Monday, February 23, 2015

Hey, would you remind repeating the last 5 minutes of your conversation for me?

Don't be this guy.

You're at an event and you walk up to a small group chatting, and clearly catch the END of a story.

"He'll never go back to THAT store again, lemme tell ya!!!"


Do NOT say "Hey! Who won't go back to that store? Wait, what store? Why won't he go back? Tell me!"


Let the moment go. Hell, you've actually lucked out, the story's probably over, you can even if you really want to try to join in moving forward.

Everyone who needs to understand the details of the anecdote clearly got it. "Hello. Can you summarize the key points of everything you just said to all these people for me?" is at best awkward and in practice kinda rude.

Add in that even casual storytelling has thematic elements --- a sense of timing, buildup, humor, etc... asking to have it Cliff Noted for you will never read you into the experience.

You missed the train. Get the next train.

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