Category: learning curve

Only on Only Connect

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One thing I have been doing this weekend is catching up with some back episodes of my favourite quiz show, Only Connect.

And sometimes, there are just moments of that show that you really – really – wouldn’t get anywhere else.

Unbelievable. What an answer in the infamous final Missing Vowels round.

See also:

Panamadonna
Maltaylor Swift
Bolivia Newton-John
Argentina Turner
Myanmary J Blige
Turkmenistannie Lennox

That last one is something I didn’t think I’d be typing out today. Or on any day, to be absolutely honest.

Gig Etiquette

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Incoming from Lucy May Walker, this:

OK. Let’s begin with a couple of disclaimers here.

Firstly, LMW isn’t my favourite artist. No real problem with her, just that her music isn’t really my sort of thing. I’m just mentioning that so you don’t think that my opinion on the above has anything to do with any sort of connection or fondness for her or her work.
And secondly, because she is a mainly acoustic folk music artist, and her stuff is very much thoughtful, thought-provoking, gentle, peaceful music, then any iffy behaviour from the audience is likely to have more of an effect than if someone was to chat through, say Mutter by Rammstein.

But still…

YES! YES! ALL OF THIS! THANK YOU!

I’m so tired of going to concerts and having to endure people talking through the whole performance. And I recognise that the experience of watching a concert is a very personal thing; different for every person, but honestly – for that exact reason – your behaviour shouldn’t impinge or affect any one else’s experience.

And I have mentioned this so many times before, but it’s symptomatic of the way that people behave everywhere these days: like they are the only ones that matter. I just don’t get it when you have paid A LOT of money (and likely gone to a lot of trouble) to enjoy the music of a band or artist, and then you do something that you could – and should – maybe do literally anywhere else.

Don’t spend five hundred and forty five fecking Rands each to sit on a dark grassy slope and ruin things for people who – really weirdly – have actually turned up at a concert to hear the band playing and not you shouting to your mate about taking junior to the fecking Constantia Uitsig fecking bike park in the morning.

Stay at home.

I just saved you R1090. That’s, like, two overpriced coffees while he’s on the pisspoor dirt track tomorrow. Boom.

Or if you really did pay your Rands to come along to hear the band, then couldn’t your utterly mundane shouty conversation just have waited for an hour and a half?
You bunch of self-absorbed, stereotypical, Southern Suburbs twats.
No wonder everyone hates you.

Yeah. That was from me back in November 2018. And it wasn’t even all of my rant. Click through for the whole thing. I was clearly rather upset after seeing James at Kirstenbosch.

But I’m not alone.

So yes, I’m all for Lucy May Walker’s helpful guide above. Of course, we shouldn’t really need to be telling grown adults how to behave with respect for other people, but hey ho, here we are.

Most attractive hobbies

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I was sent this the other day.

And I looked around on the internet, and found an article all about it.

Which had quotes like this:

Basically, women want a bilingual traveling blacksmith who does archery, gardens, and reads — or some combination like that.

which make me wonder how on earth the human race will ever continue.

Out of those Top 15, I reckon I’ve got about 7 or 8 covered. And an extra 1 if “painting” means like living room walls and stuff. You can leave me out on the archery and blacksmithing thing – when was this survey done? 1650? – but, for someone who doesn’t read books, I think I’m doing alright.

Of course, what I really need is a Top 15 of what Mrs 6000 likes.

And what she doesn’t like. Because they listed those things as well.

I was quite interested in a couple of these things: who puts “arguing online” as a hobby?!? And I am happy to say that I had to look a couple of them up.

Funko is a collection of large headed plastic model figures. And…

The manosphere is a diverse collection of websites, blogs, and online forums promoting masculinity, misogyny, and opposition to feminism.

How weird that that should be bottom of the list. And how even weirder that 3.1% of women said they found it attractive.

Quite chuffed that my occasional flutter on Sheffield United (and Mrs 6000’s bit of racehorse) is my only entry on this bottom list.

There’s also a really interesting correlation between these charts and the ones for what men think women perceive as being attractive and not. Nearly right, boys! Good effort!
Click through on the link above for that.

M3 burning bus drama: The Reddit reaction

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No wonder the traffic was so bad as I raced past it on a pretty quick (for me) 5.5km run this morning. Because apparently, just on the town side of where I was, was this:

And when this sort of thing happens, its bound to make people wonder what’s going on.

So yes: all very well to ask this sort of question: it’s an unusual incident, and a reasonable thing to be curious about. But if you’re going to ask on Reddit, then you’re going to get those helpful Reddit answers.

Like this:

This is (probably) completely accurate information. OK, it’s unlikely to assist with relieving any of the curiosity of the initial inquirer, but you can’t fault the willingness to engage.

And it’s more helpful than this sort of thing:

Ja Nee. Rubbernecking only makes things worse, hey? Don’t do it.

At the present time, there is no indication as to why the bus caught alight.
But the traffic is still awful.

Numbers

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A few things I have seen recently.

The latest offering from Enid Blyton looks rather depressing:

And if you thought that the five link was a bit random, then how about this six?

Maybe spare yourself from the pictures in that article, by the way. Literally the most positive thing about the whole episode was this:

“We are also aware of the allegation that dog food was being used to produce the sausage. Contrary to footage circulating on social media, our EHPs found no evidence of dog food on the scene.” 

So it could quite clearly have been even wors.

I’m so sorry.

According to this page, 186,000 people arrived in Finland in November last year.
Brave souls, but what a welcome when you get there:

OK, so this was actually for a tech conference in 2016, but as the “best tourist slogan ever”, it absolutely still works.

Still awake? Not for long once you get into this article, I promise you.

Why? Because it’s 2,536 words about the nomenclature of the UK’s highways. And not actually that, but the highways that were incorrectly named.

Look out for The Maybole Disaster:

You could argue, of course, that it doesn’t matter; the old road through Maybole has a number, and few people will pay much attention to it no matter what it is. Call it B77, or B770, or B7700, or B7777 (all of which are available for use), and life will go on. Well, yes, of course it will.

But the point of the exercise was to move through traffic to the new bypass – to encourage it to follow a different path, where the road now divides, and take an unfamiliar route around the west of Maybole rather than the familiar way through the middle. The point was to make it clear that the A77 is now over here, and this road you used to go down is now something else.

Spoiler: They called it the B77, and ruined everything.

Or The Accidental Motorway:

Until it was downgraded to an A-road in the late 1990s, it held the fantastically grand number M41.
We’re talking about numbering mistakes, but M41 was quite a good fit: it was in motorway zone 4, and the number wasn’t used elsewhere, so was technically valid.
The mistake was that it was supposed to be called M14.

Fascinating.

Goodnight.