And I'm trying to decide whether I mind.
In the meantime, I have questions for the group!
Poll #1130589 "Random strangers will think I am a weirdo!"
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All
Have you ever posted a perfectly innocent public post and then later thought, "If random strangers read this they will think I am a big weirdo!"
Do you then lock or friends-lock the entry in question?
Yes
6 (46.2%)
No 3 (23.1%)
Only if it's really weird or I get disturbing comments 4 (30.8%)
Specifically, do my entries on character kidnapping make you think I am a big weirdo?
Yes, and if you do it again I will unfriend you! 0 (0.0%)
No, doesn't everybody do that? 6 (54.5%)
No, I have no idea what you're talking about! 5 (45.5%)
Yes, but I only read your journal to reassure myself that there are bigger weirdos than me out there! 1 (9.1%)
I'm just curious, really. I don't think my recent self-consciousness will affect my posting style one iota. So you can consider yourself warned!
Edited to add: "Character kidnapping," for the record, is when I base a character on my impression of a real person I don't actually know. I suppose anyone who reports "casting" particular actors in their mental movie of a story is doing the same thing.
- Mood:
weird
(When I was in Texas I was talking to a coworker about possibly getting a car--I didn't, I don't have the nerve to drive in Dallas traffic--and somehow I ended up telling him about the Lada. We discovered that the four-wheel-drive Niva, my favourite model which someone at home had in bright sky-blue, also comes in an upgraded model called the Cossack. My friend asked whether that particular model came only in red. Smartarse.)
- Mood:
interested
No, it's about German drivers, or rather German traffic lights. Some time ago
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
libraryman was in Germany and he told me that he was a little weirded out by the traffic lights, which instead of the North American Green-Yellow-Red pattern went Red-Yellow-Green. Maybe there were two occurrences of yellow, I'm not sure. Red-Yellow-Green-Yellow?Anyway, the explanation given to him was that, since practically everyone in Germany drives a stick, the yellow light was the signal to shift back into first gear. Because I guess most drivers pop the car out of gear when they're sitting at a light?
Okay, admittedly I am not as good a driver as your average German. (Or your incompetent German, if we're going to be honest here.) But I've been driving a stick pretty consistently since about 1987, and most of my family drives or has driven stickshifts, and I've never seen anybody pop the car out of gear at a red light. We mostly just sit there like idiots with the clutch deployed. (Although come to think of it I look for the yellow light going in the other direction as my warning to get ready to go.)
Is this just another example of how Maritimers can't drive? Possibly. But it's also an opportunity for my second-ever poll. Here we go!
Poll #926677
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All
When sitting at a red light, I generally
shift into first and hold down the clutch. 1 (12.5%)
shift into neutral and leave the clutch alone. 5 (62.5%)
shift the automatic transmission to "N." 1 (12.5%)
ignore what the driver is doing, my job is looking after the radio. 1 (12.5%)
shift back and forth between first and reverse and let the car roll a little to keep the driver behind me alert. 0 (0.0%)
All drivers should follow the customs of
the Germans! They build Volkswagens! 5 (62.5%)
the Japanese! They build Hondas! 3 (37.5%)
the Chinese! There are more of them! 0 (0.0%)
The Russians! They build Ladas! 0 (0.0%)
By not shifting into neutral and sitting there stepping on the clutch, Coneycat is going to
destroy her transmission, eventually. 2 (25.0%)
do absolutely no harm to her transmission. 1 (12.5%)
What does it matter? Coneycat's more pressing concern should be whether someone is going to steal this car, too! 5 (62.5%)
- Mood: confused
You know, like "Driving that train/High on cocaine/Casey Jones you better watch your speed" (and thank you
latsyrk for the additional lyrics!) This happened to me after I saw Master and Commander for the first time: I got an earworm of the song in the officers' mess. In that case, however, I knew so many similar folk songs that my brain just filled in perfectly reasonable words until I had two complete, original verses of the song and honestly thought they were real. I believe they call this "the oral tradition."
Most of the time this does not happen. So, what does one do?
Poll #888744 Earworm Poll
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All
When I have an earworm of a song I don't really know, I:
Think of another song until the earworm changes 2 (28.6%)
Think of the line and a half I do know until I go crazy 2 (28.6%)
Learn the damned song so I at least have a complete earworm 3 (42.9%)
Make up my own words and eventually believe they're the real ones 0 (0.0%)
Opt for death 0 (0.0%)
- Mood:
crazed
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