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Feeling spiky
Feb. 11th, 2010 10:54 pmYou want to know what irritates me? TV schedules. I have TiVo, I know about Hulu. You wouldn't think this would still be a big deal. But we got deluged in January, to the point where there were conflicts in the recording of content. But now, there's nothing recording for the next 2 weeks (the TiVo content forecast only goes 2 weeks into the future). Why did they do that? We already know they only have enough content for about 30% of the year, so why not spread it out more?
I'd also like them to move House back to 9pm because I didn't have a conflict then. Of course if Chuck continues being as puerile as it has been, there won't be a conflict any longer. I cannot believe people campaigned to resurrect this show. It ended cleanly and the revised version is stupid and plays up the "humor".
Want to know what's good? Doc Martin is on PBS currently. So I was able to watch season one via Netflix streaming and now I'm able to watch season 3. I didn't expect to really like the show, but I do.
I listened to music today. And I got my stupid iPod to use a bedamned playlist.
I bought salted toffee today. It's excellent. Ridiculously expensive though and I keep thinking I ought to be able to make that myself. I might try at some point.
weird requests I would like to change how words are spelled. Not all of them. I'd like to ban "ough" in spelling. That's not how American-derived dipthongs are spelled and having 3 silent letters is ridiculous in a country where they drop necessary doubled letters in past tense verbs just because the Microsoft spell-checker has become the country's official dictionary. Also... we shouldn't have ough words that are not "ow!" sounds, it's confusing. I used the word "slough" today and it's not "slow" or "slau"... it's "sluff". There's not even an alternate pronunciation like there is for "enough"--- though that's probably just for poets.
I would also like there NEVER to be words where 'c' is used both as an 's' and as a 'k'. Circus is just wrong. Cyclops. Though I had a literature prof who pronounced that as "ky klops".
And I would like a name that country game that chose a random region on the globe instead of forcibly dividing by continent. I saw a map from last week's Jeopardy with the Strait of Gibraltar (note, Strait, not "straight") and I was reminded that Africa is spittin' distance from Europe. I shouldn't have discovered that in this century. It should have been something I learned before leaving high school.
I would like to know why we were taught that the song "Blue Danube" was about a river somewhere in Europe but were told that Hungary and Romania and Bulgaria were not. Must be like Chinese people saying India isn't part of Asia because "Only Asian people are Asian." Of course I am old enough to have learned the continents as "North America, South America, Australia, Antartica, Africa, Europe, Asia, Russia". Might have been residual Cold War era geography.
And finally... I would like schools to stagger their dismissal times. It's absolutely wrong that there are 70 cars waiting for an hour to pick up children from school. It blocks traffic half the afternoon. Since we don't have all the schools consolidated in some sort of child ghetto, they're scattered all over residential areas, shouldn't the children be able to walk home? We probably should have regions near businesses where all the schools are located centrally. If all the schools were in one place, then everything would be integrated and services could be provided which are not financially feasible when there are 26 locations. There could be a great school library. There could be opt-in enrichment courses. But since we're not likely to move the children off somewhere away from my home, we should at least not make it so the main thoroughfare is impassable from 2pm until 4pm. Where are the police and why aren't these people being arrested?
I'd also like them to move House back to 9pm because I didn't have a conflict then. Of course if Chuck continues being as puerile as it has been, there won't be a conflict any longer. I cannot believe people campaigned to resurrect this show. It ended cleanly and the revised version is stupid and plays up the "humor".
Want to know what's good? Doc Martin is on PBS currently. So I was able to watch season one via Netflix streaming and now I'm able to watch season 3. I didn't expect to really like the show, but I do.
I listened to music today. And I got my stupid iPod to use a bedamned playlist.
I bought salted toffee today. It's excellent. Ridiculously expensive though and I keep thinking I ought to be able to make that myself. I might try at some point.
weird requests I would like to change how words are spelled. Not all of them. I'd like to ban "ough" in spelling. That's not how American-derived dipthongs are spelled and having 3 silent letters is ridiculous in a country where they drop necessary doubled letters in past tense verbs just because the Microsoft spell-checker has become the country's official dictionary. Also... we shouldn't have ough words that are not "ow!" sounds, it's confusing. I used the word "slough" today and it's not "slow" or "slau"... it's "sluff". There's not even an alternate pronunciation like there is for "enough"--- though that's probably just for poets.
I would also like there NEVER to be words where 'c' is used both as an 's' and as a 'k'. Circus is just wrong. Cyclops. Though I had a literature prof who pronounced that as "ky klops".
And I would like a name that country game that chose a random region on the globe instead of forcibly dividing by continent. I saw a map from last week's Jeopardy with the Strait of Gibraltar (note, Strait, not "straight") and I was reminded that Africa is spittin' distance from Europe. I shouldn't have discovered that in this century. It should have been something I learned before leaving high school.
I would like to know why we were taught that the song "Blue Danube" was about a river somewhere in Europe but were told that Hungary and Romania and Bulgaria were not. Must be like Chinese people saying India isn't part of Asia because "Only Asian people are Asian." Of course I am old enough to have learned the continents as "North America, South America, Australia, Antartica, Africa, Europe, Asia, Russia". Might have been residual Cold War era geography.
And finally... I would like schools to stagger their dismissal times. It's absolutely wrong that there are 70 cars waiting for an hour to pick up children from school. It blocks traffic half the afternoon. Since we don't have all the schools consolidated in some sort of child ghetto, they're scattered all over residential areas, shouldn't the children be able to walk home? We probably should have regions near businesses where all the schools are located centrally. If all the schools were in one place, then everything would be integrated and services could be provided which are not financially feasible when there are 26 locations. There could be a great school library. There could be opt-in enrichment courses. But since we're not likely to move the children off somewhere away from my home, we should at least not make it so the main thoroughfare is impassable from 2pm until 4pm. Where are the police and why aren't these people being arrested?
