Friday 24 October 2008

No. 9.: Monosyllabic conversations… Yep.

Have you ever had a feeling you don’t feel like talking at all? (OK, then… Have you ever felt like talking? Nice… Then who am I writing to? ) Then you must be aware of the fact that sometimes everybody feels this way. Like… they don’t want talking. So they do so like they are into talking very much but they aren’t… This happens when there are no cereals in the morning usually...

Jen: ‘Hey!’
Mark: ‘Morning…’

- Mark sits down next to the table, starts reading the paper while Jen opens the fridge taking some milk out -

J.: ’Milk?’
M.: ‘Coffee.’
J.: ‘Right. Slept tight?’
M.: ‘Yep. You?’
J.: ’Kind of…’

- Jen opens a shelf, grabbing the box of the cereals -

J.: ‘Cereals?’
M.: ‘Nope.’
J.: ‘Empty.’
M.: ‘Knew it.’
J.: ‘Me too. Just hoped.’
M.: ‘Right.’
J.: ‘Kids?’
M.: ‘We don’t have kids.’
J.: ‘Right. Just… forgot it.’
M.: ‘No problem.’

- And Jen sits down eating jam and bread… -

Well, that’s the story. Short, isn’t it? Why do we complicate this kind of things? Like… Of course we could form longer sentences. But why? Is there a point?

Jen: ‘Hey there!’
Mark: ‘Good morning, Sweetheart!’
- Mark sits down next to the table, starts reading the paper while Jen opens the fridge taking some milk out -
J.: ‘Do you want some milk?’
M.: ‘No, thanks, I would prefer some coffee instead. Do we have some?’
J.: ‘Yep, I think so. Then I make some coffee for you. How was your night?’
M.: ‘It was good, I’m much fresher today. And how was yours? Good?’
J.: ‘Yes, something like that. Could sleep ‘til midday.‘

- Jen opens a shelf, grabbing the box of the cereals –

J.: ‘Would you like some cereals?’
M.: ‘No, thanks! But…’
J.: ‘It’s empty! You didn’t … I asked you to buy some cereals the other day! I told you!’
M.: ‘Yes, Honey, I know… sorry…’
J.: ‘Honey? By the way we don’t have honey either!’
M.: ’Sorry…’
J.: ‘That’s why I don’t want kids from you!’

- And Jen throws some jam and bread towards Mark. –

And THAT’S why I like monosyllabic conversations! They’re honest, they’re strict, and not that dangerous as dangerous the long sentences are.

No. 8. is coming! Bye.

Monday 13 October 2008

No. 10.: Funny acronyms: F32UA!

There are some abbreviations in the English language (or more often in internet-language if there is something like that) which are so funny or useful I really like them. (OK, I'm not talking about LOL because that's not funny anymore. Everybody uses that even if they could use 'Maan, you're so funny I'll pee my pants!' instead. - That would be funny BTW. )

There are some nice acronyms, aren't nice because of their form, but their meaning. For example IOK2MM, the invention of Joe. Well, that's a good acronym. It's OK to make mistakes.
But it made me think about this: Why don't we use acronyms in public transport like... 'DNLOotW!ID!' instead of 'Do NOT lean out of the window! It's dangerous!'. You don't even have time to read it. It's like: 'What a long sentence... Whatever... I rather lean out than read this...' As you see long sentences are dangerous!

Or we could write formal letters with acronyms. We use Ph. D., or Dr. or Mr. We could write like this:

'D. Mr. A.,
I send this L. b. I want U //Yeah, I know U know this kind of abbrev.! :) // to send me some I. about the start. Eng. course in your L. S. ...'

-- No one could read this out... :) --

There are some useful three or four-letter acronyms like LOL, which I think is the first instant message acronym. And it is totally overused. I know people using these nasty three letters even in Hungarian contexts. Even orally. And it's not that nice. But most of this people play WOW too, so in a way I can understand this kind of language transformation.

There's BTW (by the way), or OK which I'm sure is an acronym, but no one knows its history.

If you are into TV series and you watch The Big Bang Theory (TBBT BTW), the last week they had a hilarious dialogue between Penny and Sheldon. It was something like this:
Penny: What's AFK?
Sheldon: [into his headset] AFK. [to Penny] "Away From Keyboard."
Penny: Oh, I see.
Sheldon: What does that stand for?
Penny: O.I.C....
Sheldon: Yes, but what does it stand for?
(Or there is the also funny 'L3375p34k' where we use numbers instead of some letters, together with acronyms, of course. But that's a whole different story.)

Acronyms are good. So F32UA (just don't forget to describe their meaning for the first time: 'Feel free to use acronyms' this time.)
And the No. 9. is coming ASAP.