So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[Artifex]

It does bother me just how oblivious some people have become to the industry that makes European (or North-American) middle-class life possible. Our skylines may no longer be punctuated by factory chimneys, but the veritable deluge of manufactured goods we import still comes from somewhere.

There's an opportunity to use our outrageous wealth to build a sustainable local economy - but instead, we gorge ourselves on ever more elaborate landfill-to-be, and try to outsource poverty to nations abroad.

Then, as you say, there's the army of workers closer to home. How often have you heard drivers cursing the road-repair gang for causing congestion?

 

[LizzieMaine]

As the song puts it so aptly, "Enjoy Yourself -- It's Later Than You Think."

 

[Lean'n'mean]

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not as they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not it's goal,
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow
Is our destined end or way,
But to act, that each to-morrow,
Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums are beating,
Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead past bury it's dead!
Act,- act in the living present!
Heart within & God o'erhead.

Lives of great men all remind us,
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us,
Footprints on the sands of time.

Footprints, that prehaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate,
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.


A psalm of life - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

 

[tonyb]

People pretending to an expertise they don’t have.

This matter has come up before, eh?

I encounter it too frequently among peddlers of old stuff. I’ve heard it claimed that 3X was Stetson’s top-of-the-line offering; that knockoff Eames lounge chairs were the genuine article; that obviously fake “antique” advertising signs for, say, Indian four-cylinder motorcycles, are the real deal.

It goes from mildly annoying to downright insulting when you give them the benefit of the doubt by entertaining the possibility that they may be honestly misinformed and not just full of sh*t. But, alas, pointing out how they are mistaken more often than not has them getting their hackles up and they set to making up backstories for the misrepresented merchandise of theirs.

I don’t expect a junktique peddler to know all there is to know about everything that crosses his threshold. Indeed, there’s no way he could. But not wanting to know when honorably acting on that knowledge would run counter his immediate financial interests is what leaves people understandably suspicious of everyone in the game. And that’s truly unfortunate, seeing how the straight-shooters have a hard enough time of it without that burden.

 

[Hercule]

People pretending to an expertise they don’t have.

Nah, people just like to talk a good game. It's only natural. It just means you have to stay on your toes. After all "fool me once..."

Somehow I find know-it-alls more insufferable. Heaven knows there are a few of them around here.

 

[Harp]

Missed most of boss bull Q's Dodger slam last nite but caught the caught Mad Max lookin.
Q's locked in; Lester's still strung out; and Joe's gone church mouse.

 

[tonyb]

Nah, people just like to talk a good game. It's only natural. It just means you have to stay on your toes. After all "fool me once..."

Somehow I find know-it-alls more insufferable. Heaven knows there are a few of them around here.

Sorry, but I ain’t buying it.

It’s a “natural” human tendency to hold others to a standard higher than they’d meet themselves. I’m no saint, but I hope I’ve grown sufficiently not to defend what I know to be my own indefensible behaviors.

Knowingly misrepresenting merchandise is indefensible.

 

[Hercule]

Sorry, but I ain’t buying it.

It’s a “natural” human tendency to hold others to a standard higher than they’d meet themselves. I’m no saint, but I hope I’ve grown sufficiently not to defend what I know to be my own indefensible behaviors.

Knowingly misrepresenting merchandise is indefensible.

I don't believe anybody ever said knowingly misrepresenting merchandise was right or defensible. Though I do believe it is, in fact, illegal. The seller doesn't always have nefarious motives. Barring obvious unscrupulous tactics, he's just trying to promote his items to get you to buy them. Caveat emptor. If you know better then good for you. Regardless, the buyer (who hopefully has done his homework) has the last word now doesn't he. Which is worse, an uninformed seller or an uninformed buyer?

You began by noting the annoyance of "People pretending to an expertise they don’t have." which is what I was commenting on. Whether you like it or not, one-upmanship (physically, intellectually or otherwise) is a natural tendency in human interactions. It takes place everywhere and all the time. It has even taken place in our exchanges here.

 

[ChrisB]

It’s a “natural” human tendency to hold others to a standard higher than they’d meet themselves.

People pretending to an expertise they don’t have.

People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who actually do.

 

[tonyb]

I don't believe anybody ever said knowingly misrepresenting merchandise was right or defensible. Though I do believe it is, in fact, illegal. The seller doesn't always have nefarious motives. Barring obvious unscrupulous tactics, he's just trying to promote his items to get you to buy them. Caveat emptor. If you know better then good for you. Regardless, the buyer (who hopefully has done his homework) has the last word now doesn't he. Which is worse, an uninformed seller or an uninformed buyer?

You began by noting the annoyance of "People pretending to an expertise they don’t have." which is what I was commenting on. Whether you like it or not, one-upmanship (physically, intellectually or otherwise) is a natural tendency in human interactions. It takes place everywhere and all the time. It has even taken place in our exchanges here.

You sure as hell implied it! “Fool me once”? Sure sounds like a defense of shady dealings to me.

And I was careful to note that a seller misrepresenting his merchandise doesn’t always have nefarious motives. What I objected to was willful misrepresentation. Their misinformation is brought to their attention and rather than acknowledge it they double down on the lie.

Read what I wrote. If you were half as invested in coming to some greater understanding as in prevailing in a dispute, you wouldn’t misrepresent my position. And that’s what you have done.

 

[Hercule]

You, of course are correct in every way. Feel better now do you?

 

[tonyb]

You, of course are correct in every way. Feel better now do you?

Got a mirror?

If I came away with anything from this exchange, it’s knowing who not to do business with. So thanks for that.

 

[tonyb]

On asking the lovely missus when she might wish her dinner and being told it could wait, seeing how she had treats at work, and on my asking what the occasion was, she said a co-worker had brought in the muffins and whatnot in observance of Administrative Professionals Appreciation Day, a holiday certain to gladden the hearts of florists and confectioners throughout the land.

It used to be Secretaries Day. Giving them a fancy title along with the roses and the chocolate is a whole lot cheaper than a pay raise.

FWIW, the missus says her office wouldn’t function without the efforts of the quite capable young woman at the front desk, and she fears what she will do when that “administrative professional” avails herself of other opportunities.

 

[LizzieMaine]

A radio station where I worked in the Cro-Magnon days of the '80s was general-managed by a gentleman whose social outlook ossified somewhere around the second Eisenhower administration. When Secretaries Day rolled around he sent flowers to all the women in the office, even those who weren't secretaries. Including our news director, who was as close to a flesh and blood Amazon as I've ever met in my life -- she was over six feet tall, had shoulders like a linebacker, and towered over this small, grey executive. On receipt of the flowers she strode purposefully into his office, closed the door, and advised him that she was not, never was, and never would be, his secretary.

I'm not sure he got the message, this is the same guy who later had to pay out a $25,000 cash settlement after he told the pregnant sales manager that she'd be expected to step down from her job to have her baby. She didn't appreciate the flowers either.

 

[EngProf]

I have always considered lack of knowledge by sellers - flea markets, pawn shops, antique stores, etc. - to be a very good thing.
If they have something they think is rare and valuable, but isn't, I just walk away.
If they have something that really is rare and valuable and they don't know it (and it's priced low) - I buy it and smile.

Actually, I can't imagine that 99% of the regular antique clerks (and etc.) would know more about the things I care about than I do. And I wouldn't expect them to...

There is an old (and wise) saying from gun shows: "Buy the gun, not the story."

 

[GHT]

I have always considered lack of knowledge by sellers - flea markets, pawn shops, antique stores, etc. - to be a very good thing.
If they have something they think is rare and valuable, but isn't, I just walk away.
If they have something that really is rare and valuable and they don't know it (and it's priced low) - I buy it and smile.

Some time in the mid nineteen nineties, I paid a record dealer in Memphis, far more than I should have done for a rare record. The master copy had been damaged and reproductions could only be made by re-recording the song. But.
Back home, with record shops closing down wholesale, I saw a brand new copy of a Sam Butera record that I had been after for years. The proprietor was just trying to offload his stock and was asking fifty pence per record. I put a couple of other records with the Sam Butera one to mislead the cashier that I had a valuable record, paid them their money and left. That evening at a popular fifties venue the DJ saw my purchase and offered me a hundred pounds for it, there and then. I declined but felt a lot better about my Memphis purchase.

 

[EngProf]

Some time in the mid nineteen nineties, I paid a record dealer in Memphis, far more than I should have done for a rare record. The master copy had been damaged and reproductions could only be made by re-recording the song. But.
Back home, with record shops closing down wholesale, I saw a brand new copy of a Sam Butera record that I had been after for years. The proprietor was just trying to offload his stock and was asking fifty pence per record. I put a couple of other records with the Sam Butera one to mislead the cashier that I had a valuable record, paid them their money and left. That evening at a popular fifties venue the DJ saw my purchase and offered me a hundred pounds for it, there and then. I declined but felt a lot better about my Memphis purchase.

Good for you!
I think most of us who buy old stuff have a few stories like that. My favorite for myself is buying a pre-WWI ammunition belt for $5 from an estate auction.
Sold it later for $250.

 

[BobHufford]

...the fact that crime / medical dramas continue to say "GSW" when "Gun Shot Wound" has fewer syllables.

 

[Bamaboots]

...the fact that crime / medical dramas continue to say "GSW" when "Gun Shot Wound" has fewer syllables.

Don't remember ever hearing "GSW" once in real life.

 

[LizzieMaine]

My best bargains have been found abandoned at the dump or at the side of the road. I got all my living room furniture that way.

In all the decades I've been accumulating "old stuff" I don't think I've ever sold a single item. I've given a few things away to people, but never as "collectibles," it was given to them to be used. I don't "collect" stuff, I use it for its intended purpose, and cash value is the furthest thing from my mind. I'll leave that to the kids to sort out once I'm dead.