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Not The System This Time
So many recent blogitems have been about the depredations of The System that I've totally neglected the handful of stupid complaints I have about life as she is lived. Not even rancor, just petulance is the theme here. If everything were done my way, at my direction, or even logically, you would be spared a good portion of this list. It's not, and you won't be unless you take the obvious step.
Stupid Battery Tricks
Am I oversharing? Maybe! I'm a flashlight-in-most-rooms kind of guy. Not to mention glove compartments. But it's the lot of flashlightkind to be underappreciated, unloved, and cursed when it doesn't work. Back in the old days of incandescent lamps, batteries lasted such a short time that you got used to changing them. You could tell when they needed changing when the light started dimming after a few weeks. Now that the world's gone LED, flashlights come in packs of three, and they're scattered throughout the house. They're bright and convenient, and work beautifully until they don't. Which, of course, is when they're needed.
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Why don't they work? AAA Batteries, that's why. The accursed design of the flashlight requires the use of four tiny, low-capacity AAA batteries instead of the puissant, higher-energy, easy to procure* C cells. Look at their ample battery casings with room for almost four times as much sitzfleisch as the puny AAAs**. Why do they design flashlights that way? They might argue that they need four batteries in series to provide enough voltage for the LEDs. But we know that boost converters for relatively low currents are 90% efficient and cost almost nothing. They really just want to sell more batteries more often. (Yes, "they." I don't dare name names, do I? I don't want this to be my last blog even if others may feel that way.)
Speaking of Series Connections
Have you looked at the design of the four-slice toaster? The interslice heating elements are connected in series, and if one becomes discontinuous, you lose TWO slices of toast.
Don't even think about the holiday tree lights of our youth!
I Was Carded at Costco
Today was an uncharacteristically stupid day. I normally try to undertake some useful activity; today I failed miserably. Instead, I read the paper and took a walk to Costco. This was a somewhat ambitious activity—Costco is three miles round-trip. My mission was to get some exercise and, coincidentally determine if they had laid in a supply of holiday chocolate which I could purchase when I was vehicular. The custom, at least until now is to walk in the entrance, casually display some portion of a Costco membership card to the attendant who may or may not look at it, and walk in without breaking step. Today there were two attendants, one at each side of the entrance, and the closer one demanded that I unwallet my card and hand it to her for scanning in some sort of reader. Of course I initiated a conversation:
Q: Why are you suddenly doing this?
A: It's policy.
Q: They didn't check with me!
A: Puzzled look.
I continued into the store with an implied "Harrumph." And I add here and now, albeit gratuitously, a "Grrrr."
Zoom Keeps Changing My Microphone Selection!
This is new. Maybe it's conspiring with Microsoft Teams to irritate me. Don't they understand that if the picture is coming from the webcam, so is the sound? Why do I have to keep changing the setting? And how horribly embarrassing it is when my mouth is moving and there's no sound.
These First-World Problems are Getting More Numerous and Annoying
It's even getting harder to find a good Linzer torte east of the Mississippi, and remains impossible in the west. Did I mention "Harrumph" earlier?
Bonus!
Thinking about the "Grrrr" just awarded Costco, I realized that the proper spelling of Arrgh has long been in doubt. While searching for some historical information on the Hern, I came across this card.
Presumably anyone going to the trouble of making an Arrgh! card would know how to spell it, I'm henceforth adopting their spelling and rejecting variants. |
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* At least on the East and West Coasts. After all, she sells C cells at the sea shore.
** Meaning no disrespect to the august American Association for the Advancement of Science. Unless it's gone the way of AARP or ARRL, neither of which stands for anything. |
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