Random Thought Thread (main page)

(a man behind a podium, giving a speech at a business conference, reading from index cards in his hand)
"...This past quarter, we've seen a tremendous growth in profit. And I think these gains can be attributed to our company's greatest asset..."
(flips to the next card)
"...CROW MEAT!"
(frowns, looks down at card)
(turns card upside down)
"...TEAMWORK!"

There was an Err Bear every time I tried to check the site yesterday and it is my personal headcanon that Prole took the site down in protest of the Hatesong thread still going.

Was the store being robbed by a criminal hiding just out of sight? Was the cashier doing weird glance-over-there-and-look-back-back-furtively stuff?  

I have yet to get the thumbs-up emoji from someone under 60.

I get it from a lot of people under 60. I also hate it. I'm not really sure why, it just makes me irrationally angry.

Well, I'm over 60 so I'm free to use them, yay! 

I never use it on its own, but I do use it as a reaction emoji all the time at work for when a heart just seems too damn familiar and typing "k" seems like too much work.

I'm a big proponent of the thumbs up emoji. It's good and I spray them around all over the dang place (Microsoft Teams).

My supervisor uses it this way too. It took me a while to realize that it also means, "Cool, I'm fine with it" if I'm messaging to be like "yo, I wanna take a day off."

I would prefer the thumbs up to "sounds good"

All cars nowadays are perfectly capable of burning up the road at 90 miles an hours and throwing themselves between lanes. You don't have to have a BMW to drive like an asshole, and most assholes on the road don't have a BMW.

But if I did have to look at a car brand and expect the driver to be an asshole based on that alone, that brand would be Audi.

My car annoyance is strongly focused on the companies testing driverless cars in my area. I am in disbelief that these companies think their technology is developed enough to be testing it in a university district with a ton of clubs and bars. Local news routinely reports on Waymo's cars just stopping in the middle of busy streets. They seem completely unable to handle the massive amount of pedestrians on these roads, people who just dart across the road outside of crosswalks. I've seen them come to a complete halt, and then just sit there for several minutes.

They also cannot navigate road construction or repaving. Traffic cones seem to paralyze them. I got behind one once where the lanes being repaved resulted in traffic being weaved in and out of straight lanes and turning lanes. I thought this car was going to meltdown. It would move 10 feet, then stop. Sit there for several minutes. Then move 5 feet, then stop. It repeated this for nearly TWO MILES. And since the roads were under construction, there was no way to get around it. There were no crossroads to even turn onto a different street. It was brutal. Made me late to work.

They also don't do common courtesy things, such as let pedestrians cross at a 4 way stop, even if the car driver has the right of way. I do this often because it is 100 degrees outside and I'm sitting in air conditioning. It also doesn't let cars merge into the street when they are exiting a parking lot, even if traffic is backed up and moving slowly.

Got behind one this morning that didn't seem to realize that a right lane ended at a crossstreet with a right turn only lane. Making it suddenly veer left. Even the college kids don't do this!

I'm at my parents house and my mom and dad (84 and 86) are just laying here falling asleep. They are both so frail, and my mom had another ER visit last weekend that she didn't tell anyone about. She's having angina (or maybe a-fib). She's really upset that she might not make it to my sister's wedding, which is about an hour away. My sister lives in Wisconsin but had the wedding here so that my parents can make it and my mom's really upset that she might not be able to go.