Re: More Bloody Cheek

malc said:

[1] I wonder if you can hear gritted teeth down the phone? I find it very
difficult to be pleasant to people who are attempting to extract zbarl from
me, especially when I xabj exactly what they're phoning up for.

I find it increasingly difficult to even feel that I ought to.

Had a very nice young lady knocked on the door a few days ago. All smiles
and chatty, wanted to show me cute photos of poor ickle orphaned puppies,
and didn't I agree that it was awful if they couldn't be looked after, and
didn't I think they were sweet, and did I realise that all my neighbours
thought such-and-such, and didn't I agree this and didn't I that ? which
might have been very pleasant, had it been a social situation. But it
wasn't, and I was in the middle of complicated things that I didn't want all
driven out of my head. "Look, I'm busy. Would you mind telling me what
you're going to ask me for ?". I had to ask twice before she'd drop the
charm act. (A signature agreeing to regular payments to Sponsor Cute
Puppies). All very worthy, I'm sure, but Bah Humbug. People are not welcome
to help themselves to undefined quantities of my time for their purposes
according to all these "suck people people into conversation, get the
agreeing to all kinds of stuff and then they find it harder to refuse what
you're actually asking for" techniques. I'm getting Victorian in me old age,
innit ?


--
Richard Robinson
"The whole plan hinged upon the natural curiosity of potatoes" - S. Lem

My email address is at http://www.qualmograph.org.uk/contact.html
.