Discussions you have had with friends where you came away scratching your head?

Thread Starter

spinnaker

Joined Oct 29, 2009
7,830
Did you ever have a discussion with a friend that you wonder where on earth did they get their education or how their mind must work?

Lets keep politics out of this thread please.

Years ago, I had a friend that was convinced you could run an electric motor from a battery to turn an alternator to charge the battery any it would never stop running. He would bring this idea up from time to time.

I was only 14 and knew due to losses in the system this would not work for long. I had never really learned that in school just sort of figured it out on my own. I could never convince my friend that his idea would never work.


I have another friend that was arguing with me that polar bears eat penguins. I told him only at the zoo if someone left a door open. He didn't know what I meant and I explained that penguins are from the southern hemisphere and polar bears from the north, I was never able to convince him that polar bears don't eat penguins.


While that friend may have lacked an education, he at least has good common sense. Once one of his neighbors strolled over and asked his help on a project. The neighbor wanted to mount a full sized motorcycle on top of his utility van. My friend was finally able to convince the neighbor how dangerous it was to do what he wanted to do.
 

#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
Some of my best head scratchers came from women, but this Thread could become infinite if that subject matter is allowed to roam free.:D

For instance;
"You couldn't possibly like me because I'm not wearing makeup."
"That's my signature, but I don't know how you got it on that piece of paper."
"I went to a stripper bar for 30 consecutive nights and took a stranger home for sex. That proves that all men are sluts and I'm not."

:D:D:D:D:D

Edit: I've had a couple of hours to let this assignment sink in and I'm not getting answers from my brain. I think it's because I do not suffer fools well and would never call a fool my friend. That word, "friend" is the sticking point for me.:(
I don't have any stupid friends.:)
Maybe family...I'll give that a thought.:rolleyes:
 
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BR-549

Joined Sep 22, 2013
4,928
I'm not allowed to talk about women on here. And as you say........AAC would have to purchase/rent more memory.

I had an aunt in law that was convinced that I was the one making obscene phone calls to her. I'm sure she believed it till the day she died. I was 17 when she first accused me. Tried for years.....but could not convince her otherwise. Even with her children alibiing me.
 

Sinus23

Joined Sep 7, 2013
248
There are many things that my friends have said that made me scratch my head but this one was recently.

We were in the Netherlands and in the school diner there was a picture of trash and the estimate of trash that each and everyone one human on the planet outputs in a year. (it was about 1/2 a ton per person)

I was taking a picture of that piece and my roommate said why are you taking a picture of that piece? I said don't you think it's a lot of trash we leave behind?

He said. "So?"
 
About ten years ago, I heard one of my neighbors start up his chainsaw. I couldn't help myself so I looked through the hedge between our yards to see what he was doing.

My neighbor was cutting a large tree branch out of a tree in his yard. The branch extended over another neighbors fence. Seems reasonable... He was standing on the branch. He was cutting between himself and the trunk of the tree.

I decided that it might be a good time to go have a chat. By the time I got there, he had the chainsaw pinched in his first cut in the tree. He said the fence, which was about five feet from the tree, should be able to hold the branch up even with his weight on it.

I offered to help if he got out of the tree. My neighbor took me up on my offer...

Needless to say, he was quite surprised when the branch, where he was standing, came crashing down.
 

BR-549

Joined Sep 22, 2013
4,928
My caretaker just told me that they busted a mobile meth lab.....in the walmart parking lot here in town.

And then she said.....where they're rolling back prices.
 

Thread Starter

spinnaker

Joined Oct 29, 2009
7,830
About ten years ago, I heard one of my neighbors start up his chainsaw. I couldn't help myself so I looked through the hedge between our yards to see what he was doing.

My neighbor was cutting a large tree branch out of a tree in his yard. The branch extended over another neighbors fence. Seems reasonable... He was standing on the branch. He was cutting between himself and the trunk of the tree.


Needless to say, he was quite surprised when the branch, where he was standing, came crashing down.

Wait. He was making the cut between him and the trunk of the tree? Are you sure this was not some kind of cartoon? Of course if it was a cartoon, he would have stayed suspended in midair and the tree would come crashing down. ;)
 

tcmtech

Joined Nov 4, 2013
2,867
I'm not allowed to talk about women on here. And as you say........AAC would have to purchase/rent more memory.
Been married. Your opening sentence says everything I already know.

When you're an accomplished late 30's woman who gets called out daily for dumb things by your own 6 - 7 year old daughter maybe taking a moment to think things through would be a good idea. :rolleyes:
 

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
I don't habitually commit to memory stupid things said by stupid people. But myself on the other hand, I remember almost every stupid thing I say; maybe I subconsciously hold onto those memories, storing them as ammunition to use against myself once my alternate personality is finished developing.

Anyway, last week a coworker was telling me that a metal saw would weigh less in water than in air. I debated him about it at length. He said it would weigh it's weight on land, minus the weight of the water it displaces. I said that was foolish. I said only things with voids of air inside would exhibit any buoyancy.

I went home and googled for self validation only to find that I am the fool. He was exactly right. Archimedes principle. I went back to work the next day and apologized, admitted my wrong, and thanked him for teaching me something new. It was especially embarrassing because I was a submariner in the navy. A submariner who never had a full grasp on why things float and why they sink.

I don't even know why I am telling this story. Maybe I get off on my own embarrassment. Or maybe my alternate personality does.
 

#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
I remember almost every stupid thing I say
I forget thousands of ordinary days and ordinary moments, and even ordinary failures, but I seem to have that same file cabinet in my mind containing stupid things I said or did. It pops open, unbidden, from time to time, like a monster in the closet. It's nasty!:eek: I consider it an opportunity to head down the road to insanity, so I slam the door shut by doing something that keeps my mind active.

I wonder if prolonged solitary confinement lets the monster out of the closet, and that is the real torture intended by a jailer.:(

There are useful things in there, like, "Never wrench directly above your head". The wrench hurts when you drop it on your face, and you will drop the wrench.:D I believe you learned that lesson with a wire feed welder.:rolleyes:
But there is useless stuff in there, too. Like awkward moments with people long gone, or long dead. They serve no purpose. There was no lesson in them except, "I make mistakes" and there is no way to make amends.:( Those are the things that need the door slammed on them.
 

Thread Starter

spinnaker

Joined Oct 29, 2009
7,830
First appearance of Fax machines, I phoned and said send me your copy of the machine specs, He said make sure you hang on to it as this is the only copy I have!.
Max.
Your post reminded me of something someone did not said so it is a bit off topic. I had or knew of two different customers when working on PCs.

1. Customers's complaint was the PC was corrupting his 51/4" floppies. On multiple visits the tech I knew replaced his floppy drive a couple of times. Cables, controllers everything. It was some kind of intermittent problem the tech could not solve. One day the tech showed up for another visit. The customer said "good you're here, I hope you fix it this time". Customer took a magnet and hung up his floppy on his metal file cabinet! :eek:

2. I made multiple visits to a customer. Complaint was he was running out of memory, even though he had plenty. I Replaced memory, memory board etc. Nothing I did would fix his issue but diagnostics said everything was fine after each of my visits. I appeared on one visit and the customer had Lotus 123 running (this was back in the days of DOS TSR). I typed /Q to quit so I could run diagnostics. 123 popped up again. Type /Q 123 popped up again. Finally exiting to DOS after another /Q. He was shelling to SOS then typing 123 to restart loading multiple copies of 123 into memory. I could have killed him.
 

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
I forget thousands of ordinary days and ordinary moments, and even ordinary failures, but I seem to have that same file cabinet in my mind containing stupid things I said or did. It pops open, unbidden, from time to time, like a monster in the closet. It's nasty!:eek: I consider it an opportunity to head down the road to insanity, so I slam the door shut by doing something that keeps my mind active.

I wonder if prolonged solitary confinement lets the monster out of the closet, and that is the real torture intended by a jailer.:(

There are useful things in there, like, "Never wrench directly above your head". The wrench hurts when you drop it on your face, and you will drop the wrench.:D I believe you learned that lesson with a wire feed welder.:rolleyes:
But there is useless stuff in there, too. Like awkward moments with people long gone, or long dead. They serve no purpose. There was no lesson in them except, "I make mistakes" and there is no way to make amends.:( Those are the things that need the door slammed on them.
Yeah what's up with that? Are we the only weirdos doing this?
It happens most often while I'm driving. On mental auto pilot, zoned out, my train of thought wanders away and falls off into that cabinet.
It's like my brain is programmed to run a self flagellation subroutine in power saving mode.
I'll just relive the most embarrassing thing I said to a girl (and subsequent rejection) in highschool. Or the fight I had with my wife last year where I said something I regret.

I "snap out" of it after a while, like waking up from a dream.
I will have actually changed my posture while in that mode; head down, as low as it can go while still looking thru the windshield.
Then I have to shake off the gross feeling left in the wake of it, like chalk stuck to your hands that only comes off with water.
 

shortbus

Joined Sep 30, 2009
10,045
It's like my brain is programmed to run a self flagellation subroutine in power saving mode
You and #12 sound like me. I'm thinking the self flagellation is to try and make sure you don't commit the same thing again. Dreams also do that with me, I don't remember most dreams, but the ones about the dumb or cruel things I've done stay with me for a while after waking.
 
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