Minor things that bother you

[vdeane]

In 2011, trans women were almost always begrudgingly tolerated as women if they had surgery, with varying degrees of tolerance/acceptance for those who hadn't had (or don't want) surgery.  Today, it doesn't matter if you got the surgery or not - it's considered irrelevant, at least in the US (although Québec's foray into restrictions still acknowledges it, last I heard, although that might change after the next election).  Someone who started transitioning at that time could reasonably come to the conclusion of "make sure you pass and get the surgery and then you're home free no matter what happens".  Clearly the world hasn't worked out that way!  I imagine that would be quite a bitter pill to swallow for anyone who did come to that (in hindsight very erroneous) conclusion.

Obviously, your experience is different than mine.  But I just don't agree with the bolded statement.  Maybe you meant it in a strictly legal sense, but I took you to mean that people in general were more accepting (even if only begrudgingly tolerating) of trans women as women 15 years ago.  That's just not the way I remember things being then.

I mean, if someone passes, goes stealth, and none of their family/friends reacts outwardly negatively, the legal sense is the only way that they would interact with such.  Of course, begrudging tolerance is not the same as acceptance.  "I don't like it, but if they've had the surgery, I guess they can use female spaces" is not "I acknowledge they're women and that's great", but it's still better than "they're just mentally ill crossdressers who will hurt women so they must be kept out of bathrooms/sports/etc.".

Of course, then you get into the weeds of "are people really accepting, or are they just humoring you when in your presence?" and "are they really OK with trans people, or do they just view you as 'one of the good ones'?".  The whole thing can get complicated really fast.  And I've always been oblivious to many of the social undercurrents in society (and was worse in this respect when younger), so I have a tendency to not notice things until they're either obvious or pointed out.

[mgk920]

Meanwhile the American caricature of a Mexican is actually liked in Mexico.  It isn't too difficult to find knock-off Speedy apparel at almost every Mercado.

Speedy is a bona-fide FOLK HERO to many/most Mexicans.

Mike

[kkt]

Email that's full of HTML that prevents it from printing or being copy and pasted.  Retyping family member's itinerary from one window to another just to get a printed copy to stick on my fridge in case the computer is being moody the day I need it.

[Scott5114]

Email that's full of HTML that prevents it from printing or being copy and pasted.  Retyping family member's itinerary from one window to another just to get a printed copy to stick on my fridge in case the computer is being moody the day I need it.

If the problem is that the HTML makes it so that it has the World Series of Formatting glommed onto it whenever you paste it, just paste it into a plain text editor (Notepad should work for this, although knowing Microsoft they've somehow ruined it in Windows 11), then copy it from there to the intended destination.

If it's not letting you copy at all, the problem is usually JavaScript rather than HTML. When I pay my utilities, I normally have my bank account up in one tab and the utility website in the other. This means the most straightforward thing to do is to copy my account and routing numbers from the bank site and paste them into the utility site. There's one bill, though, where pasting mysteriously failed.

The last time I paid that bill I was curious so I right clicked the box and did "inspect element". Turns out that box had oncopy="return false" onpaste="return false" in its parameters. Firefox lets you temporarily edit the HTML of a page it's displaying, so I just deleted the onpaste bit and it worked like a charm. (I'm not certain why they were so desirous of me making a typo in my account or routing number that they would go out of the way to remove my ability to paste it, but that's what they did.)

If you prefer nuclear weapons to surgical tools, another approach is to just block JavaScript from executing. I have a Firefox extension called YesScript that lets me toggle JavaScript for a given site from a button on the toolbar. Unfortunately, a lot of programmers these days are wise to the fact that people can control JavaScript execution in this way, so they indulge in asshole behaviors like the HTML version of the site having no content and loading everything in with JavaScript. (I assume these same developers go to the grocery store on the way home, piss all over the toilet seat, and then leave their cart in the middle of the parking lot aisle.)

[kphoger]

The verb synchronize is commonly shortened to sync.  And the past tense of that is commonly spelled synced.  I don't like it that the letter c before -ed is pronounced like a k.  I much prefer the spelling synched instead for that reason.  (Also because I spell the present tense form as synch.)

There used to be a field tech at my job who decided the past tense should be sunc:  After the modem sunc up, it took a firmware update and started all over again.

[Big John]

The verb synchronize is commonly shortened to sync.  And the past tense of that is commonly spelled synced.  I don't like it that the letter c before -ed is pronounced like a k.  I much prefer the spelling synched instead for that reason.  (Also because I spell the present tense form as synch.)

There used to be a field tech at my job who decided the past tense should be sunc:  After the modem sunc up, it took a firmware update and started all over again.

I used to misheard it as "zinc".

[Rothman]

Men's dress shirts with plastic stays sewn into the collars.  They eventually wear their way through the fabric.

[hbelkins]

Men's dress shirts with plastic stays sewn into the collars.  They eventually wear their way through the fabric.

Are those still a thing?

The best way to avoid those is buying shirts with button-down collars.

[1995hoo]

Men's dress shirts with plastic stays sewn into the collars.  They eventually wear their way through the fabric.

Are those still a thing?

The best way to avoid those is buying shirts with button-down collars.

The better way than that is to buy shirts with removable collar stays, especially if you might wear a tie with the shirt. The shirts I buy have brass stays.

[JayhawkCO]

The better way is to work from home so you don't need to wear dress shirts.

[kphoger]

The better way is to work from home so you don't need to wear dress shirts.

I occasionally wear dress shirts, but not because of work.  So that doesn't solve it for me.

[JayhawkCO]

The better way is to work from home so you don't need to wear dress shirts.

I occasionally wear dress shirts, but not because of work.  So that doesn't solve it for me.

I think, at this point, it's just down to weddings and funerals for me.

[1995hoo]

The better way is to work from home so you don't need to wear dress shirts.

That's me! But every once in a while I do need to wear one for various reasons, including the occasional day when I go into the office.

[JayhawkCO]

The better way is to work from home so you don't need to wear dress shirts.

That's me! But every once in a while I do need to wear one for various reasons, including the occasional day when I go into the office.

They've threatened to make us go into the office occasionally, but my team has members based in Denver, Pittsburgh, Dallas, Minneapolis, Cincinnati, Tampa, and Houston. My boss is in Bangalore. It would be a complete waste of time.

[formulanone]

The better way is to work from home so you don't need to wear dress shirts.

That's me! But every once in a while I do need to wear one for various reasons, including the occasional day when I go into the office.

They've threatened to make us go into the office occasionally, but my team has members based in Denver, Pittsburgh, Dallas, Minneapolis, Cincinnati, Tampa, and Houston. My boss is in Bangalore. It would be a complete waste of time.

My company: Hold my coffee...

[vdeane]

Does anyone else feel like the Alanland thread jumped the shark at some point?

[Max Rockatansky]

Does anyone else feel like the Alanland thread jumped the shark at some point?

Which Alanland thread?  All of them jump the shark after a while and get stale.  Alanland is great after everyone has had couple months long break from it.

[wxfree]

The verb synchronize is commonly shortened to sync.  And the past tense of that is commonly spelled synced.  I don't like it that the letter c before -ed is pronounced like a k.  I much prefer the spelling synched instead for that reason.  (Also because I spell the present tense form as synch.)

There used to be a field tech at my job who decided the past tense should be sunc:  After the modem sunc up, it took a firmware update and started all over again.

Going back before "sync" was a word I heard, I hated the spelling of "picnicing."  (My browser tells me it's misspelled and wants to add a K.)  I deal with the trauma by changing the pronunciation to fit the spelling.  I pronounced that stupid word as "pik NYE sing."  Then there was "frac" when the gas boom blew up my area, and tore up the roads (and caused earthquakes).  This leads to "fracing" which to me is "FRAY sing."  I'm not as much bothered by the short form of "synchronizing," because I can spell it "synching" and it doesn't add any letters that aren't in the original.  When someone else spells it "syncing" rather than mispronouncing it I just think of it as a misspelling.

[kphoger]

Going back before "sync" was a word I heard, I hated the spelling of "picnicing."  (My browser tells me it's misspelled and wants to add a K.)  I deal with the trauma by changing the pronunciation to fit the spelling.  I pronounced that stupid word as "pik NYE sing."  Then there was "frac" when the gas boom blew up my area, and tore up the roads (and caused earthquakes).  This leads to "fracing" which to me is "FRAY sing."  I'm not as much bothered by the short form of "synchronizing," because I can spell it "synching" and it doesn't add any letters that aren't in the original.  When someone else spells it "syncing" rather than mispronouncing it I just think of it as a misspelling.

I've never seen the spelling 'picnicing' or 'fracing'.  It's always only ever been 'picnicking' or 'fracking'.

Does anyone else feel like the Alanland thread jumped the shark at some point?

Which Alanland thread?  All of them jump the shark after a while and get stale.  Alanland is great after everyone has had couple months long break from it.

The first 20-30 pages or so were epic.  After that, it was just a bunch of pictures of goats and nonstop "is and isn't" posts.  Then there was that whole annoying coup attempt by Agent Anal Toe, which sucked the thread into a vortex.

Alanland always gets much better whenever a new Grand Unified Alan of Alanland takes office.

It doesn't help that we're not allowed to talk about the secret war with Nimbya.

[Beltway]

Does anyone else feel like the Alanland thread jumped the shark at some point?

Jumped every shark between Norfolk and Bermuda

[kphoger]

Jumped every shark between Norfolk and Bermuda

Virginia Oblast was annexed as a new Oblast by Alanland in 2021.  It is official for city planning and zoning purposes, as well as for determining acceptable sandwich toppings.  It is not official for maps, government usage, census data collection, or pirate-hat subsidies.  It is perhaps important to note that the oblast is not in Alanland, even though the border between it and Pittsburgh Oblast lies completely within Alan territory.  People from Virginia Oblast use 'Vegan' to describe anything from California.

[Max Rockatansky]

Jumped every shark between Norfolk and Bermuda

Virginia Oblast was annexed as a new Oblast by Alanland in 2021.  It is official for city planning and zoning purposes, as well as for determining acceptable sandwich toppings.  It is not official for maps, government usage, census data collection, or pirate-hat subsidies.  It is perhaps important to note that the oblast is not in Alanland, even though the border between it and Pittsburgh Oblast lies completely within Alan territory.  People from Virginia Oblast use 'Vegan' to describe anything from California.

Correction, they use the term "Gross Vegan" to describe California related things.

[kphoger]

People from Virginia Oblast use 'Vegan' to describe anything from California.

Correction, they use the term "Gross Vegan" to describe California related things.

I was just going by your own entry in The AARoads Pocket Dictionary:

Vegan:  What people from Virginia Oblast use to describe anything from California.

[Rothman]

Men's dress shirts with plastic stays sewn into the collars.  They eventually wear their way through the fabric.

Are those still a thing?

The best way to avoid those is buying shirts with button-down collars.

Shirts with button-down collars are minor things that bother me, too.

[thenetwork]

Does anyone else feel like the Alanland thread jumped the shark at some point?

Jumped every shark between Norfolk and Bermuda

I think it was the Shark that jumped Alanland.