Things that have bothered you for a long time.

[Juan Kog]

Ok, so it hasn't happened recently (hurray!) But sometimes my external loudspeakers are out of sync with the TV.

Not had that problem. Sometimes my external speakers decide they’ve had enough and switch off mid programme .This is followed by me randomly pushing buttons on the TV and speaker remotes to coax them back into action.

 

[Yellow Fang]

Why did Elizabeth Beresford write The Wombles with only one female character, and she the cook and the cleaner?

 

[KnittyNorah]

Why did Elizabeth Beresford write The Wombles with only one female character, and she the cook and the cleaner?

Her first book featuring The Wombles was published in 1968. This was still the era of tightly-restricted quotas for girls entering university and 'the professions', women 'not being permitted' to enter many trades as apprentices, and well before the equal pay act. I know, I and several of my schoolfriends experienced this directly in the mid - late 1960s.

Elisabeth Beresford was already in her 40s when the first of The Wombles series was published; she was naturally influenced - as we all are - by the times in which she was writing and the earlier, even more restrictive times in which she was educated and grew up (with the brief hiatus of WW2 excepted).

 

[mustang1]

How do food advertisers, suppliers and packagers get away with their food images? Take macdonalds for example, they have images of quarter pounders with plenty of crispy lettuce, pickles, ketchup, etc. Then you buy it and get a thin meat pattie, a single piece of limp lettuce, at most one pickle slice and ketchup so thin you're not even sure it's there!

Pizza boxes with images of handmade pizzas restaurants would be proud of containing pizzas that have very little toppings that looks like it's artificial sauce on it.

Food advertisements are supposedly controlled by false advertising legislation I thought but not with images used to sell it.

I think that any supplier or advertiser of Food should be subhected to the simple test. Does it turn out like the advert or packaging images of the average purchaser follows the cooking instructions? Does the food you get given match the images in the takeaway? If not then the supplying and advertising company should be heavily fined and made to use the images taken as evidence for their advertising. Can you imagine an image of a quarter pounder that looks more like a tenth of a pounder without anything added like lettuce, pickles or ketchup being used to sell the product? I'd love for certain major fast food chains selling their products with realistic images of what they're selling.

Watch the movie Falling Down.

 

[classic33]

Watch the movie Falling Down.

Or see post 2,780, on this thread.

 

[colly]

Why tradesmen alway say "Free Quote" like ever anyone would pay for one.

Not strictly true.

A quote for insurance purposes might well involve a fee.
I suppose the reasoning is that insurance companies usually require three quotes and in cases like that the odds are against you. Not only that but the insurance company may well stump up for the cost.

Edit. I used to charge for an insurance quote as it happens.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

On the way to look after the grand-kids this afternoon we stopped at a red traffic light near a string of local shops
One was a William Hill

Why is it that they always have a very smart well maintained shop with very clean glass and constantly changing large posters in the window
and have excellently created, produced, directed advert using famous, and therefore expensive, celebrities

and amazingly good web sites with constantly changing and well thought and 'games' with, I presume, lots of bells and whistles.

and yet loads of people make bets with these companies on in the belief that they have a 'good chance' of winning

personally I am very glad I cannot see the point in proper gambling - even a Lotto ticket stresses me

but the big gambling companies - by which I very much include Bingo companies - still keep being allowed to attract people and tell them they have a good chance of winning and that it is something they almost SHOULD be doing

When - overall - if they did have a good chance of winning the companies would go out of business

biggest con jobs out there!!!

 

[Andy in Germany]

On the way to look after the grand-kids this afternoon we stopped at a red traffic light near a string of local shops
One was a William Hill

Why is it that they always have a very smart well maintained shop with very clean glass and constantly changing large posters in the window
and have excellently created, produced, directed advert using famous, and therefore expensive, celebrities

and amazingly good web sites with constantly changing and well thought and 'games' with, I presume, lots of bells and whistles.

and yet loads of people make bets with these companies on in the belief that they have a 'good chance' of winning

personally I am very glad I cannot see the point in proper gambling - even a Lotto ticket stresses me

but the big gambling companies - by which I very much include Bingo companies - still keep being allowed to attract people and tell them they have a good chance of winning and that it is something they almost SHOULD be doing

When - overall - if they did have a good chance of winning the companies would go out of business

biggest con jobs out there!!!

I've never been interested in gambling of any kind; as with you I quickly reasoned that if the companies paid out as frequently as they claimed, they would be out of business. I was startled when I heard the in Germany slot machines, et c, have to be programmed to make a minimum of 50% payouts. I'm not sure in what time period. Originally I was naively surprised that this was only 50% meaning in other jurisdictions it must be much lower, but it also occurred to me that for many people that will be interpreted as a 50% chance of winning, which I can't help feeling will pull more people in.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

I've never been interested in gambling of any kind; as with you I quickly reasoned that if the companies paid out as frequently as they claimed, they would be out of business. I was startled when I heard the in Germany slot machines, et c, have to be programmed to make a minimum of 50% payouts. I'm not sure in what time period. Originally I was naively surprised that this was only 50% meaning in other jurisdictions it must be much lower, but it also occurred to me that for many people that will be interpreted as a 50% chance of winning, which I can't help feeling will pull more people in.

Just after the war my Dad used to go to an RAF club - or something like that - and they had a proper old One Arm Bandit

He was chatting to the manager one day when it was broken and commenting on how quickly he had managed to get someone out to fix it.
Turned out it was such a major priority because the profit from it was more than for the rest of the whole club put together.

 

[Andy in Germany]

Just after the war my Dad used to go to an RAF club - or something like that - and they had a proper old One Arm Bandit

He was chatting to the manager one day when it was broken and commenting on how quickly he had managed to get someone out to fix it.
Turned out it was such a major priority because the profit from it was more than for the rest of the whole club put together.

You'd think people would notice: the clue is in the name.

 

[classic33]

You'd think people would notice: the clue is in the name.

I want a purely mechanical one, for use as a money box.

A neighbour had one years ago, and had had the payout adjusted for fewer wins. 50p in and I got the first jackpot.

 

[Andy in Germany]

I want a purely mechanical one, for use as a money box.

A neighbour had one years ago, and had had the payout adjusted for fewer wins. 50p in and I got the first jackpot.

You scared it.

 

[DRM]

I've never been interested in gambling of any kind; as with you I quickly reasoned that if the companies paid out as frequently as they claimed, they would be out of business. I was startled when I heard the in Germany slot machines, et c, have to be programmed to make a minimum of 50% payouts. I'm not sure in what time period. Originally I was naively surprised that this was only 50% meaning in other jurisdictions it must be much lower, but it also occurred to me that for many people that will be interpreted as a 50% chance of winning, which I can't help feeling will pull more people in.

Used to work at an amusement machine supplier, iirc it was a 73% payout, but what would happen is the machine would calculate that the percentage was down, so it paid out till it was at the preset level, at this point all the pub landlord would hear was the sound of 10p coins coming out, would ring up a breakdown to say it’s paying out too much, the engineer comes out, resets it so the actual percentage paid out was probably about 4%, then to cap it all a burglar would sneak in at night, break into the bit holding the cash box and disappear into the night, nobody heard a thing, honest, even their slobbering, angry, nasty Rottweiler/Doberman /German Shepherd that each pub always had, and the burglar would leave the machine looking similar to the van on the Italian Job at the point Michael Caine announced you’re only supposed to blow the bl**dy doors off!
Only one person wins on a one arm bandit, the person that gets the takings.

 

[slowmotion]

Did they ever discover who The Putney Pusher was? All those spy cameras caught him doing his nasty act, but did they ever make a difference?

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

Did they ever discover who The Putney Pusher was? All those spy cameras caught him doing his nasty act, but did they ever make a difference?

Last I heard they found someone but it turned out to be the wrong person

No word of anyone else that I have seen

Although some people must have recognised him from the footage - but are keeping quiet