6 posts tagged “etiquette”

This is a call that came in at 2.20 a.m. today:

Caller: Hi, may I speak with Jack Yan, please?
Me: Speaking.
Caller: It’s Jim *** from Madison Who’s Who. How are you?
Me: Jim, it’s 2.20 a.m.
Caller: What was that?
Me: It’s twenty past two in the morning.
Caller: Oh, Jesus Chr … [hangs up]

   Tell me, what is worse?
   1. Not realizing that not everyone on the planet lives in US eastern time, not even after dialling 011.
   2. Using the Lord’s name in vain.
   3. Hanging up on someone to whom you’ve told all your info and not apologizing for doing something stupid.

Earlier today, I had talked about dumbasses in various countries. Here is one from New Zealand, featuring some advice that isn’t that practical.
   At first, I thought this was from a spoof page as found by my friend Lynda Jessen-Tye. The question: what if I need to cough during a symphony orchestra concert? The response (my favourite bits in italics):

Coughing is an unavoidable problem. However, there are ways to avoid coughing during the music. If you feel a cold coming on, please bring lozenges with you. If there are no lozenges on hand and you need to cough, please try to wait for the end of the movement. If that's not possible, you can try to bury your cough in a louder section of the music. Also, a handkerchief or scarf will help to muffle the disruption. If you need to cough more than a couple of times, there's nothing wrong with getting up and excusing yourself from the auditorium for the rest of the movement.
   Following these guidelines will show sensitivity to your neighbours, and allow everyone to have a more enjoyable concert experience.

   Dammit, just cough, unless it’s continual!

With the good news of the engagement between my friend Jennifer Siebel and Mayor Gavin Newsom of San Francisco, whom I had some contact with in his first year on the job, I have to note that the usual anti-Jen bloggers have been more silent.
   Either it’s the time of year or they have moved to other targets.
   It makes me wonder about the type who has a need to target others. I know: I deal to politicians as though they were subjects of sitcoms—but I like to think I do so with some restraint. Men such as Winston Peters or John Key have not escaped my sarcasm, but I admit it is done with what I see as a failure for them to grasp their jobs. In short, other than the ridiculous hours at Parliament, I think I could do better. I believe I have the intelligence to. And if they wanted to dignify me with a response to justify their positions, I will welcome it—not that they would.
   When it comes to someone like Jen, who defended herself on a blog and through that attracted more negative comments, I question: why? Here is someone who is merely stating her opinion, and that opinion is then rubbished by people who are even further away from the subject than she is—yet those people all proclaim themselves experts.
   What we have is a generation that has to lash out because of envy. They wonder why they are not as loved as others, they dislike being corrected by the real facts, and express their disdain by pretending to be more important than the next person.
   These are the people who, with their cellphones, speak loudly to assure others of their self-importance, so that we all know what their business is. And giggle to ourselves about their optimistic view of their trivialities.
   And when it comes to a civil discourse, which one assumes one should be able to have in a medium where opinion-sharing is one of its raisons d’être, they no longer know how to have one. There used to be a thing called netiquette, which I thought extended to the blogosphere.
   I wonder if we can restore our values this year. I’d certainly like a 2008 where I didn’t have to quote John Gabriel’s Greater Internet F***wad Theory again.

I have learned that the posh French do not say, ‘Bon appetit.’ I will keep saying it, since I am not a posh Frenchman. But do remember this next time you dine with those aristocratic types, such as my friend Count de Money and those of that ilk.

When driving with my assistant yesterday, I let in a Honda Civic owned by a Church-based fleet management company (there was plenty of signwriting to that effect). In such a case, when you know the motorist is another Christian, do you show the extended palm to beckon the driver to move in ahead of you, or would it be more appropriate to make the Sign of the Cross?

An excerpt from a discussion between some of us here on Vox and on Facebook—the part I can share. (Thanks to Ninja and Randy for their thoughts in this.)

I believe in men being gentlemen, women being ladies. I believe in respect, grace, honour, integrity and keeping my word. I believe in facts before assumptions, I believe in truth and not BS.
   I believe in self-determination of people and respecting their paths.
   I believe that no one can complete me. A relationship is about my sharing who I fully am with someone, not needing someone to complete how I see myself.
   But we real men, those of us without sex and footy on the brain, are plain not represented widely. So when mothers consider locking up their daughters, do men like me get grouped with the assholes of this planet? You know, the guys who think Ralph is sophisticated literature?
   And when a magazine domestically says that Marc Ellis is the typical Kiwi male, what heck hope do the rest of us have?
   The last time anyone close appeared in the cultural Zeitgeist was Brendan Fraser in Blast from the Past. And he was made out to be a freak who grew up in a fallout shelter.
   We now return you to our regularly scheduled programme.