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Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

Yet another installment of "My Cousin Sent Me This".

The fact of the matter is that I don't know whether these things apply only to the U.S., but I'm certain if it's that way anywhere, it was that way here first.

Only in America

Only in America... can a pizza get to your house faster than an ambulance.

Only in America... are there handicap parking places in front of a skating rink.

Only in America... do drugstores make the sick walk all the way to the back of the store to get prescriptions.

Only in America... do we order a double cheese burger, a large fry, and a diet coke.

Only in America... do banks leave both doors open and then chain the pens to the counters.

Only in America... do we leave cars worth thousands of dollars in the driveway and leave useless junk in the garage.

Only in America... do we use answering machines to screen calls and then have call waiting so we won't miss a call from someone we didn't want to talk to in the first place.

Only in America... do banks have drive-up ATM machines with Braille lettering.

Only in America... do we buy hot dogs in packages of ten and buns in packages of eight.

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I have an unfair advantage.
I have a dictionary and I'm not afraid to use it!
www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/8641/

Posted by Jaresh Inyo on :

Same in Canada. I was once branded insensitive because of something similar to the braille thing. I was in a hotel, and I noticed that the signs with the room numbers had braille on them. I had to ask: How's the blind guy supposed to find the braille?

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Josh: I think they're getting to know each other a bit too well, if you catch my drift.
Me: Oh, I agree. I think they're spending too much time together, that is of course, if you catch my drift.
Asher: I think he's *ucking her, and he's cheating on his wife, and he's risking his marriage, and if his wife finds out about it she'll leave him and take their son, and his life will be ruined. If you catch my drift...

Posted by Jubilee (Member # 99) on :

*LOL* Jaresh, Charles asked ME the same question when we were checking into my hotel room that week.... "How's the blind person supposed to find the Braille to read it?"
I personally think that it's in a common spot for every hotel... once the blind person knows where to look in ONE hotel, they know where to look in all the others as well.

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"Nothing can be altered, there is nothing to decide
No escape, no change of heart, no anyplace to hide
You are all I'll ever want, but this I am denied
Sometimes in my darkest thoughts, I wish I'd never learned
What it is to be in love and have that love returned"

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

It could be that it isn't there for the convenience of the vision-impaired, but because to fail to put Braille there would violate the "Americans with Disabilities Act".

I have substantiating evidence! Look:

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/940520.html
and
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/940701.html

Hey, stupider things have happened. The city of New York put the brakes on a project to make public restrooms more available throughout the city. Problem: the design accepted, fully automated (it cleaned itself thoroughly after each "visit") was not easily accessible to wheelchair-dependent people.

Answer (insisted upon by the "handicapable lobby" in NYC): Provide trained people to stand around and assist any wheelchair-borne "customers".

NYC said: "Great! We can afford it if we provide assistants at 1/3 (or therabouts) of the restrooms!"

Wrong-O!, Buckwheat! Say the lobbyists. "If you don't provide assistants for ALL the restrooms, we'll sue you so hard you won't have money for toilet paper in the buildings you already have.

Rather than go in the red to provide attendants for all the restrooms (the Lobbyists wouldn't agree to a program where fewer restrooms were built to allow the city to afford attendants for them all), the city of New York "tabled" the proposal for the time being.

So where's the justice when nobody gets public restrooms because only some of them would be fully accessible to the handicapped?

--Baloo

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I have an unfair advantage.
I have a dictionary and I'm not afraid to use it!
www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/8641/

Posted by RW (Member # 27) on :

Only in America... can a pizza get to your house faster than an
ambulance.

***True. But we're close to the hospital so maybe I'm not the one to say this

Only in America... are there handicap parking places in front of a skating
rink.

***Well, that's handy. If handicapped grandpa wants to take his grandchildren to the rink? Never been to the skating rink, since there are no dry skating rinks here, and I can't ice-skate either. For a Dutchman, that's weird.

Only in America... do drugstores make the sick walk all the way to the
back of the store to get prescriptions.

***Don't you guys get prescriptions from doctors?

Only in America... do we order a double cheese burger, a large fry, and
a diet coke.

***Hm, I'm not sure, since at McDo's here there's no choice. All normal coke.

Only in America... do banks leave both doors open and then chain the
pens to the counters.

***Both doors? You mean two combine ddoors or the front and back door? Anyway, that's not exceptional either, 'cause it's the same here.

Only in America... do we leave cars worth thousands of dollars in the
driveway and leave useless junk in the garage.

***That's what we do too. But perhaps that's because the junk prevents the car from getting into the garage. But on a serious note, the junk isn't designed to withstand extreme weather conditions, the car is.

Only in America... do we use answering machines to screen calls and
then have call waiting so we won't miss a call from someone we didn't
want to talk to in the first place.

***I don't even understand this. What's call waiting?

Only in America... do banks have drive-up ATM machines with Braille
lettering.

We don't even have drive-up ATM machines. Luckily, because I don't quite understand why you need them. And yes, we DO have ATM machines, before you think the Dutch are backward.

Only in America... do we buy hot dogs in packages of ten and buns in
packages of eight.

This is true! Our hot dogs ("knakworsten") come in tins of ten (or twenty I believe), and the buns can be bought in packages of erm, 4, 6, 8, 10 etc. The difference being, I think, our buns are fresh, American buns are prebaked air sealed and all.

And I know knakworsten is a silly word. :]

Posted by Sunspot (Member # 77) on :

RW, Call waiting is like where when you are talking to someone on the phone and you get another call, a tone ounds and you put one person on hold and talk to the other. I think...

We get prescriptions from doctors, then we go to a pharmacy or supermarket to get the prescription filled.

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"Just remember...you're the queen!"
Tom Paris to Janeway, "Bride of Chaotica!"

Posted by Xentrick (Member # 64) on :

Baloo, in San Francisco a certain Francofile mayor was so impressed with the Paris-style coin-operated lavatories that he decided The City By The Bay needed them here. Part of the argument: the homeless would no longer urinate in public (ha!)

Problem: local rights grouped argued that under the ADA, the stalls had to be *big* to allow two wheel chairs inside.

Result: stalls are now so large, junkies are going inside in groups to shoot-up.

Thanks, mayor.

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

Well, at least they are out of sight while they indulge their unsightly habit.

Yeccch! Is that the same mayor who wanted to provide homeless people with credit card machines so rich people who don't carry cash would no longer have any excuse to blow them off? Why don't we just give them the keys to our homes while we're at it, eh? Let's just start with Mr. Mayor's house first, shall we?

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I have an unfair advantage.
I have a dictionary and I'm not afraid to use it!
www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/8641/

[This message has been edited by Baloo (edited July 05, 1999).]

Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :

Um... Why would they need to fit two wheelchairs? What are the wheelchair people going to be doing in there?

Erm... On second thought... Maybe I don't want to know...

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"Imagine all the people, living life in peace..."
-John Lennon, "Imagine"

Posted by Sunspot (Member # 77) on :

*LMAO @ TSN*

My thoughts exactly!

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Don't piss me off -- I'm running out of places to hide the bodies.

Posted by RW (Member # 27) on :

Can't they install blue lights in those stalls? That should solve the problem.

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

RW: I think I just missed a cultural reference. What do the blue lights do, apart from providing insufficient illumination?

--Baloo

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"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
--Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977
www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/8641/

Posted by RW (Member # 27) on :

Ah, it's ingenious actually. In blue light, you can't see your (blue) arteries and veins. Because of this, you can't take a heroin shot. So the toilets stay junk free. I've seen this several times at petrol station toilets and I wondered what it was for until I read it somewhere and thought: "Man, that's the most ingeniously simple solution I've seen in a while"
And yes, you can still see where you pee. But judging by the condition of those toilets, some men will never know where to pee.

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

On that note, I provide a relevant link from "The Straight Dope":

Why are public toilet seats always "U" shaped?

--Baloo

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Christ is coming soon.
Look busy.
www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/8641/

Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :

RW, that's...devious. I love it!

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"And give me back my evil heart so I can see you as you are."
--
John Linnell