Why should you go to jail for a crime someone else noticed? (in Off-topic)

lol, you actually made me laugh out loud with that one. reminds me of a time when someone sued Micky D's for hot coffee...ridiculus : )

huh?

Say it out loud, Maelstrom. Bob Loblaw.

Who?

We're not here to talk nonsense to Bob Loblaw.

Sure we are. If we've got the cash, Bob Loblaw has the time.

Rommel: The hot coffee lawsuit was not frivolous. That woman was very badly burned by superheated coffee. *After* McDonalds had been warned that they were in violation of safety standards. That McDonalds store knew what they were doing was dangerous, but they did it anyway.

I wouldn't trade the maiming that poor woman went through for the money she ended up getting. No amount of money would be worth that much pain.

it's still a crock, though

McD corporate wasn't encouraging franchises to do that, but they got sued for $millions anyway because a single franchise isn't worth enough to make the lawyers happy

The real sad thing here is that no one gets the joke.

Of course no one gets the joke, it makes no sense. Perhaps give us some more information about this Bob Loblaw person?

*cough cough* Arrested Development *cough cough*

As Bast has said, try saying the name aloud. You'll find that the statements in the title of this thread and the 'We're not here to talk nonsense to Bob Loblaw." will make much more sense.

Try saying it real fast. That might help you to realize what it is that you are really saying...

doesn't it mean "blah blah blah"..

Not sure what "it" is a crock, Jonathan. Sukotto was merely stating the McDonald's lawsuit was not frivolous, and he is correct.

If by "it", you mean "the world", or "the way things work out", or "that wacky corporate America", or "lawyers", well, yeah, maybe sure. I thought we most all knew that life sucked quite often? Maybe that's just me.

Yes, the name is purposely meant to sound like 'blah, blah, blah'. It is yet another witty joke brought to us by the writers of Arrested Development (Mondays at 8pm on Fox) and an definitely an interesting take on a tried format- the lawyer joke.

As for the discussions of law suits that aren't pertinent to this thread, they should go to another thread.

Oh, television. Meh.

I'll tell you what's a crock - saying the coffee was "superheated"! 180 degrees F is not superheated at atmospheric pressure - that's just really hot coffee. But I still would prefer not to have it on my genitals.

haha 180 degrees? That's really hot!
Although I thought lawsuits like that existed only on Seinfeld.

it was 140, the same temp recommended for a dishwasher for sanitation

140 F isn't superheated either. But most sources I saw indicate the temperature was around 170-190F. 140F actually sounds like about the right temperature to serve coffee at. One source: http://canf.bc.ca/briefs/mcdonalds.html Don't know if it's correct or not but it seems somewhat sorta legit for an internet source.

@Jonathan, I thought so too until I looked a bit closer.

1. The coffee brewing and serving instructions were issued at the corporate level for all franchises. They specified a brewing temp of 200F and a serving temp of 185F (each +/- 5F). This is at least 20 hotter than other establishments.
   
2. At that heat, spills can cause 3rd degree burns in less than 5 seconds. (3rd degree being the worst) Those burns remove all the skin and fat layers down to the muscle. They never heal on their own and are excruciating painful. Liebeck, the woman in question, received 3rd degree burns across her thighs, groin, and bum. (just about the worst place I can imagine after maybe my face)
   
3. She required extensive grafting surgery and therapy over 2 years to regain a semblance of normalcy (though she was permanently scarred)
   
4. She ask McDonalds to pay for her medical expenses and only sued when they refused to help her.
   
5. McDonalds internal documents show that they had over 700 reports of burns (some severe) due to the excessive heat of their product. They settled rather than allow any of those to go to court.
   
In my opinion, this is a clear case of corporate malfeasance and they deserved a far bigger slap than they actually got. Liebeck was awarded $640k (estimated), including legal fees, after several appeals and a confidential settlement.

More info
1. O'Steen & Harrison
2. Brown & Szaller
3. Elisabeth Riba
4. Wikipedia

Ah!!! My thread has been hijacked! Well if you can't beat 'em, join 'em:

I used to work at Tim Hortons, a popular Canadian chain of coffee and donut shops that also happens to operate throughout Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky. We used to brew our coffee at 185 degrees. I'm not entirely sure what the serving temperature would be, but it was hot, although not hot enough to cause any severe burning (I would know since 2.5 years spent there equals lots of spilled coffee). If I had to say, I'd say that our soup was even hotter than our coffee. Moral of the story: You can throw around all kinds of numbers, but the fact still remains that you must exercise a whole lot of caution when you are dealing with food and beverage that has been heated. If people haven't come to realize this by now then I should be able to sue them for being in such a hurry, causing them to be careless.

Well, at the least it's a pretty picture to look at whilst conjuring up my thoughts... Really like that mahogany bookcase.

Now, back to Scott Baio! Was "Charles in Charge" a movie?

Yes, if we're going to hijack a thread with posts about superheated coffee, could we move those posts into the equipment cool down period thread?

Sadly enough there was never a movie version of "Charles in Charge". The next best thing is seeing him guest star on Arrested Development these days. He'll be in the next episode on Monday at 8 pm on Fox.

Seriously if people havent come to realize that coffee is served hot, they should be sued themselves...

"Hmm....Whats this moist fog coming from the eliptical hole in my coffee cup? It looks like fun, i wanna touch it. Maybe i can pour it out to see where all the fog goes at once..." </notsomuchsarcasmasitseemsforpeoplesueingforbeinganidiot>

btw, i watched this show one time, and really did not laugh once. So i never watched it after that.

sorry, for 3rd post, but i laugh easy too, i just watched Team America, and thought it was the greatest movie in the world. So i do have a sense of humor, this show just didnt catch it for me that one time, maybe ill give it another shot....=P~

Coffee is hot.

Milk, is not (usually.)

Both you can spill on accident.

She wasn't spilling because she spilt the coffee, but because it left her looking like charred meat.

If spilled milk left me looking like charred meat, I'd sue a cow.

But it's not McD's fault she had a craving for *hot* coffee, and it's not there fault she *accidentally* spilled it either.

Ow, i broke my nail on my keyboard, I'm sueing Bill Gates...

Bill Gates doesn't own Microsoft lol.
They will soon have warning on coffee warning consumers that the coffee may be hot. Like the warning on a chainsaw that says do not stop blade with genitals.

Save it for the talk room, son.

Found on a peanut butter jar:

Warning, may contain traces of nut.

Is that so strange bartjan? I think they wouldn't mean the peanuts themselves but other nuts... ?

I couldn't stay away from this one. First, it pains me to defend them, as Mrs. Monkey & I have some very, very serious grievances with The McDonald's Corporation's employment practices, but I have to say this - it takes 2 sides to reach a settlement - Liebeck was burned where & how she was because she was driving with the coffee cup between her legs, with the LID OFF, and had to stop suddenly.

Her attorneys agreed to a settlement even lower than that estimate, due to the stupidity factor. And yes, this is from "insider information",

Buster had attempted to flee to Mexico, but instead, he wound up in Santa Ana, California, a town six miles inland from his own. The two cities were so close that they shared a newspaper. Unfortunately, due to the car fumes and high temperatures, Buster could not tell the difference.

Sorry for derailing your thread memnot.
I had the (obviously incorrect) idea that people would go look at those articles instead of continuing to post jokes here. :-(

Buster: You people are just like me!

and to think, all that was started by my simple remembrance of an old controversy. wow, I should do that more often...

In response to smallpau1 thinking that Team America was the funniest movie ever: I have news for you. Team America plays off the most basic senses of humor that it has lost all appeal for any who would choose to actually think. If you like this kind of humor I can't blame you, but I do know that if you don't like Arrested Development, and you don't even find it to be funny, then you most certainly don't like to have to think.

I'll give you a little example of why you have to think to be able to watch this show: In season 2, episode 3- Amigos- Buster finds one of those hand chairs (you know, those chairs that actually look like a big hand sticking out of the ground) at his mother's housekeeper's house, which he had mistaken for Mexico (he was running away to try to stay out of Army, which his mother had volunteered him for when a Michael Moore look alike appeared to dare her) (Bast and Ank have already delved into this subject on their most recent posts...). Now when he finds this chair he says, "I never thought I'd miss a hand so much."

In season 2, episode 11- Out On A Limb- Buster goes swimming in the ocean because he's mad at his 'over-protective' mother (which is a huge understatement since he's 32 and can't live without her) for being intimate with his uncle, who happens to be his father's identical twin (except he has hair). While swimming in the ocean a man screams out to Buster, "Loose seal! Watch out for loose seal!" Buster angrily replies, "I don't care about Lucille (which is the name of his mother)! She lies!" And then the narrator (the wonderful Ron Howard) quips, "And then a seal bites off his hand."

Now tell me you had to think when you read all that! If you didn't get it it's probably because you haven't thought about it. And perhaps this isn't the funniest thing to be written, but when you have an attachment to these characters that can only come with spending more_than_one episode with them, then you'll find that figuring out something so complex is tremendously gratifying.

So watch the show! Fox has already cut this season from 22 episodes to 13 because the ratings aren't up to par. We need a dramatic increase to keep the best show on television on television, so watch on Monday at 8pm... although perhaps it'd be better that you just rent the DVDs so you can be able to actually understand much of what is being said.

What if I find both Arrested Development _and_ Team America terribly, terribly funny?

Just a word of advice: trying to explain why something is funny and/or trying to justify a sense of humor(your's or another's) is like trying to drive a nail with a piece of uncooked pasta.

Yeah, that's right. Shattered pasta.

smallpau1

I got this off of the back of my keyboard, "Improper or prolonged keyboard use may result in injury." ;)

Sut, it's not unusal for people to enjoy Team America. I enjoyed it for what it was. And as for the pasta and the nail, I'm going to keep trying until I get that nail in!

Peanuts aren't nuts at all; they are legumes.

From Wikipedia: "As the peanut is a member of the pea family unrelated to other nuts, individuals with peanut allergies may not be allergic to the other types of nuts, and vice-versa."

-- The More You Know...

...CAUSE KNOWLEDGE IS POWER!!!
(sorry 'bout the all caps, but I felt it nessesary here)

There was a big tornado in Iowa or Kansas or one of those states that makes corn that had some really big wind that drove a piece of raw spaghetti clear through a mighty oak tree. In fact, splinters from the oak tree were found embedded in the unfeathered bottoms (on account of the wind) of several dead kosher chickens three fields over (well, they weren't kosher yet but they were going to be!). Raw spaghetti is not to be trifled with.

when high winds blow... beware spaghetti!

hehe Arrested Developement is really funny. I think we're kind of behind here in Australia.

What's the last episode you've seen?

The one where buster went to mexico to avoid joining the army. Well he really wasn't in mexico.

That was the last one? Geez. That's second season stuff there. You need to get with the third season-- it's the best one yet.

Excellent!

Season 1 DVD is $30 - I've already got mine!

It's an excellent investment...
(Because there's always money in the banana stand.)

"Liebeck was burned where & how she was because she was driving with the coffee cup between her legs, with the LID OFF, and had to stop suddenly."

Actually the law suit stated that she was not the one driving, rather her friend was driving and she was holding the cups of coffee in her hands. Not only had the McDonalds superheated the coffee, the employee had also filled the cups right to the brim and then failed to secure the lids properly. When the car was breaking normally while parking the lids came off and the coffee splashed over the side.

IT WASN'T "SUPERHEATED"!!! Superheated is a technical term. Microwaves are good at superheating liquids - watch out when you take your coffee cup out - the superheated liquid could violently splode into vapor! 190 F McDonalds coffee is not superheated. Don't make me post in this thread again. And another thing - wet paint gives off vapors, NOT FUMES! Merry Christmas! Please add "superheated" to the spellchecker so we can have these intellectual discussions without using tags.

By the FSM, start your own thread if you must go on endlessly about the way McDonald's serves coffee and how it is (or is not) consumed by its patrons!

Everything they do is so dramatic and flamboyant. It just makes me want to set myself on fire.

We are only on Season 2 here in the UK.
The last one I remember was Episode 10-Read,Aim,Marry Me but that was more than a couple of months ago.

"Actually the law suit stated that she was not the one driving, rather her friend was driving and she was holding the cups of coffee in her hands. Not only had the McDonalds superheated the coffee, the employee had also filled the cups right to the brim and then failed to secure the lids properly. When the car was breaking normally while parking the lids came off and the coffee splashed over the side."

Actually, that's the 4th version of the story that I've heard or read, supposedly "from the actual lawsuit" -

she was driving/she wasn't, her friend was/she wasn't driving, her grandson was/she was parked/ she was parked, but her grandson was in the driver's seat/she had it in her hands/she had it between her knees/she had it between her thighs/the lid was off/the lid was loose/she was trying to take the lid off.

Combine any of the above, and you'll get someone's "real" version of the story.

All I know for sure is that my first post was the "official" corporate line, handed down from Oakbrook (McD's headquarters outside of Chicago). Which version is the "real truth" I have no idea, but I'm much less inclined to believe the corporate version anymore...

Sorry Bast, I was composing that while you posted. I promise I won't do it again. Please don't immolate yourself ;)

First of all, that was not Michael Moore. That was a Michael Moore look-alike. And second it wasn't national television. It was for a bit, on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

Bast on fire, hmmmmmm.

Do continue to the logical conclusion.

She's on fire...

She scores another basket?

Logic for the win!

The 'bit' in question is a sketch and not a short amount of time...

NSFY: "IT WASN'T "SUPERHEATED"!!! Superheated is a technical term. "

Yes, superheated has a meaning in scientific jargon. It also has a vernacular meaning, "heated excessively; overheated", which happens to come before the scientific definition in my American Heritage Dictionary.

Thanks for playing. Come again.

The use of the term "superheated" in the context of this conversation is sloppy and imprecise. I have already given you a common example demonstrating the need for accurately describing the thermodynamic state of the coffee. People have in fact been burned by superheated coffee from the microwave and I would bet that there are lawsuits involving what can correctly be referred to as superheated coffee.

If McDonalds were in fact serving superheated coffee, they should be subject to even greater liability and larger punitive damages. If science is employed to determine negligence and the amount of the award$, e.g., how much hotter is this coffee than "normal" coffee, then the scientific "jargon" must be accepted as well.

I've got your American heritage dictionary RIGHT HERE!

kthxbye :p

Anybody ever hear of google?

http://www.citizen.org/congress/civjus/tort/myths/articles.cfm?ID=785

There are dozens of us! Dozens!

Its seriously hilarious that it really seems like memnot is hijacking his own thread.

And why shouldn't I? Everyone else is doing it!