The Decline Of Civilisation

[Serial_Apologist]

2 out of 3 there (i.e. the first two) - but what of those who read either or both without having first purchased them?

My experience is that the shop manager comes over and politely says, "Excuse me SIRRRR, are you intending to buy this item? If not, SIRRRR, I shall have to ask you to leave the shop".

[Serial_Apologist]

I'm not a smoker, but is it really true that no manufactuirer of electric toothbrushes makes heads for smokers' use?

I may be olde-fashioned but I am speaking of the ordinary type, not being prepared to buy electric toothbrushes.

[Panjandrum]

What they should be asking is not are they useful?, but are they necessary?"
[/I]

One has to recognise the game the BBC is playing with these questionnaires, and be savvy enough to play them at their own game. If they ask whether DOGs are useful for identifying the channel, one has to answer "No".

Similarly, on an earlier thread, you mentioned the survey which asked whether radio 3 makes good programmes and whether radio 3 is worse than it was six months earlier. In these instances, one must answer "No" to the first and "Yes" to the second, regardless of whether one believes it to be true; otherwise you play into their hands. Sad but true.

[John Skelton]

Yes - rather pointless, I agree; the answer here is usually "is that a hope or an order?".

I bet whoever it is has always dreamed of nothing in life but the opportunity to serve you a meal. So they put the thing down accompanied by a little, routine, phrase, a formulaic pleasantry, and with your wit you make their day.

Perhaps next time someone will deposit the meal in your lap.

[Serial_Apologist]

I bet whoever it is has always dreamed of nothing in life but the opportunity to serve you a meal. So they put the thing down accompanied by a little, routine, phrase, a formulaic pleasantry, and with your wit you make their day.

Perhaps next time someone will deposit the meal in your lap.

Part of my training as a waiter was never to ask a customer if they wanted stuffing

[ahinton]

I bet whoever it is has always dreamed of nothing in life but the opportunity to serve you a meal. So they put the thing down accompanied by a little, routine, phrase, a formulaic pleasantry, and with your wit you make their day.

Perhaps next time someone will deposit the meal in your lap.

My statement was not intended to be taken entirely seriously, just as your response to it presumably isn't; the real irritation perhaps rather more often occurs when that one word from the waiter is just a small part of a routine that begins along the lines of "my name is Delbert and I'm your waiter for the evening".

If anyone did deposit the meal in my lap, however, I might respond by asking "did you enjoy that?" before preparing (a) an invoice for dry cleaning and any other relevant damage reparation and (b) a report on an internet site outlining the details of the incident.

Anyway, I rather doubt that such things would take place at the Fat Duck or the Riverside at Bray...

[ahinton]

Part of my training as a waiter was never to ask a customer if they wanted stuffing

Another part perhaps ought to have been to resist asking the customer "do you want frisée with that?"

I was never, though perhaps ought to have been, trained as a waiter; sometimes one has to wait for ages for performances...

[mercia]

Drivers on the motorway self-righteously returning to the inside lane only to leave it seconds later to overtake

worse (IMV) are those not driving fast enough in the outer lanes such that one has to overtake them on the inside

[ahinton]

worse (IMV) are those not driving fast enough in the outer lanes such that one has to overtake them on the inside

Indeed so!

[Serial_Apologist]

worse (IMV) are those not driving fast enough in the outer lanes such that one has to overtake them on the inside

An extremely dangerous manoeuvre iimss mercia. "Dangerous undertaking can lead to... undertaking!". Some of the wrost culprits aren't an motorways, but risk the CC cameras by driving fast up bus lanes one has to move into to turn left.

[Chris Newman]

I'll see Curalach's "Harrumph" and raise you all a couple of "Psshawww"s and a Gallic "Pffffffffffff!!!!!"

One used to hear "Gordon Bennett!" at times of incredulity but the other day I heard a matron from Salisbury Cathedral Close utter "Gordon Brown!"

[Chris Newman]

Part of my training as a waiter was never to ask a customer if they wanted stuffing

A PC relation to the nurses' "small scratch".

[Serial_Apologist]

Another part perhaps ought to have been to resist asking the customer "do you want frisée with that?"

I was never, though perhaps ought to have been, trained as a waiter; sometimes one has to wait for ages for performances...

Apparently the correct question was, "Do you want seasoning?" - which, to me, sounded much more suggestive!

[mercia]

An extremely dangerous manoeuvre iimss mercia.

we may be thinking of two different things - in my experience, it isn't a manoeuvre at all. Joe Bloggs is sitting in lane 3 doing 65mph, I've come up in lane 2 or even 1 doing 70mph - it would be dangerous for me to go right out to lane 4 to get past him. (IMO)

[Flosshilde]

worse (IMV) are those not driving fast enough in the outer lanes such that one has to overtake them on the inside

'has to'? Sorry, but you don't 'have to' do any such thing - it's extremely dangerous both for you & the other driver (& I think it's still an offence, although there was some talk of it being allowed).


Worse, I think, are lorry drivers who try to overtake other lorries when they can only travel a couple of mph faster than them.


On my way home today (in a car) I thought of how irritating are drivers who don't know that they have indicators, & especially those who don't use them on leaving a roundabout (inconveniencing people waiting to enter the roundabout) and those who don't use them when they turn right at a junction, inconveniencing those waiting to leave the junction and endangering pedestrians trying to cross .