Things you hate IV

As a a 'researcher' I've always had access to various grades of ethanol (alcohol, EtOH). As students we used to dilute the bench top, '100%', alcohol (actually a maximum 95.485 % EtOH) roughly 50:50 with water to make a very acceptable 'vodka'. EtOH is an example of a azeotropic mixture with water - you can't distil it any purer 95.485% we, of course, used to taste this and as EtOH is a very powerful hygroscopic agent, it would be nowhere near 95.485% purity - it would be very dehydrating and taste 'sweet'. Dunno if you remember the Austrian Wine scandal of the mid 80's - they 'needed' to 'up' their white wines' alcohol content without upping its sweetness so added ethan-di-ol (HOEtOH) to the wine.

Now, I'm primarily an applied spectroscopist and need ultra-pure reagents (called Analar grade 'Gold' standard or "five nines", 99.999% purity) in experiments. This is called absolute EtOH and is synthesized not distilled. We devised a method to get a sample of this absolute EtOH to drink with minimal exposure to the air. This again was difficult to taste (other than "...sweet...") due to the dehydrating effect and was an odd experience getting drunk on about 25ml of booze.

As an aside, in the chem labs in Lithuania you had open access to as much benzene, cyanide etc. as you could carry. EtOH was kept locked up and supplies were only distributed via a signed 'chit' system that required three signatures ( supervisor, head of section and head of group) of the exact amount you required.

 

Memory's getting foggy (too much EtOH in my youth?) it was DEG (di-ethylene glycol, or 2,2′-Oxydiethanol, OHEtOEtOH). Apols.

 

Hate isn't the right word, but the BBC literally cannot go a single day without having an article about someone who is transgender on their news home page.

 

When you wake up to an email suggesting that a parcel will be delivered to your work address at 7:32.
Make every effort to get there in time, turn up at 7:33 and then realise that the email stipulates 7:32 tomorrow, not 7:32 today.

 

Haha, reminds me of when I booked an Easyjet flight to Barcelona a day later than I meant. Not so easytodealwith for such a simple error.

 

We were at the theatre the weekend before last, and there was a slight altercation involving a family of four sat in front of us who were in the seats assigned to another group. Turned out the family’s tickets were for the previous Saturday - wrong by an entire week…

 

That's not as bad as a friend of mine who was 24 hours late for a flight leaving New Zealand, the flight time as something like 0030 and had to be there 2-3 hours early but of course he made the error of misreading the details and was extremely late!

 

Why is it that when I don't like a particular actor they then turn up in every new drama.

 

My auntie went to get a bus in Mexico the next town over at 3 o'clock, but when she got there, she crossed a date line and was an hour late.

 

Fitness ads on social media, with animations, where a person’s skin is made transparent to show where all their fat resides. FFS.

 

Is that what Danny Rose is up to now?

 

Negativity

 

Most ironic post ever

 

People that use F’s instead of TH’s.

Makes me twitch when I hear it. Like scratches down a blackboard.

 

It’s just possible that Things You Hate isn’t the thread for you then.

 

Refuse to do either and you can’t say fairer than that.

 

All the blessing that goes on between the school mums. 'Oh bless you for thinking of me.' 'Oh she's got Covid? Oh bless her.'

What in the medieval christianity is going on?

What do they actually mean? Do they actually believe the bountiful blessings of a benevolent Jaweh will rain down on the subject because they invoked the blessing spell?

Just stop it. It's empty sentiment and hypocrisy.

 

Old People in Supermarkets.

 

Yeah. Nuke the buggers.

 

moog. Bless.

 

You can add calling people ‘my lovely’ to this. Another school mums favourite. ‘No problem my lovely’, ‘you alright my lovely?’

Lovely ******* what?

 

Yes!

It's ********.

 

That happens with central defenders too

 

When I was at university in Loughborough, the locals would call you "duck". Leicestershire is full of weirdos.

 

‘Duck’ is common across the East Mids. Once you get to Brum its ‘Chick’ or ‘Co.ck’.

I think these terms are endearing and not the kind of simpering and insincere pretensions moog refers to.

 

‘Me Duck’ or ‘Duckeh’ seems to be dying out now.

You’ll only really hear it in Loughborough on a market day when all of the oldies are out. I grew up just outside Loughborough so I didn’t pick up the accent but it does have quite a strong and unique accent unlike other towns in the area like Melton or Coalville.

 

Not arguing with that.

Did you ever nip over the M1 to Shepshed? Very strange folk over there.

I live in Melton now and it’s got a weirdly rural yet chavy vibe to it. More of Yorkshire flavour without the nauseating accent.

 

I think I got petrol there once but usually I only ever went through the village.

 

In Northampton it's all 'me duck'...when the missus comments on my accent with 'that was very Watfordian, me duck' she won't have it when I tell her how strong her Northampton accent is. (Luckily it's not really strong, as I don't think I'd have been able to put with that for all these years.)

 

Yeah, it's the gushing falseness that I hate. The colloquial address terms I don't mind too much.

 

Hot tubs in holiday lets.

I suppose this is more things that I don’t get as opposed to hate. After all, if a holiday for you involves soaking in a nasty sex pond on some wooden decking, who am I to judge? Even if it contains so much spunk it resembles a giant vat of Egg Drop Soup.

But since when was having a hot bath outdoors a thing for anyone but a monkey living up a Japanese mountain?

Ah how the cool evenings pass sitting in the bath with the family.

 

100% with you on this one. Add to the the sex muck the weeks of kids pi55ing in there, plus all the other detritus that we shed. NO THANKS.
£3K a week at Centre Parcs in August for the privilege.

 

Pretentious pricks

 

You a hot tub fan then TVOR?