OT Idiot lights-out drivers

[rbowman]

all I know of Yorkshire comes from Ken Loach's film, 'The Navigators'. The takeaway from that was Yorkies do not speak English. It was as incomprehensible as 'Trainspotters' or 'Sexy Beast'.

[clare]

When my kid brother was an owner / operator he thought he was making good money untill the truck he had finally finished paying off required $20,000 of work. Get it fixed and the day after that repair was paid off, something else went wrong - or he hit a herd of 26 antelope - or got struck by lightning - - -

He finally decided getting paid by the mile or hour and driving someone else's truck made a lot more cents.

[rbowman]

There are hazards. The road crews use copious amounts of gravel on bad curves and intersections after snow storms. Eventually they get around to sweeping it off the road but right now unexpected gravel piles can ruin your day. I regularly ride on dirt but that's a different animal to gravel on a paved road.

It usually isn't a springtime problem, but as the morning get below freezing in the fall there are a couple of places I have to watch. The lawn sprinklers irrigate a substantial part of the street and that can be ice until the sun gets to it.

Yesterday's ride was on the DR-650, which is a dual sport (enduro). After a hard winter it helps to have something to scout out road conditions that can handle deep potholes and stretches of missing pavement.

[Sam E]

[snip]

That reminds me of something I heard once:

A company has 2 employees to produce an employee newsletter. They get a machine that allows the newsletter to be produced in half the time. What do they do:

A) Allow both employees to go home in the middle of the day, and continue to pay them the same (since they're getting the same amount of work done).

B) Fire one or the employees.

C) Require a more complex newsletter, so it still takes them both all day to do it.

[rbowman]

That was my analysis. I was taking a break from my normally scheduled programming and not looking for a career opportunity but I had plenty of time to learn the ropes. For the naive OO, times seem great as they conveniently forget that baby is going to need a new set of shoes at about $450 a pop. Even little things can wipe out the profit of a haul. The DOT is very critical of cracked windshields. I had one replaced and made it almost 400 miles before a flying rock took the new one out.

If I did go into it, I thought the hotshot route was the better way. With a fairly new F350 and trailer you're out a lot less that a decent used Class 8 tractor. Tag it for 26,000 gross and you avoid a lot of paperwork. The problem is that limits you to about 10,000 pounds. It would be fairly easy to find a load of plastic stock tanks or irrigation pipe going to Montana, but you would pay hell getting a load back out.

I enjoyed it and it was something I'd wanted to do as a kid. otoh, I didn't have a family and I knew when I got tired of driving around the country I had other options.

[Don Y]

D) Retrain one of them to REPAIR the machine when it breaks.

[rbowman]

I'm a sucker for museums do I can't remember which one it was, possibly the Ford. Anyway, it followed household appliances through the years. They noted as labor saving devices were introduced women found more complicated things to fill their days with.

I've certainly seen it in my career from those unreadable reports printed on green bar paper to the latest dashboard with burn down graphs, pie charts, and so forth. I haven't noticed management getting more productive but the managers certainly have more toys to keep them busy.

So, based on personal experience, I'll go with C.

[Muggles]

There's nothing like graphs, pie charts, and statistics in a spreadsheet to make a manager salivate! Oh, and they like their calculators, too.

[Mr Macaw]

I've heard that in French, but not in any normal country.

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per rbowman:

It's in Somerset, not Yorkshire - but when I was there for a family reunion in a town called Wells, I came across two local-color types having an extended conversation in the local dialect.

I could not even catch the drift of what they were saying - and I really tried.... not one word... they might as well have been speaking Mandarin.

[Mr Macaw]

It's easier to understand than American.

[Mr Macaw]

Take two states. Compare their laws. One of them must be correct. The other one should follow suit.

[Mr Macaw]

Y'all can keep on drivin' yer shitty Merkin shit wiv yer 6 litre injuns wat only put out ninety horses.

[Mr Macaw]

I don't do laws. I do what I think is right. Some things are legal, like shooting deer, but I don't do that. Some things are illegal like [CENSORED] but I do that copiously.

[Muggles]

That's what a room full of people sound like to me when I don't have my hearing aides in!

[Mr Macaw]

Never heard of it. I use paracetamol and ibuprofen. Removes any pain for at least a few hours.

Yes, but a few days isn't long for a bad tooth.

Never used an antibiotic for teeth. I use painkillers until get to the dentist, who drills away the bad bit and puts in a filling.

Then be more careful with your mouth! Surely you're capable of not rubbing a certain part on another certain part?

It's hardly suffering. Toothache doesn't appear just like that, it's gradual. It won't get really bad over a weekend.

NYC is better than everyone else? Got a big ego?

I've never moaned about more than 2 things with one car.

My "random" sig generator seems to pay a lot of attention to the discussion in hand.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Not that simple. What is a law in Connecticut has no bearing on situations in Arizona. All states have laws requiring auto registration, driver's license. Tax laws differ since the budgets differ considerably.

Given your comment, the laws in your country should be the same as the laws in France and Poland.

[rbowman]

Take two countries. Compare their laws. One of them must be correct. I conclude the UK should adopt the Ugandan legal system.

Positive law is not 'correct'; it is merely law.

[Don Y]

And, by extension, all countries should have the same set of laws!

Extrapolating from that, all countries should speak the same language, have the same currency, etc.

Right?

[Mr Macaw]

Uganda is a bit more backward than us. They should take ours.

Then it should be ignored.