My son is not a dunce
BUT...On reading the Harry Potter books, from not long after they came out being quite small at the time, asked me about one of the characters.

'what's happened to sea moose?'

'sea moose?' I asked innocently..

'Yes sea moose? you know, the Irish one of Harry's friends?'

'Oh...Seamus you mean?

BLESS
( Herb Alpert's Taxi Driver I have very beautiful lips, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:48, 9 replies)

Management Consultants
I think the joke is 'They borrow your watch, then charge you to tell you what the time is'.

If only they were that competent...

I work in advertising. Specifically, I'm a media planner. I plan ad campaigns for clients.

Several years back, I worked on a big corporate client who had decided to add to their already massive marketing team by hiring an MBA-equipped Consultant to 'drive media efficiencies'. I was asked to be the liason for the agency and help her with any questions she had. Being fairly new to the whole thing at the time, I was kind of nervous about this.

Anyway, she came in for an initial meeting and quizzed us on what we contributed to their company. We explained, talked her through current campaigns, etc. All very straightforward and efficiently conducted. She thanked us and said 'I need to go away and have a look at this stuff in more depth... expect a lot of questions from me in the next week or so. Appreciate your help!'

A week went by. Nothing happened. Then on a Friday, I came back from lunch and saw I had a missed call from her.

Shit.. panic stations. I'm now no doubt going to be working all weekend to answer some robust and mind-boggling tough challenges. With a looming sense of despair, I rang her back...

Consultant: 'Hi Snowy. I've been thinking about what we discussed last week. I think the best way for us to drive media efficiency is for us to buy things cheaper.'
Me: 'Well, yeah...'
Consultant: 'OK, so how do you think we can do that.'
Me: 'Erm... I thought that would be what you were advising us on.'
Consultant: 'OK. Well, I did hope you'd have come up with some stuff yourself after our meeting, but never mind!'
Me: 'Er... no, sorry.'
Consultant: 'Alright, well I've got a couple of ideas, luckily, that I'm thinking of taking to the Marketing Director, and I would like you to sense-check them.'
Me: 'OK, go for it'
Consultant: 'I've noticed we buy an awful lot of newspaper advertising, and the colour press advertising is more expensive than the black and white press advertising. Why do we have to pay more for colour?'
Me: 'Colour advertising works better, but there are fewer colour pages. There's lower availability, so there's more of a premium.'
Consultant: 'But just because there's less of it, why should we pay more?'
Me: 'Well...supply and demand?'
Consultant: 'Hmmph... well... seems odd. Surely they've got technology to print more colour now, so why can't they drop their prices?'
Me: 'Because the technology to print more pages in colour costs more money and if they dropped their prices they wouldn't redeem their costs. Plus everybody accepts its worth more, as I say'
Consultant: 'Hmm.. OK, let me have a think... thanks.'

At this point, there was a bit of a pause as she rustled through her notes

Consultant: 'OK. Second idea: we spend lots of money targeting upmarket people. It seems that on the top 10% of the income bracket, we spend about 25% of our budget. Is that sensible?'
Me: 'They contribute 40% of your revenue, because they have more money to spend, so yes.'
Consultant: 'Oh, OK, yeah, that makes sense. Thanks for your help. I might ring you back with more stuff next week.'

She didn't.

She worked for the company on a 2 month contract. Her brief was exclusively to sort out media stuff. She was being paid probably 5 times what I was. These were her two questions in the whole time she was there and her report was handed in at the end of her time and then completely ignored and never, ever mentioned again or shared with us.

I can laugh when people are phenomenally ignorant but don't really do any harm, but it does upset me a bit when they're feted for their specialist knowledge and paid dearly, but clearly haven't a clue.

Also, bonus advertising ignoramus pearoast: www.b3ta.com/questions/gambling/post416385

Apologies for length by the way, Still makes my blood boil...
(SnowyTheWereRabbit the Leporid from Hell, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:37, 3 replies)

a mate of mine works in a cinema...
as we all know, in a cinema screen the rows are lettered from A-Z. They recently had to remove the letters 'O' and 'I' from the rows in the screens, as apparently people were confusing them with numbers, thinking they were 0 and 1, then moaning when they couldn't find their seat.

why someone would think they would randomly throw some numbers in that alphabetical order is beyond me...
(Twinx, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:36, 7 replies)

Bone of contention
One of my brother's old friends was a fellow whose father was Chief of Police in Huddersfield for some years before he retired.

This man, a FATHER OF FUCKING FIVE, in whose hands the delicate balance of public order of an entire city had rested, firmly believed until the day he died that the human male had a 'penis bone' that emerged from the body in times of sexual excitement to provide the organ with an erection.

I wish with all my heart that this is a 'Chinny Reck-on' but I am sorry to say that it is 100% true.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:33, 3 replies)

In general:
"Lol" isn't a word, it's an abbreviation. And when you say it out loud you are, by definition, both lying and being idiotic.
The plural of fish is not "fishes". It is NOT cute to say it.
(Sivvus trolley collision in the fruit aisle led to a jam, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:29, 16 replies)

Mozart
Trying to educate my sister in law a little about music, my mum and I show her Amadeus. She enjoyed the film (pretty dresses, good acting etc.)

A few weeks later mum and I were listening to his clarinet quintet and talking about Mozart while eating dinner. Sister-in-law chips in with, "Wait, he's not just a character in that film?"

She's getting incredibly gullible. We had a discussion about the Peer Gynt suite a while ago, and she only believed that there weren't really trolls terrorizing Norway when my brother set her right...
(Sivvus trolley collision in the fruit aisle led to a jam, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:25, 1 reply)

My brother's ex
genuinely thought that 'misled' was pronounced 'myzulled'.


What an utter spasmo, eh readers?
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:21, 6 replies)

Ignorance or Stupidity
There was once a girl who hung around with us called Emily. She was a stereotypical blonde bimbo I'm afraid. Cute but very gullible/dizzy.

In a pub that had those ceiling fan/light combo things I told her that they saved energy. She queried it as its plain to see that there are 2 things up there using energy, ie the bulb and the fan. I countered this by pointing out the fact that the lightbulb was a third of the power of a normal bulb and the fan blew the light into the room harder thus making it lighter. 5 minutes later she was telling a bloke she fancied this amazing fact. Staggering.
(RainKing What do I put here then?, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:19, 2 replies)

This sounds like it was fabricated
but I don't think my friend's wife could be so deadpan deliberately.

On approaching a junction, she asked:
"Are these (rumblestrips) so blind people know when to slow down?"

Also, when in a fish-shop, my friend and his wife:
Friend: "What ar you having?"
Wife: "I don't fancy fish and chips"
Friend: "What about a burger then?"
Wife: "No, not with all the mad-cow diseases and BSE outbreak on the news. Erm I'll have a steak-pie"
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:11, 1 reply)

Degrees count for nothing
One guy that used to work in my lab had his temp contract cut short as he was a little on the slow side. Both physially and mentally.

Aparently he once asked everyone in his deparment how best to mix a 5 litre bottle. Everyone answered simply: pick it up and shake it for a while.

20 minutes later he was still looking at it trying to figure out how best to pick it up because two people mimed it differently.
(Spud Diechmann joined in!, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:11, Reply)

There's a vast subset of people
who think posts on the QOTW Suggestions page get ignored.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:08, 1 reply)

My Brother's girlfriend
He had used one of those "write to your MP about this pressing issue" sites to... well, to write to his MP. A few days later - and I recommend this because it's top bananas - he received a letter in the post in a HOUSE OF COMMONS envelope. Now this is pretty typical, it's mostly a boilerplate response of "I was glad to hear from you about [issue of the day], as you know the official position of my party is to fellate corporate executives and I personally have had my kneecaps removed to make it easier." But it was the first time the girlfriend had seen such so she was all agog to find out why PARLIAMENT was writing to him. He gets home from work and she excitedly hands him the envelope. He opens it and the "What is it? What is it?" begins.

"Oh, it seems I've won being an MP for a day," he deadpans.

"REALLY?!" She goggle-eyes.

"Yep", he responds, and proceeds to elaborate on this theme for a good five minutes before she finally twigs the wind-up.

MP for a day! I ask you.
( The Light in Chains don't touch the Pope's boner, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:03, Reply)

Flatmate in halls
was borderline autistic. Amazing at writing computer code, but named Dim for a reason. Various displays of ignorance include:

Dim:"This is amazing, I don't live at home anymore! I can do what I want! I'm gonna make a bacon sandwich!"
Me:"go for it..."
Dim"How much bacon do you put in a bacon sandwich?"

Dim:"Did I just break that coffee pot?"
Me:"Yes you did"
Dim:"Was it yours?"
Me:"Yes it was."
Dim:"Can I get you a new one?"
Me:"Yes you can."

Best of all, and I can't remember how it happened, on our first night as housemates he admitted to shagging a 13 year old girl while on holiday. He actually thought "she looked 16" would save face... Doing the act was bad enough, but boasting about it to strangers you have to live with for a year just boggles the mind.
(Spud Diechmann joined in!, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 23:01, Reply)

On a planetary theme...
There's my gran who asked if the moon she saw in Spain was the same as the one she sees in the UK.

Then there's my friend from somewhere I used to work who claimed science was not taught at her school and so it's not her fault she didn't know that the earth orbited the sun.

Anyone who thinks astrology is true yet doesn't think it's odd that no two newspapers record the same 'fortune'.
( fluffymitten NAN, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:57, 1 reply)

Healthy Eating...
ROUNDTREE'S FRUIT PASTILLES DO NOT COUNT AS ONE OF YOUR 5-A-DAY!!!!

KETCHUP IS 'GLUTEN' FREE NOT 'GLUTTON' FREE!

ARTICHOKES ARE NOT ANIMALS, DESPITE HAVING A HEART!

Hazel, you are a thumb short of a ham-fist. I can't believe someone let you breed.
(FoxyBox has mange, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:47, 5 replies)

Speaking of college
I went back 5 years ago to restudy my A level physics and I ended up with the same teacher as I did back in 1991, a guy called Tony Connell. We were reminiscing about the other teachers from the past and I mentioned another old physics teacher, Gerry.
"Gerry? The man was an idiot. Me and were in the faculty staff room talking about terminal velocity and parachutes, when in walks Gerry and says 'oh yeah parachutes, when they pull the cord, they go up don't they'"

The guy was a career teacher rather than a teaching teacher, and is now a headmaster somewhere.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:46, Reply)

Dougie The Cunt
Now I'm aware that such a monikor sounds like a shit gangster in a Guy Ritchie film, but this is one that stands up to scrutiny.

As I've mentioned in other posts, I come from a small town called Hawick in the Scottish Borders. Pretty place, population of about 12,000. I would have said somewhat backwards, but not irredeemably so. My Mum's best friends son came screaming out of both the navy and the closet at the same time and noone batted an eyelid, beyond a sardonic raised eyebrow of mock suprise.

One of the residents of the town however, is Dougie the Cunt, hereafter known as DtC. Small-minded, jingoistic, big of mouth, small of brain, and probably penis. DtC is a bellend of mammoth proportions. He's also my uncle's best mate.

It was Boxing Day 1998, and myself, family, and my fiancee at the time were at my uncle and aunt's. A merry time being had by all, and as usual, I'd had a bit to drink. Unfortunately, so had DtC, who was holding forth on any number of topics. All his opinions were of the cast-iron Daily Mail variety, ie. knee-jerk, bigoted, and factually inaccurate.

We could gloss over most of these as common-or-garden fuckwittery, until he came out with something so mind-shatteringly ignorant that everyone froze like the Milky Bar Kid had walked into the saloon in that advert. It was ignorant not in the sense of stupidity although it was certainly stupid, but perhaps the single most ridiculous thing I've heard from the lips of another human.

"They should rebuild Hardian's Wall, and put all the fuckin' niggers (the word practically spat), on one side, and all us decent people on the other!"

I heard my folks intake of breath (but they're way too polite to say anything and break the Status Quo in someone else's house), my Aunt mutter, "Fuck's sake, what an arsehole," to herself, and then my brain lurched into anger. What follows is why my Aunt and Uncle come to ours on Boxing Day now where DtC isn't invited, and why my alcohol intake is monitored by my folks during any family get-together.

I said, "Oh, right. I was under the impression that you never left the town, Dougie. So I was just wondering where you'd ever met a black person in order to form that opinion. Be honest, you've never met one," and here I launched into the histrionic, "in your fucking life! You fucking ignorant prick, I hope they do rebuild Hadrian's Wall, and I'll go on the side with the black people, just so I know I'll never have to talk to another cunt like you ever again." Then I stormed out the room, almost on the verge of self-righteous tears.

Ok, not too diplomatic, perhaps some subtle good-natured satire at his expense might have been more infitting with the occasion, but I was 18, in first year of a philosophy degree, and was therefore working off left-wing moral certainties. But you would be right, few thing are as annoying as a drunk baby Marxist in full voice. Very few things, that is, apart from Dougie The Cunt.

Carlsberg don't make ignorant fuckwits, but they don't have to, for Dougie The Cunt exists.
( Boss Keloid Got your mother's maiden name tattooed on my arm, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:43, 6 replies)

I wish I had an excuse for this one
In a Biology lecture about reproduction:
Teacher: So, how do flowers reproduce?
Rebekah: Budding!
Me: (whispering to Rebekah) Wait, then when a bee pollinates a flower...does that make a baby flower, or a baby bee?
Rebekah: You're not serious...?
Me: No, but seriously...
Rebekah put her head on her desk. John finally answered me.
I wish I had an excuse for being this dumb sometimes.
( Killerkitti Like my coffee black, just like my metal, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:42, Reply)

A guy I went to college with
was on a bench outside in June and I pointed out how hot it was that day, and that it was the hottest part of the day.

He was adamant that the temperature of the day is always highest at noon, after which the day cools down again. He wouldn't listen to reason that just because the sun's energy is greatest at noon, doesn't mean the ambient temperature is.

He also thought that the British motorway system was built in the order it's numbered.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:40, 4 replies)

My mum reckons Jesus must be white...
...because he has blue eyes in the photographs.
(ShockerMocker, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:34, 2 replies)

Mum's...
MUM: Do you have a USB?
ME: Yeah, I gave you my old one.
MUM: No... no, that's a data stick. I want a USB.
(Sivvus trolley collision in the fruit aisle led to a jam, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:27, Reply)

Prince Charles
and any other fuckwit who supports and uses homeopathy
(nimrodihnio making gravy for one., Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:26, 3 replies)

Chat-up lines.
Speaking to two completely oblivious friends:

Girl: So I'm going out to a club with some new guys tonight, and I'm kinda nervous.
Me: It'll be ok, just remember to slap them if they ask you how you like your eggs in the morning.
Girl: **blank look**
Me: You don't know that one..? It's about getting pregnant...
Boy: Ohh, I get it! It means you're already pregnant, right?
(Sivvus trolley collision in the fruit aisle led to a jam, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:26, Reply)

Back when i was temping
a guy at work thought that when you have a cold the greenish goo that you blow out your nose is bits of your diseased brain.
Funny question this - i think i clicked more than half the answers :-)
(bovine intervention, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:23, Reply)

Wind turbine.
Whilst driving past a large factory which has its own wind turbine my mum said, "I don't know why they bother with that, some days it doesn't work at all."

"That'll be when there isn't any wind," I found myself having to inform her.
(Haywood Manley, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:23, Reply)

On oboes and cork grease:
One member of my wind quintet, who shall be called "Horn Guy", overheard myself and the oboe player discussing different types of cork grease. For those who don't know, that's grease used to keep the joints between different parts of the instrument from sticking together. The oboe player (who I shall call Daisy) mentioned that she didn't use plain vaseline like the rest of us cheapskates, but proper oboe grease.

Horn Guy: Wow Daisy, I didn't know you were so well lubricated!
(Sivvus trolley collision in the fruit aisle led to a jam, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:22, 1 reply)

My mum
honestly. Bless her cotton socks but, I had to explain to her last week that John Barrowman was gay.
She said she would never have guessed!
( Herb Alpert's Taxi Driver I have very beautiful lips, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:22, 2 replies)

I live in earthquake country. You get used to the minor temblors and some of the bigger quakes.
But every time there's an earthquake anywhere that isn't Southern California, a friend of mums back in the UK still insists on emailing me.
After the recent Chile and Haiti earthquakes, I woke up to emails asking if I was ok and asking if my apartment was still standing.

Best one though was the 4.4 we had a few days ago....personally I was dead to the world and didn't feel a thing, no damage or anything, but I got an email from the woman asking if she needed to send me supplies...it ended with "you're probably in the hospital, so reply when you can as I'm worrying about you".

No matter how many times I tell her of the geographic differences between countries, she's convinced that any earthquake is felt here!
( Batshitmentalist is sane for once, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:18, Reply)

Madge from neighbours
Back in the late 90's, I told me ex that Madge from "Neighbours" gargled with cat litter and that was why her voice sounded like it did.

She believed me too until I burst our laughing. El stoopido...
(spazmataz mong-a-long-a-ding-dong, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:14, 2 replies)

I laughed
When dating a man with albinism, a friend asked me in all seriousness what colour his cum was :(
(insomniac-surfer oh go on then, just this once, Thu 18 Mar 2010, 22:11, Reply)