An audiophile and petrolhead's musings: in the hi-fidelity, first class, traveling set - Page 110

 

I doubt anyone has the time to think about all this in these moments, its fight or flight.

But you sure as heck have an awesome story to tell to your children/grandchildren! 

Oh - if they don't take EBT cards at all, that's fine. The store would only get in trouble in they take EBT cash cards, but they refused to let him buy smokes on the EBT cash card. A store doesn't have to take EBT at all - but if they do, they need to follow the rules.

Yeah - she's right of course, but based on that logic, we would have no firemen, policemen or soldiers. Here's another way to look at it: Would you want to come home and tell your daughter that you watched a guy get his face beat-in and you just stood by and watched it happen?

Or - your wife is a LOTR fan, right? WWFD? (What would Frodo do?) He would have pulled Sting and given that goblin an enema of Elvin steel!

Careful, he might attack you for violating his right to (not) work.

No but seriously, I've never understood (and I know this is probably a logical fallacy) why these kinds of things seem to compound - so it isn't JUST random assault, it's a lot deeper and more elaborate (and I'm sure the guy's story is really very sad, but we've all probably heard it a thousand times before which dulls it). Am I the only one who feels like this would be less of a problem if it was just a random, isolated act of violence?


And you should've just gotten into your Batman looking black car and done the whole "I am the night" thing - hahahaha. Sure, something *could* have gone horribly wrong, but nothing *did* - I think you came out okay. In the future though I wouldn't roll the dice like that; Ferraris still have tire irons right?

Seriously. It's like, there's a supermarket near me that just opened (about a year ago actually), and they aren't WIC authorized (I don't know what goes into a supermarket being WIC authorized, other stores in the same chain (in the same area) *are* authorized, but this one isn't) - I know this because they put up signs on all of the entry doors that apologize for the inconvenience and even will give you directions to a sister store that can process WIC. AND YET, I've seen a number of customers throw a tantrum to the clerks for not taking WIC - I don't get it. It's not like the store is trying to harm anyone, but that's usually what you hear being screamed out "you're trying to starve us!" and things like that. Is this just laziness that people don't want to bother to read? Or what?

And yeah, seriously speaking, she is. It's a crappy situation overall - on one hand do you want to tell/teach the kid about vigilantism (and the associated burden), on the other non-involvement. It's a tough line. I don't think there's a good answer either.

I lol'd.

And I'm sure they have signage because the workers get sick of repeating that policy and explanation to everyone who wants to pay with Visa.

LOL "and that's just the chicks" - I don't think "reunion" is the right word there, I think "hootenanny" is more appropriate.

 

"You're trying to starve me". 

Thats exactly the same thing I said to the clerk at my local supermarket, after they forced me to use the self checkout machine because the queues at the other counters were too long. 

 

I was terribly hungry, was thinking about all the food I'd just purchased, and the though of gorging on it once I get back home.

But the machines are incredibly stupid, and with so many options and directions it takes twice as long. 

Edited by proton007 - 1/17/13 at 12:31am

Those auto-checkout machines are awful. I could totally get behind someone assaulting one of those, lol.

The best part is, they're not fully auto either. Usually they need a couple of people to help and guide the customers through the process, and they often end up doing it themselves for the customer.

Those two people can checkout stuff manually at probably the same rate as 5 self-checkout machines. Why spend the extra cash on the machines?

 

Not to mention, the machines don't organize stuff for you the way store clerks can...

Yeah, but the management probably doesn't ever see that - they see that they're putting in 20 new registers and only having one person man them, which improves the bottom line. The fact that it takes 3x as long to go through, and is a total nightmare if you're buying a full buggy of groceries (or, if you're a glutton for punishment - going to Home Depot and buying a lot of stuff there) is probably never addressed (given that most stores seem to be increasing these to phase out conventional checker lines).

I don't know, vending machines are a nice thing in some cases - I'd rather buy a soda from a vending machine than a clerk simply because it's faster, just like automated fuel pumps, but there's other things that really should have a person's touch. Or, if that isn't acceptable, AI needs to be advanced to the point where it can handle this kind of thing (but not to where it will take over the world).

Agree on both points.

And I had the same experience at home depot. There were 3 of us, and we still couldn't figure the thing out.

 

Regarding the AI part, I feel the problem is that it involves part human interface, and part object interface. Conveying information to people (who take varying amounts of time to process it) and then interacting with objects (It would be incredibly easy if all the stuff was in rectangular boxes, but the varied shapes and sizes make it a hard problem to solve).

I remember seeing a tour of Newegg's automated sort facility which actually accomplishes this correctly - but yeah, the items are stored in standardized bins and there's no human customers to address. I think there's a Science Channel documentary on a larger VW factory that uses the same kind of system that's quite interesting too.

But yeah, I think you're spot-on with the AI problem - it's a very complex problem for a computer to solve.

*sigh* I'd have to agree. It's just sad though. I notice the angriness and lack of patience most prevalently - just in my daily commute I notice people getting incredibly pushy and belligerent just to get to the same red lights faster, get on the same train faster, etc. It's like they're all worked up for some big "gotcha" to happen, and that "gotcha" isn't coming. I don't get it - I really don't. It's exhausting to go around pissed off all the time.

Aye.

Yeah...I get those glares sometimes too. Or obnoxious questions...