[dicklont]

broze, on 2013-September-19, 09:22, said:

Megapeeve: When in a debate or argument, whether online or face to face, people insist on labouring the point that the views they are expressing are 'their opinion': "Well, that is my opinion and I'm entitled to it" ... "You have your opinions and I have mine" - as if that matters in the slightest.

Your argument being 'your own opinion' does not make it cogent in any way and certainly does not mean it warrants any respect for that fact alone. Nine times out of ten the 'opinion holder' turns out to be completely uninterested in reasoned debate but merely wants to put forward a weak ill-informed viewpoint without having it challenged.

[barmar]

helene_t, on 2014-July-22, 02:22, said:

Yes, negations are often ambigious in English. In most other languages I know of it would be clear that it means "Do not (exercise until the heart is pounding)". If they meant "(Do not exercise) until the heart is pounding" they would have said "Do not (exercise before the heart is pounding)"

SNL (or maybe it was MAD TV) did a sketch about this many years ago. The boss of a nuclear power station was going on vacation, and on his way out he told the underlings: "Just remember one thing: you can't put too much water in the coolant tank." As soon as he left, an alarm went off, and the underlings got into an agreement. Did he meant "You must not put too much water in", or "No matter how much water you put in, it's not possible for it to be too much" (i.e. it's OK to keep putting more water in).

[gwnn]

People pronouncing Toni Kroos like Toni Cruz. I still can't get used to it, pisses me off every time.

[barmar]

gwnn, on 2014-August-13, 03:04, said:

People pronouncing Toni Kroos like Toni Cruz. I still can't get used to it, pisses me off every time.

I doubt I'll ever piss you off like this, since I had to google him to find out who you're talking about. Although I suspect I could still tick you off by saying he's a soccer player, rather than footballer.

[WellSpyder]

barmar, on 2014-August-13, 10:29, said:

I doubt I'll ever piss you off like this, since I had to google him to find out who you're talking about.

Just out of curiosity, did you know that you were googling him rather than her? (I wouldn't have done....)

[barmar]

WellSpyder, on 2014-August-13, 10:38, said:

Just out of curiosity, did you know that you were googling him rather than her? (I wouldn't have done....)

No, I didn't know prior to googling. I suspected it was a sports figure, since that's my area of least expertise.

[Al_U_Card]

Having taken Driver's Ed., I was surprised to find that up north (Saguenay-Lac St-Jean) they had yield signs rather than stops (worked well) traffic circles (okay too) but intersections were another story. Rather than what I had learned, their approach was: Yellow means continue without reduction in speed. Red meant that the next five cars were allowed to cross the intersection and Green meant: Look out for the next five cars!

As for traffic jams, it seems that they are most prevalent where differential rates of braking occur. Big trucks can stop faster than they can accelerate away from a stop. Thus, lots of cars will be held back by their braking. A great reason for ring roads and truck bypasses.

[kenberg]

gwnn, on 2014-August-13, 03:04, said:

People pronouncing Toni Kroos like Toni Cruz. I still can't get used to it, pisses me off every time.

You wouldn't think a person, at least a fellow American, could do much with Berg but they do. I am sometimes addressed as Berge, sort of like barge with an e sound where the a is. I usually try to mention how sad it was that the Titanic was struck by an iceberge.

[helene_t]

They probably find it easier to say "Ken" than to say "Csaba", though.

[Winstonm]

gwnn, on 2014-August-13, 03:04, said:

People pronouncing Toni Kroos like Toni Cruz. I still can't get used to it, pisses me off every time.

These are probably the same people who let others cut in to traffic.

[barmar]

Getting back to the sub-thread about traffic, I wonder what people think about this situation:

There are two travel lanes in your direction. When nearing an intersection, the left lane is also the left-turn lane, as there's no separate turn lane. If someone is trying to make a left turn, and there's no let-up in the traffic in the other direction, everyone behind them in the left lane is stuck waiting.

You wisely got yourself into the right lane early, to avoid getting stuck. When you see cars with their right-turn signal on, because they want to get out of that logjam, do you ever slow down to let one of them in? Or is it every man for himself, they have to wait for a natural gap in the traffic that will let them pull over (or for the left-turner to succeed -- but often there's more than one of them).

[kenberg]

barmar, on 2014-August-25, 18:09, said:

Getting back to the sub-thread about traffic, I wonder what people think about this situation:

There are two travel lanes in your direction. When nearing an intersection, the left lane is also the left-turn lane, as there's no separate turn lane. If someone is trying to make a left turn, and there's no let-up in the traffic in the other direction, everyone behind them in the left lane is stuck waiting.

You wisely got yourself into the right lane early, to avoid getting stuck. When you see cars with their right-turn signal on, because they want to get out of that logjam, do you ever slow down to let one of them in? Or is it every man for himself, they have to wait for a natural gap in the traffic that will let them pull over (or for the left-turner to succeed -- but often there's more than one of them).

It depends a little on the circumstances (doesn't everything?) but mostly I think that they are just stuck.Let's take a fairly typical situation. Traffic in the right lane, the one you are in, is going maybe 35 or 40. How do I let him in? Practically speaking, I can't. Let's vary it a little. Traffic still going 35 or 40, but not dense. There is enough room between me and the guy in fromt so that if the guy in the left lane is alert and pushes it, he can get in.. Well, I definitely don't speed up to close the gap and keep him out.Possibly I ease off just a bit if it seems practical but usually I think it is best for everyone if I just keep moving. maybe even for leftie, at least my car will be gone.

Here is a version that just happened today. I am one of the left laners. We are all, left and right, stopped but now ready to go. Oops. The guy in front of me is not a left turner, he is stalled, going nowhere. I see this as the guy who was in front of me edges right. allowed to do so by the right laners. And then, shortly, someone lets me move over.

But in the basic situation that I think you are describing, I expect to be stuck if I am in the left lane and I think that's the way it has to be.

We live in Maryland but Becky and I were recently in Lincoln City OR, right on the beach on the Pacific Coast. It was terrific, lots of nice beach walking and trails and so on. But the traffic was often quite a problem. Very much of every man for himself. I thought a bit about this thread. I think what was going on was that many, probably most, were out of towners just as we were, and were not ready for this. Back home, I know where the problem spots are. most others do also, I accept that there will be problems,. so does everyone else, we figure we are all in this together and we slack off a bit with our aggressiveness. We know there will be delays but we slip some Ellington into the player and relax, we will get there. I repeat that we had a great time on the Oregon coast, I like the Pacific a lot, and we enjoyed the people we met. But the coastal traffic was not part of the enjoyment. For anyone, I think.

[Antrax]

Whenever I try to let a left laner in, it's inevitably someone dense who takes forever to figure out what's going on so I either stall the people behind me or just end up driving slowly past them. Good drivers can merge without being helped, bad ones take too long even with a clear signal that I expect them to.

[kenberg]

Antrax, on 2014-August-25, 21:59, said:

Whenever I try to let a left laner in, it's inevitably someone dense who takes forever to figure out what's going on so I either stall the people behind me or just end up driving slowly past them. Good drivers can merge without being helped, bad ones take too long even with a clear signal that I expect them to.

Yes, this pretty much matches my experience. Someone has to go or we all lose, and some people just can't seize an opportunity when it is laid in front of them. I have now been driving for sixty years. Somewhere along the road I learned to take it easy. Yesterday I had someone cur from the right lane to the left, right in front of me, without signaling and then he slowed so he could get into the left turn lane to my left. I just applied the brakes, rather sharply, and let it go. If he doesn't realize he is an idiot, honking at him probably wouldn't help.

[barmar]

In the case where I did let someone in last week, my lane was only moving about 15-20 MPH; it's a main road with stop lights every few blocks, so none of the lanes move very fast during busy periods. So all I had to do was slow down for a few seconds to open up a gap that someone could slip into. If they don't slip in, I just get moving again, and the "harm" to my lane is minimal or nonexistent (since we probably would have all been stopped at the next light anyway).

[mycroft]

well, if I saw the guy pull out and run all the way up the left lane, past me, and then wants back in because the left lane's blocked by left-turners, I may be a little less generous than if they didn't know or couldn't avoid it.

What, me, passive-aggressive? That Can't Be!

[Winstonm]

My sister-in-law lived in a section of St. Louis where this lane contraction occurred everyday on her way home - she would ride the bumper of the care in front of her to make certain that no one could merge. I sympathized with her pov.

[barmar]

mycroft, on 2014-August-26, 11:54, said:

well, if I saw the guy pull out and run all the way up the left lane, past me, and then wants back in because the left lane's blocked by left-turners, I may be a little less generous than if they didn't know or couldn't avoid it.

What, me, passive-aggressive? That Can't Be!

I agree that I have no sympathy for the people who jump into the left lane, thinking they can use it to pass, and then try to get out when they discover the backlog. I'm just talking about people who were in the left lane normally for several blocks, and then got stuck in the logjam. While I try to think ahead and avoid that lane for most of the trip on streets I know, I also recognize that if everyone did that it would clog the right line. So a reasonable compromise is to occasionally slow down to let a car merge. And I hope that some day someone will pay it back to me when I get stuck in an unfamiliar area.

[kenberg]

barmar, on 2014-August-26, 14:03, said:

So a reasonable compromise is to occasionally slow down to let a car merge. And I hope that some day someone will pay it back to me when I get stuck in an unfamiliar area.

This is pretty much an all purpose description of my view on several different formulations of the problem. I think it does get paid back. Maybe directly to someone else, but as more people take this view, driving becomes a more peaceful activity. And if a strict accounting would show that I gave way more than I got back, I don't mind. I might even take some pleasure in it..

[mycroft]

I'm actually one of the most generous drivers on the road - unless "the regular rules of courtesy don't apply to me". Then it's different. I think we're violently agreeing, barmar.

Of course, my favourite was what I said to my family after my first month in Waterloo, ON: "If you're driving along, and all of a sudden, everybody is leaving your lane, join them. It's about to become a turn only lane - and by the time they tell you, it's too late." I will freely admit I looked like one of those "someone will let me in, *I'm* too important to wait" types; and frequently, I took my lumps, and the turn, and figured out how to get back on the road.