I find cursive far less clear than print. If I had my way it would have been gone as soon as the typewriter was invented. Give me clean lines any day of the week over those silly loops. I take points off my students if they write in cursive.
And while you are practicing your beautiful writing, your boss is yelling at you because you are taking too long.
I’ll agree and disagree at the same time. Print is far clearer than cursive, even the cleanest, smoothest cursive I’ve seen. On the other hand, cursive is beautiful if done well and I can actually write faster in it (and have it still legible to me), so it has its uses. My rule of thumb if this: is someone else going to be attempting to read it? Print, and print as clearly as possible.
This is why we use scanners to count everything where I work. It is also why when I have to leave notes for coworkers, I type them out rather than write it.
I also suffer from Cooper’s problem where my 4s and 9s tend to be indistinguishable from each other (Gs and Ss are another big one).
With the wide variety of fonts available, why can’t they find one that makes 3, 5, 6, 8, 9,and 0 distinct numerals? That makes for a lot of possible combinations when parts of numbers in a SKU are missing. Even with bifocals, I often have to take my glasses OFF, squint closely at the price tag, then put the glasses back on to type in a teenytiny SKU.
My store is guilty of this. The SKUs on the product labels are written in insanely tiny type (about 5 point!). Ink can’t possibly be so expensive that they can’t write the numbers large enough to read!
I’m a former inventory associate from a certain nameless company. I often worked overstock items. I’ve learned to appreciate legible numerals on precount labels. When it’s unreadable, I ask, and get a new number written out.
After a while, I notice patterns in the products, and I do question it if the count doesn’t match the number of cases. Again, technically I’m just supposed to take whatever is there. But I personally want to be correct. And there have been times I’ve been questioned about the
“missing” items. Not my fault; I can’t count what isn’t there. Period.
Another issue I’ve had to correct (& been corrected on) is wrong labels. It’s kinda embarrassing when you scan a small makeup box and the SKU is for a large wagon. To be fair, our equipment isn’t meant to be viewed while we work. The item descriptions are not in our program, either. And for time constraints, all we can do is scan whatever is there. But I notice when the label has a wrong department code or if the high-dollar chime sounds. Most client associates actually appreciate my efforts to be correct. That is all the motivation I needed to be accurate.
Reminds me of the time my friend got a speeding ticket. Where I’m from, speeding tickets are $196 and up, so he got the bare minimum. However, the cop who gave him the ticket must’ve written it hastily, because it looked like “146″. So my friend fought the ticket in court. He still had to pay the ticket, but at least they honored the amount. He left the courthouse $50 richer.
Dad got one a few years back where the cop wrote the wrong date of issue on the ticket. Dad noticed the mistake as soon as he got it then smiled and thanked the guy, who kept looking at him funny for his response to the ticket. When it came time to go infront of the judge, Dad pointed out that the officer wrote down the court date in place of the date of issue and asked to have the ticket thrown out. When the now very pissed cop confirmed that the full ticket was written by him, the judge threw it oyt and Dad didn’t have to pay it……..then with as pissed off as that cop was, Dad stayed off that road for a couple months in his work truck so the officer wouldn’t have the chance to ticket him again.
My dad ran a red light once (not to be excused) and had a ticket written up. In the hour slot, the cop wrote 24.12 (we use a 24 hour clock, not AM and PM). Dad looked at it, said OK – and then of course fought it in court and won. My clock sort of switches to 00 at midnight.
The cop never knew, afaik, so dad didn’t have to avoid him
Because on some roads, that can get you run over. There are portions of the tollway leading into Chicago that have a 55mph limit and the cops won’t even drive that slow.
I believe (I used to live in Illinois) that there is a “keeping up with traffic” law. If the posted speed is say 55… and everyone is going 85… and you are going 65… you can get a ticket, NOT for speeding, but for going to slow and being a danger to the other (speeding) drivers. It was called the “keeping up with traffic law”. I remember going 95 on I-90 into Chicago one day.. and being passed by a cop doing at least 105..
Never heard that one Kefo, usually it’s meant for folks that wouldn’t even run the minimum posted limit. My folks are old enough to driven on the interstate roads when they first opened in Iowa and if a motorist drove below 45-50mph (some stretches were “Reasonable and Prudent” and now are 70mph), if those motorists refused to drive faster, they were given a police escort to the nearest country road……and stay on those instead!
My husband writes his numbers this way and yeah the 4 and 9 are interchangable. His 9′s and 6′s are also very difficult to read as he doesn’t make the hole in them big enough! And he’s so good with figures otherwise, in his head at least, but not writing them down.
What’s even more annoying is when the people with the worst handwriting are also the ones who most stubbornly insist that there’s nothing wrong with it.
I’ve had customers fill out forms totally illegibly, and then they bluntly told us that we need to have our vision checked if we can’t read it.
I take care of my pre counts myself. As for the cursive debate, yes, it should still be taught in school. Change is part of life, I know, but still, we should hold on to some things. It is indeed easier to use new tech but I wonder how many of us can still write a research paper with a pen and unlined paper.
when doing our inventory in the mid 80′s, whenever we came to an item that there were 0 of, we were instructed to write the word ‘NONE’ on the inventory sheet. My buddies and I started getting bored with NONE so we started creatively writing other words like, ZERO, ZILCH, ZIP, NADA…
Our manager (who was doing his first inventory) comes by to check some of our counts, we hear him yell, “WHAT THE F* IS ‘NADA’!!” and he throws the clipboard across the room. To this day we can say one word “NADA” and we still break out into laughter.
Writing clearly is key for good communication. Too bad America is tryig to get rid of cursive
I find cursive far less clear than print. If I had my way it would have been gone as soon as the typewriter was invented. Give me clean lines any day of the week over those silly loops. I take points off my students if they write in cursive.
Cursive is a lost art, should not be discouraged.
I agree! Taking pride in beautiful writing should be encouraged.
And while you are practicing your beautiful writing, your boss is yelling at you because you are taking too long.
I’ll agree and disagree at the same time. Print is far clearer than cursive, even the cleanest, smoothest cursive I’ve seen. On the other hand, cursive is beautiful if done well and I can actually write faster in it (and have it still legible to me), so it has its uses. My rule of thumb if this: is someone else going to be attempting to read it? Print, and print as clearly as possible.
I haven’t used cursive since the fourth grade. And 18 years later, as a writer, I have found no use for cursive whatsoever.
I never understood why they taught us cursive when everytime you filled something out in school they said “Please Print”.
When I was in junior high school, my mother insisted that I handwrite my reports instead of typing them …
… until I pointed out that a neat, easy-to-read typewritten paper might put my teachers into a friendlier mindset when grading my reports.
She had no real response to that, so she finally let me type my papers. Made things easier for all concerned.
Cursive, and proper spelling, too! U R gr8! AAARRRGGGHHH!!! Also, touch typing.
This is why we use scanners to count everything where I work. It is also why when I have to leave notes for coworkers, I type them out rather than write it.
I also suffer from Cooper’s problem where my 4s and 9s tend to be indistinguishable from each other (Gs and Ss are another big one).
With the wide variety of fonts available, why can’t they find one that makes 3, 5, 6, 8, 9,and 0 distinct numerals? That makes for a lot of possible combinations when parts of numbers in a SKU are missing. Even with bifocals, I often have to take my glasses OFF, squint closely at the price tag, then put the glasses back on to type in a teenytiny SKU.
My store is guilty of this. The SKUs on the product labels are written in insanely tiny type (about 5 point!). Ink can’t possibly be so expensive that they can’t write the numbers large enough to read!
And the stores complain if you don’t count them right!
I work for an inventory company and goddess only knows entering precount sheets can be a beast if the handwriting is bad!
Brandy who doesn’t work for ergis!
I’m a former inventory associate from a certain nameless company. I often worked overstock items. I’ve learned to appreciate legible numerals on precount labels. When it’s unreadable, I ask, and get a new number written out.
After a while, I notice patterns in the products, and I do question it if the count doesn’t match the number of cases. Again, technically I’m just supposed to take whatever is there. But I personally want to be correct. And there have been times I’ve been questioned about the
“missing” items. Not my fault; I can’t count what isn’t there. Period.
Another issue I’ve had to correct (& been corrected on) is wrong labels. It’s kinda embarrassing when you scan a small makeup box and the SKU is for a large wagon. To be fair, our equipment isn’t meant to be viewed while we work. The item descriptions are not in our program, either. And for time constraints, all we can do is scan whatever is there. But I notice when the label has a wrong department code or if the high-dollar chime sounds. Most client associates actually appreciate my efforts to be correct. That is all the motivation I needed to be accurate.
Agreed. I have had that experience too. The worst is the actual counts being illegible. And if its repack..
Reminds me of the time my friend got a speeding ticket. Where I’m from, speeding tickets are $196 and up, so he got the bare minimum. However, the cop who gave him the ticket must’ve written it hastily, because it looked like “146″. So my friend fought the ticket in court. He still had to pay the ticket, but at least they honored the amount. He left the courthouse $50 richer.
Dad got one a few years back where the cop wrote the wrong date of issue on the ticket. Dad noticed the mistake as soon as he got it then smiled and thanked the guy, who kept looking at him funny for his response to the ticket. When it came time to go infront of the judge, Dad pointed out that the officer wrote down the court date in place of the date of issue and asked to have the ticket thrown out. When the now very pissed cop confirmed that the full ticket was written by him, the judge threw it oyt and Dad didn’t have to pay it……..then with as pissed off as that cop was, Dad stayed off that road for a couple months in his work truck so the officer wouldn’t have the chance to ticket him again.
He’d have to because that cop would be zeroing in on him.
That’s why he stayed off that road, not sure if it would have been safe for him to run that road in his and Mom’s minivan.
My dad ran a red light once (not to be excused) and had a ticket written up. In the hour slot, the cop wrote 24.12 (we use a 24 hour clock, not AM and PM). Dad looked at it, said OK – and then of course fought it in court and won. My clock sort of switches to 00 at midnight.
The cop never knew, afaik, so dad didn’t have to avoid him
Why not just drive the speed limit instead?
Because on some roads, that can get you run over. There are portions of the tollway leading into Chicago that have a 55mph limit and the cops won’t even drive that slow.
I believe (I used to live in Illinois) that there is a “keeping up with traffic” law. If the posted speed is say 55… and everyone is going 85… and you are going 65… you can get a ticket, NOT for speeding, but for going to slow and being a danger to the other (speeding) drivers. It was called the “keeping up with traffic law”. I remember going 95 on I-90 into Chicago one day.. and being passed by a cop doing at least 105..
Never heard that one Kefo, usually it’s meant for folks that wouldn’t even run the minimum posted limit. My folks are old enough to driven on the interstate roads when they first opened in Iowa and if a motorist drove below 45-50mph (some stretches were “Reasonable and Prudent” and now are 70mph), if those motorists refused to drive faster, they were given a police escort to the nearest country road……and stay on those instead!
Well…$50 not quite as poor!
My husband writes his numbers this way and yeah the 4 and 9 are interchangable. His 9′s and 6′s are also very difficult to read as he doesn’t make the hole in them big enough! And he’s so good with figures otherwise, in his head at least, but not writing them down.
What’s even more annoying is when the people with the worst handwriting are also the ones who most stubbornly insist that there’s nothing wrong with it.
I’ve had customers fill out forms totally illegibly, and then they bluntly told us that we need to have our vision checked if we can’t read it.
I take care of my pre counts myself. As for the cursive debate, yes, it should still be taught in school. Change is part of life, I know, but still, we should hold on to some things. It is indeed easier to use new tech but I wonder how many of us can still write a research paper with a pen and unlined paper.
when doing our inventory in the mid 80′s, whenever we came to an item that there were 0 of, we were instructed to write the word ‘NONE’ on the inventory sheet. My buddies and I started getting bored with NONE so we started creatively writing other words like, ZERO, ZILCH, ZIP, NADA…
Our manager (who was doing his first inventory) comes by to check some of our counts, we hear him yell, “WHAT THE F* IS ‘NADA’!!” and he throws the clipboard across the room. To this day we can say one word “NADA” and we still break out into laughter.
I sympathize with Cooper.
The other day I wrote the date was 1/R/B
(1/12/13)