h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

My Mum often said that there was snow on her birthday (mid April) more often than Christmas Day. It's the swing of 10 degrees from one day to the next which is a bit disorientating.

PH: Having to choose a replacement for a long lasting household item. Just recently both my hair dryer & iron have died, after some 40 years service. Hard to get items with just basic functions these days.

I don't remember cricket being stopped by snow in August, but I do remember it in June 1975.
Mind you it was a match in Buxton, up in the hills, where you are always advised to add a vest and take an extra jumper, whatever time of year you go.
Lovely town though.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/jun/01/weatherwatch-freak-snow-stopped-cricket-on-2-june-1975

More recently April 2016 at Old Trafford.
https://twitter.com/Gilo/status/724972047680557057

PH: Printers

Day 1:

SQ presses 'Print'
Printer: 'Black Ink Low'
SQ: 'OK - print in single cartridge mode then'
Printer: 'No'

Day 2:

SQ installs new black ink cartridge and presses 'Print'
Printer: 'Printing in single cartridge mode' - 'Colour Ink Low'
SQ: 'Gah'

The watering down of the term 'In stock'. A lot of retailers now seem happy to take your money and allow you to place an order for something which is 'in stock', but actually all they mean by this is that the product exists somewhere on earth.

Latest of a long line of examples; I ordered RAM from Crucial. Days after my order I'm told that actually they don't have the stock to supply straight away... 2 weeks later after I chase the order, they say it's now in stock and being despatched. Right enough a sequence of emails every 2 days or so, seems to confirm its passage from them to the courier, a 24 hour service...

Only no upon closer inspection of the tracking page I see that Royal Mail is still waiting for the package because it's still making its way across.. Germany... now it's in The Hague.. destination UK sometime next week maybe before it then becomes a 24 hour service?

If something is out of stock just say so goddammit! Why do this? I could've actually ordered from somewhere with physical stock. Maybe Of course I know why they do it .

Wow, that is more than a petty hate...

My PH of the day is a version of shrinkflation - an item of clothing I needed is now 30% cheaper than it was last time I bought it, but made with 50% less material, so it doesn’t fit as well and won’t last as long as the fabric is so much thinner...

Current PH: so many small gadgets/appliances are USB powered these days. Means having somewhere to plug them in to charge & ensure charge full before taking anywhere. Why can't we have some battery options for going 'off grid' places.

Solar Charged USB battery packs are available, if that helps...
https://www.independent.co.uk/extras/indybest/gadgets-tech/phones-accessories/best-solar-charger-battery-b1871460.html

Also, I am very happy for some plug standardization. I hated the days when every gadget and every mobile device had a proprietary plug, or one of those generic power plugs of indeterminate voltage and amperage. I think DNA would be happy with the near ubiquity of USB outlets these days.
http://douglasadams.com/dna/980707-03-a.html

It is good, eliminates safety issues of rewiring plugs. One plug & lead does for several of my devices (in turn) or even a multi usb plug to save blocking loads of sockets.
I'd just like to have a choice, especially for portable gadgets.

PH: Last week I received a letter saying, “As per our recent letter, here is the document we promised to send you.” Today I received a letter saying, “Thank you for your enquiry. We will send you a document within the next 7 days.”

The postal service (Royal Mail) really is getting bad. Several times I have had letters sent to me by banks and official organisations in the UK half of which don't arrive.

Also the cost of postage seems to have gone through the roof. Not to mention parcels. My sister spent £95 just to send Christmas presents to my grandchildren (her great nieces and nephews) - just a few books!) - last Christmas.

That is more than a petty hate that your mail doesn't arrive The cost is another thing indeed - I wanted to post some items that fitted neatly into a tiny padded envelope, but it would have cost £3.95 to send that, because it was classed as a small parcel. Placing the items side by side in an A4 envelope cost 95p as it was classed as a large letter...

Our postal service, USPS, is being destroyed from within and without.

Years ago, the US Congress passed some resolution that requires the USPS to FULLY fund its healthcare and pension funds. That means they have to basically have cash on hand for all current and past employees full pensions and insurance plans. That's billions of dollars that just sit putting the USPS in massive debt when they had previous operated a tidy profit. No other employer is expected to have a cash reserve like that. The workers didn't ask for it. It's just crippling the USPS. Then during the Trump administration, Louis DeJoy was appointed as Postmaster General and he's been doing everything he can to bury the USPS. He's closed many post offices across the country leaving neighboring ones short handed and over tasked. He infamously ordered the removal and destruction of mail sorting machines just before the 2020 election, likely in an attempt to thwart vote-by-mail and any advantage they imagined that might give Democrats (not that there's much evidence that vote-by-mail is favored by Democrats over Republican voters). Much of this has benefited his former company and businesses he's invested in.

And what really gets me is even though there's lots of attention given to the damage DeJoy is doing, I've seen no indication Congress is at all interested in fixing the problem a previous Congress created regarding the pension fund.

Here's John Oliver explaining some of the problems the USPS is facing.
http://youtu.be/IoL8g0W9gAQ

And here's some recent news about Louis DeJoy from Rachel Maddow.

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/louis-dejoy-finance-entanglements-with-supportive-usps-board-member-raise-ethics-questions-118682181957

Today's PH.
Programme scheduling (particularly BBC). My pet peeves are showing episodes of a drama or documentary on consecutive evenings, sometimes over a full week. Also there's a new drama scheduled for 9.30 - 10.30 pm on one channel, clashing wit the 10 pm news.
I know I could record & re-schedule but I often end up then with half watched series or half an hour available & only hour long programmes stored.

New PH:
Almost everyone interviewed about the return to school & work seems to be saying how covid restrictions etc has affected their mental health. I know mental health is as important as physical health, but no-one says it's affected their physical health ( eg lack of exercise, poor diet )
Just seems to be almost trivialising the issue of serious mental health issues, as opposed to normal reactions to change, stressful situations etc. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I can't help wondering if a lot of our young people think they have a mental health problem when it's just normal emotions?

Yeah, that postal service situation is more than a petty hate...

Good point about the risk of trivialising serious issues... On the one hand it is positive that more people are able to be open about hidden matters rather than bottling things up in the name of resilience, but on the other hand it might mean that people who need professional help don't seek it because they don't realise the seriousness.

I've seen some mention of 'lockdown pounds' in relation to physical health, but with eating disorders mental and physical health are closely linked.

While I truly despise videos that auto-play at full volume, I have petty hate for those that auto-play muted as well. If it's an ad or something invasive, I still prefer muted than not, but I'm talking about things you're actively trying to view. Some boofcake pages do this, particularly one I've "liked" associated with BBC comedies. I get a notification for a new video clip. I click on the link. The video automatically starts playing and I have to click un-mute and then back the video back up to the start.

Who, exactly, did they think would appreciate this behaviour?

I just hate auto play of either sort!