It's News to Me

If you've been a reader of this blog for any time at all, you'll have seen me mention my friend Paul Moor, whom I have known now since the early 1990s, almost 15 years. 

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I virtually never take a vacation, last year's cruise to Alaska with Carole being a spectacularly notable exception, but I do take virtual vacations. For instance, I am participating in two vacations, vicariously and virtually this Memorial Day weekend, with my son Mike and his extended family at Ft. Walton Beach, FL, and with Andy of Yellow Swordfish and his wife, as they visit the American west and southwest from the British Isles. (Also see Andy's posts here and here.) The beauty of virtual vacations is that I can switch quickly from the beach to the Grand Canyon and I don't incur the shock to my bank account of having to stop every 300 or 400 miles to get soaked at a gas station, nor do I have to leave the familiar surroundings or the comfort of my own computer. All in all, I'm glad I'm here rather than there.

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I sometimes believe the wheels of technological progress would screech to a halt without the use of acronyms. And facility with acronyms seems to be the shibboleth that divides the technological cognoscenti from those who are lost in space when they walk into Best Buy or Circuit City. Seniors, in particular, find dealing with some pimply-faced geek wannabe who has scored a job selling the latest computers, digital cameras and MP3 players to an unsuspecting public to be an anathema. God forbid you should have a problem with your computer and have to try to determine whether that Geek Squad Savior who rode in on a white PT Cruiser is blowing smoke up your ass when he tells you you've got to buy a $300.00 component just to get your email to work again. They'll sling acronyms at you so fast that it'll make your head spin. As the old saying goes, «If you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit.»

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This is from an email I sent to a couple of friends this morning about the tendency to forward messages we receive advocating activism to resolve some problem we see as important.

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As my friend Jerry observes in this post, we humans love to talk, to hear the sound of our own voice, sometimes even though what we are saying is just meaningless babble. I plead guilty. Can't help it. It's just the way I am. In fact, when I was in grade school they even had classes in elocution, which I doubt you would find in many modern curricula. And in a way, I think that's sad, because I believe that its absence probably contributes to that almost-universal fear many people have about speaking in public.

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