Things I Don't Understand, Part Four

You can read part one here, part two here, and part three here.

How We Move, Exhibit A: Being In a Hurry, Except We're Not

One time in a shopping centre, a young woman pushed past our double pram on the escalator. She had asked if she could squeeze past, but given an escalator isn't much wider than a double pram and we were already about two-thirds up, my wife politely asked if she could just wait. This seemed reasonable as while she would lose ten seconds from her super important Saturday morning, she also wouldn't unnecessarily invade my kids personal space.

She pushed past anyway.

I wasn't happy and sarcastically said "seriously, you're in that much of a fucking hurry?". When it comes to your own children I find you kind of stop caring about being polite, plus at the time they still couldn't parrot swearing.

She said something I didn't hear, along with a flapping of arms that suggested she was in too much of a hurry to explain herself or care about others, and continued her urgent ascent to the next level. I thought she must be late to some critical appointment or something along those lines, based on the interaction. Yet when she finished climbing the escalator, she actually slowed down to walk at a normal speed. It was a slap in the face to the inventor of the moving walkway.

It was very tempting to catch up to her, but this is how people end up banned from shopping centres by security, so instead I bought a milkshake.

Not the same milkshake, but you get the idea.

Thinking about this afterwards, I realised I observe this ridiculous behaviour all the time, especially in the Sydney CBD. Two examples:

• People playing chicken with a busy crossing. They do that funny fast shuffle to get across as the little man stops flashing red and the traffic light changes to green, then upon getting to the other side under a barrage of honking horns, they slow right back down to a normal walking speed. So these people clearly have somewhere to go that is important enough to risk their life playing chicken with traffic, yet not important enough to walk briskly along the footpath. They are really just trolling cars.

• People standing right on the edge of the gutter at the traffic light crossing, even though buses normally hang over the gutter when they turn. I've actually seen people get clipped by buses like this twice, fortunately neither occasion was too serious. They probably thought it was worth it, as on balance of probabilities they must have got a 30cm advantage on crossing the road hundreds of times before coming to grief.

I put all this down to the way the mind works. Most people would rather be busy than be efficient. Moving feels like progress compared to standing still, even if you don't actually save any time. So you're a big winner if you beat the traffic or get in front of a queue, even if it really accomplishes very little. It's the same principle that leads people to get up the very second a plane lands, as I have discussed previously.


How We Move, Exhibit B: Able Bodied People Using Lifts

Where there are escalators or only one flight of stairs, only the following groups of people should get priority to utilise the lifts:

A. Disabled people
B. Really old people
C. People with prams
D. Old people

That means the following groups of people don't get to use the lifts:

E. Everyone else

If you belong in category E and use the lifts, not only are you being lazy, you're also being stupid and I don't understand you.

Don't even!

Nearly all the time waiting for a lift takes far longer than using the escalator or climbing the stairs.

I regularly see people at Town Hall Station miss their connecting morning train because instead of taking one flight of steps up to the next platform, they wait for the lift to arrive so they can squeeze in alongside my double pram, two senior citizens and a guy limping with a walking cane. You could divide the lift journey into four parts - the wait, getting in, moving, and getting out - and I think all four parts are longer than the entire process of using your legs.

Then again, it could be worse. I've never had someone literally jump over the pram to beat me into a lift full of other able-bodied people, as has happened to my wife.


The English Language Fails To Provide Appropriate Words To Describe "The Middle"

The English language is one of the most remarkable languages on the planet. The main reason is because the English language has no purity or integrity. So the mongrel child of Germanic origins, where most words come from Old Norse (via Vikings settlement) or Old Norman/French (via the Normans and 1066), continues to expand and evolve by shamelessly stealing hundreds of words annually from other languages, and then making up hundreds of others. This leaves English-speakers with a far richer vocabulary than any other people on the planet.

The one area of the English language I find lacking is, we just can't compete with the Eskimos in number of words to describe snow. Actually that's probably a myth, and also Wikipedia has an entry for almost everything.

No, my problem with the English language is far greater than describing stuff falling from the sky. My problem is that while it is brilliant at describing ends, it fails to provide words to describe things in the middle. Even the fact I just had to use "the middle" rather than a singular word is grating.

This occurred to me when I thought about being overwhelmed, and how you can also be underwhelmed, but most of the time my reactions to things happening is neither of these extremes. My reactions mostly fall into a vast continuum between those two points. And yet if I was to say I was feeling whelmed, you'd think I was either unintelligent or being silly. Or you might be confused as to why I was using an archaic term that describes capsizing or drowning, unless we were on a boat while having the conversation of course. In which case, you should help me out.

We can be up or down, or near or far, yet we are unable to describe a position that is neither of these extremes, other than making inelegant compromises along the lines of "in between" or "pretty low" or "not too far".

We can be good or bad, or right or wrong, yet we lack the sophistication to succinctly describe a compromise position between these points which would actually reflect most behaviours and beliefs.

This is disappointing. 

If "selfie" can make the dictionary, someone needs to get "whelmed" in there with a modern meaning.

I would find that development to be... appointing? 

Damn you, English language!


People claiming your kids are identical when they clearly are not

I appreciate this is probably a niche complaint. 

I have twin boys. This is a magnet for attracting old people, weird people, and old weird people.

Often these people ask if they are identical, because I guess it's easier than looking for themselves.

So I say 'no'.

A few times the response to this will be to then glance very superficially at the boys, because I suppose I could be lying for some reason. They will see they both have blonde hair and blue eyes, and say something like, 'maybe not to you'. The implication is they are actually identical and only my familiarity as their parent allows me to tell them apart, while also failing to recognise that others will be unable to also tell them apart.

The problem with this is they're really not identical at all.

The last time this happened was at the shops - it might have even been the same day as the escalator incident previously mentioned. A guy said to me, "how are they not identical?". This was delivered in the same incredulous way you might say "how is that not a penalty?" when watching your team getting mugged at the footy.

I just smiled and went to buy some cheese.

Not the same cheese, but you get the idea.

What I should've had said is this:

You're right mate, they are identical. Except for having different body shapes and weighing different amounts. And having different shaped faces on different sized heads. And their eyes, while the same colour, are quite different. They also have different mouths. And different shaped ears. And different noses. Also one has far more hair, that is full and thick and sits flat, while the other still has thin hair, that hasn't fully come in at the front and spikes up in all directions. 

Plus you missed the most obvious reason they are not identical.

They are wearing different coloured hoodies.

You can see the differences for yourself, right here...

...not actually my boys for privacy reasons, but you get the idea.