Turkey Bacon, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love Genetic Modification
Emma was a lovely lass, really: sweetness and light, chatty and bubbly, but my God was she thick as two short planks. I worked with her in an un-named British supermarket (I might remember more stories about it later and would rather not identify it too clearly) in the fresh meat section, diligently tossing slabs of dead animal onto shelves every weekend for beer money during my degree. Emma was a high school drop-out working there full-time. Anyhow, onto the story:

Our protagonist (moi): Dry, sarcastic, straight-faced. I'm also a reader, as such I quite often had a Fact Of The Day and would chip in to pretty much any discussion with an interesting titbit or factoid.
The ignorant (Emma): Lovely, thick, trusting.
The scene: She and I standing side-by-side, restocking the bacon, with a few of the rest of our number close-by.

Emma sees the case in my hand, full of the Mattesons Turkey Rashers (for those who like their bacon shit and bacon-free) and I see her brow furrow. "Where does turkey bacon come from?" she asks. Taking a second to compose myself, I turned toward her and - in one of my finest straight-faced performances in that job - nonchalantly replied: "Cross-breeds." She looked surprised for a moment but, presumably recalling all the other times I'd provided her with nuggets of information that no-one else seemed to question, was briefly sated. I can only imagine what was running through her head as she tried to work out the logistics of that, but after a moment or two she turned back toward me. I preempted her next question by reminding her of the huge size of some of the turkeys we got in around Christmas time - those were the ones they used along with small pigs. At this point I noticed that we now had a small audience of our co-workers who'd caught the conversation and were now standing behind us, out of her view, trying not to break the scene.

"Really?" I was trying so, so hard at this point not to crack a smile as I nodded seriously. "It's the same sort of thing as the beef ham, right?" My facade was slipping as she thought about this for a moment and nodded, her face showing the strain her poor brain was under trying to comprehend it all. "Or the salmon-cut beef." I know I cracked a grin at this one and I received a smack in the arm for my trouble but the guttural guffaws from those assembled behind us was worth it.

Yes, it was mean but I made sure to undo the damage afterwards by informing her of the truth - complete with interesting facts on the true logistical difficulties of pig copulation. It's still kind of worrying just how readily she ate it up, and somewhat damning of the schooling system in that area (another shining moment of her brilliance was when she asked if Hitler was "That one with that beard.")
(warmidea, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:38, Reply)

Sure that I was correct, I went around telling people that the valley in the middle of your top lip is called the frenulum.
I got a few funny looks but never thought anything of it.
( Noeli overtheshoulderboulderholderthingstraplatchboobs, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:31, 7 replies)

My lovely lovely friend.
I have a very gullible friend. We managed to convince her that Jay Kay made his own jam which is why he named the band Jamiroquai. Also, we told her there was a new service available where you could order pizza by pressing a button on the remote and it would be delivered through your video player.

She also didn't know where cheese came from (as in what it was made from). 'I never really thought about it. My mum just gets it from the shop'.

This was when we were about 15 or so. It wasn't REALLY bullying...

She's ace.
( Blue Star was working part time at the 5 and Dime, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:30, Reply)

My mate had a new girlfriend a few years ago...
She was basically expensively educated but very naive about anything as she had led a very sheltered life all her 19 years.
We were out for a curry night where they had a huge buffet of different dishes laid out. Naive girl (I'll call her Gina for that was her name)had never had the joy of curry before and didn't know what all the dishes were.
With a knowing look at my mate I started explaining to Gina "This is the lamb dagger, that's a beef bayonet, the red one is a veal scimitar and this is the pork sword ....etc"
My mate Pete actually snorted Kingfisher lager through his nostrils and joined in on the gag, saying that most girls love to get a lamb dagger inside them and pork sword juices leave an interesting taste in the mouth.

However much we overplayed the gag she still didn't get it although she did get a portion of pork sword later on from Pete.

Oh and by the way, reader he married her...still together 2 kids and 15 years later.
(Barnetboy, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:27, Reply)

My most favorite rude boy line ever:
"You bein' racist white boy?"


My mate went to college a fair few years ago with another rude boy of the same line of thought. The kid used to be incredibly racist towards everyone, at least 2/3 of what he said was aimed at insulting people of different cultures. Whenever people tried to pull him up on it and explain how offensive he was being his response was: "I'm not racist! I'm black."
( Crap Little Monkey Deathstar, so good they built it twice, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:25, Reply)

CSI: Crime Scene Ignorant
When william peterson (aka Gil Grissom) left CSI and got replaced by an entirely new character named Ray played by Lawrence Fishburne, my missus had obviously missed his first episode because when she saw Fishburne lead the CSI team came out with "that new Grissom is a terrible casting choice, You'd have thought they'd use someone that looked like the original Grissom, he's not even white".
(WOGAN'S WIG FIXER, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:22, Reply)

Childproof electricity
Can't claim this one personally, but Mumm-ra senior (father of the clan), while at university (Manchester, circa 1971), managed to slip this past an actual physics undergraduate.

PhysicsGirl: "What are those little plastic plugs doing in the sockets?"
Dad: "Well, you've got a charge building up in the cable and it's got nowhere to go. If you don't put something in the socket, electrons will pour out over the floor..."
PG: "Really? You're joking..."
Dad, hardly able to believe luck: "No, seriously. That's where you get static electricity from..."

Just how much she believed him only became apparent when her friend's boyfriend approached him in the bar to remonstrate that this wasn't, in fact, strictly within the boundaries of truth. And they say education is getting easier...
(Mumm-ra, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:21, Reply)

Nights out
In the good old days during our Twenties, we would all meet at the local for a few pints in handle glasses paid for with a few golden Ducats.

While here we would all make up a job we did, so we could impress any ladies we might happen to meet in a shit night club. everyone would pick various jobs Cosmonaut, footballer, Clam diver etc, and let each other know so they could back them up if the young lady didn't believe us.

I met a young lady that night and convinced her ''I Design Monkeys for zoos'' I spent a good hour telling her all about how I put said monkeys together and design new ones.

I boshed her that night.
(ruud316, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:13, 6 replies)

My sister again
When my brothers girlfriend was 3 months pregnant. My sister asked me

'So how long until the baby is born? 9 months?'
'No... that would make her 12 months pregnant'
'Ohhhh yeah. I got it mixed up with a year'
(babyaeroplanes, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:08, 2 replies)

My sister
During last Yuletide I was playing Trivial Pursuit with my family.

My sister (who is 17 and generally quite intelligent, but still gets to answer the Kids questions) came out with:

'What's the Capital of London again? The UK?'
'London doesn't have a capital. England is the country...'
'Oh yeah. What's the capital of England?'

This would be bad enough even if it wasn't for the fact that she lives in London.
(babyaeroplanes, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:06, Reply)

Poor Mr Tortoise...
A mate's dad used to have a tortoise called Alan - he loved Alan dearly, fed him lettuce and let him roam around the garden as fast as Alan's stubby little legs could carry him.

Soon winter was coming and little Alan needed to go into hibernation for the winter, so preparations were made for his long sleep. Blue Peter has taught us to put tortoises in a box of straw, in a dark cool place for a until spring.... They definitely do not recommend digging a hole in the garden and burying your tortoise alive for four months.

Poor Alan's worm-eaten corpse was was found in March the next year.
(tinpixel, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 13:06, 4 replies)

IT Tech Support is full of these stories
I could make a big song and dance about the time I had to help someone because 'My Documents' wouldn't open*, but I have a different story this time.

Our company has a course for those people who have to learn how to use a computer, despite their inability to understand any technology more advanced than a toaster. I actually think that even though technology is very simple once you pay attention, it isn't for everyone. Some people just won't get it, and that's fine. Leave them be.

But those who want/need to learn come to an educational establishment in the hope of becoming at least vaguely competent. They don't need to have a tutor who has never had any training in using a computer themselves. The tutor can teach, and has used a computer for many years. Just no training (which is fine apparently because the paying public are only on a short-term course - go figure).

Anyway, enough waffle. The tutor in question came to ask advice one day.

"There's a computer downstairs that goes a funny colour every couple of minutes and this message keeps scrolling across the screen about having left the computer logged on. It disappears when we move the mouse, but comes back again after another couple of minutes. Do you think it's a virus?"

The scary thing here is that this means we've trained a load more people to be confused and scared of screensavers.

*I walked across the building just to double-click 'My Documents'. It opened.
( Awesome Welles petitioning for foetuses to be rebranded 'wombles', Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:54, 1 reply)

I worked as a chauffeur years ago, doing airport runs.
I always asked the punters where they were going. Not that I cared much, but it was an icebreaker towards getting a tip.
One couple answered with where it was they were going to, I didn't recognise the destination, and asked them what country that was. They didn't know, they'd just asked the travel agent for a cheap package. Seriously, they didn't know the bloody country.
(Bear Pookie The Frankly Challenged. Halloween is coming to town., Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:51, 2 replies)

This is my own brain-fail sadly
my room-mate (from oop north) was telling me how some person had thought that Scousers were from Newcastle, and I laughed a bit and came out with the gem 'how silly, it's obviously Manchester.' She's not let me forget it.
( Amberl was stripey and dominated Europe, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:51, 1 reply)

The first Bank Holiday after Christmas this year
Christmas and Boxing Day were at a weekend this year so we got one of those strange Bank Holidays called something like Christmas Tuesday.
Mrs. Barnetboy was desperate to spend some money as the shops had been closed for a few days.
"Let's go to IKEA in Nottingham" she says. I point out that it will be more rammed than usual what with it being a public holiday and all and people will be desperate to go out and spend money after days being cooped up with their nearest and dearest.
"No," says Mrs. B "It won't be that busy on a bank holiday"
IKEA WON'T BE THAT BUSY ON A BANK HOLIDAY AFTER CHRISTMAS!!!!!! IKEA WOPULD BE BUSY THE DAY AFTER ARMAGEDDON!!!!
We had to queue on the A610 to get onto the slip road to get onto the roundabout to get onto the side road to get into the queue to get into the car park. The last half mile of the journey took over an hour.
(Barnetboy, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:50, 4 replies)

Not too many moons ago
I was whiling my hours away chatting online to a funny but quite dizzy blond girl. We chatted about all sorts, but one slow evening the topic of conversation turned to sunset times (life of the party me). Me at the time living in the Midlands, her, living on the south coast.

I was slightly bored so I decided to tell her about how the country being as large as it is was split into time zones, and that the Midlands were actually half an hour ahead of her, Scotland obviously being the top of the country was a full hour in advance.

I honestly have no idea who she told this to, but she did believe me later that week when I said I must go as it had just turned midnight, she responded with oh its still only 11.30 here. Oh dear. Luckily she was a hairdresser.
(feedingtimeatthezoo day 1 of his bikini diet started, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:46, 3 replies)

Cakes
Overheard in a restaurant by a friend of the family. (I have to do this phonetically or it doesn't work):

Waiter: Would you like anything from this here sweet trolley, Sir, Madam?

Wife: I'l have some of that gattex please.

Husband: Don't show your ignorance, dear. It's "gay-tex".
( Amish Information Systems hates misplaced, commas, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:37, 3 replies)

Morningwood Bellend! Peppers! Blushing Colleagues! Subject style stolen from disasterprone!
Ah, Smiler. More commonly known as Manni, but I called him Smiler because he always had a smile on his face. Whatever the circumstances. The phone would ring, he'd smile. Kick him in the balls, he'd smile. Shag his Mum, he'd probably keep smiling. Manni was a top guy, but Christ he could be naive sometimes. Of course, naivety to some means that they need putting right about a few things. To me, it means playtime. Yes, I'm a git.

One day, he asked out of the blue what the name of the hottest pepper known to mankind was. Now, some would say the Nag Jalapia or something along those lines. To be honest, I don't really know. Nor care, to be honest. But as I usually end up doing, I'm getting off the point.

Poor Manni. He didn't stand a chance as I happily spoonfed him the utter bullshit that the hottest pepper known to mankind was in fact the Morningwood Bellend pepper. I even furnished him with a physical description- about 6 to 8 inches long, girth variable, pinkish in colour with a purple tip, and if handled correctly would produce about a teaspoonful of seeds. And I told him they sold it in the Morrison's round the corner.

And off he toddled. And then returned, about half an hour later, blushing, and loudly calling me a bastard to all who would listen.

In my defence, I didn't actually think he'd be that stupid...
( jim_bob can herd cats., Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:36, 6 replies)

I once sat in a pub...
... (The Sun, in Reading, in case anyone cares) and overheard the most staggeringly ignorant conversation ever on the next table.

Drunk Bloke A: It's Burns night tonight, innit? That's some scottish thing about this poet.

Drunk Bloke B: No, mate. It's an Irish thing where the Protestants used to burn the Catholics.

Drunk Bloke B then proceeds to harangue Drunk Bloke A for the next hour about this until Drunk Bloke A changes his mind and agrees.
( Amish Information Systems hates misplaced, commas, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:35, 2 replies)

my neighbour is a brunette, but honorary blonde...
A mutual friend recently bought himself an iPhone and was demonstrating the inbuilt compass. He found north easily enough when my neighbour asked how it could point to north when we live in the north? Surely the compass needle would just spin or the graphics change to an X?

It took a while to explain the concept of magnetic north vs. north of England, but the use of Polar Bears and Penguins helped.
(downhill without brakes . It was the worst day of my life, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:30, 2 replies)

One of the country's best universities.
I was sitting in on a lecture not so long ago, and the lecturer was guiding the students through a particular procedure. I can't remember exactly what the preamble was, but the end point was something like this:
LECTURER: Right, and so all we have to do is to divide A by B. In this case, A and B happen both to be?
STUDENT: One million.
LECTURER: Right. So the answer is?
STUDENT: ..... pause ..... Sorry. I'm not very good at maths.


Yep. My employer aspires to be one of the top 3 universities in the country, and one of the top 20 in the world, by 2015.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:28, 2 replies)

Car Trouble.
My best mate works in Farnborough, on the rare occasion he's in the office and not working from home or at a client site in the City.

One day he heads out to the Petrol Station at lunchtime to fill up his car, as the Petrol gauge is low. Sure enough, he runs out halfway there, parks up his car and walks the rest of the distance. He dutifully fills up the very small container he buys at the Station with petrol and treks back to his car and drives back to the office.

Come the end of the day, he repeats his earlier journey, and unsurprisingly runs out of petrol halfway to the Petrol Station....

"Why the hell didn't you drive on to the Petrol Station after you'd filled up your car with the thimble-full of petrol you'd bought at lunchtime and get a full tank????" I asked him incredulously, as he relayed this story to me.

"I hadn't thought of that!" he answered.....
(caescarna Hell's Roomba, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:26, Reply)

Overheard in a changing room.
This isn't stupidity in the sense factual ignorance, but stupidity in the sense of, "EH?"

I was in the changing room of the gym, and overheard a tanned-to-the-point-of-crackling bloke telling another about the holiday from which he'd just returned. I gleaned that it had been in Egypt, and he'd never been before.
"It was fantastic," he said. "Everything was laid on - food, drinks, everything. We didn't have to leave the hotel complex once in the whole two weeks. Fantastic."
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:23, 8 replies)

Yey for Facebook IQ tests
Not the most reliable of testing methods ie a Facebook app is not going to be full-on Mensa, but it can be used for a laugh.

The missus has got the Facebook bug and started signing up to every fucking app imaginable, one of which was the logic IQ test. Logic isn't exactly her specialist subject however so she struggled a bit.

"I can't do this Jeccy" said her, "I don't understand what I'm meant to do."

So I explain it to her in the sense that she has to look for links between symbols etc and she gives it a go.

ESTIMATED IQ: 79 - BORDERLINE RETARD.

She wasn't happy. She insisted that the test be faulty, so she forwarded the app to my account on Facebook for me to do. I login and do the test, getting an IQ of 139 with MODERATE GENIUS under it. She couldn't understand it bless.

Helped that I remembered all the answers from when she tried it 2 minutes ago.
( Jeccius Steam Borderlands 2 junkie, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:22, 2 replies)

Left feeling deflated.
This story comes courtesy of a friend of mine, B, and his neighbour, J. J is none too bright, and B has been known to exploit this.

One day, J's car had a puncture, and he knocked on B's door to ask for help fixing it. B took a look, jacked up the car, removed the wheel, rotated it by 180^o, and bolted it back on.
"You see," he explained to J, "the flat bit of the tyre was at the bottom where the tyre touches the road. It's now at the top, where it doesn't touch anything, so you won't have to worry about it any more."

J thanked him.

But he was back the following day to ask for help again. Apparently the puncture had slid back to the bottom of the wheel overnight.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:17, 1 reply)

Fuck it, why not, it's been a while since I posted anything.
I was Once in the Millenium stadium in Cardiff watching Wales V Finland. Playing for Finland was the Legendary Jari Litmanen, One of my Dumb ass mates waits for Jari to get the ball and says

''Jari Litmanen, I know he plays for Bacerlona but wheres he from?''

My reply '' Urrr Germany I think''

Much frowning followed, it took him several minutes before he realised what a total tit he had been.
(ruud316, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:17, Reply)

World's Worst Gaydar
My wife didn't realise that Graham Norton was gay, in spite of watching a whole serious of him phoning up gay men and talking to them about cocks, etc. When she suddenly asked, with a mixture of surprise and excitement "Is Graham Norton... Gay??" I could only really come up with "Er... Yeah..!"

I think my brain may have pretty much bluescreened from a sarcasm overflow.

"I think it's fair to say that he's pretty well out of the closet."
( Ennui loves you, Fri 19 Mar 2010, 12:14, 8 replies)