Words, WTF?

As a person to whom words mean more than to the average Joe, I think maybe I have some hangups that the average Joe doesn’t have – the average Joe who uses words as a means to an end. Words like Yup, Nope, and acronyms like LOL. These still push my buttons, no matter how mainstream and internationally used and commonplace they have become. Even I have succumbed to LOL or WTF on occasion, and ROTFLMFAO is one of my all time faves, for its sheer idiocracy.

But in communication, this is where our lovely and convenient technology fails, and everything gets lost in translation, leaving one of the communicators feeling, well, cheated. Inflection, tone, context - these elements are all key to communicating and we, as a society, have chosen to settle for less. To end a “conversation” not really knowing WTF the other person REALLY meant is... dissatisfying, at best.

No, I’m not the first person to write about this topic, or to think it, but I may be one of the few. And it’s certainly not news to anyone, but at 4 a.m. I just felt that I came up with a decent articulation of it in my head. Hank Moody said it best, like I quoted here back in December of 08.

And, just FYI, in addition to my pet verbal peeves of “yup” and “nope”, there is the ending a sentence with my first name. Don’t do it. I find it to be terribly condescending. I have no idea why, maybe some strange insecurity born in childhood.

Ok, now that my masterpiece memo is out, I must go back to bed.

~R