Some classics from work
"Which one is the homepage?"

"Can you optimise my website for the word 'porn' so I get more traffic?"

"The website doesn't work."
(After a brief conversation, we found out BT had cut their office Internet/phone off for non-payment and NO websites worked!)
(retrac fumble in the jungle, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 16:33, Reply)

Reliance on Electricty is just ignorance
The truth is that so-called "electronics" don't run on electricity at all. It's a myth, in fact one of the greatest scams out there.

Ask any electronics engineer and they'll tell you that things actually run on smoke. That's why they stop working when it escapes, no matter how much electric you pump into them.
(Kushan just wants to fit in..to your mum, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 16:07, 2 replies)

Ignorance
I work in a North African country that recently saw a minor upheaval....and i was looking over some bid proposals for workshop tools a couple of days ago when one item caught my eye,it said '300mm adjustable wrenches-must not be metric' ...Oh dear god.....
(mad_dog_one, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 15:58, 1 reply)

Basic cooking ignorance #2 - My Dad.
When my mum went into hospital to have ther internal plumbing rearranged she left my dad a stack of easy to cook frozen foods.
One evening he went into visit her and complained that the Pizza she'd got him tasted fucking awful and he was only able to eat half of it.

After my dear mum got back out of hospital she had to spend quite some time scraping solidified globs of previously molten polystyrene from the oven rack.
( Airman Gabber Living life like a 70's BBC presenter, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 15:56, Reply)

Are you an IT Pro? Earn money!
Here
( MisterPunch did it that way on, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 15:33, 7 replies)

Ignoranus
I've never understood what my arsehole has got to do with being ignorant...
( CaptainCrackerjack live trout, slow motion, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:59, 1 reply)

egg free omelette
My 9 year old son would only eat the special omelettes that I made him without egg... they looked and tasted just like regular omelettes.. .but only if he didnt see me add the eggs!!
(the_icks has the sweet essence of giraffe, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:50, 6 replies)

Basic of cooking ignorance
My friend Helen never really got the concept of cooking or anything related to cooking, preferring McDonalds take-aways as often as she could. When she moved into a new house with her boyfriend we were surprised to be invited to a dinner-party at their place, where she announced she would be cooking 8 of us a scrumptious meal. We were duly given a menu advising us of the delights we were about to experience.

Prawn cocktail followed by Roast Chicken, Chips and Peas - Nothing spectacular but knowing her culinary expertise it was a bold adventure. It was clear she hadn't even started cooking anything yet and was on her 3rd or 4th glass of wine to boot.

"Erm, Helen, shouldn't you put the chicken in?" my girlfriend suggested.
"Oh, do you think so?" and off she went to put it in the oven

And the party continued.

"What time are the starters?" someone else enquired as the night went on.
"I'll go and get the prawns out of the freezer." - Riiiiight.

After some hasty microwaving we all politely ate our slightly crunchy, yet warm, prawn offering.
The night progressed, more wine was imbibed.

"Have you put the chips on yet?"
"Oh, no! I'll go do that now. The fryer has been on all night so it'll be nice and hot.

After a few moments one of our friends came back pissing herself laughing, describing a scene that she could only relate to us as,"Chip Darts" - Because the fat was hot and spitty lovely Helen was standing in the middle of the kitchen and throwing the chipped potatoes into the pan one by one.
When the chips were about done our hostess announced that everything was nearly ready, all she had to do was carve the chicken after asking me to take it out of the oven for her.
In the middle of the roasting tin was the most anaemic looking roast chicken I've ever seen.

"Helen, did you baste the chicken at all?"
"What's basting?"
"You know, putting a bit of oil on it. Helen, did you remove the bag of giblets at all?"
"What are giblets?" - Still inside was a shrivelled bag of innards.

Once the edible parts of the meal were consumed we sat back to play some parlour game which resulted in the hostess having a blazing argument with her boyfriend. Shortly followed by the unholiest sound of shattering glass.
Rushing to the kitchen we were greeted with the sight of the glass cover that folds down over the gas rings shattered into a thousand hot melty globs all over the kitchen.

"Helen, Did you turn the rings off before shutting the canopy?"

My best mate Dave who hated this woman and was only there out of politeness was heard to whimper,"Please kill me now."
( Airman Gabber Living life like a 70's BBC presenter, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:48, 9 replies)

My stepmother told me
"Your father never loved your mother, and him and I have been together spiritually forever, actually."
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:35, 9 replies)

I used to work for an extermination company
and I had one colleague who was so stupid he would disregard pests of the family Formicidae from the Hymenoptera Order.

(apologies, but not very sincere ones)
( prince-igor si tacuisses, philosophus mansisses, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:09, 1 reply)

Flight Attendants

A good friend of mine is an airline pilot, and he always has great stories about his conversations with the sky waitresses (excuse me, "flight attendants") at work. Two of my favorites:

Story 1:

One of his usual routes is Los Angeles to San Francisco and back, up and down the California coast in the US. One one flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco, a flight attendant points out the window on the left side of the plane and asks, "What is that huge body of water out there?"

"That's the Pacific Ocean."

Later that day, they both worked the same return flight, San Francisco to Los Angeles. The same flight attendant points out the window on the right side of the plane and asks, "What is that huge body of water out there?

"I told you this morning, that's the Pacific Ocean"

"...No, that can't be right; the Pacific Ocean is on the LEFT side of the plane!"

Story 2:

In the middle of nowhere in the desert Southwest region of the US there exists a large crater, caused long ago by a meteor strike. It's now one of those "wonders of nature" tourist attractions, with an access road leading to it, and a smaller road around the perimeter so that tourists can drive around and look down into it.

"What's that large crater down there?"
"That was caused by a meteor strike."
"...Wow, they were really lucky! Look how close it came to that road!"
(Roving Blowtorch, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:06, 2 replies)

Walking along the beach with Mrs Pobblepop....
'Oooh, there's lots of flotsam and jetsam here.' I said, remarking on all the rubbish and showing I know words.
'Aren't they reindeer?' Mrs Pobblepop replies.
( Brandy_Bumwinkle, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:04, 5 replies)

Funny Foreign Money
I used to work for a rather strange charity which ran children's holidays. They used to take a few children from France, so they opened a French bank account. The founder, who was rather old and confused, told me that we'd have to make sure that only French people used it because "it's for French Euros, not German ones".
(ubergeekian, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 14:04, 2 replies)

Not really ignorance but more a case of confused old lady.
My mother is in her sixties and is a bit of a health food nazi due to a current stomach problem of hers and won't eat certain foods. One day whilest thinking of what to have for dinner, she asked me if eggs counted as dairy.

I gave her a minute to think about what she'd said and she was still unsure till I confirmed not.
( girlinthehole, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 13:49, 1 reply)

Attempted seduction

At university, had a roommate who liked the ladies, and used to tempt them with offers to join him for carnal pleasures on his waterbed.

He once attempted to seduce Anita, very pretty but not very smart.

"Hey Anita, do you want to sleep with me? I have a waterbed..."
Pause.
"Don't you live on the fifth floor?
"Yes.."
Pause.
"Aren't they awfully heavy, waterbeds?"
"Yes..."
Pause.
"How did you get it up there?"
(Roving Blowtorch, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 13:34, Reply)

Jumping on the parents and computers bandwagon.
My Mum once asked my brother and I to check on something online while she was on holiday in Portugal and let her know the outcome. We had been there when she booked the holiday so we asked:

"You've got internet at the villa you've booked, why can't you check?"

to which she replied
"It won't be the same internet in Portugal though will it?"
( JebediahSpringfield, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 13:13, 4 replies)

Why are there no black HGV drivers?
A fair question, you may say. Perhaps it's because the industry is racist, or a sad comment on lack of training.

The truth is far stranger. Five years ago, the industry went over to digital tachographs. The smart card each driver carries, that records driving, carries a photo of the user.

Apparently, roadside cameras detect the card wirelessly and face recognition matches the driver to it. Black faces don't show up in a dark cab, so no black drivers are permitted.

This is what a colleague firmly believes.

The only things wrong with the teory is that:

Face recognition doesn't work.
Wireless digitachs don't exist.
His transport manager is Barbadian and a former driver ("yeah, but he had to come off the road when the digitach came in").
(all my scars face forward possesses 2.5% of a hyperalloy combat chassis, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 13:05, 5 replies)

Computer stories seem popular.
I have heard a couple of versions of this, but the most recent was from my brother who works on a huge network for a big publishing group.

They recently started migrating everything to 'the cloud', which included moving from Exchange servers to web based mail.

All users are told as from Monday, they will be accessing mails differently. No need to do anything, all mailboxes will be backed up and migrated. Lovely.

Big cheese calls him up on Monday morning. "All my emails have gone".

"Um, ok. I can see your mailbox. Everything was moved, what exactly is it you're missing?"

"All the ones I archived. There are thousands of them, 6 years worth"

"Archived? What do you mean?"

"After I read them, I hit delete, and they all go to the 'deleted items' folder. I keep them all there so I know which ones I have dealt with".

"Um, I have some bad news then".
(username failed moderation, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 12:50, 7 replies)

Docs and dogging - condensed pea
I've mentioned this mate of mine before several times. He honestly believed that Word documents became smaller if you changed from double to single line spacing or reduced the font.

He also believed that people who went dogging actually had sex with dogs.
(BearWithLittleBrain, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 12:45, 2 replies)

I worked with a guy whose laptop ran low on disk space...
He freed up loads of space by deleting all those pesky .dll files.
Well, it's not like you ever use them is it?
(minimalist ..., Fri 31 Aug 2012, 12:40, 2 replies)

I'm fearing an incoming influx of computer ignorance questions from my parents.
After years of persuading them to get the Internet to save the endless requests of 'Can you find this on the internet for us, can you book these flights on the internet for us...'

I'm anticipating they are going to fall for every scam going so am preparing a preemptive laminate for them to read with such pearls of wisdom as

"When receiving an email reporting that your Barclays account has been hacked, ask yourself this important question,'Do I actually bank with Barclays?' "
"Would you give your bank details to a random stranger in the street in exchange for a briefcase full of 'cash'"
"No, Not everything you read on www.dailymail.co.uk is true, infact most of it is total bollocks."
"You do not have a World of Warcraft account so do not worry whether it has been hacked or not."
"Check, check and double check before pressing 'submit' on any website that requires your credit card number"
"If it looks too good to be true, it probably is."
( Airman Gabber Living life like a 70's BBC presenter, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 12:30, 18 replies)

Wireless Printer
A few years ago my fiancée lived in a bedsit. The couple who owned the house were a nice bunch. Early 30s, a little vacant but the perfect kind of people to share your personal space with.

I was visiting my fiancée over the weekend and we needed to print off a couple of forms from her laptop. We asked the lady if they had a printer spare, after it was dug out from some hiding place she explained "It's a wireless printer, but we could never really get it to work properly".

I thought I would have a go at it anyway, so took the box back to the room, opened it up and searched for the power cable. I went back, asked if she knew where the power cable was..

"Oh no, its wireless" she says.
(After a brief confused pause) "Oh of course, sorry, forgot you mentioned that" I reply. Beginning to sense that this wasn't going well.

I thought I would give her the benefit of the doubt and looked to see if there was a battery compartment like some of the old school tape decks used to have with the massive D sized batteries. The search was in vain. I did find a small toggle that would allow it to connect to a wireless network, but the big plug socket in the back that was obviously missing a cable was the clincher.

I checked inside the compartment... no ink cartridge either.

So I handed it back, "I couldn't get it to work either!". "Oh well, thanks for trying" She replied. I walked back into my fiancées room, she turned to me and said...

"You know what she does for a living? She works for the council on the I.T. Department"
(TheASK, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 12:22, 1 reply)

una grande cola por favor
Mucho amusement here in Espana teaching all non Spanish speakers, including English expats here for 8+ years, that the term "Coca Cola" is very rude and you must always make sure you ask for "Una grande cola por favor"
(chemdog, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 12:12, 3 replies)

I work in IT, and one time someone using a computer made a very basic error!

( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 11:48, 9 replies)

Whilst working in Malaysia
our driver told us a story as we were travelling through the countryside. According to him, he was taking an American couple to Kuala Lumpar when the wife commented on how neatly arranged the forests were. "oh no, he told her. Those are rubber trees".

"Rubber trees?" She replied. "They look real to me!"

Face/Palm
(lurkylurklurk swings more, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 11:42, Reply)

My old boss the short-arsed sociopath..
..had total ignorance of the English language, often inventing words that didn't exist. We'd start to play 'Boothy's Buzzword Bingo' whenever he was in a meeting. Scoring points for each 'Boothism' spotted.

Common examples of his word gymnastics were:

Interpretate/Interpret
Proquirement/Procurement
Pacific/Specific
Escaped Goat/Scapegoat

Sometimes it was uncomfortable to sit in meetings where our Managing Director made a complete arse of himself in front of potential clients.

He got sacked though. Twat.
( Airman Gabber Living life like a 70's BBC presenter, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 11:38, 2 replies)

Go on then...
b3ta.com/users/manage.php?ignore=4187

*Mike's face*
( BraynDedd Natasha Kaplinsky's labia majora, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 11:37, 2 replies)

I used to work for a local council (which shall of course remain nameless)
...in their IT department, working on their Finance systems.

One of my jobs one day was updating the user records for everyone in the Finance department. In an example of scary ignorance, I found out as a result the Assistant Director of Finance, the main guy responsible for dictating computer policy, upgrades, security, new systems, etc, had NEVER logged in. Not once.

There was self-absorbed lanky streak of welsh piss who named himself 'Director of Networks', who decided (this was the 90's) during the council wide upgrade from Windows 3.11 to 95, instead of going for a Windows network, plumped for some kit from an unknown Norwegian company because they had taken him out for more meals. Needless to say, it was a piece of shit and a waste of time & expense that had to be replaced.

The local councillors were the most self-important and yet most ignorant fuckers around. You had to drop everything if one of them yelped for assistance, and most of the time it was because the dozy twats didn't know where the on button or 'the system was broken' i.e. they had entered their password incorrectly.

Still...your council tax at work... :)
(CharminglyShallow incarcerated for a crime he probably did commit., Fri 31 Aug 2012, 11:37, Reply)

Coloured
A few years ago, one of my colleagues left and I had to train up another muppet colleague to do her job.

As I was explaining the job to her, I said "you need to send this form to X"
She said "Who's X"
I said "Y'know, the Theatre Manager"
To which she replied "Oh right, the coloured woman, you mean?"
After I processed what she'd said, I replied "She's not coloured, she's black"
"That's coloured, isn't it?"
"No, that's racist. X is black"
"So coloured, yeah?"

this went on for some time, with this woman basically mocking me because I took exception to her describing someone I was quite friendly with as "coloured". I even dug out my Equality and Diversity workbook, which included a list of words that were not acceptable. She still continued to make a point of calling her "coloured".

but then, this was in Manchester, where no-one seemed to bat an eyelid when someone in the office kept referring to her husbard as being "a paki" and her daughter as "a half-paki"...
(ScousersPet, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 11:24, 23 replies)

I work in an FE College...
... and a colleague and I were working together on the help desk in the computer suite.

A student rolled up and asked us is we had any of "Those, y'know, yellow sticky things?" My colleague held up and showed him a stack of Post-It notes and said, "What? These? Post-It notes?"

"Yeah, that's it! Post-It notes" the student replied.

"Nah.. " my colleague said, "We haven't got any of those." and the student duly returned to his computer.
(stealthbanana, Fri 31 Aug 2012, 11:14, 1 reply)