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Curmudgeon Corner

  • Cookies. Seems like every few days I have to click to accept them on sites I frequent (not pfm I hasten to add). And despite logging in to the BBC site, accepting cookies and telling it which local news and weather I want it regularly bins the setting.
  • The way every news story just has to have a picture with it, that takes up loads of screen space and rarely adds anything to the words.
  • The way I have to fight this reply box to have a blank line between bullet points.
Think I need some of that diminished reality stuff Steve.
 
The way I have to fight this reply box to have a blank line between bullet points.

YES!!! I want it to look like I want it to look like. Not how some bloody algorithm thinks it should look. ARGHHHHHH!

And bloody auto correct that either keeps correcting the way I want to say something or offers gibberish when I genuinely can’t spell!
 
And bloody auto correct that either keeps correcting the way I want to say something or offers gibberish when I genuinely can’t spell!

I think you mean the way you want to phrase something... ;)

Unless you have autocorrect installed in real life. In which case, my apologies.
 
  • Cookies. Seems like every few days I have to click to accept them on sites I frequent (not pfm I hasten to add). And despite logging in to the BBC site, accepting cookies and telling it which local news and weather I want it regularly bins the setting.
  • The way every news story just has to have a picture with it, that takes up loads of screen space and rarely adds anything to the words.
  • The way I have to fight this reply box to have a blank line between bullet points.
Think I need some of that diminished reality stuff Steve.
Yes, cookies really get my goat. The way some websites make it difficult to choose your preferences. I never visit sites that don’t let me choose what cookies I accept, and I always decline the nonessential marketing ones, and if I can’t do that quickly, I’m not sticking around your website.
 
Oh god, you've got me started again.

The number of sites that sell stuff and have multiple sorting methods and items to display per page, but won't maintain your setting and reset them to the default, which is of course 4 f--k off large pictures per page, reached by scrolling past a load of unnecessary toss and sorted in the least useful order it's possible to imagine. Seems to me that back when connections were slower more thought had to be given to not create bloated webpages that needed lots of reloading to get through. Can I have 1997 back please?
 
Yes, cookies really get my goat. The way some websites make it difficult to choose your preferences. I never visit sites that don’t let me choose what cookies I accept, and I always decline the nonessential marketing ones, and if I can’t do that quickly, I’m not sticking around your website.
Yes. “Reject All” should be a statutory option
 
Pencils. Whenever you specifically need a pencil all you can find are several gross of biros. I’m almost certain the pencils hide in a corner with your lost ball of string waiting for you to need a biro, then all jump out at once. Not the string though. That waits until you have bought some more. I found three barely-started balls, all sitting openly on shelves and tables, within ten minutes of returning from Tesco with a new one the other day. I hadn’t even started researching how to get into the packaging.
 
Pencils. Whenever you specifically need a pencil all you can find are several gross of biros. I’m almost the pencils hide in a corner with your lost ball of string waiting for you to need a biro, then all jump out at once. Not the string though. That waits until you have bought some more. I found three barely-started balls, all sitting openly on shelves and tables, within ten minutes of returning from Tesco with a new one the other day. I hadn’t even started researching how to get into the packaging.
Oh my god, Biros. Where do they come from? Never buy the evil little things with their nice even lines, never use them, but there they are infecting my mark making life with their incomprehensible ubiquity.
 
Bought a pack of 5 ink pens in Sainsbury's a few weeks ago. Excellent ink flow but I'm sure this should be on paper, not my hand. Bloody useless, 3 of them, so bought Papermate pack of 8 for £3; 6 colours; brilliant so far.

Cookie panels: my default move, if they render reading impossible, is to simply ditch that site. There are a few 'reject all' ones, a few tucked into a corner by way of asking politely but not impeding anything and those which allow you to move the less distinct text sufficient to read it, but not enjoyably. Then those (most?) which don't allow access unless you accept. I much preferred it when I didn't know.

What baffles me, as it's totally counter-intuitive, is that the company want your custom (whatever form that may take) yet forbid you, in effect, from accessing their site. Stark raving bonkers and deffo a Curmudgeon Corner item, i.m.o.
 
Reader view on a Mac comes in quite handy as often it will show the page without the cookie monster, but some sites just won't work. Great for taking pages back to how they were in the early days too, with just plain black text on a white background, though sometimes images go missing.
 
Pulled a few weeds out of our raised bit of garden out the front and nettles stung me on the fingertips. This was hours ago, and it still nips.
 
Bastard nettles. I plunged my hand into one of my nice Salvias in order to get to the root of the bastard bindweed winding its way up one of the stalks, and found a nettle at the bottom. I type this under duress.

Bindweed. Don't get me started. A flamethrower is too good for it.
 
Football. Why? Isn't it the cricket season? I walked past a local sports field this morning and there was a match between a team in blue shirts (some topless) and one in orange shirts (some also topless). Made me wonder why they bothered buying shirts at all. TBH I wonder why they bothered, full stop. They seemed to expend more energy yelling than kicking the ball. Although I did hear someone shout 'Man on! Man on!' which I thought only happened in comedy sketches about over-competitive dads watching sons play.

It was a relief to climb over the stile to try my luck outrunning the killer sheep.
 
Yes. Always best to avoid the Downs on a Saturday or Wednesday afternoons, as there's literally hundreds of sweaty blokes shouting 'Man on!' or 'Played!' at each other.

Yesterday we went for a short walk along the Severn Estuary. We bravely marched past some cows which were blocking the footpath (a young-ish trio chickened out and went on a diversion to avoid them, which made us feel even braver and smugger). There was a wedding afoot at the church where we stopped for lunch. They had perfect weather for it, and everyone seemed very jolly. Lovely.
 
Bastard nettles.
Particularly potent when forming an Unholy Trinity with brambles and mud. I tripped over a root on a boggy public footpath a few days ago and was propelled headlong into a mix of all three. I revisited the spot this morning. There was still a bright blue haze in the air.
 
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Yes. Always best to avoid the Downs on a Saturday or Wednesday afternoons, as there's literally hundreds of sweaty blokes shouting 'Man on!' or 'Played!' at each other.

Yesterday we went for a short walk along the Severn Estuary. We bravely marched past some cows which were blocking the footpath (a young-ish trio chickened out and went on a diversion to avoid them, which made us feel even braver and smugger). There was a wedding afoot at the church where we stopped for lunch. They had perfect weather for it, and everyone seemed very jolly. Lovely.
Er, excuse me but would you take your positivity and sunny outlook elsewhere, please? This is curmudgeon corner.
 


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