Friday, March 14, 2008

Uh, hello?

This morning I was reading a friend's thoughts on change and decided to think some on my own. Well, APUSH kind of cut me short, and reminded me of how little time I have to accomplish so much work! Still hate APUSH... I'm organizing a ban on it, if anyone's interested... It will never amount to much, but it will make me feel better knowing that I've let it know precisely what I think of it. Anyhow! Right after getting knee-deep into Presidents, crises, and who-did-whats, a good friend of mine called on the phone. Now, this is an extremely rare event-- emphasis on "extremely". So, this person called me up on the phone to confirm something or other. My brain kind of frizzled, to be honest. Not only was there 1) someone on the phone... for ME, but b) it was in English. Even more surprising was the realization I came to: I couldn't remember the "how-to"s of phone conversations. My entire world revolves around the Internet, so even my rare phone calls are digitized. And then, I figure, "hey, it's free, so chat away!" But, on an actual PHONE, I had no idea how to interact: what to do, what to say... The seemingly normal, "How are you?" stumped me. Now, if that stumps you, you know you're in for trouble. Then, my practical, let us say, "thrifty" mindset kicked in, and I started mincing words to save money (I doubt that I was paying for it, but I still like to minimize costs, almost subconsciously). Luckily I always leave 5% of my brain for an emergency power supply, so I was able to form coherent sentences at least. I don't think my caller noticed... or did they?

All in all, I realized how accustomed I have become to interacting on the Internet, but that "change" that my blogging friend mentioned was truly change, and in no ways foreseen. What a wonderful world we live in~ I leave you with something I stumbled across on the Internet this afternoon:

*Phone rings--Joe picks it up* Joe: "Hello?"
Caller and Joe: "who is this?"
C: "Who'm I speaking with?"
J: "No... Who am I speaking with?"
*Silence* J: "You know, usually when person 'A' calls person 'B', person 'A' says who he is first."
C: "Since when!?"
J: "Since always..."
*Long pause*
C: I'm the person who's asking who you are!"
J: "AH!! I'm the person who's asking who I am!? Wait... no! Ah!"


Yeah, sounds a little bit like the insane conversation that was playing in my head while talking on the phone today. Only, I don't think I actually said anything outright dumb out loud... I think...

1 comment:

Eschew obfuscation! said...

LOL!!! Oh dear. yes. That is exactly how I felt when you came down to BCN for that course in Egyptology. You are quite the writer, Scheherezade! Always one to play with words in the blink of an eye and produce them like lovely surprises for those around you. indeed.
tell Olivia I said hi! (we mk's need to stick together. :P)
wishing you a sunshiny Wednesday!
k