The Random Wonderments Thread

[hindle xiii]

12 hours ago, The Hallucinating Goose said:

It's a good wonderment that one, I've thought about this kind of thing before; as you're going to bed the people on the other side of the world just getting up to go do the same thing as yourself, the unspoken, faceless masses that keep the world moving. I've just got up while the sanitary workers of the Far East are just finishing for the day. Really makes you curious to find out more about these people doesn't it and how closely their life possibly compares to your own. 

I travel abroad infrequently, but I watch numerous cookery shows where Rick Stein, for example, travels the world.

And there will be a cityscape shot of Lisbon, for example, and I like to look at the tall, old buildings crammed in together and think "someone lives behind that window there".

I vividly remember being on a train in Belgium through the countryside to Ostend or wherever and we panned by a house which had a lady reading the newspaper in the kitchen, that's it.

[Shadow]

On 22/02/2022 at 20:23, hindle xiii said:

My wonderment is thinking of the mundane around the world.

I could ramble on but I think this question best describes my interest:

Think of the people all over the world who have the same job as you.

For example, the florists of Belgrade, Serbia. Or the preschools of Santiago, Chile.

I 'friended' someone on facebook with the same name as me, he's in Buenos Aires and has a life almost entirely unlike mine, apart from knowing several Falklands vets, but on the other side. 

I'm also linked with someone with the same name as me in Stockholm who's MD of a division of Volvo.

In both cases we all seem to take an element of amusement in making each other look narcissistic by liking each other's posts occasionally. It makes me smile when I read <shadow> likes <shadow>'s post

[The Hallucinating Goose]

1 hour ago, hindle xiii said:

I travel abroad infrequently, but I watch numerous cookery shows where Rick Stein, for example, travels the world.

And there will be a cityscape shot of Lisbon, for example, and I like to look at the tall, old buildings crammed in together and think "someone lives behind that window there".

I vividly remember being on a train in Belgium through the countryside to Ostend or wherever and we panned by a house which had a lady reading the newspaper in the kitchen, that's it.

This is exactly what I do and it makes me incredibly happy to know there is someone else out there that does this same thing. I'll often pass by a random building and there'll be a curious, out of place window or a dirty window with some ripped curtains, half drawn across or something like that and I'll just think, "I wonder what's in that room" and maybe accompany the thought with a sigh, a slight sadness that I'll never find out. 

Today I was in Bridlington and I was sat on a bench and opposite me was a hotel. In the attic of the hotel must have been some rooms because in a small window at that level was a woman just leaning forward, looking out with her head resting on her hand and I wondered what her name was, where she was from, I just wanted to know everything about this random woman. 

Sigh...

[The Hallucinating Goose]

1 hour ago, Shadow said:

I 'friended' someone on facebook with the same name as me, he's in Buenos Aires and has a life almost entirely unlike mine, apart from knowing several Falklands vets, but on the other side. 

I'm also linked with someone with the same name as me in Stockholm who's MD of a division of Volvo.

In both cases we all seem to take an element of amusement in making each other look narcissistic by liking each other's posts occasionally. It makes me smile when I read <shadow> likes <shadow>'s post

That makes me think of Dave Gorman when he travelled the world meeting as many other people called Dave Gorman as he could. 

[The Hallucinating Goose]

I was in a clothing shop recently and I noticed the amount of items of clothing that had a random foreign city or university name emblazoned on them and it made me wonder whether if you went to say Italy or France, there would be clothing in shops there that say, Manchester or Birmingham or Liverpool or wherever on them. 

Another wonderment linked to this one is why someone would walk around with a foreign city on their top if they've never been there, or like I say a jumper with Harvard or Yale written on it. If I bought a top in a foreign city with said city's name on it and wore that then that's different, you've bought it there as a souvenir, but I wouldn't walk round in a top bought in Britain that says New York on it when I've never been there. 

[voteronniegibbs]

.

[The Hallucinating Goose]

3 minutes ago, voteronniegibbs said:

I would guess it will come down to human vanity, people like to look or feel as if they are an interesting person.

On a similar note, it amuses me that you can buy a monocolour sweatshirt on the high street for about £10, but if a self promoting sports brand puts their name across the front of a monocolour sweatshirt the price can go up to £30+, without there being anything remotely better about the garment itself.

I suspect you're probably right and i imagine it comes down to people's vanity as to why the monocolour sweatshirt can be more expensive with a brand on it.

It seems a good lot of people's lives are dictated by image which is itself dictated by consumerism, the fact that a person's image is improved by possessing the most expensive and exclusive objects and of course the clothing companies know this and use it to their advantage.

You could have two items on sale of exactly the same quality, let's say a red sweater. The first is plain and priced at £10, the second has a sports team's name written on the front of it and thus is £30. The name of course does not improve the quality or integrity of the garment but does provide the wearer with an interesting story to tell whomever may question them about it and as a result makes the wearer a much more interesting and desirable person to be acquainted with. Even if said story about going to New York (evidence provided in the form of your NY sweater) or whatever is total rubbish. 

I've probably gone into that a bit too much but it is something that has really got me thinking. The ins and outs of retail and the psychology behind it is something I find very interesting! 

[Futtocks]

43 minutes ago, voteronniegibbs said:

I would guess it will come down to human vanity, people like to look or feel as if they are an interesting person.

On a similar note, it amuses me that you can buy a monocolour sweatshirt on the high street for about £10, but if a self promoting sports brand puts their name across the front of a monocolour sweatshirt the price can go up to £30+, without there being anything remotely better about the garment itself.

It was in the Eighties when some luxury brands realised that, while many could not afford their actual products, they would may a premium for a t-shirt (Armani) or some other cheap product (like a Ferrari key fob), as long as it had the official* brand ID on it.

In the end, it has probably made them more money than the genuine, limited-production items.

*then the dodgy knock-off merchants noticed and started producing their own subculture of products.

[The Hallucinating Goose]

I've spent all morning at work wondering how hard it would actually be to find a needle in a haystack. I don't think it would actually be that hard. It might take a long time and you'll get back ache from all the bending over but I don't think it would actually be hard. 

I would spread all the hay out evenly and divide it into metre square sections and then using a combination of torch light to make the needle shine against the dull hay and a very powerful magnet I would meticulously scan each square in turn. Like I say, it might take a while but I don't think it would be too hard.