Kind of off topic.

I’m reading the head of this thread as “Don Quixote“. The mind is a strange thing.

^😂!

petallique, IPAs are a type of ale with a distinctive hoppy flavor (the hop ingredient more prominent). Some like it, some don't.

There are about a half dozen or a bit more broad categories of beer. The flavors differ considerably when comparing one to another.

Brew pubs are fun places to spend time. Many have good food too. They typically offer tasting flights, little glasses of different kinds to try.

My wife has always enjoyed drinking beer but mostly of the lager or pilsner variety. I was successful in getting her to do a tasting in a brew pub and she found several more types that she likes as well or even better.

" I am pretty sure Elmer has said in the past he doesn't mind when his threads wander, it is like a good conversation that way. "

I don't mind when anyone's thread or conversation wanders. Why should I, that happens more often than not. It puzzles me that it bothers some enough to speak up about it. Starting a conversation is like planting seeds in the wild, not like starting a garden with a fence and locked gate that no one else can go into.

I wonder what people who grouse here (when a topic wanders) do at public gatherings in real life when a converesation strays off its starting point. Do they sit quietly and hyperventillate?

Yes, some comments can become wearisome, but it’s just good manners to let them go

and not get bothered.

It’s the polite thing to do. 😉

" Some folks are making fun, but I think your polite suggestion is a good one . "

It's a pet peeve of mine when people unnecessarily use acronyms or abbreviations, especially when the term is mentioned only once. If you're considerate enough to define it first, why use the abbreviation at all?

Some seem to think using acronyms make them sound cool, authoritative or "in the know." I think doing so often has the opposite impact.

Before retirement, part of my job was to contribute to training younger staff and providing meaningful experiential learning. (No need here for me to say OJT or on the job training, my phrasing was shorter and clear). Every profession and occupation has its buzzwords, technical terms, and shorthand. That's fine when speaking with colleagues in the same specialty, but it's a mistake when communicating with clients or people outside that specialty.

I taught staff to avoid buzzwords, acronyms, abbreviations, and technical jargon when speaking with people who they didn't know to be familiar with them. I can't remember how many times I was in meetings and saw eyes glaze over or show boredom when someone was speaking while overusing technical terms with a general audience. That impresses no one.

The purpose of communication is to communicate. Using terms a recipient can't be sure to immediately understand is rude and defeats that purpose. The same applies to informal conversations and exchanges of ideas online.

"FWIW referenced as for what it's worth."

That's what I use it for if I'm texting. ICE to me is an internal combustion engine, as in an ICE vehicle vs an electric vehicle.

" I finally discovered it stands for ”Jesus, Mary and Joseph” in the Catholic tradition. I‘ve asked several Catholics I know and none had ever seen it. "

I wonder if they've never seen it because it's used as a swear term, like JFC, not as a term of religion or reverence?

One of my favourite IPAs being pulled for me the day before yesterday.

In Italy we were offered something called 'eepa'. Took us a moment to realise this was IPA pronounced as if it were an Italian word.

“That's what I use it for if I'm texting. ICE to me is an internal combustion engine, as in an ICE vehicle vs an electric vehicle.”

TV, I learned that one only last week on this very forum!

Anyhow, I have no problem with folks using acronyms. If you really are interested and want to know what it stands for, you can research. That can lead to some very interesting topics. On a forum like this, one can always ask the writer what it stands for. No one seems to be in a rush here.

This is a very informal forum to me.

I’m okay with acronyms.

TV, the person I know who uses it is very Catholic, so I’m certain it’s religious for her. We have business dealings with her, and she includes it on those emails, too. Even a one or two sentence email will have ”JMJ” right at the top. I’ve seen it in emails she’s sent to an attorney. I’ve no doubt at all she includes it in emails/texts to someone like a plumber or roofer. I do wonder how many people see it and have no idea what it means. Or maybe they don’t care.🤷‍♀️

Elmer I love your analogy on conversation! ”Starting a conversation is like planting seeds in the wild, not like starting a garden with a fence and locked gate that no one else can go into.” In addition to what you’re describing about meandering conversations, it made me think of the person who is monopolizing a conversation and will not stop talking!

This acronym business - I’m sure most of us know the that business writing style calls for spelling out the phrase / term & including the acronym letters after the phrase / term at the first writing of it in the document. Subsequent mentions of the phrase / term are correctly written using only the acronym. We don’t often follow business writing styles in casual writing. A random thought on acronyms occurred to me while reading this entertaining thread. That is, there are two kinds - some that can be used in speech i.e. ICE and those that cannot be spoken i.e. FWIW.

Meandering to the IPA & hoppy beer topic. Some people don’t like IPA type beers because their International Bitterness Units (IBU) is too high. I’m not much of a beer drinker so I don’t care about this - I try it and if I like it I drink it. If not, I go back to my blended red faves.

Ah, floral, pulling pints. I enjoy the brews made in the British Isles (I intentionally used the broader term to encompass Irish brews).

I once owned an MGB Roadster. It was great fun to drive, and slightly safer than its cousin Triumph cars because the MGBs were slower. These cars had many what I'll call "congenital problems", issues that would appear year after year with seemingly no success or no effort expended to fix them. One perennial problem was the unreliability of the cars' electronic parts and components. Whether fuel pumps, or gauges, or motors (starters or windshield wipers), or whatever - unreliable, prone to failure and often needing repair. Many of these faulty components were made by a company named "Lucas", whose name was visible on many of the products they supplied.

So at least in the US, a common "joke" among owners of these and other British Leyland car brands:

Q- Do you know why the British drink warm beer?

A- Most pubs use Lucas refrigerators.

Edit - note for Yankees who haven't visited or are unfamiliar with British brews and pubs.

Many brews are considerably less carbonated than what's common here. The handles shown in floral's photo shows a man "pulling" on a handle to get the liquid into the glass. The mechanism used is a manual pump, and several downward pulls are required to fill a glass. Think of an old fashioned water well pump with a handle, same mechanism.

Lagers and the like are usually as carbonated as we encounter here. But not ales.

Elmer - the first brand new car my husband & I bought was a TR-6! My dad wouldn’t let us park in his driveway since he didn’t want oil stains on it.Oil leaking was chronic.

@chloebud - I was raised Catholic and never encountered this JMJ business. But, my reaction to seeing it & knowing what it meant from that person would cause me to be offended. I react the same way to anyone who tells me to have a ”blessed day”. Brings out the worst in me reaction wise. To me it feels the same as proselytizing.

roxsolid, Oh, I wasn't complaining at all! It was just a statement. It didn't bother me that people were making light of it. No! I just wanted to give Elmer credit for his request. Have all the fun everyone wants! I enjoyed reading those, too. (I think I'll edit my post because of the misunderstanding.)

" the first brand new car my husband & I bought was a TR-6! "

Many may not believe that a new car would leak oil. I believe, Hallelujah!

They were such lousy cars but there was something about them that was captivating. I'll bet you had a lot of fun with your Triumph.

We had a family friend who had a TR3. I was a little kid at the time, he'd take us on rides. I loved it when he did but it scared the heck out of me (which he knew and took advantage of)

The TR6s were quite zippy compared to MGBs. Here's a video I found, the well known car collector Jay Leno likes them too.

Edit to add - I watched the whole thing and Leno said something like "these cars had all the usual problems, the Lucas electric and all those kind of things...."

Great video! Ours was a Damson Plum color with a white convertible top. My husband taught me to drive a stick in that car. And, our marriage made it through that! We bought it through International Motors while we were stationed in Germany. We picked it up in Jamaica, NY & drove across I-90 to next base in No CA. A few years later he was sent to Omaha & after we got there we sold it. A winter in snow country in a convertible is not a good experience!

chloebud, JMJ absolutely Joseph Mary Jesus. We used to put JMJ at the top of all assignment papers being turned in. I'm old so maybe they don't do it anymore.

My MGB was a second car, for a total of 3 for the household (before kids were driving teenagers). Weekend and only occasional workweek driving, I couldn't rely on it for daily use. .

I used to joke that it was easy to meet others in town who owned British Leyland cars because you would often find them parked alone in empty parking lots or on the shoulders of roads and highways. Sometimes with the hoods up, sometimes resting on axle stands, sometimes next to a tow truck with flashing lights getting ready to haul them away.

Suzique, I didn’t think you were complaining. I’m sorry that I gave you that impression. Your post was fine.

KW, I tend to agree with you. I’m just thinking most people who notice it don’t know and don’t care. Her family and close friends might get it, but beyond that seems a bit much…like a contractor!😵‍💫

murraysmom, you’re the very first person I’ve heard from that knows! The person who uses it is 85. We have a friend who I think is 86 or 87 and a very devout Catholic. She was clueless about it.

“…the first brand new car my husband & I bought was a TR-6!”

KW, I used to date a guy who had the cutest yellow TR-6. I loved that little car!

At the risk of cementing my place of occasional village idiot...

I don't drink beer and don't pay attention to the various kinds. My spouse likes beer though, and I do like the food in many breweries - so we often eat in places with lots of "IPA" written on chalkboards and menus and whatnot.

And so me being an occasional idiot thought IPA was basically like a beer's IPO. 😄 You know, like a new flavor's coming out party or something.

(I like wine. What do you want from me...🤣)

" IPA was basically like a beer's IPO. 😄 You know, like a new flavor's coming out party or something. "

What a great concept!

I don't drink beer and couldn't tell you what an IPA tastes like, but I have seen them in the store when buying beer for friends.

Nah, not at all. I don't enjoy all kinds of beer. Few do and many don't.

Like Murraysmom I knew immediately what the JMJ stood for. We used to put it at the top of any paperwork that we were handing in to the teacher. That would have been in the lower grades in parochial elementary school in the mid- 1950's. It wasn't something that we continued to do as moved up in school.

Maybe it was regional since I grew up near Pittsburgh - not too far from Ohio.

I agree with KW that it has no place on correspondence. I'm surprised she doesn't close her messages with 'Praying for You" -

maire_cate, yes, that would be the time frame for me as well.

I do think it's weird that an adult would use it in a business setting unless it was one nun writing to another.

I know many people don't like it when someone wishes you "a blessed day" but I try to take it in the spirit it is given. Even being called "honey" or "girlfriend" or something like that doesn't bother me. At least I am being acknowledged. Better than being "invisible" and that has happened to me and I hate that.

Well, I'm very familiar with IPA but I had to Google IPO.

Elmer said,

“I don't mind when anyone's thread or conversation wanders. Why should I, that happens more often than not. It puzzles me that it bothers some enough to speak up about it.“

and,

“The purpose of communication is to communicate. Using terms a recipient can't be sure to immediately understand is rude and defeats that purpose. The same applies to informal conversations and exchanges of ideas online.”

Elmer, you misunderstood my comment. It wasn’t about the use of acronyms, it was about threads wandering and accepting what others are saying. I was thinking about comments like this.

You often say things like this to others, and it is really quite rude. 🤷‍♀️

ETA=edited to add

IMO=in my opinion

“I'm surprised she doesn't close her messages with 'Praying for You"

Who knows…she might and I just haven’t seen it!

rox, there's a seemingly off the wall comment but you're welcome to it.

My comments here and there are not so memorable as to justify collecting them. I tend to remember few comments - not mine, not yours, not anyone else's- but I do remember the one you've shown. It was on a day you seemed to be trying too hard to be obnoxious when it was neither justified nor necessary. I suggested a diversion to a different activity to break the cycle you seemed to be on.

Elmer - I find it ironic in a funny way that the most recent acronym here that I recall sending me to google was written by you of all people. It was abundantly clear from the context what you meant when you wrote MBZ instead of just MB, I just never took note of it before. Extra chuckle when I read who’s more likely to include the Z:

MB

• Context: Industry shorthand, dealership notes, corporate references, and legacy enthusiast forums (like MBWorld or PeachParts).
• Vibe: Clean, direct, and functions as standard initialism for Mercedes-Benz.

MBZ

• Context: Hip-hop culture, text messaging, custom car scenes, and older internet message boards.
• Vibe: Phonetic/slang; the "Z" replaces "-enz" to mimic the sound of the spoken word in a punchy, stylized way.

Elmer, I’m sorry you thought that I was being obnoxious. That’s on you, though.

It’s quite unpleasant to have someone say that to me. I don’t like it.

Please refrain.

Would you like me to suggest a diversion for you? That’s not my place.

Please practice what you preach and claim about yourself. When you say things like that, it’s hard to believe that you got anywhere in your professional career.

Highly doubtful, actually.

Here’s a good one! Used for narcissists!

DARVO=Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender

foas - there are quite a few acronyms that I'm just not savvy enough to recognize but I've never seen MBZ. Interesting, and we've had 3 of them over the years.

Glad it’s not just me - and I’ve got one as well!

MBZ for me = Mercedes Benz. Maybe it’s a West Coast regional use? MB for me = megabyte. But, I did just Google both. Both have several meanings but interestingly - for me - is that MB doesn’t mean Mercedes Benz per Google anyway. Seems where we look up info makes a difference. No wonder we’re all confused!

food and others, I don't think owning a particular car sets a person up as an authority about the product or how to refer to it.

I too have owned 3. I've NEVER seen or heard anyone use the acronym MB for the brand. MB is an abbreviation in wide use for another purpose, wider than anything referring to a German car brand. I'm not just saying that with bias from my Silicon Valley location, I think it's pretty widespread. With a capital B, MB is megabyte. When a small b, Mb is megabit. I bet many of you didn't know that. Is there a difference? Yes.

I'll hitch my wagon to KW's explanation. Perhaps it's a regional thing. It's always been MBZ that I've seen. Another odd manifestation of usage - I think in informal conversation, using the word "Mercedes" can be seen as being somewhat immodest or boastful. A much softer and more modest reference is to instead use the word "Benz". As in, "My Benz needs new tires".

MBZ isn't so long as to need further shortening. How about BMW? Is that too long and need to be shortened to BM? I'd hate to hear someone say "I spent the morning today washing off my BM".

To me MB=Manitoba

“food and others, I don't think owning a particular car sets a person up as an authority about the product or how to refer to it.”

I’m certainly not claiming authority (are you?) but perhaps owners are more likely than others to have used accessed their website (mbusa.com) and not seen a Z in any of their acronyms. Or had reason to be on places like MB reddit discussions where the Z apprears to be relatively rare.

The idea of it being regional led to me ask AI a non-leading question about that. They did find a higher prevalence of MBZ on the west coast, particularly CA, but said that was mixed with other things including generational and context. However they also said MB is universally more standard, so I’m way more surprised to hear you’ve never seen MB, than that anyone else wouldn’t have seen MBZ.

Anyway all this is pretty irrelevant, I brought it up simply for the irony, not to start a debate. I thought it was amusing, that’s all. The fact is that as you’ve demonstrated, people are likely to use acronyms without introduction if they feel they don’t need introduction. I’d rarely think to spell out my HBP or TKR, but sometimes we assume too much. Fortunately there are easily accessible sources for clarification.

foas - HBP= high blood pressure? TKR= total knee replacement? I had to look up since I am fortunate to have no frame of reference or other reason to be familiar with those acronyms - yet….! 🤞

^^^Yes!

I forgot to mention, I guess in one of my searches I was TOO non-leading. Asking if mb or mbz was more common, the reply was that mb is the common abbreviation for ”my bad” and mbz would be unusual!

" The idea of it being regional led to me ask AI a non-leading question about that. "

What was your intention in looking it up further? To dispute my comment, in which I shared my own experiences? Had you found something different from what I said, would that have made my experiences invalid? Or my comment in relating them untrue?

" I’d rarely think to spell out my HBP or TKR "

I've never heard of these, don't care to look further.

As I mentioned before, the point of communication is to communicate. Using words or abbreviations not in wide usage or widely understood does not contribute to being an effective communicator. It also doesn't engender positive reactions from people, I can think of a few words of negative reaction that doing so can trigger. Though, they're probably regional.

You've said before that you have some German ancestry and speak some German (or speak it well, no matter). Say there is a German word your parents said to you in certain circumstances. If you were at a social gathering today, someone mentioned an experience of some kind, and that triggered a German phrase in your mind they would say to you on such occasions, and you said "Oh yes, I used to "katzenjammer von der höchste Himmel", would you expect anyone to understand you? (I just made up nonsense, no need to look it up, check my spelling, or refer to an AI site)

Keep that in mind the next time you want to throw around acronyms/abbreviations. Or don't, your choice.

" It’s quite unpleasant to have someone say that to me. I don’t like it. "

That was how I felt being on the receiving end of a tirade of your unpleasant comments. My intent was to say something to end it and it did.

" I’m reading the head of this thread as “Don Quixote“ "

rox, I forgot to mention yesterday when I say this comment of yours

Looking at the heading now, it looks like it could almost be a Greek word. Like

ΚΑΤΑΣΤΗΜΑ

Elmer, this is the thread that you felt that I was being unpleasant on

https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/6580378/first-aid-kit#n=91

Please tell me what was so unpleasant that you had to resort to a comment like that.

“That was how I felt being on the receiving end of a tirade of your unpleasant comments. My intent was to say something to end it and it did.”

Is that like saying ”Quiet piggy”?

Elmer - Your comments suggest that MBZ might be more common and widespread than MB. Since I use the MB abbreviation in writing, I was curious. If I had learned that MBZ was more common and better understood, I might have changed my usage. So I took a mild interest and looked it up. Turns out from corporate down to the general public, MB is more standard. I got no clear concensus where MBZ is more commonly heard, but no direction that I was pointed to - older people, hip hop, west coast - apply to me so I’ll stick with MB. I’m sure that in context, it’ll never be mistaken for megabyte or Manitoba..

That made me think of Ontario, CA.

" MB is more standard. "

It's amusing that this bothered you so much that you were motivated to do a search. To what end, I won't try to guess. So where I am is less standard. I'm okay with that, hope you are too.

The rest of what your search found seemed like nonsense to me but if you liked it, great!

“It's amusing that this bothered you so much that you were motivated to do a search. To what end, I won't try to guess.”

No need to guess, Elmer, I stated my motivation. I didn’t even use acronyms so it would have been quite clear if you had read my words rather than search for something that wasn’t between the lines. I’m sure had I come back saying, ”Wow Elmer, you’re right, MBZ is the more common abbreviation,” you would have taken no issue with me searching.