Have you ever noticed.....?

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I know this is going to make me sound like Andy Rooney, who, by the way, claims to never use the phrase "Have your ever noticed?" BUT

Have you ever noticed how stuck in routines people can get?

Tonight, I am standing in an elevator bank with about thirty people. There are six elevators. All four of the down buttons have been pushed and we are all waiting for one or more of the elevators to "ding" and announce it's arrival.
Okay.
So along comes a young woman, about thirty I would guess, she comes into the elevator bank and, without looking at any of the rest of us, she goes to each of the four down buttons and pushs them.

DUH! say the rest of us. No wonder the elevators haven't come!! We only pushed the buttons ONCE.

I am laughing to myself about this when along come two men, they are taking to each other very seriously about some matching somethings as they come into the elevator bank. Without missing a beat, the taller of the two brushes by four or five people and PUSHES one of the Down buttons which is already glowing nicely. He then continues to talk to the other guy as if they are alone.

What is this an indication of?

Narsacisstic obliviousness?

Pavlovian training?

What have you noticed lately?

Joe(Personal undefined tics?)Nation

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I noticed the same guys on my commute to work. The big hairy guy (not in a good way) at the bus stop. The other big hairy guy (in a good way) walking on the sidewalk over the RR tracks and the Asian man at the bus stop. I see them ALL the time. We have the same schedule. The first big hairy guy cut his hair, now he's just big. I almost yelled out the window at him - "Hey, you cut your hair!"

Not quite the same thing as your button-pushers, but close.

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littlek wrote:

"Hey, you cut your hair!"

To which he might have responded "Yes", with that helpful little smile people use when dealing with the possibly dangerous lunatic.

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<grin>

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What I hate is when some guy and his girl are riding in the elevator alone and he pushes the emergency 'stop' button so he can get a blow job! This really slows things down for people waiting. I did this once in college...

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I noticed something in my years of driving a truck, and you can confirm it yourself at any truckstop.

Watch truckdrivers when they park their trucks.
ALL of them (and I include myself) will take a few steps, then turn and look back at their truck.
Why we do this is a mystery to me, but I have never seen a driver that didnt do that.

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Hah! I never noticed that, but I bet I will next time I'm in a truck stop.

Know the difference between a machinist and a tool & die maker? Machinists stack their parts. Tool & die makers pet them. Really.

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mysteryman wrote:

I noticed something in my years of driving a truck, and you can confirm it yourself at any truckstop.

Watch truckdrivers when they park their trucks.
ALL of them (and I include myself) will take a few steps, then turn and look back at their truck.
Why we do this is a mystery to me, but I have never seen a driver that didnt do that.

I think this is explained by the joke about the guy driving through the toll booth on Sydney Harbour Bridge. He says to the toll guy 'How much for my caravan?'

The toll guy says 'What caravan?'

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Ulp!

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The truckers are saying to themselves (and I know I would):

"Holy Cow, I drove that thing all the way here!"
===
There used to be a guy who would come into the store during rainstorms, he always had the same complaint, that there were some people out on the sidewalks with huge umbrellas.

"Huge, giant,"he would whine," You can't get past them.There should be some kind of ordinance about how large an umbrella you can have"

Then he would buy a six dollar puny umbrella and head out to do battle.

He said and did that every rainstorm for years and years.

Joe(Him against the Golf Umbrellaistsas)Nation

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At a railway station people line the platform, waiting for the train.

They don't know where the train's doors will end up, when the train stops, so the people spread themselves out more or less evenly along the platform.

When the train pulls in, do the people wait to see where the door will finally be? No, many of them, or most of them, start walking or running alongside the moving train as it stops...even though there are more doors, and more empty seats, still to come, behind them.

Watch it, it's quite funny. Some cover quite a distance, more than a carriage length usually.

My theory is that this is and old deeply-ingrained folk memory of when groups of cavemen had to hunt buffalo and mammoths on the plains- they ran alongside the great beast to eventually bring it down.
And they can't stop doing it even now.

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littlek wrote:

I noticed the same guys on my commute to work. The big hairy guy (not in a good way) at the bus stop. The other big hairy guy (in a good way) walking on the sidewalk over the RR tracks and the Asian man at the bus stop. I see them ALL the time. We have the same schedule. The first big hairy guy cut his hair, now he's just big. I almost yelled out the window at him - "Hey, you cut your hair!"

Not quite the same thing as your button-pushers, but close.

Does everyone have their favorite spot on the platform?

(I do. Because it's for the right door on the subway.)

Unlike the train, the subway stops within inches every time.

==
One machinist tale

At Yuba Heat we had a toolmaker named Woody. He was about seventy but not retired because he loved working those cutting machines and lathes.
One day the white shirts in Engineeing needed a sample of some steel, they called us and said "Just get us a piece about two inches by two inches." I said okay and headed for the door.

Philpot, my boss, asked where I was going. I said I was going to have Woody cut the 2X2 piece.

"Oh no," said Philpot. And he sat down and carefully drew a cube on a piece of paper.

"Make one (1) each
Sample:
2.014" X 1.955 X 2.000"

That's how you kept Woody happy.

Joe(and busy, but mostly happy.)Nation

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That the more people in front of you at Starbucks, the longer it takes for each of them to spit out what they want and then, when they are again ahead of you at the milk dispensing area, they are par---tic--u-lary careful to juuuust pour in juuuuuuuust the right amount of milk and then -oh, where or where IS that pink stuff?? --- right in front of you, dingbat.--and then they open and use a straw to (what?) stir the foam alittle bit???

Joe(these are the same people who you have to wait an hour for them to back out of a parking space.)Nation

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Joe Nation wrote:

Joe(these are the same people who you have to wait an hour for them to back out of a parking space.)Nation

They have actually studied this phenomenon, and found that people really do take longer to get out of the parking space when another car is waiting.

And the add'l length of time varies, based on the relative values of the vehicles.

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Without ever reading the study I'll bet that the results are as follows:

The greater the value difference between the two vehicles (including status value) the longer the time period without regard to the positions of the cars.

In other words: The driver of the Hummer is likely to look in the mirrors and say, regarding the beat-up Chevy-in-waiting:

"Screw you, you lowlife, I am taking my sweet time."

Whereas, the Chevy driver when parked and readying to withdraw sees the Hummer in his rearview and says:

"Screw you, you rich prick, I am taking my sweet time".

Joe(See? We, rich and poor, we are alike.)Nation

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... that you can't buy a half gallon of paint?

No, you have to buy two quarts.

The paint I prefer is $16 a quart, $50 a gallon.

A quart is rarely enough to paint a room, a gallon is too much, so you either pay more for two quarts and have double the trash or end up with a lot of left over paint.

The company that decides to make a good quality paint sold in half gallon cans will have my undying gratitude.

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Actually, people make way for the more expensive car.

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I've got some bad news for you.

Just like the 8oz Hersey bar has become the 7.2oz.
Just like the 1lb can of coffee which now weighs 13.3oz.

The gallon of paint is extinct or nearly so.

Joe(check the label)nation

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There's the plus side to all of that Joe. 7.2 oz means fewer calories. Drink one less cup a day and you'll have even more coffe than you did before. Use one coat of paint instead of two and you'll save even more money!

Granted, I struggled a bit to see these bright sides.

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Joe Nation wrote:

That the more people in front of you at Starbucks, the longer it takes for each of them to spit out what they want and then, when they are again ahead of you at the milk dispensing area, they are par---tic--u-lary careful to juuuust pour in juuuuuuuust the right amount of milk and then -oh, where or where IS that pink stuff?? --- right in front of you, dingbat.--and then they open and use a straw to (what?) stir the foam alittle bit???

These are the same people who stand in line impatiently, then it is only after all their items are rung up, and told the price, that they realize they have to somehow produce a form of payment.

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Have you ever noticed.....?

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