July 29, 2009

Common Sense Potpourri Part II

I hoped you liked last week's Common Sense Potpourri post, because I have more for you...
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Ryan Seacrest is the worst, most awkward, humorless TV host ever. I can't believe the producers of American Idol can't recognize this. Would anyone really care if we switched out Ryan for a better host? Just compare him to someone like Cat Deeley (from "So You Think You Can Dance") and his awkwardness with the contestants and judges is just glaring. He possesses an amazing amount of unlikeability.
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When a girl is said to have "gigantic nipples", do you understand it to mean that she has long, pointy nipples, or big round aureoles? This always confuses me.
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Why are there no overhead ceiling lights in hotel rooms? They always have a bunch of these little, inadequate table lamps instead. I hate them. Give me a real, overhead light. Is that a problem?
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Why is finding the hair dryer in a hotel room like playing hide and seek? Sometimes it's on the sink, other times it's in a drawer, or in a cabinet under the sink, or hanging on the wall... Most recently, I found it in the closet with the ironing board! By the time you find these things, your hair is already dry.
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Why is the word "Internet" capitalized? (Answer: Because it's a proper noun, a place.) That seems stupid, so can we do away with the capitalization? (Yes, the style of official publications such as Wired have publicly stated they will no longer capitalize it.)
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I hate the golf fans that scream "GET IN THE HOLE!" as soon as Tiger Woods strikes the ball from anywhere. Sometimes this happens when he's teeing off on a par 5 (i.e. so there is no physical way the ball could possibly "get in the hole" from the first shot). It's so annoying - I don't know how Tiger handles it. I would club these spectators. Why are these morons doing this? Why don't the other fans that are standing around them beat these people?
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Similarly, I also hate the baseball fans that sit behind home plate on their cell phone and wave at the TV camera. You're such a douche bag and everyone hates you. Grow up.
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How much worse do you think the recession is because people are too scared by the recession to spend money? Just about all my friends still have the same job, making the same amount of money – but all of them are spending less because they are scared. I think the easiest way to create a recession is just to tell people that there is a recession. The Federal government should just say that the recession is over, and maybe everything would go back to normal.
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Do people use pencils anymore? I can't remember the last time I saw one. I couldn't produce a pencil in the next 15 minutes if you gave me a million dollars. Do kids in school still use pencils? Maybe I'm just getting old.
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I love rap and hip hop, but I have a theory that it has generally retarded the economic growth of African-Americans. It seems to me that the constant reference to excessive materialism in the lyrics of popular songs has probably encouraged ordinary listeners to spend beyond their means in order to validate their worth in their culture (i.e. they need bling, rims, Crystal and to "make it rain"). As a result, I wonder how much completely unnecessary spending has gone on in the African-American community during the past ten years. I think that has been a tangible economic step backward by the very people who can least afford it.
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How much worse are all of our memories because we now rely on PDAs and Blackberries? Everything I need to know is in my Blackberry and, as a result, I'm not required to remember anything and, as a result, I now know nothing.
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You have to put on your left-turn blinker BEFORE you arrive at the intersection. I hate those people that you pull up behind at a stop light in the left-hand lane, and when the light turns green, they pop on their left-turn blinker. Now I'm stuck behind this guy as we wait for oncoming traffic to pass before he can make his left turn, when all I want to do is go straight. And I COULD have gone straight minutes ago, had he had his blinker on the whole time at the stop light, so I could have positioned myself in the right-hand lane. Please don't be one of those people - you slow down societal progress.
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I'm pretty sure that the universal keypad commands for voicemail boxes are: “1” for play message; “2” for save message; and “3” for erase message, right? So why is my voicemail at work set up as: “2” for play message; “77” for save message; and “8” for delete message? Have you ever heard of such ridiculous commands? How arbitrary. How does this make any sense whatsoever?


What makes it even worse is that after you listen to the voicemail message, the computer voice tells you all your options (i.e. save, delete, etc.). What options/commands do you think would be the most logical to list first? Probably the most common options, right?... the options that people select the most often, such as "play the message again", "save it", "delete it", etc.

Well, my retarded voicemail offers these options (in order): reply (reply??... doesn't that mean you hang up and call the person back??); listen to the previous message (wait, what if I want to listen to the message I just heard? How do I do that?); forward a copy of this message; listen to the next message (wait, what if I want to listen to the message I just heard?); listen to the time when the message was left; save the message (press "77"??... how stupid); erase the message (press "8"... how "intuitive"); reply to the message (press "9"... wait, weren't we already given this option? Yes, we were, it was the first option). And that's it - no more choices.

So, assuming you haven't previously memorized the completely awkward commands, you have to listen to FIVE different options before getting to most common commands, which are "save" and "delete". And, to top it off, there is no "play the message again" command, which is probably the third most common command after delete and save! I freaking hate my voicemail - which, again, is another reason why you shouldn't call me.

4 comments:

  1. I like your poppouri!! Part 1 and Part 2 were both good. That sounds like the worse voicemail message system ever!

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  2. Hi, Minister. I have "gigantic nipples"... and aren't you just DYING to know! ; )

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  3. Ohmygod - I hate Ryan Seacrest, too!! He is the WORST. I can't believe they signed him up for 3 more years. He's a douche bag.

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