People who live in glass houses...

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You can't please all of the people, all of the time. Mostly because all of these people are idiots. When dealing with the idiots in your life, I find it best to always take the high road, and make yourself purposefully look like the bigger idiot. This is effective for a multitude of reasons, but I mostly use it for getting through the work day.

Wow, I literally just had one of those "let's repeat that back to you and spell everything out, making sure to say a word that starts with each letter" people call me while I was typing this blog about morons just like him. I couldn't feel any better about today's subject matter now.

He got to the letter 'V' in his read back, and there was this long pause before he finally said, "as in Visco". I shit thee not. He should have just finished the whole statement and said, "V, as in Visco-Elastic Memory Foam." Then I would've known he was putting me on, trying to take the high road as the bigger idiot as I am suggesting in this very blog. But no. He just said Visco. And he hesitated in doing so, as if to say, "shit, what's a word that starts with 'V'", and "Visco" was the first thing that came to mind. He knows he's heard it somewhere before, but has no idea what it means. Now, he could've meant "disco" or "cisco" or any other number of similar words. But what he said was "visco". And THAT, makes him an actual idiot, and not just playing a fun little game with me to make his day go by more quickly.

Here's my suggestion. Be the bigger idiot first. Own your own intelligence FAIL, long before it ever comes to fruition. Whether you're a "let's repeat that back to you and spell everything out, making sure to say a word that starts with each letter" person or not, become one. And while you're reading back the entire message, letter by letter, word by word, use words that are as fucked up as "visco", and/or, the real nut kicker, say the letter, and then say a word that starts with a completely different letter altogether (i.e.: 'b' as in 'olfactory'). If the person at the other end of the phone asks you to repeat that, because obviously he/she heard that you said "'b' as in 'olfactory'", use a word other than olfactory this time. Just make sure it doesn't start with a 'b', or anything even close to a 'b' sound.

Now, if you're on the receiving end of a "let's repeat that back to you and spell everything out, making sure to say a word that starts with each letter" person's phone call, as I just was, wait until the person starts their read back, and interrupt them whenever you see fit, but well before the end, and just say, "No, that's 'I' as in, "I know you'd like me to sit here and listen to you read me back this message that I gave you, but I'm not going to." Then hang up.

"Phone's ringing dude."

"Thank you, Donnie!"

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