Old people don't review online. She's safe. When I was younger I worked for an HVAC Supply house. Our phone number was 1 number off from Cablevision. Despite answering the phone "United Refrigeration", these numbnuts would jump right into their bitchfest. I set many a midweek 8am-7pm technician appointments back then.

When I had the bar down in Florida, I would get calls for some Chinese restaurant all the time, I finally just took the callers order and told them "Ten minute.") it's always ten minute isn't it?).

lol

You don't think 'thin the herd' has the same sinister over/undertones? You need to improve your imagination. Bad lumber is culled, the herd is thinned. Which herd? That's for you to decide. How should it be thinned? That's up to you, too. Which members should go? Again, up to you. How does that not have sinister undertones?

I would bet that fewer people use the word 'cull'- if they don't want to expand their vocabulary, that's their problem but either can be used, to mean the same intent.

Here's another definition for 'cull'-

"select from a large quantity; obtain from a variety of sources."

Pretty scary.

I found an example for 'This the herd'-

Allowing natural selection to work its course, thus thinning out the population of those that can not survive on their own.
Criminal: 'gimme your f---ing money!!!'

Victim: (pulls gun out) BANG!!!

The victim has helped thin the herd.

How old is 'old'? I know people who were in their 50s when they seem to have stopped trying to learn to do new things. OTOH, I know people who were in their 80s and still trying new things that forced them to think and solve problems.

WRT stupid, when I worked for a Sony dealer from '78-'88, we had a big sale and the following Monday morning, I answered the phone as we were opening for the day. The guy on the other end started yelling that he had bought a cassette deck and it was the biggest POS he's ever seen. I asked what it was doing and he said "Nothing! Absolutely nothing!" (he wasn't that nice about it). I asked if the lights came on when he pressed the power button and he told me they didn't, so I asked "What is the power cord plugged into?".

Click. Call ended.

I had a woman call about her turntable sounding like "chipmunks". It wasn't an angry call, but she was perplexed. I asked her to check the 33/45 button --- "click".

I hope she was playing 'Christmas, Don't Be Late'.

Back when stereo receivers all had TAPE MON buttons, sales guys who were asked for help over the phone would suggest that the person turn the volume up. Then further up. Then further up.

Then check to see if the TAPE MON button was pushed in....

We saw a lot of receivers and integrated amps come in for service to repair the blown up amplifier. Occasionally, that's what we had to do but it was probably 9/10 that had the Tape Monitor switch engaged. Lots of happy customers. I would NEVER do what you say the sales guys did.

Oh, we messed with people, that's for sure. One night, a guy came in to pick up his receiver that had been repaired and, as it turned out, one just like it had been scrapped because the customer didn't want to pay for what it needed. The guy I was working with went back, took the work order off of the good one and put it on the scrapped one, then proceeded to act like he tripped as he came out of the service department, throwing the receiver on the floor and making the cover fly off with a lot of racket. I thought the customer was going to have a stroke! Once Rick came out with the other receiver, he laughed his ass off.

When I worked at Rogersound I had a pair of their 312s, a 12" 3-way acoustic suspension speaker. I let it be known to customers that I'd like to sell them and one guy was interested. But he had to try them out in his house to be sure they were what he wanted. I agreed. He took them.

Next day he came back and sheepishly (baaaa) told me that he didn't want them, but on the way down the stairs to return them he had tripped and dropped one. He'd like to just give them back to me.

Now THAT was about the STUPIDEST thing I've ever had anyone ask me. Of course the hell not! And I had to convince the guy that it was not okay to even think he could just return them and let me somehow come up with a new cabinet for one of them!

People used to call me from work to ask how the installation at their home was going....

I would say, "well there's some bad news and some good news.....the bad news is that Dave had a small electrical problem which started a bit of a fire......but the good news is that when Harry drilled through the water pipe the flood put the fire out....."

There would be a good five second delay whilst they mentally processed that info and then worked out that surely I must be joking.....

The resultant relief that everything was in fact okay distracted them from their original purpose of the call - micro managing from afar...!

I've done something sorta similar. When asked the question, I just stop them and ask if they know where their water main shut off valve is.

Way back, working in my first multi million dollar mansion, I was cutting into some VERY expensive wood walls for some inwall speakers when the homeowner's came into the room.

I made like I didn't notice, and said "Oh no!".

The clients wife was not happy. Especially after her husband started laughing....

Years ago, a guy I was working with drilled into a standard sheetrock wall for a tv hang. Drilled no problem, except for the fact some jackasses ran soft tubing for radiant heat in the floors through that wall, towards the edge of the stud, with no nail plates. The answer is, the water main shut off valve was in the crawl space.

One thing I learned from BellSouth years ago was: You never DRILL into a space when you don't know what is in the space.

I know someone (electrician) that learned a very expensive lesson by drilling through a floor to install a floor outlet, and then watching in amazement as a stream of water came shooting out of the floor.