I've had this same experience. Also, while looking for a flashlight once the power has gone out, I keep flicking the light switch to make it easier to see what I'm doing. Not just once or twice, but again and again. Creatures of habit.

I don't think taking running water for granted makes you a privileged jerk, though it's not a bad reminder that we are lucky.

That said, the fact that we shit into potable water drives me nuts.

Elevated heartrate past a certain point apparently makes people prone to super-reflexive, unthinking action. I've been told an anecdote about someone who accidentally shot himself at home cleaning a gun, tried to call 911, but because he had a habit of dialing 411 to make calls, his hands kept hitting 411 instead of 911, and this happened several times in a row.

You think it drives *you* nuts?

I don't think taking running water for granted makes you a privileged jerk

I agree. Privileged jerk = taking utilities for granted and not wanting to help pay for them.

My dog doesn't know the meaning of potable.

Truly, an expectation of a functioning indoor running water system is the mark of the privileged jerk. I mean expecting a custom-built running water system to be installed in your Veyron or mega yacht might be different.

Surely we can all agree that I'm a privileged jerk for reasons unrelated to my expectations about city utilities.

We have water here in Richmond. It is only 60 miles away.

If you know a woman and have access to a giant bucket, she could walk here for your water.

Someone in my office was just raving about a jacket that they bought for $5.00 from WalMart.

I ate a banana for breakfast.

I was really frustrated because I had to wait for two minutes for my computer to start this morning.

I just sent a help ticket to our facilities team at work complaining that there hasn't been hot water in the shower every morning this week.

I was frustrated that I had no water until I met the man who had no meaning in his life.

Water dissolving and water removing
There is water at the bottom of the ocean
Remove the water, carry the water
Remove the water from the bottom of the ocean

...same as it ever was...

Good news, everybody: water's back on!

Making sense has no meaning here.

To the "creature of habit" aspect of the OP, A few years back the road up to or house washed-out and during the months it took to fix it there was a barrier a few hundred feet down the road (but just around the bend where I could not see it from my driveway). Going out the "back way" involved turning right rather than left coming out of my driveway, but I'd be surprised if I ever managed to get to a consistent 50% success rate in doing so.

14: Meaning what?

17: If urple's on the city maintenance crew, it means I can now make coffee in my washing machine by flushing the toilet.

There are worse things than no water.

Web links that don't work?

Link.

19: Presumably trying to link to this story? Yeah, worse things (just saw it on the news this morning).

Another recent occasion I was obnoxious! Usually I participate minimally on FB, because I'm essentially my work persona there. (Folk job!)

A colleague posted a video of African children reading first-world complaints - adorable stumbling accent, shabby clothes, banana trees, child reading "This house is so big that I need two routers!" or "It's so annoying when I can't remember my maid's last name and I'm trying to write her a check!"

Everyone in the FB thread was fawning over how good it is to remember that we're so privileged. I went on a big tirade about how everyone can be petty, and who cares, and I'm sure the adorable African child is sometimes like "Goddamn that classmate is annoying when they eat" or acts like a brat.

It is good not to take privilege for granted. It's also okay to be petty, and if I stopped complaining about petty shit, then I'd lose one of my best past times. 10,000 hours, everyone.

A much cooler series of tubes. Until they rouse the Balrog, anyhow.

the fact that we shit into potable water drives me nuts.

I sort of get this, but I also like the economy of scale and reliability that we get from centrally treating water, and it seems even sillier to have two parallel sets of water infrastructure. Of course, when we had well water, we pretty much just assumed it was potable.

(Though there's awesome greywater tricks. I loved the toilets I saw where the tank had a handwashing sink on top that filled it up).

2 and 25: It does seem wasteful to use potable water. I'm sure that gray water would be better. And intellectually I'm with you. Having said that, I totally want a toilet that sprays be clean and doesn't require the use of toilet paper.

Yeah, it's better gray water usage I'm after. Especially living in this drought-ridden state, it's insane what we don't do to conserve water.

Someplace in Houston (one of the universities, I think) started collecting the condensation off the A/C ducts and ended up with a ton of water they could use elsewhere.

[google pause]

It's Rice and U of H that are saving million of gallons of water a year.

24: Those are great. Also relevant to a current topic in the Shallow thread. Also Chris Christie is a fucking loser.

Jammie periodically re-organizes the kitchen. I'm still looking in the new utility drawer for the old silverware, and that's been a year now. Who knows how long it will take me to remember that the mugs and glasses have switched places.

The video described in 23 just sounds patronizing and obnoxious.

Oh, and maybe a little exploitative?

I don't know that it was exploitative - I got the impression that the kids were enjoying the joke - but it was definitely patronizing as all fuck.

But Diiiiiiiiii, what about the simple wisdom of simple people?

My parents shuffled the contents of their cabinets about two months after I moved out. I expect to never get used to this, and take two tries to find everything for essentially the rest of their natural lives.

Here's the video, FWIW.

Wait, I didn't realize there was a video involved in 23 until I saw 31 and went back and reread it. I thought you were just talking about this kid or something like it. I've seen plenty of pictures like that and some are funnier than others but I didn't see anything wrong with the basic idea. It's a lot easier to imagine a video being obnoxious, though.

And now that I'm re-watching it, I'm re-irritated all over again! Those are totally legitimate petty gripes!

After I bitched about the video in the FB thread, my colleague wrote "I wonder if you'd see it differently if an African child read your comment back to you" which I thought was a pretty awesome retort.

Neil T.E.W. once had a post that said simply "Third world people have first world problems too." I liked that one.

Well-put.

I mean, "I hate it when the guy puts pickles on my sandwiches after I say 'no pickles'." What, people in Africa love that? How noble.

Starving children in Africa would climb over each other for your discarded pickles, heebie.

I guess I'm the first asshole who feels compelled to point out that the linked video shows people in Haiti, not Africa.

Oh please, like Haiti's not part of Africa.

33: You know what those kids would have enjoyed even more than the joke? A house big enough for two routers, that's what!

45 made me happy.

45: You'd be surprised. They're all individual countries down there.

47: yeah, heebie is getting ever more snippy and badass. it's awesome. let's make bogus extrapolations about the future personality of ham sammich or whoever. hamwise beegee.