HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: Gordon.Riddell@prg.oxford.ac.uk
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Spectacle(s)
Date: 31 Jul 92 14:12:41 GMT
X-Mailer: mail-news 2.0.3


I have a week to spend being visually challenged (getting the hang of this PC-
jargon good style!) after breaking my glasses. Peeveworthy in its own right
that situation, especially as I stepped on my glasses as they lay on the
floor in front of me as I sat on the toilet having a crap (thought I still had
them on and just got up and walked on them!).

However, every time I go to my optician I get the same thing - my these 
glasses are good quality, they are made of rolled gold you know".

Every time I say "Yes, I got them free when I was a student." [UK students
used to get benefits (welfare).]

The opticians eyes glaze over and he sucks in and always fails to say 
something along the lines of "yes, you welfare junkies should be given crap
glasses. Think of my profits." But I know what he's thinking.

What he doesn't realise is that my taxes are now paying his salary in some
small way. Am I really meant to look like a geek just because some shithead
optician thinks good eyesight is a privilege not a right in our 
wonderful country. Pisses me off.

That and the 30 pounds for the repair!

Gordon
From: kprashan@sdcc3.ucsd.edu (hyderabadi)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: radio stuff
Date: 22 Jul 92 17:14:19 GMT
Distribution: na

In article <1992Jul21.230155.22123@twg.com>, nolan@twg.com (Andy Rooney) writes:
> In article <35831@sdcc12.ucsd.edu>, kprashan@sdcc3.ucsd.edu (hyderabadi) writes:
> [whining about the practices of commercial radio stations mercifully excised]
> 
> LargePeeve: Whiners going on and on about discretionary activities like
> listening to the radio. GET A CLUE! Don't listen to those stations if they
> bother you! Change the station, or turn the bleedin' thing off. No one has a
> powder-driven projectile propulsion device aimed at you (unless there's
> something I don't know??), and I know of no religion that requires you to
> listen to that drivel. The only time you may feel an obligation to put up with
> the drivel is in the presence of others whom you like or respect and who
> listen to same drivel, but even then you have options.
> 
> Take responsibility for your life, if you have one. Otherwise GET ONE NOW!
> Nolan "Grandpa Grumble" Hinshaw


Looky here, dude, this group was created for whining and
complaining about anything that bugs us. So you keep complaining
about whiners and I will keep writing about what I feel like. As you
so eloquently put it, nobody
put a gun to your head and said, "Read every article in alt.peeves".
That is also a 'discretionary' activity. I have to listen to music
or whatever on the radio, and I will keep whining about any BDI DJ 
who keeps bugging me in between songs.

If I do not want to listen to whining, go read alt.walt-disney.


__________________________________________________________
| Prashanth                    |                         |
| U. of California @ San Diego | prash@bhaskara.ucsd.edu |
##########################################################
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
From: slv@cs.wisc.edu (Scott L. Vandenberg)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Bedhead  (was: Re: Newbie Alert!)
Date: 30 Jul 92 19:34:52 GMT
Organization: UW-Madison Computer Sciences

In article <1992Jul30.052808.2532@cs.yale.edu>, elliott-bruce@CS.YALE.EDU (Bruce Elliott)
 writes:
|> Imagine the three following facts in juxtaposition.
|> 
|> 1.  I have fairly long bangs, about 5-6 inches long, and my hair is quite
|>     straight.
|> 
|> 2.  I use hair gel -- some days I use more than others, but I always use
|>     some to keep aforementioned bangs from obstructing my vision.
|> 
|> 3.  I sleep with one pillow under my head and a second one on top of my
|>     head.
|>  [ .... ]
|> As a result, when I get up in the morning, I have long spikes of hair
|> sticking out several inches in random directions, vaguely reminiscent
|> of Edward Scissorhands' coif.  This means that any social interaction
|> with other people, including roommates and the like, must be postponed
|> until after my shower since it is very hard to converse with someone
|> when they keep pointing at your head and laughing.  No amount of combing
|> or brushing will quell the phenomenon, a shower is the only cure.

PEEVE:  Some people just don't know how good they've got it.  My hair
magically manages to achieve the same appearance with short bangs, no gel,
and only one pillow.  Ex-cohabitants of mine were frequently known to
laugh uproariously upon first viewing me in the morning.  One even made
me stand right where I was without moving until he could take my
picture.  Sadly, I'm not making this up.  At that point I considered joining 
the circus as a side show.

ANTIPEEVE:  I get the satisfaction of being able to make people laugh
without even going to the effort of telling a joke.  Eat your heart out, 
Jay Leno.
From: Not_Al_Crawford@ed.ac.uk (Not Al Crawford)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Bike Helmets
Keywords: bikes, safety, law
Date: 30 Jul 92 16:02:33 GMT
Reply-To: Not_Al_Crawford@ed.ac.uk (Not Al Crawford)
Organization: Penicuik People's Revolutionary Sheepdog Liberation Front

And lo, pwg@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Paul Goldberg) spake unto the masses saying:
>
> Adult cyclists act as if they are above the law, but at least have
> some sense of self-preservation. What particularly annoys me about
> them is the way they routinely pass through red lights, as if traffic
> lights don't apply to them.

I was unfortunate enough to encounter a seriously insane cyclist a few
weeks back. I'd just got on a Sprinter (small minibuses that run at a high
frequency on certain routes within the city). The bus pulled out and in
front was...a cycle courier. This guy was going along at a reasonable speed
and fairly close to the kerb. The driver proceeded to give him a beep on
the horn. Now this wasn't really fair, since there was no way the guy could
move any faster or move closer to the kerb. However, the actions of the
cyclist were positively suicidal. In response to being beeped at, he moved
into the centre of the road, making overtaking impossible. The bus driver
then beeped again, so the courier (and this is the bit that got me)
*stopped dead*. Quite what he was trying to achieve, I don't know, but he
succeeded in causing the bus to make an emergency stop, ending up about
10cm from the guy's rear wheel and causing every passenger on the bus to
get flung violently into the seat in front. He then gave the driver the
finger and tore off down the road, going straight through a red light and
turned off up a side street.

Now I can understand why he was annoyed at being beeped at when he couldn't
move in any further, but just what was the aim of his stopping like that?
If the bus *had* hit him, he'd have had no comeback whatsoever, since
myself and about five other passengers, as well as a load of people on
Princes Street saw exactly what he did. Not only was he endangering his own
life, but those of all the passengers on the bus. If the case had come up
in court (whether the bus had hit him or not) *he'd* have been the one on
the losing end.

--
		Not Al Crawford - Not_Al_Crawford@ed.ac.uk
     "The water shines/A sheepdog skips across the face/A dozen times"
From: mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk>
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Oleolimpics
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 92 12:53:10 BST
Distribution: world
Organization: Mantis Consultants, Cambridge. UK.

dourish@EuroPARC.Xerox.COM (Paul Dourish) writes:
> Peeve: the belief that somehow people from ages past were endowed with
> some extra humanity to which we should all strive (eg. a return to
> "Victorian values")

But we *are* returning to "Victorian values"!  We have TB on the increase,
beggars on every street, and people throwing buckets of urine and faeces out
into the gutter.


mathew
-- 
"Even the most bizarre of the unions (probably that between a cat's gall
 stone and a single note 'G' from CNN's ident theme) managed to convey a
 sense of rampant impropriety."  -- 'Fortran Five', Simon G. Lawrence Leonard
From: dourish@EuroPARC.Xerox.COM (Paul Dourish)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Oleolimpics
Date: 28 Jul 92 20:17:07 GMT
Reply-To: dourish@EuroPARC.Xerox.COM (Paul Dourish)
Organization: Rank Xerox EuroPARC, Cambridge, UK

In article <24232@castle.ed.ac.uk>, eset08@castle.ed.ac.uk (J Strobridge) writes:
> Must say I more or less agree with this - I LIKE the idea that the
> Olympiad creates a neutral area where all people and nations set aside
> political differences and compete on purely atheletic terms.   Let each
> athelete compete as an individual - forget about country, race and creed

Jill, what colour is the sky on your planet?

It's many hundreds of years since this had any fleeting relationship
to reality, if indeed it ever had any. If we believe that the Greek
Olympics really caused wars to stop so that everyone could compete in
a spirit of friendly competition and freedom, we have to ask -- why?
Do you really believe that the Greeks were just some group of people
whose motivations and ideals were somehow so different from those of
our own time; or do you think it was merely an ancient "holier than
thou"?

Peeve: the belief that somehow people from ages past were endowed with
some extra humanity to which we should all strive (eg. a return to
"Victorian values")

--
Paul Dourish, Rank Xerox EuroPARC, Cambridge, UK   <dourish@europarc.xerox.com>

          "Ain't they got no barbers where you come from, boy?"
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
From: dourish@EuroPARC.Xerox.COM (Paul Dourish)
Subject: Re: Bike Helmets
Keywords: bikes, safety, law
Reply-To: dourish@EuroPARC.Xerox.COM (Paul Dourish)
Organization: Rank Xerox EuroPARC, Cambridge, UK
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 18:45:43 GMT

In article <24346@castle.ed.ac.uk>, tjc@castle.ed.ac.uk (A J Cunningham) writes:
> ObPeeve: Children on bikes. The little fuckwits have no idea how to
> behave on the roads.

Yeah. They don't understand that you have to wear the appropriate
cycling fashion garments, and frequently they don't have nearly enough
of those little disposable cartons of isotonic drinks.

They just have *no* idea what it's like to be a *real* cyclist. Ahem.


--
Paul Dourish, Rank Xerox EuroPARC, Cambridge, UK   <dourish@europarc.xerox.com>

          "Ain't they got no barbers where you come from, boy?"
From: mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk>
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Picnics
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 92 11:50:50 BST
Distribution: world
Organization: Mantis Consultants, Cambridge. UK.

booter@Autodesk.COM (Elaine Richards) writes:
> Peeve: Little brown flying bugs, about the size of the letter "l" in
> 14 point type. They were all over my house and now they are all over
> my apartment. They like to die in my crystal glasses. I invite friends
> over, want to serve them some nice beverage in crystal, forget to shake
> the glass out and am mortified to see One Dead Bug in each glass.

Sounds like thrips (or thunder flies as they're also known).

The little buggers crawl into CD jewel boxes, worm their way under the
cardboard of the back cover, then die.


mathew
[ "Hey, this track listing has WAY too much punctuation..." ]
-- 
Ceci | n'est pas une pipe.

Newsgroups: alt.peeves
From: hillman@carina.unm.edu (Dan Hillman)
Subject: Re: Self-serve gas stations
Date: Sun, 26 Jul 92 08:17:34 GMT
Organization: Holy Order of Quadra 950 Lust

In article <1992Jul24.192834.23276@spool.cs.wisc.edu> slv@camembert.cs.wisc.edu (Scott L. Vandenberg) writes:
>
>PEEVE 1:  "You're all criminals, so pay before pumping the gas".  
>[...]

What really yanks my crank is when places don't have some sort of sign
indicating whether one is supposed to pay first, pump first, or make
a secret sign to the Gasoline Goddess before they'll let you get the
stuff into your car.

That's right up there with the places that have a special window to go
up to, only when you do, there's a small sign saying to go inside the
store. Arrrrrrrrrrrgh!!!

>I'm so relieved
>now that I can stand there and smell the fruits of my labor (i.e.
>inhale cancerous fumes) and not have to worry about the gas pump when
>I wash my window and check my oil and make out with my wife (yes, we
>got married while I was waiting to give up my credit card -- had plenty
>of time to spare, too).

Jesus, man, have the wife check the oil and wash the windows! 

GiantEconomy-SizedPeeve: People who just stand there while you do
all the work at the gas station. Sure, doing a good job washing the
windscreen may be difficult if you're short, but that's no excuse
for not checking the oil and the tire pressure.

>In short, why the hell do we have to stand there and hold the damn
>handle?  Why have they disabled the mechanism used to keep it pumping?

It's a method used to differentiate between BDIs and People-Who-Think-
Of-Using-Their-Gas-Cap-To-Hold-The-Handle-Up-While-They-Do-Something-
More-Meaningful-With-Their-Lives. Guess which one *you* are.

-- 
| _   ;/                                                          Dan Hillman
|(")_/   "I'm right and you're not."                   hillman@carina.unm.edu
|~~/                                                 University of New Mexico
|~/                                               Land of Fucking Enchantment
From: elliott-bruce@CS.YALE.EDU (Bruce Elliott)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Micro Beards (was something else entirely)
Date: 31 Jul 92 04:20:45 GMT
Organization: Yale University Computer Science Dept., New Haven, CT 06520-2158

In article <CINDY.92Jul30170942@solan10.solan.unit.no> cindy@solan10.solan.unit.no (Cynthia Kandolf) writes:
>Alex Elliott writes:
>>Peeve:  Germanic Latin.
>
>Germanic Latin????
>
Although Latin is a dead language, it was used as the language of the Catholic
Church throughout the Holy Roman Empire.  Like most languages, it evolved over
time.  Latin as spoken by Church-types in Italy is Italianate Latin.  Latin
as spoken by Church-types in Germany is Germanic Latin.

For example, take the Latin word "coeli".
In Italianate Latin, this is pronounced "chelli".
In Germanic Latin, this is pronounced "tso"li"  (That's supposed to be an
o with an umlaut over it.)

I'm used to Italianate Latin.  When some conductor insists on Germanic
Latin it gets kind of confusing.


Alex Elliott
The Lemming.
elliott@minerva.cs.yale.edu
From: geoffm@purplehaze.Corp.Sun.COM (Bill Berbenich)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: "Bad Boy Club Stickers"
Followup-To: alt.peeves
Date: 23 Jul 1992 16:03:50 GMT
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Menlo Park, Ca.
Distribution: usa
NNTP-Posting-Host: purplehaze.corp.sun.com



In article <1992Jul23.041058.1317966@zeus.calpoly.edu> 
kpollack@zeus.calpoly.edu (Kirk Pollack) writes:

>These little gems feature a caricature of some scowling dickhead that 
>some people seem obliged to plaster on the back of their cars.  What does
>all this mean?  What am I supposed to think when I see a car, usually
>some VW GTI thing or a large 4 X 4 truck displaying one of these.  Does
>it mean "Look out for me because I look and act like the guy on the 
>decal?" 


I've peeved about those myself, as a matter of fact.  One of my 
downstairs neighbors has one on the back window of his Peugeot.
I believe that "Bad Boy Club" is a line of motocross bicycle 
clothing and accessories.  I have a friend who's knowledgeable 
about that stuff (despite being 27 years old), so I'll make a 
point of asking him.

Essenially, the stickers are this season's equivalent of those
Oakley Thermonuclear Protection windshield tints that were so
popular awhile back.  It's the same crowd.


Geoff


-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Geoff Miller                    + + + + + + + +        Sun Microsystems
geoffm@purplehaze.Corp.Sun.COM  + + + + + + + +     Menlo Park, California
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

Newsgroups: alt.peeves
From: baldwin@carina.unm.edu (Chris Baldwin)
Subject: Re: Drug testing and welfare
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 92 00:13:09 GMT
Organization: Atheist for the Development of a Better God

In article <1992Jul27.184207.1@husky1.stmarys.ca> cs226a030@husky1.stmarys.ca writes:
>Actually, here in Canada, I think both of those are legal. If they aren't,
>then "they" DON'T have a right to have those forms of sex. Just because you
>*think* that something should be legal, doesn't mean you have a right to do it.

	This is patently false, unless you are a fascist. Rights are 
independent of the legality of an action. You can never have the right
to unjustly kill someone(i.e. murder) regardless of murder's legal
status. By the same token, the people under the Stalin's government still
had the right to free speech, but it was denied them. Now, if you really 
are a fascist and think that our rights are defined by the government and
the state should be the final arbiter of what is right then none of this 
applies. 

>In the same token, just because something is illegal, dosen't mean it's morally
>wrong. It *IS* illegal, though. If you do something illegal, you risk
>punishment. It is that simple.
	This is true. But, I don't really see where it is relevant. I don't
think that any of the people who are advocating doing something that is
currently illegal expect the government to step in and say "Oh, we were just
kidding about all those pesky law things. Carry on." if, or when, they get
caught.

ObNazi: Himmler
	Now I've gone and mentioned the Nazi's, so this thread is
closed by a well known net.guideline. There are well known news groups
for this kind of thing. Geeze, Steve leave and suddenly politics erupts
on alt.peeves...Oh, the humanity!

ObPeeve(I doubt anyone actually made it this far, so I might as well
throw in a slightly compu-nerdy peeve.): News has started recycling
articles lately. Old ones show up again and 2 copies of new ones have
been appearing for the last coupla days. The problem seems to have
cleared up, but it is annoying when something like this happens.

-- 
Chris Baldwin                | Robert Johnson invented the pickle! 
baldwin@carina.unm.edu       |                         - Adam Reid
            If I were a carpenter I'd hammer my piglet. -- TMBG
From: baldwin@carina.unm.edu (Chris Baldwin)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Picnics
Date: 23 Jul 92 16:43:59 GMT
Organization: Atheist for the Development of a Better God

In article <adwright.711885742@vincent1.iastate.edu> adwright@iastate.edu () writes:
>Peeve: That one person at a picnic who who says something about the
>"extra protein" when a bug flies into the food.
	I hate people who seem to be incapable of not saying something
incredibly stupid, like your example, over and over again. As another
example, it is impossible to use any form of the word "assume" without
some dimbulb saying "When you assume..." Also, I like my steak very rare. 
Every time I have eaten steak in the presence of my mother for the past 23 
years, she says that I like it so rare that it is still mooing. 

ObPeeve: People who appear to be able to write, but unable to read. There
have been 3 users this morning who have complained that the printer was
taking longer than normal in processing the documents. When I went over to
look at the screen to see what was up, there is a message stating quite
clearly that they are waiting for the printer and someone else's document 
is being processed.

-- 
Chris Baldwin                |"1984 has past. Forget about Big Brother.Welcome
baldwin@carina.unm.edu       |to the '90s, where the givernments your mother." 
                             |                     --Scatterbrain
"I say that What the Country Needs is a Drieux In Every Pot!"
From: egpv29@castle.ed.ac.uk (JHenderson)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Drug testing and welfare
Date: 29 Jul 92 08:58:55 GMT
Organization: Edinburgh University

In article <1992Jul27.152305.18855@parc.xerox.com> dourish@EuroPARC.Xerox.COM (Paul Dourish) writes:
=>In article <5wPkoB14w165w@mantis.co.uk>, mathew@mantis.co.uk (mathew) writes:
=>> People receiving welfare cheques might be spending the money on stolen goods,
=>> did you think of that?
=>
=>Hey, it goes deeper than that. They might be buying tacky furniture,
=>for instance, with horrible flowery patterns which us honest
=>tax-payers might violently object to. Or Hawkwind albums, even. Or
=>worse (if there *is* worse).

Y'all 'r noo 'round these parts, aintcha, booy?
One mo' taam: "Flaming Mike Holmes in MY job".
-- 
-Jeremy Henderson        egpv29@castle.ed.ac.uk   

(or am I?)
From: jflint@libserv1.ic.sunysb.edu (Jesse Flint)
Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Kids N' Stuff
Date: 21 Jul 1992 00:51:05 -0500
Organization: State University of New York at Stony Brook
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

I want somebody to explain this to me:

Peeve: Kids. Children. I DON'T like them. Not only don't I like them,
I HATE them. Whiny little snots, spoiled (especially here on Long 
Island) crabby crying little anklebiting shits. Here I am, working
in a toystore, and the place's full of the whiny little bastards. Makes
me want to sterilize myself with a boxcutter.

AND

Peeve: Parents who obviously HATE their kids. I just LOOOOVE it when 
some idiot threatens their little brat with bodily harm; makes me want 
to go over and offer 'em a baseball bat. "Here, you can do MUCH more 
damage with this!" If you don't LOVE the damn thing, why'd you HAVE it??

Now here's the deal... I despise children with a vengance, but I
 equally hate the parents who threaten their kids with flaming death. 
Is there a sorta inconsistency here?

!Peeve: The cute girls who come wandering through the store.
Peeve: They either all have boyfreinds or children.


Newsgroups: alt.peeves
From: yarvin@cs.yale.edu (Norman Yarvin)
Subject: Re: Drug testing and welfare
Originator: yarvin@turquoise.CS.Yale.Edu
Organization: Yale Computer Science Department
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 10:40:10 GMT

fofp@castle.ed.ac.uk (M Holmes) writes:
>Then again, I'm not real impressed by the argument that the Guvmint has
>a legitimate interest in what goes on in folks bodies anyway.

You have the wrong line of reasoning there.  The assumption that the
government shouldn't be concerned about people's bodies leads directly to
the conclusion that welfare should be junked completely.

Which would be out of line.  We all live in socialist countries, where
socialist thought is so all-pervasive that nobody would ever _dream_ of
eliminating welfare, except for a few radical Libertarians and such who are
light years away from having any power.

No, the argument that the government shouldn't be coercing people is naive.
What the hell do you think our governments are for, besides coercing
people?  That is their primal function.  It's how they came into power, and
how they keep it.  They do nothing else.  And, notwithstanding the arguments
of anarchists, we really are better off with them than we would be without
them.

There are still good reasons to oppose the drug testing, though.  A new
government bureaucracy would have to be created to maintain it.  It would
waste money on expensive drug tests.  It would create opportunities for
corruption.

--
Norman Yarvin						yarvin@cs.yale.edu
 "When a democratic government does a wise thing it usually does it for a
  foolish reason." -- H. L. Mencken
Newsgroups: alt.peeves