#267: Chasers

I don't like when people take shots in a bar and follow with chasers of beer. I feel it takes away from the shot. If you can't or don't like the shot without the chaser, don't do the shot. Severity: 1

#266: Bond Price Quotes in Wall Street Journal

If you go to the front page of the WSJ, they list the 10 Year treasury note's current yield, then the change in price, and the percentage change in price. Well, what they don't list, and what I'm most interested in, is the change in yield. I'm not interested in the change in price. While it is possible to calculate the change in yield from the information given, I find it annoying that they are out of sync in the bases they are using. The change-in figure should reflect the first number, so either the change-in value should reflect the change in the yield or the first value should be the price of the bond, not the yield. They are mixing apples and oranges, which maybe makes sense to bond professionals, but to regular people interested in how interest rates have moved during the day, it is confusing and not communicating the desired information to the reader. Severity: 2

#265: Smart-aleck online poll choices

On sfgate.com, they have a daily poll related to the current news and I find it interesting to see what people think, but they always have some smart-aleck choice(s) that I feel skews the results because some people are more apt to pick the snide choice rather than a normal one, especially for politically-charged topics. Take today's poll, which reflects the latest news of Ford offering buyouts to 38,000 employees (I'm jealous). The question is "How much of a buyout would you need to leave your job?" The choices are: a) 10-99k b) more than 100k c) wouldn't take one d) if I worked for Ford, just about anything would do. I don't like that "d" is non-responsive to the question and yet they offer it as a choice. It cheapens the poll. Not that it's scientific or anything, but people took the time to answer honestly and these "d" answerers are screwing up the results. But I blame sfgate.com for allowing them to pick the snide answer in the first place. In this case, only 12% picked the non-responsive answer, but that's just because the issue wasn't really a hot-button one. BTW, I didn't even pick a choice for this poll since my selection wasn't there. I'd be pretty cheap to get rid of; free checking for life is all I ask (no direct deposit required) Severity: 2

#264: Faux-booing

The common sports fan practice of faking a "boo" by yelling a guy's name that has the "oo" sound in it. For instance, when Isaac Bruce makes a good catch for the St. Louis Rams, when the fans go "Bruuuuuuuuuuuce" which sounds like boos but isn't. People think they are so cool because they are tricking others into thinking they are booing when in fact they are doing the opposite, lauding the good play. However, this practice has become so cliche that it's annoying, like waving towels at a sporting event (which I've already expounded upon in a previous post.) Severity: 1

#263: Going to the "gym"

I don't like how people call places like 24 Hour Fitness "The Gym." Unless your place has a basketball court or a boxing ring included, you can't use that term. Gym is short of Gymnasium which, as you can see if you click the link, does not describe the place where you go on a treadmill while you watch the Food Network. Does you place have Yoga classes? Not a gym. Smoothie bar? Not a gym. In other words, your place of exercise has to have either some kind of court for playing a game or running AND not have any froufrou stuff like a day spa or pilates to get the moniker "gym." Please stop misusing this name to imply you doing some gritty Rocky-type workouts when you aren't. Severity: 2

Note, I do realize that this brings up a problem of what to call you new non-gym where you workout. I don't have a good answer.

#262: Voting For/Against Judges

In my sample ballot for this election, there's a bunch of state supreme court and appeals court judges that I'm supposed to be for or against. But there is absolutely no information on these guys in the voter pamphlet. I even went online to try to find some information and couldn't so how can anyone make an informed decision that is not a lawyer or another judge familiar with the guys (which is about 99% of the state?) I'm voting against all of them just in case one is a wacko. Severity: 3

#261: Hockey Cheerleaders

I think it's wrong for there to be cheerleaders for an NHL team. It's just not part of the tradition and the nature of the game makes it lame since they can't be on the ice except. Severity: 1