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

[kassygreene]

Joan Hickson's Miss Marple is nice too, if you can find her.

[andromeda331]

My school district never closed school no matter how bad it was. Blizzard, horrible roads. There were many times the buses really shouldn't be on the road. The year after I graduated they were finally forced to change that after a scary incident with a bus full of elementary age kids. They had been warned for years but refused to listen until they ended up liable. Now they close when ever the weather is bad.         

[selkie]

I live in north Florida so we get a decent number of hurricane & tropical storm days off over the years. The schools also had a couple of days off in January this year because it was cold and wet enough to get icy during Polar Vortex 2018, and there is zero capacity down here to salt, sand, or otherwise de-ice roadways. 

[riley702]

The only notables I remember were the Blizzard of 1978, where we were stuck in our house for 6 days due to enormous drifts. Dad finally tunnelled out to the tractor and plowed the driveway and shoveled the walk because the 4 of us (all teenagers) were driving him and Mom crazy. Before school resumed, we ice-skated on the road.

And we got sent home at noon on the first day of the Super Outbreak of tornadoes in 1974, and stayed out the following day. The closest one to my town was 25 or 30 miles away, but I just looked up the stats and there were 148 tornadoes in a 24 hour period (30 of them F4 or F5) that killed over 300 people. Strangely, I wasn't terrified, but I was hyper-vigilant about watching the sky. And dancing and twirling around in the yard (until Mom would yell at me to come back inside) as I first discovered that "tornado weather" - greenish skies and very windy - makes me giddy with excitement. Still does. I do wonder if it's due to changes in the barometric pressure and/or negative ions building up in the atmosphere, which can increase serotonin levels in the brain.

[Annber03]

When I see "tornado weather" coming, I get all antsy and nervous and start watching the radar like a hawk :p. I love learning about tornadoes, but the thought of ever encountering one up close terrifies me. 

[riley702]

I'm good with watching them on YouTube!

[Lugal]

I remember my school occasionally closing for snow, but often it was one hour or two hour delays.  Sometimes we would even get sent home early if the weather turned bad.  I remember once they didn't send us home early and some kids didn't get home until after 6PM.  The next storm they predicted they just cancelled school outright even though we ended up with about a quarter inch of snow.

[DearEvette]

I live in the Fingerlakes area of New York.  Snow days (extra days) are built into the k-12 school calendar.  If they are not used, then sometime around early May we get an email from the district giving us a revised May calendar.  Usually the kids'll get those extra days off as a couple of free Fridays and Monday in May.  Colleges typically only close when there is a State of Emergency or if the city has declared it unsafe to be on the roads.  I worked at a college once where each year they'd send out their annual notice of policy regarding school closing and the first line of the letter/email was "We do not close."  That always struck me as funny.

We have in-laws who live in Buffalo and last year they had thunder snow.  My Sis -in-law was telling me how freaky it was to hear thunder& see lightning while it was snowing. And people were trapped inside houses with snow and high as their window sills.  But even that extreme they are like, *shrug* just a little extra snow, whatevs. Even when my sis-in-law was telling me about it she was all "yeah it was really freaky but then I had to check my pot roast..."

[Annber03]

4 minutes ago, DearEvette said:

We have in-laws who live in Buffalo and last year they had thunder snow.  My Sis -in-law was telling me how freaky it was to hear thunder& see lightning while it was snowing. 

We've had that here in Iowa, too. It is very surreal, yeah. 

[Anela]

22 hours ago, riley702 said:

The only notables I remember were the Blizzard of 1978, where we were stuck in our house for 6 days due to enormous drifts. Dad finally tunnelled out to the tractor and plowed the driveway and shoveled the walk because the 4 of us (all teenagers) were driving him and Mom crazy. Before school resumed, we ice-skated on the road.

And we got sent home at noon on the first day of the Super Outbreak of tornadoes in 1974, and stayed out the following day. The closest one to my town was 25 or 30 miles away, but I just looked up the stats and there were 148 tornadoes in a 24 hour period (30 of them F4 or F5) that killed over 300 people. Strangely, I wasn't terrified, but I was hyper-vigilant about watching the sky. And dancing and twirling around in the yard (until Mom would yell at me to come back inside) as I first discovered that "tornado weather" - greenish skies and very windy - makes me giddy with excitement. Still does. I do wonder if it's due to changes in the barometric pressure and/or negative ions building up in the atmosphere, which can increase serotonin levels in the brain.

We experienced a lot of tornado weather, in the 90's. The area we've lived in since 1998, luckily doesn't get that much bad weather (I hope I'm not speaking too soon), but I get a bit excited, too. I used to drive my mum nuts, when she'd be in the basement, yelling for me to get down there, if we had a warning, and I was up here watching the radar on my computer, and looking out of the window.

I was terrified when I was alone in a house with  no basement, though. My family had gone to Wisconsin to spring an older dog from the pound, who was about to be put down, and it coincided with those strings of storms crossing Ohio. There were warnings all across the State, moving from left to right. I was supposed to be sleeping, since I'd been up all night, but I couldn't sleep. So I got the furniture cushions into the hallway, got my budgie and his cage into the coat cupboard, and my cats into the other cupboards in the hallway, and squeezed in with my bird, if it got especially scary outside. I ended up sleeping in that hallway, that night, when things calmed down, exhausted. I didn't know where to put my dog (Springer Spaniel). 

2 hours ago, DearEvette said:

 

We have in-laws who live in Buffalo and last year they had thunder snow.  My Sis -in-law was telling me how freaky it was to hear thunder& see lightning while it was snowing. And people were trapped inside houses with snow and high as their window sills.  But even that extreme they are like, *shrug* just a little extra snow, whatevs. Even when my sis-in-law was telling me about it she was all "yeah it was really freaky but then I had to check my pot roast..."

We had that in 2004, just before Christmas, and just again recently. :) Freaky. 

Edited February 6, 2018 by Anela

[Haleth]

On 2/4/2018 at 8:56 PM, selkie said:

I live in north Florida so we get a decent number of hurricane & tropical storm days off over the years. The schools also had a couple of days off in January this year because it was cold and wet enough to get icy during Polar Vortex 2018, and there is zero capacity down here to salt, sand, or otherwise de-ice roadways. 

Sorry, I had to chuckle at the idea that FL can't find sand or salt.

11 hours ago, DearEvette said:

Colleges typically only close when there is a State of Emergency or if the city has declared it unsafe to be on the roads. 

Yeah, I remember during the Blizzard of '78 we were expected to go to classes.  I did not.

[theredhead77]

I'm from SoCal, we got zero days off for weather. I think now some of the schools are closing early when it's too hot out due to lack of A/C but it's very, very rare.

[auntlada]

On 2/4/2018 at 11:33 AM, HunterHunted said:

It's a federal holiday. There's no mail. The banks are closed. Federal offices are closed. State offices and the schools usually follow suit and take the day off too. Although, sometimes they'll designate it as a teacher in service day where there is no school, but teachers might have some supplemental training. I've never been to a school where we didn't have it off, but that's not to say that there aren't schools that don't get the day. However, schools are usually closed on Veterans day in the largest school districts. 

I work for the state, my husband works for a university, and we have a son in public school. I am the only one to get Veterans Day off. I love it.

We have built-in snow days, but hardly ever use them as it doesn't snow very often here. If it does at all, they usually cancel school. It's usually more ice than snow, though, so it's no fun.

Schools never cancel for tornadoes, although they are much more careful about watching since a school in one city got hit several years ago, and children died. Districts are building more safe rooms and don't necessarily penalize children if their parents take them out when a superstorm is being forecast by everyone. If we can eled for tornadoes, there are years where school would be out more than in during the spring.

[ABay]

The only time I remember my school district closing was during the Blizzard of '77. It wasn't so much the snow as the weeks without a temperature above freezing. Although there was a lot of snow. The university never offically closed. Ironically, the Blizzard Ball held in December every year to commemorate the event had to be moved to February because there was rarely enough snow for the events on the actual anniversary date.

And now I'm thinking of Les Nessman announcing that a giant lizzard is threatening the east coast.

[Raja]

7 hours ago, theredhead77 said:

I'm from SoCal, we got zero days off for weather. I think now some of the schools are closing early when it's too hot out due to lack of A/C but it's very, very rare.

A/C only the newly constructed schools  or those retrofitted after the 1971 earthquake had that.

[theredhead77]

4 hours ago, Raja said:

A/C only the newly constructed schools  or those retrofitted after the 1971 earthquake had that.

Yep. None of the schools I attended had A/C and the windows were the kind that had to be opened and closed with poles. Being on window duty was exciting!

[meep.meep]

On 2/4/2018 at 9:33 AM, HunterHunted said:

It's a federal holiday. There's no mail. The banks are closed. Federal offices are closed. State offices and the schools usually follow suit and take the day off too. Although, sometimes they'll designate it as a teacher in service day where there is no school, but teachers might have some supplemental training. I've never been to a school where we didn't have it off, but that's not to say that there aren't schools that don't get the day. However, schools are usually closed on Veterans day in the largest school districts. 

I"m a federal employee.  I had a colleague who referred to Veterans Day as the only real holiday because we had it off, but the schools were still in session.  In California, schools are also open on Columbus Day.

[HunterHunted]

27 minutes ago, meep.meep said:

I"m a federal employee.  I had a colleague who referred to Veterans Day as the only real holiday because we had it off, but the schools were still in session.  In California, schools are also open on Columbus Day.

A ton of places don't have Columbus Day off. It's not recognized in Alaska, Hawaii, Oregon, South Dakota, and Vermont. It's not a state holiday in California or Texas.

In other things that only happen on TV, St. Patrick's Day is the only lesser holiday that TV sitcoms seem to celebrate or acknowledge. I'm not saying that no one in the real world celebrates it, but it's not as big of a thing as sitcoms would have you think it is.

http://ew.com/tv/st-patricks-day-tv-episodes/mike-molly-st-patricks-day

http://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2016/03/15_memorable_st_patricks_day_t.html

[Katy M]

3 minutes ago, HunterHunted said:

A ton of places don't have Columbus Day off. It's not recognized in Alaska, Hawaii, Oregon, South Dakota, and Vermont. It's not a state holiday in California or Texas.

Still don't have it off, but it's actually Indigenous People's Day in Vermont, and perhaps those other places, too.

 

4 minutes ago, HunterHunted said:

I'm not saying that no one in the real world celebrates it, but it's not as big of a thing as sitcoms would have you think it is.

It's pretty big in Boston.  Maybe New York City.  The rest of the country, not so much.

[ABay]

New Haven has a Columbus Day parade. Connecticut in general and New Haven in particular have large Italian-American populations.  There's also a St. Patrick's Day parade although I think there's an issue with that. Not sure what. Maybe the city is just tired off having to clean up mountains of green puke the next day. The large Catholic population in the state is probably why there's a state holiday on Good Friday.

My work holidays are determined by collective bargaining, other units get some different days off. Like, my contract gets me the Friday and Monday of Presidents Day weekend, but the clerical union gets two Mondays. We work Veterans' Day and Columbus Day but have the days before and after Thanksgiving as a trade off. But we all mostly get the same group: New Year, MLK, Presidents Day in one form or another, Good Friday, Memorial Day, July 4th, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and the days on either side (clerical might only get the Friday), and Christmas. O course this year we all get the extra "holiday of 3 furlough days. Because we are state workers and therefore somehow responsible for breaking the economy in 2008 and therefore must make up the state deficit (caused by 40 years of looting and/or not adequately funding our pension plan).

[Raja]

5 hours ago, Katy M said:

Still don't have it off, but it's actually Indigenous People's Day in Vermont, and perhaps those other places, too.

 

It's pretty big in Boston.  Maybe New York City.  The rest of the country, not so much.

In Compton CA. Columbus Day was traded in for Cinco de Mayo years ago.

[blueray]

5 hours ago, HunterHunted said:

A ton of places don't have Columbus Day off. It's not recognized in Alaska, Hawaii, Oregon, South Dakota, and Vermont. It's not a state holiday in California or Texas.

In other things that only happen on TV, St. Patrick's Day is the only lesser holiday that TV sitcoms seem to celebrate or acknowledge. I'm not saying that no one in the real world celebrates it, but it's not as big of a thing as sitcoms would have you think it is.

http://ew.com/tv/st-patricks-day-tv-episodes/mike-molly-st-patricks-day

http://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2016/03/15_memorable_st_patricks_day_t.html

It's a big deal where I'm from. While no one is "off", honestly we should be as many go to the parade and drink green beer.

[shapeshifter]

7 minutes ago, blueray said:

6 HOURS AGO, HUNTERHUNTED SAID:

In other things that only happen on TV, St. Patrick's Day is the only lesser holiday that TV sitcoms seem to celebrate or a

It's a big deal where I'm from. While no one is "off", honestly we should be as many go to the parade and drink green beer.

Chicago, right? Heck, with all the TV shows shot in Chicago now, dyeing rivers green on Saint Paddy's day should have worked its way into the popular culture by now. Probably won't be too long before Pulaski Day is a national holiday.

 

 

Only on TV—and only when an actor of a long time character decides to quit the show—do people who have always behaved with only-on-TV levels of consistency the same way, episode after episode, season after season, lo, yea, Only On TV do these characters then suddenly do something totally out of character that gets them killed or otherwise gone. It's like the character is replaced by a pod person or a Stepford wife in the character's last episode just so the character can go out with d.r.a.m.a. 

[xaxat]

Mod Note

Let's get back on topic. 

[Joe]

So at work today, I thought about TV DIY projects. They either work perfectly or they're 'singe the eyebrows' terrible. Bonus if they weren't doing anything involving fire to start with. No one ever just has to drill another hole 5 millimetres to the left or anything like that. But I suppose that's boring.

[shapeshifter]

4 hours ago, Joe said:

So at work today, I thought about TV DIY projects. They either work perfectly or they're 'singe the eyebrows' terrible. Bonus if they weren't doing anything involving fire to start with. No one ever just has to drill another hole 5 millimetres to the left or anything like that. But I suppose that's boring.

And if the measurements are a little off, Only On TV do they always fix it/redo it so it's perfect rather than calling it "good enough," I guess because on TV there are all kinds of budgeting consultants and whatnot. Sigh. Sometimes I wish I lived in a TV show—and not just so my 25+ year old, slightly too big platform bed would fit more easily through doors when moving or rearranging. 

[Joe]

According to TV, any man whose hair is going grey has it symmetrical and neat. I just noticed today that I seem to have a lot more on the right than the left. In the gym bathroom mirror. Adding insult to injury.

[Shannon L.]

2 hours ago, Joe said:

According to TV, any man whose hair is going grey has it symmetrical and neat. I just noticed today that I seem to have a lot more on the right than the left. In the gym bathroom mirror. Adding insult to injury.

I'm a woman and mine is pretty evenly spread out, but I do have one lock that has much more gray than anywhere else in on my head and it's just above the temple on one side of my head. 

This is more a movie thing than tv, I think, but:  anyone who hates their small town life and leaves immediately after graduation will 1. learn rather quickly just how wonderful it really was and long for it again, or 2. if they don't miss it and long for it, then they have either turned into a horrible person or were already a horrible person when they left.

Edited February 11, 2018 by Shannon L.

[shapeshifter]

33 minutes ago, Joe said:

According to TV, any man whose hair is going grey has it symmetrical and neat. I just noticed today that I seem to have a lot more on the right than the left. In the gym bathroom mirror. Adding insult to injury.

On The Nanny, isn't Mr. Sheffield's gray/white streak off center?
Maybe you just need to grow it out a little to look debonair?
 

Confession: When I developed a streak on the right of my (female style) bob, I switched my part to the left.

[fishcakes]

Parking is never a problem on TV (exception that proves the rule: Seinfeld's George Costanza). Everyone just drives up to the building they want to go to in the middle of Manhattan or San Francisco or wherever and parks in the unmetered space right in front of the main entrance.

[Blergh]

Folks can gab on their cells all they want when driving and they'll never too distracted to drive much less have any accidents- regardless of how animated the convo gets!

[ganesh]

2 hours ago, fishcakes said:

Parking is never a problem on TV (exception that proves the rule: Seinfeld's George Costanza). Everyone just drives up to the building they want to go to in the middle of Manhattan or San Francisco or wherever and parks in the unmetered space right in front of the main entrance.

We call that Rock Star Parking. 

[Anela]

57 minutes ago, Blergh said:

Folks can gab on their cells all they want when driving and they'll never too distracted to drive much less have any accidents- regardless of how animated the convo gets!

They never lose service, either, unless it's crucial to the plot. Then they can't get a signal anywhere. 

[Annber03]

My mom comments on that sometimes when watching "Criminal Minds" with me. She'll be like, "How are they getting service out in that area?" :p.

[merylinkid]

2 hours ago, Annber03 said:

My mom comments on that sometimes when watching "Criminal Minds" with me. She'll be like, "How are they getting service out in that area?" :p.

Probably satellite phones.   because unlike real cop shops, tv cops have endless budgets*   They can get all the latest gadgets.   Put manpower on personal quests, heck even get whole special units set up for their personal issue.    And the higher ups just sign off on it.   

 

*unless integral to the plot.

[auntlada]

4 hours ago, Blergh said:

Folks can gab on their cells all they want when driving and they'll never too distracted to drive much less have any accidents- regardless of how animated the convo gets!

Also while driving, they can turn to look at the person next to them for 10-20 seconds at a time -- in heavy traffic -- and never hit a thing.

[Katy M]

Just now, auntlada said:

Also while driving, they can turn to look at the person next to them for 10-20 seconds at a time -- in heavy traffic -- and never hit a thing.

That honestly drives me crazy, just because I imagine there are teenagers (and perhaps those that are older) that see that and at the very least subconsciously think to themselves, see, I can text and drive. I don't look away any longer than that.  And, in that, they're absolutely right. It doesn't not take them any longer to send or read a text than it does for people on TV to look at their traveling companion and have a conversation.

[andromeda331]

3 hours ago, auntlada said:

Also while driving, they can turn to look at the person next to them for 10-20 seconds at a time -- in heavy traffic -- and never hit a thing.

This always cracks me up! Sometimes minutes go by and they've never once looked at the road. 

[shapeshifter]

18 minutes ago, andromeda331 said:

This always cracks me up! Sometimes minutes go by and they've never once looked at the road. 

It gives me a panic attack! (almost)

 

When the action hero/heroine character is riding with a sidekick, s/he will tell the sidekick to wait in the car. The sidekick never does. And that's either a good thing or a comic moment or both.

[andromeda331]

34 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

It gives me a panic attack! (almost)

 

When the action hero/heroine character is riding with a sidekick, s/he will tell the sidekick to wait in the car. The sidekick never does. And that's either a good thing or a comic moment or both.

Yes and my favorite. The hero or heroine about to fire when they see someone or hears something and who is it? The sidekick! Hey maybe if you stayed in the car you might not have almost got shot.

[xaxat]

9 hours ago, Anela said:

They never lose service, either

The best example of this is the Volvo ad where a guy is so confident in his cell service that he decides to take a drive in what looks like the middle of nowhere Scottish Moorlands while talking with his wife. . . who is calling from outer space!

[shapeshifter]

10 hours ago, Anela said:

They never lose service, either, unless it's crucial to the plot. Then they can't get a signal anywhere. 

When I got my first cell phone in 1999 when service was spotty everywhere and dropped calls were the norm, I was constantly ranting to myself: This never happens to Mulder and Scully!

[andromeda331]

11 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

When I got my first cell phone in 1999 when service was spotty everywhere and dropped calls were the norm, I was constantly ranting to myself: This never happens to Mulder and Scully!

I admit I laughed when Phoebe got service in the Underworld aka Hell on Charmed.

[festivus]

2 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

It gives me a panic attack! (almost)

Yeah me too. I can't even concentrate on what they're saying. All I can think of is look at the road dammit!

[Orillia]

16 hours ago, auntlada said:

Also while driving, they can turn to look at the person next to them for 10-20 seconds at a time -- in heavy traffic -- and never hit a thing.

That drives me absolutely crazy. It's even worse in real life when that happens. I ride with someone who actually turns around and looks at me if I say something to him. Believe me I won't be offended if you don't look at me when answering. I must be screwed up because I think you should pay more attention to the road than your passengers. 

[HunterHunted]

22 hours ago, Orillia said:

That drives me absolutely crazy. It's even worse in real life when that happens. I ride with someone who actually turns around and looks at me if I say something to him. Believe me I won't be offended if you don't look at me when answering. I must be screwed up because I think you should pay more attention to the road than your passengers. 

You're not screwed up. I have the same issue. I've even told passengers that I will not look at them because. I'm. Busy. Driving.

On 2/11/2018 at 11:13 PM, andromeda331 said:

I admit I laughed when Phoebe got service in the Underworld aka Hell on Charmed.

I actually think Phoebe getting good reception in the Underworld and in the mirror universe kind of subverts the great reception trope because the show always makes a point to talk about how surprised they are that the reception is so great.

Edited February 13, 2018 by HunterHunted

[Picture It. Sicily]

Imagine my surprise when I got my drivers license and quickly found out what bullshit car driving scenes on tv were. On tv cars pretty much steer themselves

[Bastet]

1 hour ago, Picture It. Sicily said:

On tv cars pretty much steer themselves

Yet are simultaneously immune to steering, as characters can yank the wheel back and forth 45+ degrees without the car swerving.  Actors are a lot better about that now, but when I re-watch shows from the '70s and '80s it is a constant feature among car chases/escapes.

[Annber03]

9 minutes ago, Bastet said:

Yet are simultaneously immune to steering, as characters can yank the wheel back and forth 45+ degrees without the car swerving.  Actors are a lot better about that now, but when I re-watch shows from the '70s and '80s it is a constant feature among car chases/escapes.

I always like it in those old scenes when somebody turns the steering wheel, yet when you look at the road they're driving on through the back window, there doesn't look to be a curve in it anywhere. Either that, or the road will be curvy, and yet they're just driving straight, not messing with the wheel at all.

[OtterMommy]

Here's mine...and maybe it is just a case of me (and every other woman I know) being social outcasts, but I don't know of anyone who gets a bikini wax as a get-together-with-your-girlfriends sort of social thing.