I'm an eloquent and thorough individual (not to be confused with Thoreau, I'm less than poetic). My emails are well thought out and convey the entirety of my thought process. I've never been accused of rambling, except for those 20 or so times, but I digress (code word that means...rambling)
Some people I have worked with in the past have had the attention span of a gnat. Worse, an ADHD suffering gnat. An ADHD suffering gnat on caffeine at a squirrel convention. If this blog post were an email, their attention would have stopped at about "all of them." These are the people that you learn early on you could call shirley a panty wasted crybaby with a dirty diaper (or worse if you can imagine it) so long as you do it 2/3 of the way into a long email.
Some would call blogging a "creative outlet" but for me as it is my inner-monologue's field trip to the museum of life. Sure, it's a 2 hour traffic laden field trip on a bus filled with 27 second graders to an art museum with no gift shop, in the rain.
Here I go off on a tangent really skinny branch... I live near the District of Columbia, Washington, the Nation's Capitol, the armpit of United States politics...but the Mecca for all things Smithsonian. You want Air and Space, American History, Natural History, American Art, American Indian, African Art...Yes, we have that. Unfortunately... Growing up here was to be subjected to all of them, with assignments to research. Air and Space was cool, but that was often the dessert if all 27 of us were well behaved at the National Natural Historical Museum of Fru-Fru Skidoo... Unlikely.
So are you the type to write the bare minimum communications are you the literate email novelette writer?
I enjoy writing a thorough, well written and edited e-mail. But I have learned that when writing to certain friends with the attention span of say "an ADHD suffering gnat on caffeine at the squirrel convention" that highlighting key points or necessary information (literally painting over the words with a lovely neon yellow or cosmic pink) is very helpful at ensuring maximum retension of information.
ReplyDeleteGood luck on 31 blogs in 31 days. I did a "30 days of thankfulness" facebook posting marathon in November and after Thanksgiving I lost the will to post and ended up doubling up on posts at the end just to be done with it. Squirrel!
I love your witty style Scott. Should be more of it. I'd read your emails. They'd be better than the mundane ones I get. I wonder is that a reflection of me????
ReplyDeleteAny relation to Carl?
Great post! I can completely relate and was literally laughing out loud. (Not LOL - I don't do text speak.) I have actually called people names in the middle of my e-mail to see if they actually read it. They didn't. I'm not long-winded, just thorough.
ReplyDeleteI tried the highlighting method, but then on my next email, I had to do a lot of creative editing to get the right words Under the highlighting on the monitor....
ReplyDeleteAh, great question Madonna... He had no children of his own and his birth records were lost in the war, but word is he looks like pictures of a great uncle. (well, I never met him, so don't know if he was great...)
ReplyDeleteWhat about you? Any relationship to a baby in a manger? Ok, how about the pop star?
How did I miss a nice side bar on "long winded" vs. "winds of change" vs. "break like the wind"?!?
ReplyDeleteNeither novelette nor bare minimum, I try to be to the point and usually fail miserably.
ReplyDeleteI hate explaining things twice or answering simple questions if I can avoid it. Some people warrant the Short Story / Long Story email where I give the barest essentials at the top, then give them the "if you feel like you need utter confusion, here is the rest of the story" LOL
ReplyDeleteI totally write things out. As I find the l337-speak, or whatever the heck the kids call it, painful and unnecessary. Except for LOL. I like LOL'ing, so there...
ReplyDeleteWhat, LOL isn't like lulling? Crudbucket!
Lullying!
ReplyDeleteIf I could set up a filter on my email to rid of txt spk, I would.
ReplyDeleteBut then I would be only left with Nigerian Prince's and special deals on Viagra.