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3 February 2006

Grumpy Old Man

I’m clearly turning into a grumpy old man. Each day something new angers me to the point that I have to have a rant about it to get it out of my system. Today’s Grumpy Levels are extremely high.

First of all, I saw a child that could have been no older than ten or twelve years old throwing his finished cigarette end into the road. I detest smoking at the best of times, but when I see children as young as him smoking that really winds me up. Do his parents even know or care about his habit?

Then, 10 minutes later (before I’d had chance to calm down), I saw a chav at the tram stop open his cigarette packet – yes, this is smoking related too – take out his last cigarette and then drop the empty packet on the floor at his feet. THERE WERE EVEN TWO BINS NO FUTHER THAN 10 METRES AWAY FROM HIM!!! Oh, and as if he needed to wind me up anymore, he had some crap sounding music playing on his mobile phone!

So, you can imagine my joy when I got on the tram, opened the Metro and read about some cock trying to sue Apple because their iPods are ‘inherently defective in design and are not sufficiently adorned with adequate warnings regarding the likelihood of hearing loss’. People like him make my blood boil. The story’s all over the news just because it’s so ridiculous.

I’ve been close to writing letters to the Metro before, but this article actually made me do it. Here’s my take on it:

Dear Mail Metro,

Re: iPod user sues Apple over ‘risk of deafness’

Does John Kiel Patterson (Metro, Fri) lack any common sense or responsibility? The iPod is clearly not a defective or unsafe product. Apple includes a disclaimer explaining that hearing loss is possible if earphones are used at high volumes. If he’s suffered hearing loss as a direct result of using an iPod, then it’s his own incompetence that is to blame. Perhaps he also plans on suing car manufacturers because they allow him to drive his car at 35mph, which means he’s twice as likely to kill someone as he would be at 30mph?

I recently purchased a Sony PSP and was angered to discover that the included headphones were “ear-friendly” and therefore capped at 90dB – which is apparently equivalent to the noise experienced in a loud factory. However, I soon discovered that I was unable to listen to my music on my way to work because the noise of the tram was drowning it out – even at full volume! Does this mean that my daily dose of tram noise is gradually deafening me? Perhaps I should sue...

T Ruscoe

Grumble. Grumble. Grumble.

Update: 7 February 2006 (13:03)
They’ve now had two days to print my letter and it looks like they’ve not going to. Oh well, at least that’s something else I can moan about...

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Grumpy Old Man posted by at 13:16 3 comments Add your comments

3 Comments

ruscoe - you've been smoking 40 woodbines a day since you were 11 you hypocritical twit.

And you frequently litter the pavements on a saturday night with your own vomit.

It's your public breastfeeding that really offends me though.
by Anonymous Anonymous  
I too am a Grumpy old(er) man. I even got bought the book for Christmas. One of my "grumps" is people with personal stereos/ipods or whatever turned up so loud that everybody around them can hear a tiny unrecognisable version of the song they are listening to. Sony's idea of limiting the volume sounds like a good idea. Saves the users hearing and saves severybody else from listening to Tony playing his Son of Dork tracks in all thier tinny glory.
by Anonymous Anonymous  
And another thing I hate. Chavs driving down the bypass chucking thier empty McBurger wrappers out of the window. They visit McBurgers everyday to loiter in the carpark with thier Chav mates so why not use the bins that the nice McBurger people provide.
Wouldn't want to get grease on the inside of thier "tricked up" (blue neon washer jets etc)Citreon AX. Except if they look at thier Greasy spotty faces they would realise that they are way too late.
by Anonymous Anonymous