Faux Life: Things That Happen On TV But Not In Reality

[kiddo82]

8 hours ago, Nordly Beaumont said:

On tv people can be falling down drunk then turn stone cold sober when someone tells them bad news. Bad news doesn't change your blood alcohol levels!

And hangovers only consist of soft groans and showing up to work/school in sunglasses.  No one is ever shown crawling back and forth to the bathroom for half a day or demonstrating an inability to even sit up on the edge of the couch.  Not that I would know from experience.  No, sir.  These are just anecdotes from friends.

[Jacqs]

Only on TV do elderly retirees still listen to Benny Goodman and Glenn Miller when they want to be nostalgic for their teenage years. In real life, a 78 year old in 2018 was a teenage in the 1950s and would be nostalgic for Buddy Holly and Elvis Presley.

[fishcakes]

Soap operas only: any time someone is seen driving a car, they will invariably be blinded by oncoming headlights as you hear the screech of tires and see them yank hard on the steering wheel and end up crashing in a ditch. If there is a passenger in the car at the time, the crash will occur just as one of them was about to confess to something.

[andromeda331]

An amazing a mount of criminals find the person they are wanting to beat up/rob/murder with someone else and yet chose not to beat up/rob/murder that person and not because they get interrupted. Paid assassins will tell the second person to leave because they were only paid to deliver one body.  Which yeah but I doubt they want any witnesses to the murder alive to testify either. If their going to beat up a guy he maybe with his girlfriend or she'll show up only for them to tell her to go away and/or its none of her business.  Sure that way she'll go call the cops and they'll be waiting for you when you leave the room after you finish beating him up, robbing or murdering him.     

Edited July 30, 2018 by andromeda331

[Maharincess]

Nobody in real life would take a dish of food to somebody that isn't covered.  I see it all the time on tv though. Seriously, would any of you take food to somebody in an open container with no covering at all?   I wouldn't even walk uncovered food next door but people on tv will drive across town to deliver uncovered food. 

[riley702]

Sounds like a good excuse to get the car detailed.

[ChromaKelly]

On 7/28/2018 at 11:34 PM, JacquelineAppleton said:

Only on TV do elderly retirees still listen to Benny Goodman and Glenn Miller when they want to be nostalgic for their teenage years. In real life, a 78 year old in 2018 was a teenage in the 1950s and would be nostalgic for Buddy Holly and Elvis Presley.

Going along with that, grandparents are always old. Like old old. I'm in my mid- 40's with kids, and most of my friends have parents that are in their mid/late 60's-early 70's. Which of course is older, but not sitting in a rocking chair with white hair old. Our parents still travel, go out, have hobbies, etc. And they aren't nostalgic for big band music, my mom is a Beatlemaniac.

[shapeshifter]

Only On TV are passwords to valuable information always a single name or word with a meaning that can be determined by anyone with a little background knowledge of the person who created the password—who is always known (like: I know Sarah's one and only beloved dog was named Fido!). The password never uses numbers or symbols to substitute for letters (like 5 for S), and capitalization is never an issue. All of this is a good thing, because the plucky Scooby gang will "decrypt" this password with just moments to spare before some global calamity transpires. And only on TV (unlike my bank) is the user name always obvious.

Edited July 31, 2018 by shapeshifter

[Raja]

1 hour ago, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV are passwords to valuable information always a single name or word with a meaning that can be determined by anyone with a little background knowledge of the person who created the password—who is always known (like: I know Sarah's one and only beloved dog was named Fido!). The password never uses numbers or symbols to substitute for letters (like 5 for S), and capitalization is never an issue. All of this is a good thing, because the plucky Scooby gang will "decrypt" this password with just moments to spare before some global calamity transpires. And only on TV (unlike my bank) is the user name always obvious.

I don't know I would guess for PC's that is all most have for a password unless they have a master program filling the multiple passwords after their master code.  When it used to be said that telephone numbers were limited to seven digits because we can't dependably remember more I wonder if it is really possible for characters telling their ship to self destruct or fire the nukes to fire off random characters and symbols on cue without reading the code off a card physically locked in a safe. 

[Jacqs]

Most people probably use the same password for most of their online accounts...

[Nordly Beaumont]

4 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV are passwords to valuable information always a single name or word with a meaning that can be determined by anyone with a little background knowledge of the person who created the password—who is always known (like: I know Sarah's one and only beloved dog was named Fido!). 

Or, heck, just look around the room! A poster of a butterfly? Well, let's try b.. u.. t .. no, wait! m..o..n..a..r..c..h WE'RE IN!

[Jacqs]

This must be the only kid to wear a fancy green dress with lace trim and white tights when going to the local mall to see Santa. Thank you "Family Ties":

 

[Katy M]

3 hours ago, JacquelineAppleton said:

This must be the only kid to wear a fancy green dress with lace trim and white tights when going to the local mall to see Santa. Thank you "Family Ties":

 

There's a picture of me wit Santa when I was a kid with a pretty fancy red dress on.

[Jacqs]

47 minutes ago, Katy M said:

There's a picture of me wit Santa when I was a kid with a pretty fancy red dress on.

@Katy M it just didn't seem that a visit to a bog standard Mall Santa would be a "fancy dress and perfume and flowers" time.

[Raja]

A police department will assign a hundred cars to escort someone but not use their helicopter to watch over the entire thing.

[Bastet]

12 hours ago, JacquelineAppleton said:

This must be the only kid to wear a fancy green dress with lace trim and white tights when going to the local mall to see Santa. Thank you "Family Ties":

I doubt that very much; the point of taking a kid to see Santa is to get a picture of said kid on Santa's lap, so I'm sure plenty of parents put their kid in their "holiday best" for the occasion one year (or more).

[Lugal]

On 7/28/2018 at 11:14 AM, Browncoat said:

Neither does black coffee (or any coffee) or a cold shower or dunking the drunk's head repeatedly in a bucket of water.  Except on TV and in the movies.

I remember a show years ago where one character says to another: Do you know what you get when you give a drunk guy black coffee?  A wide-awake drunk guy.

On 7/30/2018 at 10:08 AM, ChromaKelly said:

Going along with that, grandparents are always old. Like old old. I'm in my mid- 40's with kids, and most of my friends have parents that are in their mid/late 60's-early 70's. Which of course is older, but not sitting in a rocking chair with white hair old. Our parents still travel, go out, have hobbies, etc. And they aren't nostalgic for big band music, my mom is a Beatlemaniac.

It's funny because I'm also mid-40s but I have friends in their mid/upper-70s but they look younger.  And another friend I knew had the white hair, but climbed up on her roof to fix her own cooler well into her upper seventies.  And my mom is also a Beatlemaniac.

[shapeshifter]

11 hours ago, JacquelineAppleton said:

 

12 hours ago, Katy M said:

There's a picture of me wit Santa when I was a kid with a pretty fancy red dress on.

@Katy M it just didn't seem that a visit to a bog standard Mall Santa would be a "fancy dress and perfume and flowers" time.

It was a thing in the 50s and 60s.

[Jacqs]

Speaking of surprises, I was interested to find out that "Doubtfire" is a genuine surname and not just made up for the Robin Williams film. A "D. Doubtfire" co-wrote a book about stamp collecting many years ago.

[shapeshifter]

Only On TV do people wake up in bed together with amnesia that effects whether or not they had sex, and, in spite of apparently having no odors, substances, or physical sensations that would indicate sex had occurred, they are still unsure about whether or not they had sex.

Edited August 3, 2018 by shapeshifter
Added a comma

[Joe]

4 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV do people wake up in bed together with amnesia that effects whether or not they had sex and, in spite of apparently having no odors, substances, or physical sensations that would indicate sex had occurred, they are still unsure about whether or not they had sex.

They still have their clothes on too, including underwear.

[Jacqs]

Yeah and we definitely never see a woman or teenage girl sleeping nude on TV.

[Bort]

7 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV do people wake up in bed together with amnesia that effects whether or not they had sex, and, in spite of apparently having no odors, substances, or physical sensations that would indicate sex had occurred, they are still unsure about whether or not they had sex.

 

2 hours ago, Joe said:

They still have their clothes on too, including underwear.

This has worked for me because I totally will get dressed afterwards, I hate sleeping naked. And if a dude is rather, uh, underwhelming, size-wise, well... 

[merylinkid]

7 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV do people wake up in bed together with amnesia that effects whether or not they had sex, and, in spite of apparently having no odors, substances, or physical sensations that would indicate sex had occurred, they are still unsure about whether or not they had sex.

the totally best take on this trope was Warehouse 13.   The two agents wake up in bed together.    Knowing their relationshp they are aghast.   

Spoiler

Turns out they got into bed together because something happened in the Warehouse and they knew if they woke up together, they would wonder why and retrace the events.   Thus discovering what went wrong in the Warehouse.

[shapeshifter]

3 hours ago, Joe said:

7 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV do people wake up in bed together with amnesia that effects whether or not they had sex and, in spite of apparently having no odors, substances, or physical sensations that would indicate sex had occurred, they are still unsure about whether or not they had sex.

They still have their clothes on too, including underwear.

Actually, on the episode of Take Two that aired last night on plain old vanilla network TV they were naked; so maybe TV morés are changing. Of course, being on network TV (not HBO) the female pulled the sheet around herself while the male simultaneously grabbed a pillow to cover his parts—even though she was now out of the room—but the TV camera and so our viewer eyes were still on him. He then hilariously grabbed a second pillow to cover his derrière while dashing out of the room.

And, they even managed to work the nakedness into a Silkwood-type plot to leave the Did-They-Or-Didn't-They question up for grabs.

But I was still annoyed because there is no way humans would not notice physical signs of having had coitus (or other sex) if they really wanted to know, and in this case, the two characters were even detectives.

I guess my suspension of disbelief fails when it comes to sex. Fictional faster-than-the-speed-of-light space travel I'm okay with. Not knowing if you had sex within the last 12 hours? Not so much.

[proserpina65]

On ‎07‎/‎19‎/‎2018 at 8:27 PM, Maharincess said:

Thanks @BastetI've never heard of it. So it's kind of like a bigger 7-11?

Yep, it's the bomb.

[proserpina65]

On ‎07‎/‎20‎/‎2018 at 9:48 AM, Ohwell said:

I don't know if all Wawa's are like this, but the one thing I don't like is that you have to touch the screen to place your order instead of speaking to a person.   Considering how many hands have touched that screen, that's just nasty.  

It has it's plusses and minuses: yes, there's the whole germ thing, but you don't have to wait for the employee to finish what they're currently making to take your order. 

I remember my childhood neighbors' phone numbers even though one of them doesn't have that number anymore.

I still know my SAT score (640 verbal, 450 math - yes, I suck at math).  But most people I know don't remember theirs.

On ‎07‎/‎31‎/‎2018 at 6:19 PM, JacquelineAppleton said:

Most people probably use the same password for most of their online accounts...

I think the general computer using public is divided between those who still use "1234" or "password" as their password, and people like me whose passwords might be variations on a couple of themes, but you'd really have to know me well to guess any of the themes.

[ABay]

@merylinkid, you've reminded me how much I enjoyed Warehouse 13 right up until the last 15 minutes.

[ZuluQueenOfDwarves]

Some friends of mine moved last year from Pennsylvania to Oregon. The thing they miss most apart from friends and family (sometimes BEFORE friends and family) is Wawa. I bring Wawa coffee with me when I visit and send them a bag on Christmas. 

Last December, my dad (who had had to abstain from caffeine for several days prior) woke up from a quadruple bypass and, still heavily sedated, requested Wawa coffee. Incidentally, he and my mom met while working at Wawa. So yeah, it’s a THING for those of us who grew up with it. 

[andromeda331]

 Teens in a relationship are always leaving their pet in the hands of their boyfriend or girlfriend to watch when they have to go out of town. And the pet always dies. Rarely the pet just gets lost but will be found. The rest always die.

Edited August 4, 2018 by andromeda331

[shapeshifter]

28 minutes ago, andromeda331 said:

 Teens in a relationship are always leaving their pet in the hands of their boyfriend or girlfriend to watch when they have to go out of town. And the pet always dies. Rarely the pet just gets lost but will be found. The rest always die.

Really? Like cats and dogs? Or is it "just" fish and hamsters and such? 
Perhaps it's a good thing I no longer seem to watch CW shows.

[Anela]

23 hours ago, merylinkid said:

the totally best take on this trope was Warehouse 13.   The two agents wake up in bed together.    Knowing their relationshp they are aghast.   

  Reveal hidden contents

Turns out they got into bed together because something happened in the Warehouse and they knew if they woke up together, they would wonder why and retrace the events.   Thus discovering what went wrong in the Warehouse.

Oh, that's clever! I only watched one episode of that, when it first started. I'll have to see if it's still on netflix. So many shows to look up. 

[andromeda331]

1 hour ago, shapeshifter said:

Really? Like cats and dogs? Or is it "just" fish and hamsters and such? 
Perhaps it's a good thing I no longer seem to watch CW shows.

 If its a fish it will always die and they'll try to find one that looks exactly like it. They may or may not. Home Improvement Jennifer's fish died because Brad put it too close to a lamp, on Castle Alexis's boyfriend pet rat got out somehow and no one could find it until after Ashley returned and Alexis had to tell him she lost his pet. Then it turned up in Martha's room. Its probably more then just couples Saved by the Bell with Slater's chameleon died when Zach watched it. On My Wife and Kids Kady was watching her school pet hamster that died. Michael bought a replacement and didn't tell her until the replacement had babies. On Just Shoot Me Finch asks Maya and Jack to watch his cat Spartacus but Jack accidently killed it while chasing it with a remote control car. On Golden Girls Sophia lost Harry's dog Dreyfuss and got a replacement dog. But then the dog comes back and then can't tell which is the real dog and rich is the fake dog.

[shapeshifter]

34 minutes ago, andromeda331 said:

On Just Shoot Me Finch asks Maya and Jack to watch his cat Spartacus but Jack accidently killed it while chasing it with a remote control car.

????
Okay. I will assume that the feline actor actually had a fun time shooting the scene, and enjoyed chasing remote control cars in its spare time, and maybe most cats enjoyed this past time, which gave rise to the story in the first place?
Or maybe cats didn't like this activity when these toys were popular in the 80s? My oldest daughter is still bitter about not having a remote control car, so I don't know what our cat would've thought of chasing or being chased by one.

[Katy M]

10 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

????
Okay. I will assume that the feline actor actually had a fun time shooting the scene, and enjoyed chasing remote control cars in its spare time, and maybe most cats enjoyed this past time, which gave rise to the story in the first place?
Or maybe cats didn't like this activity when these toys were popular in the 80s? My oldest daughter is still bitter about not having a remote control car, so I don't know what our cat would've thought of chasing or being chased by one.

My cat liked me to play with this rubber rope thingie with her.  She was totally obsessed with it.  She would go up to it, meow, look at me. So, I would have to play with her, because she was piteous.  She would want to do it forever, so I went out and bought her a motorized ball.  I figured then when I had bills to pay and laundry to fold and whatnot, she could chase the ball on her own.  So, you would turn it on, put it on the floor and the ball would roll around by itself.  But, it had a motor so it made a noise. Instead of chasing it, my cat ran away and hid.  So, my point is, I don't think cats like being chased by motorized cars.

[andromeda331]

10 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

????
Okay. I will assume that the feline actor actually had a fun time shooting the scene, and enjoyed chasing remote control cars in its spare time, and maybe most cats enjoyed this past time, which gave rise to the story in the first place?
Or maybe cats didn't like this activity when these toys were popular in the 80s? My oldest daughter is still bitter about not having a remote control car, so I don't know what our cat would've thought of chasing or being chased by one.

I think it just depends on the cat I've seen a lot of cats love that too and have fun chasing it around. It is so much fun watching them chasing the remote controlled cars, But also seen ones who either didn't like it and freaked out at a moving object and others that just didn't care. 

[Katy M]

21 minutes ago, andromeda331 said:

I think it just depends on the cat I've seen a lot of cats love that too and have fun chasing it around. It is so much fun watching them chasing the remote controlled cars, But also seen ones who either didn't like it and freaked out at a moving object and others that just didn't care. 

sure, it totally depends on the cat.  But, if the cat wanted to play with the cars, it'd probably turn around and pounce on them.  Cats run away from things they're scared of. They pounce on things they want to play with.  They ignore things they couldn't give two figs about.  My current cat is always ignoring me:(

Edited August 4, 2018 by Katy M

[ratgirlagogo]

On 8/3/2018 at 8:02 AM, merylinkid said:

On 8/3/2018 at 12:02 AM, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV do people wake up in bed together with amnesia that effects whether or not they had sex, and, in spite of apparently having no odors, substances, or physical sensations that would indicate sex had occurred, they are still unsure about whether or not they had sex.

 

the totally best take on this trope was Warehouse 13.   The two agents wake up in bed together.    Knowing their relationshp they are aghast.   

  Reveal hidden contents

I agree about Warehouse 13.   And, sigh, they JUST did this precise plotline on this week's Take Two.

[shapeshifter]

1 hour ago, ratgirlagogo said:

I agree about Warehouse 13.   And, sigh, they JUST did this precise plotline on this week's Take Two.

Yes, and yes, the Take Two episode is what triggered my post. When I read the episode description, I hoped they weren't going to have 21st century detectives unable to detect whether or not their own bodies had sex. But, nope. And it would have been so easy (and modernly frank) to have them say, "Well at least we know we didn't have intercourse." They could have still wondered if they had kissed etc., which, in a #MeToo era, would also be less offensive.

[janie jones]

On 8/2/2018 at 9:02 PM, shapeshifter said:

Only On TV do people wake up in bed together with amnesia that effects whether or not they had sex, and, in spite of apparently having no odors, substances, or physical sensations that would indicate sex had occurred, they are still unsure about whether or not they had sex.

On one hand, I feel like there should be some clue, but on the other hand, (TMI) I had sex last night and if I didn't have memory of it, I'm not sure I would know it.  Maybe I've been having sex wrong.  But my husband and I both clean up and get dressed afterwards, and no one on TV gets dressed after sex unless they're doing it at work.

[andromeda331]

On ‎8‎/‎4‎/‎2018 at 7:41 AM, Katy M said:

sure, it totally depends on the cat.  But, if the cat wanted to play with the cars, it'd probably turn around and pounce on them.  Cats run away from things they're scared of. They pounce on things they want to play with.  They ignore things they couldn't give two figs about.  My current cat is always ignoring me:(

 

Have you seen the videos of cats riding Roombas on YouTube? They look like their having fun.

Edited August 6, 2018 by andromeda331

[Maharincess]

On 8/5/2018 at 5:34 PM, andromeda331 said:

Have you seen the videos of cats riding Roombas on YouTube? They look like their having fun.

They do look like they're having fun.  My car ignores mine. 

[shapeshifter]

1 hour ago, stewedsquash said:

Haha, I love my library card number, 12 digits, because when I type it in the numbers just flow from each side that it is almost like playing the piano. I have a one line lyric made up for it that goes "Punch ing in my li brar y card is so. MUCH. fun."  

I am 52 and dressing up for Santa, yep that was my childhood. I also have a picture of me at about age six or seven dressed to go to an afternoon birthday party in a plaid dress, white leotards, patent leather shoes, front of my long hair pulled back  way too tightly in a rubber band and a great big bow. 

Hello, younger copy of me!

[Sara2009]

On 7/30/2018 at 12:08 PM, ChromaKelly said:

Going along with that, grandparents are always old. Like old old. I'm in my mid- 40's with kids, and most of my friends have parents that are in their mid/late 60's-early 70's. Which of course is older, but not sitting in a rocking chair with white hair old. Our parents still travel, go out, have hobbies, etc. And they aren't nostalgic for big band music, my mom is a Beatlemaniac.

I’m in my early 30s, and my parents are pushing 70. It happens, though obviously it depends.

[Raja]

Around the time of the second LA Riots, the Rodney King ones I was working with a next generation of low income youth around LA and the Compton schools. I was amazed at the number of barely 30 year old grandmothers that I was encountering. Meanwhile in the broader society  first time mothers were getting older and older. On TV the sexy lead of shows were increasingly in their 40s.  So we had this interesting situation of grandparents, of the TV character class both being older than in the early days of TV however being younger looking and more active  than the grandparents of shows produced from the 50s well into the 80s

[Trini]

... That thing where someone takes a necklace from someone else by just snatching it off the person's neck, instead of unhooking the clasp or pulling it over the head.

I mean, that ruins the clasp, right?

[SVNBob]

15 minutes ago, Trini said:

... That thing where someone takes a necklace from someone else by just snatching it off the person's neck, instead of unhooking the clasp or pulling it over the head.

I mean, that ruins the clasp, right?

It could damage the clasp.  But more often than not, the chain breaks instead.  Or the thread/wire, if it's a beaded or pearl necklace.

(And I would assume for some scenes, the prop masters add an intentional breaking point to these necklaces, so as to ensure a quick easy break that doesn't hurt the actors, but still allows for the necklace to be worn normally without fear of breaking until the dramatic moment.)

[ratgirlagogo]

1 hour ago, SVNBob said:

  Or the thread/wire, if it's a beaded or pearl necklace.

as with Batman's mom.......

[jennblevins]

On 8/20/2018 at 10:26 PM, Trini said:

... That thing where someone takes a necklace from someone else by just snatching it off the person's neck, instead of unhooking the clasp or pulling it over the head.

I mean, that ruins the clasp, right?

I have a couple of necklaces with magnetic clasps — they could probably be pulled off without hurting the necklace, although it would dig into the back of the neck before the magnets disconnected. 

I know what necklace I’m going to wear next time I’m on TV, though. Just in case it becomes relevant. 

[Jacqs]

A lot of commercials seem to use little girls for emotional  manipulation reasons.

So do public service announcements - the recent Australian government

PSA for National Missing Persons Week chose to use a father and young

daughter as the ones left behinf, rather than a father and young son.

Then there was that show where a little girl is forced into a fluffy

pink dress with white underskirt and the studio audience laugh as it's

obvious that she had no say in the situation - her adults were trying

to make her look as pretty as possible even if she preferred trousers

and climbing trees..