Thursday, June 25, 2009

Idiomatic

MERCURY IN GEMINI IN THE 3RD HOUSE
Triple threat. Mercury, planet of the mind, sits in its naturally ruled sign, Gemini. Both are in their natural house, the 3rd House, house of communication. We'll see a sharp peak in communication while this alignment exists.

Communication is a funny concept. We discussed some of it back in Tact: A Lost Art. There are always certain phrases that are innate to a language. Vernacular is powerful. Phrases such as "It's raining cats and dogs" or even "What's up?" are ingrained to mean things other than their literal interpretation. We all accept that these are known.

I had an interesting incident today at work. One of my supervisors sent me an instant message. Now, I know that instant messages have their own versions of language and their own rules regarding response time.

Sidebar: Apparently, if there is romantic interest, not responding within four hours to a text message is considered rude. (Keep that in mind.)

So, I was in a meeting and I get back to my desk and there's an IM on my screen asking for a username and a password for one of our sites. It had been sent, I saw, some seven minutes prior. As I laid my fingers on the keyboard to tap out a response, a new message popped up on the screen: "Nevermind." Shrugging, I went back to my work. Not three minutes later, another message pops up. "Are you going to respond to my IMs? It's been like, 10 minutes." I blinked. Um, did I miss a social cue? Does not "nevermind" mean "forget about it; don't bother responding?" Who responds to "nevermind?" I wouldn't even know what to say to that.

Seriously, let's get with the program people! Learn the words and know what they mean! I mean, am I alone on this? Anyone? Anyone?!

Nevermind...

1 comment:

  1. "Anyone....Bueler...?" Yes, society seems to be more and more preoccupied with "instant" gratification.

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