Really trivial stuff that bugs you

[schlaugh]

At least it's now possible to buy packages of hot dogs and buns with the same quantities!

And sometimes even the same lengths.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro

[kpatz]

We're 2 decades into the 21st century and they still can't figure out how to make food packages "easy" to open. They either weld them shut requiring them to be cut, or they tear, or (like the aforementioned hot dog package, or bacon or other meat packages) are nearly impossible to pull apart unless you're Hercules with dry hands or have a pair of vice grips.

[profloater]

We're 2 decades into the 21st century and they still can't figure out how to make food packages "easy" to open. They either weld them shut requiring them to be cut, or they tear, or (like the aforementioned hot dog package, or bacon or other meat packages) are nearly impossible to pull apart unless you're Hercules with dry hands or have a pair of vice grips.

Maybe they want the pack to survive till after you are responsible for it and to avoid theft in store. Maybe they don’t care how hard it is to open it? Maybe we need a new tool equivalent to a tinopener, (canopener), great online sell idea!

[Noclevername]

Maybe we need a new tool equivalent to a tinopener, (canopener), great online sell idea!

Eureka, you've invented the scissors!

[profloater]

Eureka, you've invented the scissors!

Yeah I was thinking an oversize stitch ripper as used in needlework. Or a hook knife like a carpet knife, or a neat combo. It would be a blade in a multitool perhaps, where today you just get a redundant beer can opener. But it's true, scissors are good.

[21st Century Schizoid Man]

We're 2 decades into the 21st century and they still can't figure out how to make food packages "easy" to open. They either weld them shut requiring them to be cut, or they tear, or (like the aforementioned hot dog package, or bacon or other meat packages) are nearly impossible to pull apart unless you're Hercules with dry hands or have a pair of vice grips.

I'm guessing PetersCreek can probably just leave the packages outside for a short time, and they'll get opened. The condition of the food may not be that great though.

I did learn at one particular fast food outlet - when they give me the chili packages with the French fries, tear open the packages first, because once I touch the sandwich, there is no way my hands will be able to keep a firm enough grip on the chili packages to tear them.

[Noclevername]

"Hercules with dry hands" is the catch phrase of the day.

"Mighty Zeus, I must have the Lotion Of The Gods!"

[Jim]

Grocery stores provide convenient plastic bags on rolls in the produce section. Find the produce you want, peel off a plastic bag, open it up ... open it up ... OPEN IT UP!!!

The darn bags are almost impossible to open. The plastic is thin and sticks to itself. You can't get a grip with dry hands and the low humidity in the store promotes dry hands. Pre-pandemic it was easy. Just lick your fingers and open the bag. Try that trick now and see the looks you get from other customers. In unison they will point at you and chant, "Unclean! Unclean!"

If you're lucky an employee just hosed down the cucumbers and you can wet your fingers there. Or you bought milk or frozen foods and the package is sweating.

[Noclevername]

If you're lucky an employee just hosed down the cucumbers and you can wet your fingers there.

I'd think that just fingering the produce in this day and age would also make you an outcast from civilized society.

[kpatz]

Eureka, you've invented the scissors!

The thing is, opening packages should NOT require tools.

As a kid I could open bags of chips or cookies with my scrawny weakling kid fingers. Now I need scissors, a knife, a light saber, a jigsaw.

If I'm somewhere else (like outside), I may not have such implements available. Who packs scissors in their picnic basket?

Whoever invented those impossible to open plastic shells that cheap electronics come in should be sealed inside one for a day.

The fact that some Amazon items come in what is called "frustration free packaging" says everything about society today.

[grant hutchison]

I buy a lot of physical books. Sometimes quite rare old books. Often they arrive packaged to within an inch of their lives. The vendor is rightly concerned to avoid damage or damp in the post, but when a precious book arrives wrapped in plastic, then corrugated cardboard wrapped in thick layers of packing tape, then more plastic, then an outer cardboard shell, it's sometimes difficult to extract the book unharmed from its protective covering. The sealed outer plastic is sometimes so robust that any effort to pull it open by brute force runs the risk of damaging the book corners, or propelling the book across the room as the packaging suddenly bursts.
And on more than one occasion, I've found myself using a magnifying lens, a bright light, and careful strokes of a fresh scalpel blade to split the wodges of packing tape so that I can open the interior cardboard wrap without making an incursion into the cover of the book.

Grant Hutchison

[Trebuchet]

Grocery stores provide convenient plastic bags on rolls in the produce section. Find the produce you want, peel off a plastic bag, open it up ... open it up ... OPEN IT UP!!!

The darn bags are almost impossible to open. The plastic is thin and sticks to itself. You can't get a grip with dry hands and the low humidity in the store promotes dry hands. Pre-pandemic it was easy. Just lick your fingers and open the bag. Try that trick now and see the looks you get from other customers. In unison they will point at you and chant, "Unclean! Unclean!"

If you're lucky an employee just hosed down the cucumbers and you can wet your fingers there. Or you bought milk or frozen foods and the package is sweating.

At least those bags at my store have a big arrow and "Open this end" on them. Unlike the little garbage bags I use when cleaning the litter boxes. They're already printing a suffocation warning on them, how hard would it be to add an arrow?

[Swift]

I buy a lot of physical books. Sometimes quite rare old books. Often they arrive packaged to within an inch of their lives.

I get my prescriptions from a mail-order pharmacy and I've had some weird packaging experiences with them. Most of the pills come in plastic bottles that are pretty rugged - they come in at least well-padded envelopes and often in boxes, all wrapped with bubble wrap. I take one med that comes in glass spray bottles (you squirt it in your nose) - the glass bottles are in small cardboard boxes, but those just get tossed in an envelope with no padding. By the time I receive them the bottles have bounced out of the boxes and are loose in the envelope - it is amazing none of them have broken yet.

[Noclevername]

I've seen large boxes "full" of one small item and some bags of air. Or bulging, overstuffed envelopes that don't always make it through the delivery process intact.

[Roger E. Moore]

Cats that jump up next to my laptop and demand to be petted. Or else they will lie on the keyboard.

[Jim]

I get my prescriptions from a mail-order pharmacy and I've had some weird packaging experiences with them. ...

Sorta related, I had a doctor prescribe "sprinkle capsules" for me once. I simply took the capsules but wondered what the "sprinkle" was all about, so I read the information book that came with them. Turns out you could either take the capsules straight as I did or open the capsules and sprinkle the medicine on some food.

Never tried it.

[Trebuchet]

Sorta related, I had a doctor prescribe "sprinkle capsules" for me once. I simply took the capsules but wondered what the "sprinkle" was all about, so I read the information book that came with them. Turns out you could either take the capsules straight as I did or open the capsules and sprinkle the medicine on some food.

Never tried it.

Sounds like that's for pets or children!

[pzkpfw]

The thing is, opening packages should NOT require tools.

...

I bought a pair of padlocks on the weekend, as I wanted two that use the same key.

Had to use "serious tools" to open the packaging.


Then read some more of the packaging, and it turns out the locks are for "low risk applications".

So possibly, the packaging was more secure than the locks.

[21st Century Schizoid Man]

So a lot of people I know only through the internet, who are in various on-line bicycle fora, go on long rides, and then say that all of the distance travelled was 100% emissions free.

I don’t know how they do it. I exhale a lot of greenhouse gas when I bicycle.

[kpatz]

Then read some more of the packaging, and it turns out the locks are for "low risk applications".

So possibly, the packaging was more secure than the locks.

They should make the product out of the same plastic the packaging is made from. It would last long enough to hand down to your great great grandchildren.

[KaiYeves]

So a lot of people I know only through the internet, who are in various on-line bicycle fora, go on long rides, and then say that all of the distance travelled was 100% emissions free.

I don’t know how they do it. I exhale a lot of greenhouse gas when I bicycle.

There was a National Geographic graphic years ago comparing modes of personal transportation that put it as “0*”, with the asterisk note saying “*Except rider’s breath”.

[profloater]

Milk delivery used to be nearly ideal. Fresh milk every day to your door in bottles with a choice of fat content shown by the easy action top colour. The bottles were reused many times and could be 100% recycled into new bottles. The milk was safe to drink. Many products also came in glass jars, some still do. But retail habits have changed. The pack now carries audit information, even radio links for both accounting and theft protection. Will the Amazon tillless stores change it all? The cameras track shoppers and purchases , will complex packs still be required? Can an AI system count apples without barcodes? Then there does seem to be a lot of cardboard . Is it efficiently recycled? The plastic is not, that is a big problem. Final thought: containers revolutionised sea transport, could mini containers solve the last mile issue?

[21st Century Schizoid Man]

There was a National Geographic graphic years ago comparing modes of personal transportation that put it as “0*”, with the asterisk note saying “*Except rider’s breath”.

I've actually wondered whether cars or other such devices are really all that bad in terms of emissions. If I have to run/walk/ride, I produce a certain amount of carbon dioxide getting there. If I take a highly engineered machine, it produces a certain amount. Is it more? Is it a lot more? Now, if I take some kind of huge land yacht, that might produce a lot of greenhouse gas, but what if I take a small economy car with recent technology - is the amount of carbon dioxide produced a lot more than what I would produce moving under my own power? Or is it possibly even less? Might the car be more emissions-efficient than a human?

But then, I think the main reduction in emissions if you walk, run, ride a bicycle, etc. is, if you have to do that all the time instead of driving a car, you're probably not going to travel nearly as much . . .

[Gillianren]

Also, the last I checked, I was always breathing.

[Swift]

I've actually wondered whether cars or other such devices are really all that bad in terms of emissions. If I have to run/walk/ride, I produce a certain amount of carbon dioxide getting there. If I take a highly engineered machine, it produces a certain amount. Is it more? Is it a lot more? Now, if I take some kind of huge land yacht, that might produce a lot of greenhouse gas, but what if I take a small economy car with recent technology - is the amount of carbon dioxide produced a lot more than what I would produce moving under my own power? Or is it possibly even less? Might the car be more emissions-efficient than a human?

But then, I think the main reduction in emissions if you walk, run, ride a bicycle, etc. is, if you have to do that all the time instead of driving a car, you're probably not going to travel nearly as much . . .

According to this website, a person emits about 700 grams of CO2 per day. According to this website it is 2.3 pounds (1043 grams) per day.

According to this website a car driven 15,000 miles per year and getting 50 miles per gallon (which is double the fleet average in the US) emits 4.2 tons per year, which is 10,439 grams per day.

I don't see how one can argue that cars are better than people walking for CO2 emissions.

[Swift]

According to this website, a person emits about 700 grams of CO2 per day. According to this website it is 2.3 pounds (1043 grams) per day.

According to this website a car driven 15,000 miles per year and getting 50 miles per gallon (which is double the fleet average in the US) emits 4.2 tons per year, which is 10,439 grams per day.

I don't see how one can argue that cars are better than people walking for CO2 emissions.

I assume the next argument will be emissions per mile.

Let's assume a person walks 10 miles per day (I just made up that number, but it seems high). And lets double the CO2 estimate for humans to 2000 grams per day. So that's 200 grams/mile.

Using the car in the above example, that's 41 miles per day, and 10,439 grams per day, so that's 255 grams/mile. So doubling the human emission estimate, and taking a highly efficient car, the emissions per mile get at least close.

I still wouldn't argue cars are more efficient than humans walking.

[PetersCreek]

It's March in Alaska. My truck has a heater. Argument over.

[profloater]

I assume the next argument will be emissions per mile.

Let's assume a person walks 10 miles per day (I just made up that number, but it seems high). And lets double the CO2 estimate for humans to 2000 grams per day. So that's 200 grams/mile.

Using the car in the above example, that's 41 miles per day, and 10,439 grams per day, so that's 255 grams/mile. So doubling the human emission estimate, and taking a highly efficient car, the emissions per mile get at least close.

I still wouldn't argue cars are more efficient than humans walking.

Humans breathe out CO2 all the time though! Cars don’t. I guess there is an issue whether cycling beats walking, but do we differentiate the purpose of the trip? Dangerous territory for human overall CO2 emissions!

[Trebuchet]

You know what else we breathe out? DiHydrogenMonoxide! That stuff's deadly!

[Swift]

Humans breathe out CO2 all the time though! Cars don’t.

Exactly correct. So humans are generating CO2 whether we walk or drive or sit still. I guess the question should be "how much more CO2 do humans generate walking, versus how much does their car generate if they drive it". I'll leave it to someone else to figure that out.

I'll stand by the idea that cars are worse than people for CO2 emissions. Let someone prove me wrong.