me of an impending stop on the freeway than the brake lights of an SUV in front of me, driven by a person who's a bad driver and brakes very late to boot.
Oh sure, I could get a big SUV so I could see around, and then pay out the fucking nose for gas (which I can't afford more than ever now), and then STILL have to deal with all the SUVs that are bigger than mine, because I couldn't afford more than a GMC Jimmy.
Screw all you rich fucks with your Escalades, Hummers, Excursions etc. You people need to really learn what it's like to have to work for something for once. Maybe if you had to budget your check every week just to afford to keep going to work, you just might sell that big thing and get something that makes more sense. Oops. I'm sorry, was that not PC of me? Too bad. Fuck off.
BTW, as I said in the article, I have no problem with people that buy SUVs and put them to the use for which they were intended. That woman I let in had a monster of a truck, but every seat had a kid in it. JT, your family has two of them, but they are put the fullest use they ever could, with the kids and the house projects going on. Justified. I've seen people with Escalades, but they had magnetic signs advertising the landscaping business, and the truck was towing a HUGE trailer. Justified.
You jackholes driving an H2 just to go park in front of the nearest 7-11 in town and boom your bullshit sound system? Fuck you. I hate you, and I hate your piece of shit truck. Why don't you just go back to ricers? At least the rest of us could tell how much of an idiot you were by the size of the wing on your Civic.
Jealousy? Nah. I just wish that, since a motorcyclist has to get a permit to ride a vehicle that behaves so differently from cars, people who have those monster SUVs should also have to permit to drive them. The smaller trucks that actually have a purpose and make sense are exempt, because they are, after all, built on car chassis, so they will handle pretty similar.
You can't tell me an Excursion feels the same to drive as a Jimmy or a Colorado. I know, I've driven an S-10, a Jimmy, a Yukon (and later the Denali version, sheesh), and test-driven an Excursion. Once you get past the original Yukon, it just gets to be so much hell to keep from running smaller guys over. If I have trouble with it, I know little Mr. fancy-pants "Look What Daddy Bought Me" isn't going to last too long before becoming a candidate for vehicular homicide.
Ack. It's late. Time to call this one off.
/end Rant II
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