Theory of Conversation, Existence

Conversation is like bad blogging you can't escape. In conversation, you take turns bringing up topics that are only as relevant as your partner is sane. You can't skip the boring parts or open up a second tab. Most of it is repetitive and unoriginal.

And I have sinned. I often start a conversation with "I read online..., I saw on TV..., I heard on the radio...." By the time I have prefaced my tidbit with "I'm making up the numbers..., I wish I could remember the author..., I forget what he said exactly..." my contribution is basically: "I saw, read, or heard something unexpected and was surprised." Ta da!

To strain the electronic metaphor further, these conversations form the web of my social existence. A group of people that understands these references coalesces around me--business people for business stuff, religious people for religious stuff, and shiftless time-wasters for internet stuff.

Group fit, intelligence, and wit are then just a function of a conversation batting average. For example, I worked the wear-leveling of flash memory (hat-tip to feed) and "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." into a conversation with my boss and one sentence later seriously claimed there was an East Coast Television and Microwave Oven Programming Division at NBC. So I hit a double with the tech- and health-obsessed partners and probably a triple with the smooth 30 Rocks reference.

Regurgitation--that is existence. If you can vomit quickly and accurately you are intelligent. If you choose to staccato-puke out certain references, in the right order, with the right timing, then you are witty. Boring.

I want to do and be more. Instead of "I read, saw, or heard..." I want to say "I researched and analyzed..., I designed and created..., or I planned and executed...." To be more precise, I want to say those things and not be lying.

Not just lying as in being untrue to myself--like borrowing a metaphor from a sport I detest and then mixing that metaphor badly because I am intellectually lazy--though that is part of it. I mean actually lying. I mean claiming to have told my boss that a mildly humorous element of a soon-to-be-overexposed sitcom is true just so I could work in the McSweeny's 30 Rocks reference. Twice.