Speculation: And yet again...the Off-Topic Thread

Winger98

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Feb 27, 2002
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Winger98

Moderator
Feb 27, 2002
22,831
4,713
Cleveland
I'll kick this one off. So, apparently those big arms that come down and block your way at turnpike tollbooths are made of foam and hurt nothing on your car if you decide to say to hell with the system and stick it to the man.

I have an Easy Pass which, for those who don't know, is a little wifi box that is stuck to the inside of your windshield and pays your tolls wirelessly so you can just drive up and go. Well, these things are not an exact science. If you have a row of cars all going through sometimes the bar comes down, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it comes down part way and then goes back up. Sometimes it stubbornly comes all the way down, pauses for every car, and then goes up. It's not consistent from exit to exit, lane to lane, or even car to car. Oh, and if you misred what's going on or if the car ahead of you is a dill and sits too long before going through and the arm comes down after reading you, it will then refuse to go back up unless someone hits a button

So, I'm in line. I'm next to go. The thing goes up. I pause a moment. It doesn't come back down, so I start going.

The arm comes down.

It smacks across the hood of the van, catches part of the windshield. I'm sort of a mix of emotions as I watch this arm thump off the car and just say to hell with it. I gun the gas as impressively as you can in a 2010 Dodge Grand Caravan, plough through what's left of the arm, and go home. I call them, they ask if the car is damaged, I say no. They say not to worry about it. So now I'm thinking that whenever I'm having a rough day, I might just barrel through the things for funs.
 

jaster

Take me off ignore, please.
Jun 8, 2007
13,270
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I'll kick this one off. So, apparently those big arms that come down and block your way at turnpike tollbooths are made of foam and hurt nothing on your car if you decide to say to hell with the system and stick it to the man.

I have an Easy Pass which, for those who don't know, is a little wifi box that is stuck to the inside of your windshield and pays your tolls wirelessly so you can just drive up and go. Well, these things are not an exact science. If you have a row of cars all going through sometimes the bar comes down, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it comes down part way and then goes back up. Sometimes it stubbornly comes all the way down, pauses for every car, and then goes up. It's not consistent from exit to exit, lane to lane, or even car to car. Oh, and if you misred what's going on or if the car ahead of you is a dill and sits too long before going through and the arm comes down after reading you, it will then refuse to go back up unless someone hits a button

So, I'm in line. I'm next to go. The thing goes up. I pause a moment. It doesn't come back down, so I start going.

The arm comes down.

It smacks across the hood of the van, catches part of the windshield. I'm sort of a mix of emotions as I watch this arm thump off the car and just say to hell with it. I gun the gas as impressively as you can in a 2010 Dodge Grand Caravan, plough through what's left of the arm, and go home. I call them, they ask if the car is damaged, I say no. They say not to worry about it. So now I'm thinking that whenever I'm having a rough day, I might just barrel through the things for funs.

I'll just say, they ain't all foam in Chicago :laugh:
 
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FabricDetails

HF still in need of automated text analytics
Mar 30, 2009
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I'll kick this one off. So, apparently those big arms that come down and block your way at turnpike tollbooths are made of foam and hurt nothing on your car if you decide to say to hell with the system and stick it to the man.

I really like the Ohio Turnpike rest stops.
 
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Winger98

Moderator
Feb 27, 2002
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Cleveland
I really like the Ohio Turnpike rest stops.

They are some of the best I've been to. New York has some interesting ones, at least up 90 towards Buffalo where the shops are built into a structure spanning the road and people from each side park and eat/shop in the middle. Means they get crazy busy, though, too.
 
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FabricDetails

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Anybody here know what "Scope Creep" is?

I wonder- Has anyone here ever been the asshole trying to push someone for that scope creep?

How do you sleep at night? Haha. "If I squeeze the hell out of this contract then I'll get a bonus!"
 
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Winger98

Moderator
Feb 27, 2002
22,831
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Cleveland
Anybody here know what "Scope Creep" is?

I wonder- Has anyone here ever been the asshole trying to push someone for that scope creep?

How do you sleep at night? Haha. "If I squeeze the hell out of this contract then I'll get a bonus!"

My wife deals with it all of the time in her job. Honestly, it often seems as if a client was just unwilling to think anything through when their project started and refused to ask any questions until well into the process. Other times it as been clear that someone higher up the food chain heard about it and wanted to put their two cents in despite not being around for the whole project. They do have one client, though, who just seems to pull it as a standard part of doing business with them despite being told no. Repeatedly. Of course, this client is also a cash cow so you roll your eyes and deal with it.
 

FabricDetails

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My wife deals with it all of the time in her job. Honestly, it often seems as if a client was just unwilling to think anything through when their project started and refused to ask any questions until well into the process. Other times it as been clear that someone higher up the food chain heard about it and wanted to put their two cents in despite not being around for the whole project. They do have one client, though, who just seems to pull it as a standard part of doing business with them despite being told no. Repeatedly. Of course, this client is also a cash cow so you roll your eyes and deal with it.

Yeah my day to day contact (what inspired the post) seems like the unwitting type you described when it comes to scope creep but I've met with her bosses as well and they seem like the bully business type when it comes to it. As in, I'm going to keep mentioning how what you're giving us doesn't suit our needs and I'm fully aware of what's in the contract and I'm going to see if I can make you feel bad enough that you make promises to us you're not allowed to make. I will see the latter types in hell.
 
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jkutswings

hot piss hockey
Jul 10, 2014
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Anybody here know what "Scope Creep" is?
Ten months ago I transferred to a different location within the same company. And I went from testing with well-defined agreements and highly structured processes...

...to all that going out the window, and scope creep being so commonplace that most of the lab personnel have resigned themselves to expecting it.

Dear Scope Creep:

i-hate-you-with-the-fire-of-a-thousand-suns.jpg
 
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FabricDetails

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It took me all the tries today to get the NYT one. Both my first guesses came up empty too. Tricky word today.

The answer came to mind but I didn't want to guess it because it felt like a waste. But I was at attempt #4 so I said fine, F it...
 
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izlez

We need more toe-drags/60
Feb 28, 2012
4,627
3,515
It took me all the tries today to get the NYT one. Both my first guesses came up empty too. Tricky word today.
I only had 1 letter through 3 and decided to go off the board on my 4th to figure out some more letters. I got 0 on my 4th. Finally got it on my last guess.

Side note: the first ever one I did I got in 2 and I thought the game was going to be dumb and super easy. I've only had like 2-3 in 3 since then.
 

Lil Sebastian Cossa

Opinions are share are my own personal opinions.
Jul 6, 2012
11,436
7,446
Those cowards at the NYT didn't accept Elden as my starting word.

I stick to TACOS. Didn't help me today, but damn, I like tacos.

Different note, any of you guys play the Diablo series? I played it a decent amount back when it was more new (like almost two decades ago) and a year or so ago got the old version of D2 from Blizzard before they released the HD remaster. It's a bit dated in gameplay mode, I'm sure, but it's actually kind of fun running around bashing in things heads with double swords. Never got super far, just currently at Act 2 of Nightmare difficulty.

I know I'm not exactly challenging the horsepower of my computer by playing it, but I like old games, what can I say.
 

jkutswings

hot piss hockey
Jul 10, 2014
11,000
8,750
I stick to TACOS. Didn't help me today, but damn, I like tacos.
I use ADIEU for my starting word. Knocks out 4 vowels right off the bat. If I get zero hits there, I use STORY next, to hit the O and Y with the 3 most common consonants.

Different note, any of you guys play the Diablo series? I played it a decent amount back when it was more new (like almost two decades ago) and a year or so ago got the old version of D2 from Blizzard before they released the HD remaster. It's a bit dated in gameplay mode, I'm sure, but it's actually kind of fun running around bashing in things heads with double swords. Never got super far, just currently at Act 2 of Nightmare difficulty.

I know I'm not exactly challenging the horsepower of my computer by playing it, but I like old games, what can I say.
Love me some D2. Eventually I'll get the reboot with the improved graphics, but back in the day my friends and I played the daylights out of it.

To explain things for our younger posters, back before online gaming around the world was commonplace, nerds had LAN parties, creating Local Access Networks with Ethernet cable and playing PC games with friends.

And when playing on a local network instead of BattleNet, you had your own save file. That you could copy. So when playing with a friend, you could use different versions of your save file to duplicate as many items as you wanted. Meaning that in D2, you could duplicate runes and then transmute then in the Horadric cube to create whatever incredible rune words that you felt like.

I had a level 90-something zeal / fanaticism paladin that hit like a truck, with 12 attacks per click, and the best armor pieces around. He killed anything that moved, quick fast and in a hurry. Good times.
 

Bench

3 is a good start
Aug 14, 2011
21,238
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I stick to TACOS. Didn't help me today, but damn, I like tacos.

I used "sword" out of spite.

Different note, any of you guys play the Diablo series?

Many moons ago. These days the typical ARPG kinda bores me. At some point that novelty of a billion dudes coming at me and dropping random loot lost its endorphin loop in my brain. I wish it didn't, because I like to like things.

Diablo 4 and Path of Exile 2 look interesting, though. But I burn out on those games like basically as soon as I finish the story one time. I have a buddy that plays them on a loop though, so it's definitely a taste thing.

But enough about that because Elden Ring is out and my weekend is booked.
 

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