So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[tonyb]

^^^^^
I find that I treat most matters with less urgency. I can now much more easily defer gratification for a greater gratification down the road.

 

[Zombie_61]

Now, I took a closer look and I finally saw the cottage cheese cups in our supermarkets. Totally identical to US cottage cheese, I think.

For example:

gervais hüttenkäse - Bing

Intelligent search from Bing makes it easier to quickly find what you’re looking for and rewards you.

www.bing.com

Yes, that looks like what they sell here in the U.S.. Horrible stuff!

 

[Hercule]

^^^^^
I find that I treat most matters with less urgency. I can now much more easily defer gratification for a greater gratification down the road.

I try, but I'm not always successful. I can actually remember, as a very young kid, being utterly consumed with wanting various things. As I look back on it, it wasn't at all a pleasant feeling. Now, as an aging adult, I find there are few things I actually want beyond what I need. And then, being generally cheap, I tend to second guess the justification of my wants. Well, I feel guilty at least. But if I really want something I usually get it, unless the timing of the expense is inconvenient. Like right now. I have my sights on a new razor. I don't need it, the one I have and use is pretty much perfect for me. The potential new one however, might be even better. Then again, it isn't much different from the one I have... But right about now I could benefit from some retail therapy... it's only $XX.... Vicious, vicious mind games! Let me remind you, by the way, "want" is NOT one of the seven deadly sins. So we're good.

 

[tonyb]

As I’ve said before, the reason I can afford impractical things such as a sports car is because I don’t buy impractical things such as a sports car. If it were just me in this household, I might be more profligate. A sports car would suit my purposes alone about as well as any car. But that’s not my life.

 

[Tiki Tom]

I grew up on generic brands and low cost knockoffs. So did my wife, which I think contributes to the fact that our marriage has lasted. We both came from Big families, one small paycheck.
But THEN circumstances landed me in a fancy pants overseas job, which dropped us in a whole new social circle. Suddenly we had to know our wine and cheese and what not. (That’s valid too, and we enjoyed it thoroughly.)
My wife and I sometimes joke with each other that we are social chameleons.
All well and good. The price, of course, being that i Sometimes wonder if there is a there there. I marvel at people who are very solidly whatever they are and don’t appear to fudge it too much. Perhaps that’s an illusion. Maybe everyone is secretly in the “fake it til you make it” column. Are we all imposters to one degree or another? I don’t know. I can only speak for myself. Oh, well.

 

[tonyb]

^^^^^
My wife and I also come from similar social and economic backgrounds — working class families with grandiose heads of household whose entrepreneurial chops were entirely in their own minds. Bankruptcies. Instability. Day late, dollar short. Etc.

She doesn’t have quite the instinct for thrift as mine (I’ve lived on very little for extended periods, so I’m well practiced). But we both take a generally conservative approach to our household finances. We like shiny new things, but we have much more than we need and we know that the shiny and new wears off quickly. We tell ourselves frequently how fortunate we are, knowing as we do many people in far more difficult straits.

 

[KILO NOVEMBER]

Th

The mechanism for my vintage MG's air-con is the window winder.

When I was a boy my family never owned a car with an air conditioner, or even a new car, for that. Air conditioners became standard a few years later. As a teenager, we would joke that our cars had 450 Air Conditioning. That is, roll down the four passenger windows and drive 50 MPH.

 

[tonyb]

^^^^^^
Is there such a thing as an aftermarket, under the dash A/C unit anymore? The Old Man had one installed in his ’59 Impala just ahead of a summertime family road trip to the Southwest in 1965.

 

[ChiTownScion]

My wife insists upon her freshly ground Trader Joe's coffee every morning. I enjoy it as well, but if she's out of town for a week or so I have been known to just pick up a can of commercial grade Folger's with the sole motive of saving a few bucks. It really doesn't bother me to go low end on coffee: I'll even pick up day old baked goods for breakfast, with no qualms of conscience. Some have issues with buying/ eating day old bread, sweet rolls, donuts, etc.: it's not a hill that I'll die on, rest assured.

While it's fun to splurge on really nice desserts and such(I'm a sucker for quality ice cream, for example ) I have to admit that occasionally getting more for less makes what I'm eating taste better in my own mind. I'm just grateful to be able to eat well, when all's said and done. I lived hand- to- mouth as a poor student for nearly a decade. It wasn't fun at the time, but it taught me to appreciate what I have and never take having what I need for granted.

I just got back from a three-day fraternal shindig where the hotel offered a free hot breakfast daily. Biscuits & gravy, hash browns, sausage, OJ, & coffee: such simple pleasures make life worth living.

 

[GHT]

The fuel company Shell have bought the company that I use for my Broadband.
Today I had a letter from Shell. It started off correctly in that it was addressed to me, with my title of Mr.
After that, it was all downhill.
The opening endearment that in the past would have been: Dear Mr. has now become: Hello Robert.
The letter is about terms and conditions, I give them their due, little use is made of gobble-de-gook, but in signing off, where in the past it would have used, Yours faithfully, or even, Yours sincerely, it's now simply:
"Thanks."
The signature was no better either. Where it might once have been: John Smith, Regional Director.
It's now: The Shell Energy Broadband Team.

Tell me, are standards dropping or am I just a curmudgeonly old fart?

 

[Edward]

I found quite some time ago that with maturity comes a transition from quantity to quality. In other words, when you grow up you tend to appreciate finer things.

Certainly I found a big transition once I got to a stage where I could buy something that could last a decade knowing I wouldn't grow out of it made a big difference. That coinciding with being in full time employment and thus more disposable income also helped.

 

[ChrisB]

Only 200 days until Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas | Days Until Christmas | Sleeps to Christmas

Join us in Counting Down the Weeks, Days, Hours, Minutes and Seconds to Christmas: The Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

www.christmascountdownlive.com

 

[Zombie_61]

...Tell me, are standards dropping or am I just a curmudgeonly old fart?

I don't know you well enough to provide a qualified answer about the second half of that question, but I do believe standards have been consistently dropping throughout my lifetime. It seems large businesses have somehow become convinced that the personal touch is preferred by most of their customers, but they've taken it a little too far and rather than maintaining a reasonably business-like and professional manner their communications (here in the U.S., anyway) regularly feel more like the after-dinner conversation with friends while you're passing the joint around.

Uhhh, or so I've heard.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I couldn't care less about being called by a title, but the word "team," when used in any sense other than an athletic competition, and especially when used in the modern corporate "make them feel so very very special and empowered without giving them a raise" sense, makes me want to vomit.

 

[EngProf]

I couldn't care less about being called by a title, but the word "team," when used in any sense other than an athletic competition, and especially when used in the modern corporate "make them feel so very very special and empowered without giving them a raise" sense, makes me want to vomit.

Don't be too critical of a perfectly valid term as used in certain applications. We engineers work in "teams" all the time. From first-year through senior-year and on into the real world, "Design Teams" are the standard organizational and operating method. I literally tell the first-year folks that engineering is a "team sport".
I have also used the "wolf pack" analogy in that class - if you can't work together as a team you won't eat.
"make them feel so very very special and empowered without giving them a raise" sense, makes me want to vomit." - No one likes that false and unconvincing usage...

 

[Ticklishchap]

I’m going to introduce another linguistic bugbear: the increasingly generic use of the singular ‘they’ and ‘them’ and the attempt at both governmental and corporate level to force this on us.

This morning, I was in contact with a private sector company I work with sometimes and was told by a female PA there: “I’ll get them to give you a call.”
“No,” I replied. “You will get him to give me a call because he is a man.”

On another occasion recently, I was speaking to a department at our local National Health Service hospital about arranging an appointment for a friend, as he is hard of hearing. When I asked for a specific person (female), I was told: “They are in a meeting”. I said: “You mean that she is in a meeting”.

I work in the real estate sector and employ an agency to draw up tenancy agreements. A few weeks ago they produced a document that referred to the tenant as “they” and “them”. I sent it back and asked them to write “he or she” and “his or her”.

This is Orwellian and dehumanising. It reduces us to the level of livestock or machines. Also, as a gay man, it makes me feel erased. It took years for my relationship to be recognised fully in law as ‘he and he’; ‘Mr and Mr’. Absolutely no way are we going to be “They and they”. The implication is that we should all be bisexual: it is like a sinister religious cult or a form of “conversion therapy”.

In fact this erases all of us: male, female, heterosexual, homosexual. It takes away everything that defines us as human in a manner reminiscent of totalitarian societies.

 

[Ticklishchap]

The fuel company Shell have bought the company that I use for my Broadband.
Today I had a letter from Shell. It started off correctly in that it was addressed to me, with my title of Mr.
After that, it was all downhill.
The opening endearment that in the past would have been: Dear Mr. has now become: Hello Robert.
The letter is about terms and conditions, I give them their due, little use is made of gobble-de-gook, but in signing off, where in the past it would have used, Yours faithfully, or even, Yours sincerely, it's now simply:
"Thanks."
The signature was no better either. Where it might once have been: John Smith, Regional Director.
It's now: The Shell Energy Broadband Team.

Tell me, are standards dropping or am I just a curmudgeonly old fart?

On your last sentence, both propositions are true.

Agree entirely with you. My other bugbear is the almost ubiquitous and very ugly sign-off ‘Kind Regards’. I always want to reply ‘Unkind Gargoyles’.

 

[Hercule]

On your last sentence, both propositions are true.

Agree entirely with you. My other bugbear is the almost ubiquitous and very ugly sign-off ‘Kind Regards’. I always want to reply ‘Unkind Gargoyles’.

When somebody tells me to have a good day I so much want to reply "NO, MAKE ME!!"

 

[Ticklishchap]

When somebody tells me to have a good day I so much want to reply "NO, MAKE ME!!"

There’s also ‘No worries’ when said by non-Australians. It sounds false, shallow and dare I say it … common … on British lips. When Aussies say it, it sounds laidback and cool .

Which brings me to another British monstrosity: cool pronounced kewl. It’s usually said by Basic Becky when she’s instagramming her vegan skinny latte in Starbucks - or by nerdy (and needy) young men with personal hygiene issues who live with their mothers, work on the fringes of IT and are into conspiracy theories about Covid or space aliens.

 

[GHT]

Which brings me to another British monstrosity: cool pronounced kewl. It’s usually said by Basic Becky when she’s instagramming her vegan skinny latte in Starbucks - or by nerdy (and needy) young men with personal hygiene issues who live with their mothers, work on the fringes of IT and are into conspiracy theories about Covid or space aliens.

The image that conjures up!