• Our new ticketing site is now live! Using either this or the original site (both powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

Comedic "things you would ban": minor things that irritate you

Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

Techniquest

Veteran Member
Joined
19 Jun 2005
Messages
21,845
Location
Nowhere Heath
I would just ban tea full stop (and coffee). I don't understand the obsession most people seem to have with either (or both)

You'll find the country will grind to a halt very fast if you actually did that! Not to mention the amount of damage you'd do to the economy, how many people you'd put out of work and how much the entire world would slow down.

I understand your enthusiasm for doing so though, as I'd wipe out the entire alcohol and tobacco industry overnight if I could.
 

LYRobert

Member
Joined
18 Apr 2022
Messages
88
Location
Banbury
Using the word "Either" to mean "Both".
And what does "Iconic" mean - really?
Calling drivers of cars "Motorists" and not "drivers". (Thinks:- 'enginists'? 'petrolists'? 'pedalists'? 'shoe-ists'? walk-ists?, skate-board ists?)
TV presenters (even the very concept of a "Presenter" is suspect) who fill in a few minutes at the start of a programme by telling you what's going to be in the on-coming programme. It's called "Isle 'B' " by TV people).
Makers of videos about something interesting who think that head-and-shoulders pictures of THEM is more interesting than the subject of the video. Even the "Big" TV is full of that, - TV news, for instance, where we look at a news reader instead of the news.
 
Last edited:

Gloster

Veteran Member
Joined
4 Sep 2020
Messages
13,049
Location
Up the creek
People who pick up a basket in a supermarket and then stand in front of the stack. They search through their pockets for their shopping list, study it for ages, realise it is an old one, put it back in a pocket, search through their pockets, take out a list, study it, and realise that it is the same one. They stand there in bewilderment until they realise that they had dropped the list they wanted in the basket before they picked it up. They then stand there studying it before putting it in their pocket and wandering off into the shop to repeat the performance. Meanwhile nobody has been able to get to the baskets.
 

Techniquest

Veteran Member
Joined
19 Jun 2005
Messages
21,845
Location
Nowhere Heath
Fortunately in my shop there's enough room to navigate around such a person and pick up a basket from a different stack! However I share your frustration, as my local Sainsburys puts baskets by the doors on the way in. Great, but the two-way flow of people and slow movers makes getting a basket much more complicated than it really needs to be!
 

Gloster

Veteran Member
Joined
4 Sep 2020
Messages
13,049
Location
Up the creek
Fortunately in my shop there's enough room to navigate around such a person and pick up a basket from a different stack! However I share your frustration, as my local Sainsburys puts baskets by the doors on the way in. Great, but the two-way flow of people and slow movers makes getting a basket much more complicated than it really needs to be!

My nearest Morrisons used to have two doors on the town side: on In and one Out. As soon as you went in the In door you had to cross over the Out flow and then cross back to get in to the store. I did manage to persuade them to move the baskets (there was no shortage of space), but it only lasted a couple of months before someone from higher up said it wasn’t on the plan and so they must revert to the old system. They have solved it now: the old Out door is no longer in use and everybody has to go in (and out of) the other one. Then, after collecting a basket, you have to go all the way across the store, rather than straight in.
 
Last edited:

52290

Member
Joined
23 Oct 2015
Messages
732
People who pick up a basket in a supermarket and then stand in front of the stack. They search through their pockets for their shopping list, study it for ages, realise it is an old one, put it back in a pocket, search through their pockets, take out a list, study it, and realise that it is the same one. They stand there in bewilderment until they realise that they had dropped the list they wanted in the basket before they picked it up. They then stand there studying it before putting it in their pocket and wandering off into the shop to repeat the performance. Meanwhile nobody has been able to get to the baskets.
Just tell me to move out of the way, I won't mind.
 

duncanp

Established Member
Joined
16 Aug 2012
Messages
4,856
I understand your enthusiasm for doing so though, as I'd wipe out the entire alcohol and tobacco industry overnight if I could.

The United States tried prohibition from 1920 - 1933.

That went well, didn't it?

There were more illegal drinking dens in Chicago during prohibition than there were legal bars beforehand.
 

gg1

Established Member
Joined
2 Jun 2011
Messages
2,500
Location
Birmingham
Another shopping basket annoyance, supermarkets which hide them away in a corner rather than keeping them somewhere you can easily see as you walk in. At my local Asda you need to turn right immediately after walking through the door, you can't see them on the way in and similarly can't see them if you walk a few metres into the store and look around at that point.
 

Techniquest

Veteran Member
Joined
19 Jun 2005
Messages
21,845
Location
Nowhere Heath
The United States tried prohibition from 1920 - 1933.

That went well, didn't it?

There were more illegal drinking dens in Chicago during prohibition than there were legal bars beforehand.

Fair point, but it's also 90 years later and I'd like to think common sense and a better understanding of health would be prevalent.

I'm also very aware, through the job I do, how dependant on alcohol a lot of people are. They *need* their alcohol, I'm told. Yes, I'm sure you do. I've been there, I've been a heavy drinker myself, thankfully I got myself away from that and I would like to see more people do the same.

On the topic of the thread, before I get too distracted, I'd ban anyone smelling of weed entering any public place. If they want to partake of the stuff, then don't go out in public. I'd also enforce an actual ban on people sharing a house with others and partaking of the stuff, especially if there are people in said house who don't smoke anything.

Yes I have a particularly large crater on my shoulder about that!
 

LYRobert

Member
Joined
18 Apr 2022
Messages
88
Location
Banbury
More about words:

Why has the expression "Along with" come to mean "Together with" ?
On consideration it is rediculous:-
I took my coat, along with my umbrella - - - !
Long and short! Try "A-short with - - - "
" I took my coat, ashort with my umbrella - - - !
- to see if it means 'NOT with'.
It could, I suppose, but it doesn't.

And "Should" placed to mean "if":
"Should you have any queries, then - - - "

What's wrong with "if" ?
And doesn't "Should" carry some sort of obligatory or maybe moral sense as well?
e.g. "I should pay my library fine" (but I'm not gonna!)

I have more, but I can't just bring 'em to mind at the moment.
 

43096

On Moderation
Joined
23 Nov 2015
Messages
18,889
People telling us on Tw@tter/Bookface/web forums/wherever that they're not going to do something (e.g. diesel galas) for whatever reason. The rest of us couldn't give a stuff if you are there or not!
 

Acey

Member
Joined
16 Nov 2018
Messages
431
Those stupid plastic bags they use for sweets/rice /pasta /cereals etc that always split when you open them !
 

Gloster

Veteran Member
Joined
4 Sep 2020
Messages
13,049
Location
Up the creek
People telling us on Tw@tter/Bookface/web forums/wherever that they're not going to do something (e.g. diesel galas) for whatever reason. The rest of us couldn't give a stuff if you are there or not!

Although I am not on any of those various thingies, I sometimes come across such comments. They do at least provide a little bit of cheer as you can think, ‘At least I am not as big a twonk as that.’
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
More about words:

Why has the expression "Along with" come to mean "Together with" ?
On consideration it is rediculous:-
I took my coat, along with my umbrella - - - !
Long and short! Try "A-short with - - - "
" I took my coat, ashort with my umbrella - - - !
- to see if it means 'NOT with'.
It could, I suppose, but it doesn't.

And "Should" placed to mean "if":
"Should you have any queries, then - - - "

What's wrong with "if" ?
And doesn't "Should" carry some sort of obligatory or maybe moral sense as well?
e.g. "I should pay my library fine" (but I'm not gonna!)

I have more, but I can't just bring 'em to mind at the moment.

I have, for most of my seventy-plus years, quite often used "along with" as an alternative to "together with" -- it seems to me (as it would !) perfectly acceptable in that role. And "should", used in the way "called out" by you in your posting: I value that as an occasional -- jocularly pompous and "ten-bob-word-ish" -- alternative to "if". Am wondering now whether I'm weird; or whether you are maybe in the camp of proponents of "one word / expression, and no more, for each concept: verbal 'flourishes and fancy-work' a bad thing, to be fought against" <D.
 

duncanp

Established Member
Joined
16 Aug 2012
Messages
4,856
Can we ban all mention of the alleged feud between H***y W********y and P*****p S*******d on the ITV Good Morning show.

Note to all newspaper editors who think this is important: most people couldn't care less, and would rather watch paint dry.
 

dangie

On Moderation
Joined
4 May 2011
Messages
2,353
Location
Rugeley Staffordshire
Can we ban all mention of the alleged feud between H***y W********y and P*****p S*******d on the ITV Good Morning show.

Note to all newspaper editors who think this is important: most people couldn't care less, and would rather watch paint dry.
Why did you mention it…..??
 

dangie

On Moderation
Joined
4 May 2011
Messages
2,353
Location
Rugeley Staffordshire
Sitting in the dentist while the wife's having her gnashers sorted. Forgot my Kindle. Flipping through a selection of Vogue, Yachting Monthly & Horse & Hound magazines etc..... Riveting reading.
 

StripeyNick

Member
Joined
25 Apr 2012
Messages
412
Location
Cowbridge, S.Wales
After watching Eurovision on Saturday, the one thing that really winds me up is people who do the heart gesture with their hands.

It seemed to start off at the 2012 Olympics and has stuck around since.

The lead singer of one of my favourite bands is always doing that stage and I feel my blood boiling every time she does it!
 

61653 HTAFC

Veteran Member
Joined
18 Dec 2012
Messages
19,373
Location
Yorkshire
Sitting in the dentist while the wife's having her gnashers sorted. Forgot my Kindle. Flipping through a selection of Vogue, Yachting Monthly & Horse & Hound magazines etc..... Riveting reading.
It always amused me that the Doctor's surgery had "ordinary" magazines in the waiting room, but at the dentists every magazine seemed to be a brag about how well paid dentists were paid. If you were lucky the Doctor's might have an old, dog-eared issue What Car for the blokes in amongst all the copies of Women's Weekly or People's Friend... at the Dentist the best you can do is What Yacht!

Of course nowadays the Dentist is the only place that still has magazines in the waiting room, thanks to yet another Covid overreaction.
 

Techniquest

Veteran Member
Joined
19 Jun 2005
Messages
21,845
Location
Nowhere Heath
Indeed, i only know about it now because of this forum. :p

Quite so here too. Not that I care enough to find out what all the fuss is about, I think I'd rather go to work and deal with that than reading/watching all the gossip/drama that's no doubt involved!

I did have an entry for this list that came to mind earlier, but I've forgot it!
 

yorksrob

Veteran Member
Joined
6 Aug 2009
Messages
44,433
Location
Yorks
Can we ban all mention of the alleged feud between H***y W********y and P*****p S*******d on the ITV Good Morning show.

Note to all newspaper editors who think this is important: most people couldn't care less, and would rather watch paint dry.

Why did you mention it…..??

Indeed, i only know about it now because of this forum. :p

I wasn't even aware that he'd parted ways with Gordon the Gopher.
 

Top