Didn't get that memo eh?

Here we are, year 2009 a mere 3 years shy of the predicted apocalypse and living in the age of information. Somehow, between email, google, wikipedia, spellcheck, and other lightning fast info sources, we still have people living in caves. Undisciplined, yes-men filled caves.

Think back to the last time you went to the airport. Guaranteed that somebody in line tried to bring an economy sized bottle of shampoo and 8 gatorades through the security point, and was completely flabbergasted when they were told by the dude in the homeland security getup that it was not allowed. Regardless of how absurd you think the rules are, they've been the rules for years now. It's right up there with no smoking on the plane. Google it. Ask somebody. Turn on the news. something.

In 2006 the FCC announced plans to terminate analog television broadcast in 2009, meaning that people with old TV's still relying on rabbit-ears to get their signal would have to get a digital converter box, which is free with a government subsidized program. Easiest thing in the world to target this audience - just play the above information once in a while on the six and a half channels that you still get on broadcast. Bam, done. And yet somehow, 3 years wasn't enough time for people to call the hotline and do something about it, and now 5.8 million unprepared households want an extension. And here I was assuming it was old people, but from the sound of things it includes a fair number of slacker college kids.

Then you have your suspiciously plentiful pile of sub-average internet users who insist on typing everything in all caps. This is the most painfully confusing demographic I've ever discovered, and I suspect that it was created by a government think tank to hurt my head. One would assume that a member of the 'internet' who is well informed enough to use a 'computer' and construct a craigslist/ebay/forum post would get a clue about the all caps thing. One would be wrong, and go to bed early dreaming of variations on the Geico cavemen commercial.

Not My Problem

The following is a list of things that are piled up outside the stairway to my office building. None of them are mine.

-Two 40 gallon drums of 95% and 100% Ethylene. It ranks just south of "hella flammable" on the burn-o-meter.
-An ever changing tidal line of leakage from said drums.
-Approximately 50 cigarette butts.
-Some leaves.
-A 1950's era refrigerator door.
-A plastic tampon applicator device thingy.
-A pile of inside out (presumably used) latex gloves.

why would you ever do this?

If you were to ask me, the man on the blog street, what I love to hate most, you might surmise from pretty much any of these posts that it's stupidity. And, while that does get my undies in quite an untidy bunch, general stupidity is usually pretty aimless. The rub is that it's so damn general. Anyhow, there are worse offenses: aggressive stupidity, such as trying to run me over with your pickup truck while a-hootin and a-hollerin, and professional stupidity, where you're just being plain negligent at the thing you supposedly do well.

For today's example we turn yet again to the traffic circle. They're all the rage these days, everybody who's anybody is installing them. A quick hint though: If you build a bike specific traffic circle, and make it a really small radius one for whatever reason, it'd probably be best not to put super slippery metal utility covers right in the middle of the path.