Innuendo

[Editor's note: In retrospect, this blog is MUCH less interesting than it originally seemed, but it's been sitting in the queue for so long that it seemed a shame just to delete it. Maybe I had intended to use it as a springboard for something else, but it's been so long that I hardly remember what that might have been. In any event, I am warning you that the following is neither interesting/funny nor touching/insightful, so if you'd rather, just skip to the next post.]

[IF YOU ARE ALVIN, SKIP THIS ONE REGARDLESS OF WHETHER YOU FIND IT INTERESTING. YOU MAY BE OFFENDED AT MY ANALYSIS OF YOUR ARGUMENTS, AND BECAUSE I HAVE PERSONALY RESOLVED NEVER TO RECOMMENCE THIS DEBATE WITH YOU, I DO NOT WANT TO HEAR WHATEVER REJOINDERS YOU MAY BE COOKING UP. STOP READING. MOREOVER, I CANNOT BE HELD LIABLE FOR ANY OFFENSE, INJURY, AND/OR PERSONAL SLIGHT YOU MAY INCUR AS A RESULT OF READING THIS, BECAUSE I AM WARNING YOU (FOR THE THIRD TIME) THAT YOU SHOULD STOP READING NOW.]

About a month or two ago, Alvin told me he had received a response from a job for which he had applied. He scheduled an interview just for some practice, but had no intention of accepting a job offer (which was later extended to him). This new job: a) offered a higher salary than his current position; b) had a much more organized administrative staff with more realistic project schedules; and c) was approximately on par with his current job in terms of travel distance/time to and from work. He had been griping considerably about point (b), the disorganization at his work, and last minute changes to his programming projects. Though I find it amusing to reread old posts and laugh at my own ranting, listening to Alvin drone on about his work-related problems is not at the top of my leisure activity list, so I encouraged him to take the other job. His reasons for staying were vague, but they seemed to have involved preferring the type of programming he was doing at his old job. (Again, I'm not sure how one sort of programming can be more enjoyable than another, because it all seems like pounding out html to me. Click here for more on the relationship between Alvin's interest in programming and my consequent boredom.)

So when the subject of his daily office meetings came up, I used it as an opportunity to hammer home the point that he accept the new job offer (to spare me from listening to him complain about the useless meetings, inefficiency and poor planning at his workplace). Our chat went something like this:

WheresMyRailgun: a time of meeting is coming upon me, and if I do not meet, the[n] who will meet for me? what can be accomplished without meetings.
Tomato JT: i thought you said alot can be done w/o meetings
Tomato JT: i was under the impression you reviled them for their inefficacy
WheresMyRailgun: change is coming so we must be prepared. it will come like a snail trodding through molasses, but we must be prepared for the day meetings prove their worth.
Tomato JT: at a snail's pace thru molasses, the changes will come long after you've retired or been taken to Glory but, you have chosen to work there, so more power to you.
WheresMyRailgun: But what is man's power compared to God's power. who is man that his power can save himself.
WheresMyRailgun: I must now prepare myself for the alotted time. The time ordained before I was born by he who knew me from the beginning of time.

My saying "you chose to work there" was a rhetorical move which I hoped would pursuade Alvin of his previously poor decision-making. [But, as I have already confessed, my motives for this were strickly selfish, not based on a desire to see Alvin improve his decision-making skills, improve his lot in life, and subsequently enter into a new era of personal happiness.] The other purpose of this subtle innuendo was to show him (without the overt, overbearingness of "Alvin, you make very poor decisions,") the superiority of my thinking in an argument we had just prior to the mentioning of his meeting. I discourage it, but if you want to read it, I have posted an excerpt of that part of the conversation below. Reading it will also shed light on why Alvin is communicating in that stilted, affected style.


* * * * *
WheresMyRailgun: Why do they talk so funny in the Bible
Tomato JT: I dont think they talk funny. to whom in particular are you referring?
WheresMyRailgun: Like, a lot of Job's dialog
Tomato JT: well, this conversation occured at the beginning of human history.
Tomato JT: shakespeare wrote just 400 years ago
Tomato JT: and look how differently HE used language
Tomato JT: in comparison, i think Job actually is alot more discernable to the average reader than is shax.
WheresMyRailgun: But shakespeare's writings were read and edited.
WheresMyRailgun: Job is just talking
Tomato JT: but, you must remember, shakespeare's plays were entirely ORAL. they were delivered for aural consumption
Tomato JT: and are meant to reflect DIALOGUE between charaters
Tomato JT: so he wrote for the purpose of making it sound more or less like the actual "talking" of his day
WheresMyRailgun: But the dialogue was still edited and refined
Tomato JT: but NOT edited and refined so as to be less understandable
Tomato JT: which his writing is to us today, because of the lingual drift across the centuries
Tomato JT: i will give you another example, then:
Tomato JT: when my high school students talk today, sometimes if i werent as hip as i am, i would have difficulties understanding them because their vocabulary is different
Tomato JT: we might both use a particular word, but they use it in a very different way than i do
Tomato JT: and often the subject matter of which they speak is unfamiliar to me
Tomato JT: so take the 10 years between me and my students, and multiply that by 600-800 to reach job's day…
Tomato JT: and voila! a recipe for difficult speach.
WheresMyRailgun: It seems that everyone is very articulate back then
Tomato JT: [btw, i think editing and refining does not sufficiently explain the differences in our language, because you could give shakespeare an editorial from the NY Times (that has been edited), and he would have a hard time reading it, not because it was edited, but because our use of language is different from his.]
WheresMyRailgun: Elihu spends almost 20 versus just saying that he wants to say something
Tomato JT: maybe that is a cultural difference
Tomato JT: not necesarrily a time difference
Tomato JT: some cultures just endorse repetition as a means of communication
WheresMyRailgun: if they are verbose in the Bible, we must be verbose
WheresMyRailgun: for many words that were said have been said by those who said them
Tomato JT: i dont think we need to be verbose.
Tomato JT: they mourn in sack cloth and ashes
Tomato JT: we dont need to do that
WheresMyRailgun: but those are the clothing of that day. who, if cold, would not addorn cloth to warm him. and if he has not cloth, then will God not clothe him.
Tomato JT: no, sack cloth was not typically worn
Tomato JT: it was a very low grade material, used for bags and things, worn only when one was mourning