Least Subtle Irony

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Today I saw the most obvious irony ever. As I went into the building where I work there was a man on a stepladder working on something in the ceiling (smoke detectors, I think). He had obeyed health and safety rules by distributing a few of those plastic "DANGER: TRIP HAZARD" signs. He backed down off the ladder and tripped over one of those signs. This makes cartoons where a clairvoyant doesn't turn up due to unforeseen circumstances look subtle.

Any competition?

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Thursday, 3 October 2002 19:50 (twenty-three years ago)

hahaha

nope.
have decided today is 'be serious' day.

take back previous hahaha.

― donna (donna), Thursday, 3 October 2002 21:07 (twenty-three years ago)

i think this a contender

"Man dies after shooting himself in head during gun safety lesson"

http://home.post-dispatch.com/channel/pdweb.nsf/98d88f9202f6bdea85256a0f005f18c7/86256a0e0068fe5086256c45003bef01?OpenDocument

― chaki (chaki), Friday, 4 October 2002 06:39 (twenty-three years ago)

btw that wasnt my ironic offering.
cause it isnt ironic

― donna (donna), Friday, 4 October 2002 07:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i've seen a sign that says "this sign not yet in use". seriously. i was stuck in an irony loop for about three weeks.

― g-kit (g-kit), Friday, 4 October 2002 08:11 (twenty-three years ago)

Ive read IBM manuals that have pages with "THIS PAGE IS INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK" typed on them.

― gazza, Friday, 4 October 2002 08:14 (twenty-three years ago)

oh yeah, they also featured heavily in exam papers.

BLANK PAGE

yeah, right.

what the hell was the purpose of those BLANK PAGEs?

― g-kit (g-kit), Friday, 4 October 2002 09:04 (twenty-three years ago)

the health and safety offiecer at my old workplace chopped off his thumb when using a circular saw without a safety guard.

― chris (chris), Friday, 4 October 2002 10:36 (twenty-three years ago)

the 'blank page' is to stop you from having a panis attack thinking your copy of the exam papaer has pages missing.

― Sofa King Alternative (Sofa King Alternative), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:10 (twenty-three years ago)

Panis being the F1 driver most notorious for cacking himself, apparently.

See, I try to say something clever and it turns out I can't type. Is that irony? Or am I not Alanis Morrisette

― Sofa King Alternative (Sofa King Alternative), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:10 (twenty-three years ago)

i know that, but i mean... why have blank pages in exam papers at all? why not just (and i know this may seem crazy) put questions etc on all of the pages? i don't buy books & magazines etc with big blank pages in them. so WHY??? for the love of god, WHY????

― g-kit (g-kit), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:15 (twenty-three years ago)

So that there are the correct number of questions and that each of them is of a reasoanble length?

― Sofa King Alternative (Sofa King Alternative), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:21 (twenty-three years ago)

how do blank pages help the paper have the correct number of questions? am i missing something painfully obvious (for a change)?

― g-kit (g-kit), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:26 (twenty-three years ago)

it's hard to bind just three pages, gut you may not have enuff questions for four pages

haha old text-books and paperbacks sometimes used to have blank pages at the back which wd say "these pages are for your notes"!!

"perfect binding" technology has improved immeasuably since the 60s = you no longer have to print books via the batch or bundle process = they can have exactly the number of pages you want and not for example a multiple of 16 or 32)

― mark s (mark s), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:26 (twenty-three years ago)

i called you "gut" by mistake, it just slipped out

― mark s (mark s), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:27 (twenty-three years ago)

gut?? how does g-kit become gut?

― g-kit (g-kit), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:31 (twenty-three years ago)

One too many cans of whiskas, I imagine.

― Tim (Tim), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:34 (twenty-three years ago)

meow to that.

― g-kit (g-kit), Friday, 4 October 2002 11:36 (twenty-three years ago)

Don't books still generally have an even number of pages? All the ones I have do, but I suppose that might be a coincidence.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Friday, 4 October 2002 16:58 (twenty-three years ago)

I have books with three pages. They made 'em with four, but just took off the back of one of the pages 'coz it was useless.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Friday, 4 October 2002 17:29 (twenty-three years ago)

Ha!

Okay well beyond that yes, Martin, there are an even number of leaves/pages too, which I assume is what you meant. For any book of decent size the pages are gathered into little folded bundles, which are then sort of glued into the spine. It would be possible to take an odd number of loose leaves/pages and perfect-bind those -- i.e. glue all the ends against a spine -- but then you run into two problems: (a) half of them will pop loose and fall out, as they're only glued in by like the thickness of a piece of paper, and (b) it's pointless anyway, as the pages get printed in sets as well.

Alang and Pyth and Nory will surely back me up when I say that the "this page intentionally blank" is even more important for things that aren't bound but are meant to be, eventually: it's what reminds you not to look at a one-sided manuscript stack and say "oh what's this blank one doing in here?" -- and throw it out and wind up reversing the pagination for the entire rest of the text.

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 4 October 2002 17:56 (twenty-three years ago)

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