Phrase-Meaning – What’s the Meaning of ‘Try Me’?

Okay, this one's just weird. I did a little Googling (while, Binging really, but whatever) and "Quills & Sofas" is apparently a reference to the children's TV program "My Little Pony", it looks like that's the name of a store that sells, well, quill pens and sofas. I limited my research because I'm at work and searches for My Little Pony stuff seem to turn up sites by creepy old men with little-girl fetishes, so if anyone who actually knows wants to correct or clarify what I say about the reference, feel free. Anyway, the idea appears to be that these are two things that have nothing to do with each other and are thrown together for no apparent reason. In the context of the post you cite, people are criticizing some sort of research proposal about "Insects and Reptiles" on the grounds that the proposer is throwing together two unrelated things without making any link between them.

As we say so often on this site, it depends on context.

Sometimes a person will say "as I said" just to remind others what he said before. But yes, if you need to re-state what you already said, often this means that the other person didn't understand you. (Which, of course, might be their fault for being dumb, or might be your fault for not speaking clearly, or might be nobody's fault and just a confusing situtation.) People often say "as I said" in an argument or debate to mean that the other person is deliberately ignoring your point.