People I hate: People That Don't Know How To Use The TV Remote

I'll give you the remote, soon as you can tell the difference between Live TV and Recorded.

We haven't had a good people I hate rant in a while, so here we go.

I hate when a complete television novice decides they're going to be the ones in charge of the remote for the day.  Not only are you embarrasing yourself, but you're ruining the afternoon for the rest of us. Fumbling to find certain buttons on the controller, a complete lack of awareness as to how long a commercial break lasts (it's a minute and half to 2 minutes, tops people), general disregard for the viewing priority of others, and 0 understanding of the Chanel line up.  If this any of those describe you, don't fucking touch the remote.  Offer it up to a more experienced couch potato and just enjoy the ride.  It takes a big man to admit he may not be the best person suited for remote control duties, it takes an asshole to realize this and ignore it at the peril, aggravation, and outright boredom of others.

A few simple standards and rules:

1. If you don't know where the HD channels are, you're a moron.  This especially true if we're talking about comcast.  95% of the time if you throw a 7 or an 8 in front of the chanel number, that'll get the job done.  4 year olds can figure this out for chrissakes.  In the rarest of rare cases that this doesn't solve the problem, hit OK and it'll ask if you'd like to jump to HD, in bright high-lighted yellow.  You really can't miss it. There is no excuse for making me watch a basketball game  like it's 1996 and my parents just bought a state of the art 36 inch tube television.

2. If you want or need to browse the channels, fine.  If you choose to do this by opening the full guide that takes up 3/4'ths of the screen, I reserve the right to bludgeon you with the remote.  In fact I wouldn't mind starting a petition to remove this option from the controller all together, there is absolutely no need for this.  Just hit the OK button and browse 3 channels at a time like a normal human being.  If you really need to see the extra two channels of options you probably shouldn't be commandeering the remote.

3. Get your "Last" Button situation under control.  If you were like most heterosexual males this past weekend you were flipping back and forth between basketball games.  Get the two channels together so you can just hit last.  Spare me the opening of the guide or the menu to flick to the game each time.  It's quicker, it won't raise my blood pressure, and you won't risk selecting the wrong channel and subjecting us all to 30 seconds of Sex and the City, followed by 5 minutes of ridicule from every guy in the room. 

4. Understand the hierarchy of importance for each show.  A live march madness game trumps an inter league spring training game.  I don't care if you more into baseball than basketball, that's not real baseball.  That's not even a real sport.  Any event where Billy Chrystal was given a roster sport should not be on the radar for television viewing.  Go read a book if you're that boring of a person.  Seriously.

5. If you're dealing with Direct TV, give the remote to someone that owns Direct TV. Don't try to be a hero, too much shit can go wrong.  One second you're trying to find TruTV in HD, the next thing you know  you've hit a combination of buttons that shuts down the satellite service and now you're stuck waiting 3 hours for the service repair man to climb up on your roof and reset it.  No one that doesn't own Direct TV understands that remote. It's ok to admit this. Shit is confusing as hell and they do it on purpose. It's one of their advertising features, it stops annoying people from coming into your living room and commandeering the remote on you like they own the place.

That's it, 5 simple rules to television viewing and using the remote control.  Failure to comply will result in you being asked to leave, possible physical harm, and the possible guilt knowing that you were the cause of my heart attack as my blood pressure slowly boiled over watching you bumble from one mistake to the next. 

Wrap Up From South Boston's St. Patricks Day Parade, With Some Naked Guy Patrolling the Subway

Nice way to kick off the day on the way to the Southie Parade for St. Patrick's Day.  Just a dude loving life, stark ass naked patrolling the tunnels of the MBTA (I'm glad he wore socks though, the floor is gross, you have to draw the line somewhere).

The Southie parade was yesterday, and was an all around blast as usual.  Drinking, house parties, drunk hooligans making asses of themselves, and the worlds most bizarre parade...I don't think that's much of an exagerration.  Do many other St. Patty's day parades include white people marching around with a Chinese Dragon, the folks of China Town doing their best marching band impression, fat and bloated Elvis, Fat and Bloated Mr. T (guy had worse cafeteria lady arms than, well, a cafeteria lady), Storm Troopers, and the Tin Man.  All mixed in with your usual suspects, bag pipers, firemen, and Shriners just causing mayhem in their little go-kart things...

The real story for the day was the terrible job the MBTA did preparing for this day.  Did the annual parade just sneak up on everyone over there running Boston's subway system?  This does happen every year right? Maybe you want to run a few extra trains to Southie for the day?

Take a look at the video below, that's the crowd waiting for the train on the way into the parade in the morning...This is downtown Boston mind you, not Bangladesh or Mumbai, we're not exactly accustomed to having to sexually assault our way to a spot on the subway.  Can you imagine being stuck dick to ass with Naked Guy in this mess? That would start your day off on the wrong foot.

The missteps continued in the afternoon, with the MBTA making rides free up until 6 pm.  That's right, the MBTA, constantly crying broke and threatening to hike service prices, didn't charge on one of the single biggest rushes of the year.  Real freaken smart businessmen they got running the show over there.

Anyway, finally boarded the train home, saw the usual sights, drunk creatures in various states of consciousness, and a few tough guys swearing up a storm trying to intimidate anyone who asked them to watch their mouths (who later commented how their Dad would be pissed if they didn't make it home in time for curfew, yea, real tough guys). 

All in all a great afternoon in Southie, hope I'm not back til next year.

Mother of Australian Bully Calls for Apology...From the Internet I guess?

Fox News - The mother of an Australian bully who's become an Internet sensation for being body-slammed on video by one of his victims says she wants an apology.  But Gale's mother, Tina, says she and her family are the victims, now that the video has gone viral, and she says Heynes owes her family an apology. "We don't need this posted everywhere," she told Australia's Seven Network on Wednesday. "I would like him to apologize." Tina said she while was "shocked" at Ritchard's behavior, she didn't think he deserved to be slammed to the ground. Neither boy suffered serious injuries in the fight....

The school however did not pick sides in the fight and instead suspended both boys for four days. Trial attorney Lee Armstrong said that was a mistake and unfair to Heynes. "We understand that in the past he gets bullied every day… If this was like a Wii video game and we could control his limbs, that's exactly what one of us would have done," Armstrong told Fox News. "The fact that this smaller kid can't appreciate the difference in size between himself and a larger kid is his problem. This kid should not have been suspended."

This is why I love Australians, it's not just their delightfully comical accents, it's there general common sense out look on life.  Like this kid's lawyer didn't come out and pussyfoot around this issue, he laid the facts out straight.  The bully doesn't deserve an apology, if he was too dumb to realize the kid he was picking on could crush him and eat him for a snack thats his own fault.  You've also got to love how the lawyer got the Wii involved here, using an example everyone can understand.  They may not be the brightest or most sophisticated people, just a special talent for cutting through the bullshit and calling spade a spade. 

PS: Who did this mom expect an apology from? The Internet? Like the poor bullied fat kid didn't make this video go viral, and I'm fairly certain Youtube isn't about to send an I'm Sorry E-Card. 

Utah State Science Geeks Drop 20,000 Bouncy Balls From Helicopter

Get them excited about science with what exactly? The hypothesis that a bunch of bouncy balls dropped from altitude will bounce? Gee, ya think? What exactly was the scientific reasoning behind this? No, that's a serious question, please answer me.  I mean besides blowing you Geek Club's entire budget for the year on 20k rubber balls, a helicopter rental, and the police detail ensuring you don't kill anyone by dropping falling objects from a flying machine, what did you accomplish here? 

Would I be excited as a kid? Hell yes, the chance to grab free bouncy balls in any situation would excite me, but I'd see right through your thinly veiled disguise that this was a science project.

Reminds me of a certain kid I knew in middle schools, lets call him Penny Packer.  Penny Packer, in all seriousness, hypothesized that a basketball would have greater bounce with air in it than if it were flat. Way to go out on a ledge there Packer.  Funny part is that to this very day, he still defends the scientific merit behind that project.  Really? What's next "I hypothesize that boiling water is hotter to the touch than room temperature water?"

McDonalds Commercial Blatantly Stereotyping Irish During the 1980's

I'm just shocked to see that McDonald's made a commercial at some point that wasn't all black people. I just assumed that's the way they've advertised since the beginning of time.

It's amazing to think that McDonald's made it out of this alive. Sure it helped that it was made in the 1980's before Twitter came around and everyone had a forum to bitch about all their injustices, but I think it's more than just that.  It's the way the Irish are, they don't take offense and flip out about every little political injustice. 

Characterize them as alcoholics, leprechauns, a bunch of funny looking gingers, hobbits, potato eaters, doesn't matter, they'll laugh with you, probably curse you under your breath and share a pint with you.  Life's too short to care. 

The rest of the world could take a lesson here, like can you imagine if this footage was McDonald's throwing a yarmulke as a lid on a soft-drink? Or some kid finding a dradel in his Happy Meal?  You'd hear outrage from Manhattan to Hollywood all day until the ad was pulled.   

Or how about if the voice over was speaking in an Italian Mob accent over a cup of McDonald's Coffee?  Every guinea politician would be up in arms crying foul more than they already do over the Jersey Shore. 

No excuse me while I go get my Irish on and find a seat at the bar, big day off for the CW, basketball and pints starting at noon. 

Woman Thought Her 9 Pound Baby Was "Just A Stomach Ache"

Fox News - A 35-year-old mother-of-two – who had no idea that she was pregnant with her third child – delivered a healthy 9-pound baby boy after going to the hospital with a severe stomachache, The Daily Mail reported.  Lesley Nicholl from England said she was amazed when she was told she was carrying a baby who was already a few days overdue. Hours later, she gave birth via cesarean section at Homerton Hospital, in East London.  “I have seen this before. There are many women who may have irregular periods, and they don’t realize it when they become pregnant. Some of these women are overweight, and therefore do not perceive movement as the fetus grows,” he said. “Because of this, many of these women do not see a doctor. I remember 20 years ago, a patient came into the emergency room complaining of cramps. Upon examining her, I realized that she was pregnant and about to give birth.”

I'm trying to give you ladies the benefit of the doubt, I really am.  But you've got to get a handle on your weakest 10% here because they're making you all look bad.

I'm sorry, I don't care how fat you are, unless you're clinically retarded you should notice a living human being growing inside of you.  Maybe it's just me, but I find it hard to believe a woman would walk around for 9 months feeling like she had a stomach ache or had to take a monster shit without questioning what was going on inside of her.  

It's not like this one hasn't had a kid before and wasn't familiar, it's her third one.  Like when you felt the kid kicking, what did you think that was?  Just the bad batch of chili-cheese dogs you polished off at lunch? What the hell ladies? 

And how bad do you feel for the kid here?  Growing up all he's going to hear is how his mom just thought he was a bad case of food poisoning.  Kids have a hard enough time fitting in without a mom who mistook carrying him as a baby for having an extended case of diarrhea.  

Glaxo Loves Musical Chairs A Bit Too Much, Abolishes Personal Desks and Cubes

Yes life on the cube farm sucks, but its my life and far be it for you to take it from me.

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has a slightly insane plan to install a free-form, open-space office environment at its HQ in which no one has an assigned desk, chair or computer. Employees will just show up at the Research Triangle Park, N.C., building with their laptops and sit wherever they want...This trendy new program seems guaranteed to make everyone crazy: Employees will be unable to personalize their workspaces with family photos or memorabilia. Instead, they will be given a storage locker in which they can keep files and keyboards. Welcome back to high school, GSK! About 40 GSK employees have already made the switch; 1,500 will follow shortly. Among the other changes:

• Offices will be divided into flexible “neighborhoods” in which groups of employees can work on projects together.
• Employees will receive etiquette classes to teach them to leave the space they used pristine for the next worker.
• GSK expects the system will increase collaboration, and lessen use of email and phones.
• Workstations will be adjustable for tall and short employees.

Oh, well at least they'll make the work stations adjustable for tall and short employees, that'll solve all the other headaches this was sure to cause... 

Like, where am I supposed to hang my cube basketball hoop? And now I have to walk all the way over to my locker to dig out a take out menu that used to be tacked to my wall? You guys understand I'm lazy as all hell right? That's why I'm ordering take out? I can't be bothered to have to walk across the office to retrieve a menu, that shit is insane.

And I'm sure these "neighborhoods" will work out swell.  As the original author points out, as in real life with neighborhoods you get class stratification.  After a few weeks you'll have all the cubes by the windows thumbing their noses and hurling racial slurs at those unfortunate enough to have to sit near the bathroom or the bosses office.  As if promotions, salary, and recognition awards weren't enough for employees to compete over now there's going to be tensions over who gets the best desk location.  Won't be long until you'll see the true crazies sleeping out side the office at night like its Black Friday or something. 

Look, I may hate life in a cube, the fluorescent lights, the half walls that everyone can look over when I'm just trying to slack off and read the internet or take a nap, the fact that if you fart the people in the cubes surrounding you have to deal with it, and the overall monotony of work.  I hate it all.  But at least its mine.  For whatever little its worth, I know that little shit hole is mine and I can do basically whatever I want in it.

I don't want to take ettiquette classes on cleanliness.  I like my current system.  I hoard old Tupperware like I'm starting a science project, half drank bottles of water littered around the desk, my sony stereo pumping out phat beats, random cheat sheets with valuable passwords just tacked on the wall for all to see. All of that is what makes my job tolerable.  You take that away and I'm 2 minutes away from making this blog a full time gig, even if barely enough people have clicked the advertising to afford a large sub at D'Angelos. I'll take poverty over a loose-leaf desk and a storage locker any day, that's just uncivilized.  

PS: Thanks to Dillinger for the tip.  Dillinger contacted The Alt-Tab through our Contact Us tab at the top right.  If you've got a tip, video, or topic you'd like to see blogged about please do the same or e-mail us at TheAltTab@gmail.com

March Madness Bracket Update, Day 1: I'm Screwed

Allright, maybe I'm not that bad off, but under no circumstances am I in good shape, just middle of the pack by any measure you choose, but it just feels worse.  Why?  Because of frigen Morehead St and their delightfully entertaining school shirts (pictured above). 

Despite the Maestro's warnings I liked what I saw from Louisville in the Big East Tourney and decided I was going to ride them all the way to the Elite 8, including an upset over Kansas.  What do they do? They go out and pull a Choke-Job on MoreHead State.  A sloppy, humiliating choke job. 

On the plus side I am still leading both of the Maestro's brackets (because he's the kind of guy who does multiple entries in one pool).  In his defense he pretty much locked himself into Belmont with his Pre-Pre NCAA prediction a couple of weeks ago, at least I hope that's the reason he chose them over a poorly seeded Wisconsin team.   At any rate he's sure to hear an ear full in a couple of hours as a meeting of the minds for this blog convenes at Game On for today's tables slate of action.

Kids Prank Mom Into Thinking House is on Fire

What the hell lady? Get the Dog? This is exactly why this Dad didn't give a shit about his kids pranking your ass.  Probably deals with this kind of shit all the time, wife just belittling and taking him for granted at every turn.  Meanwhile this Dad should probably be up for a Father of the Year award.

This is exactly what people are talking about when they say kids need more parental vision.  You see a dad just chilling out, browsing the net, crushing some peanuts, and watching the TV. I see a Dad acting as project manager for one of the greatest home pranks of all time.   Do you really think these kids could have came up with and executed all this on their own?  Doubt it.  Probably would have just ended up with a smoky living room and the fire alarm going off.  Then the rest of the day you've got to air out the house to get all the god damned fog out.