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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   4004 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for November 25, 2022

Be advised; this thread is not for serious in depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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It depends on context, but I'm going to throw out some somewhat unrelated thoughts.

-- On resumes and in interviews, when one is trying to show value, specificity is key, and people think in stories. So when you're trying to show that you do things better than anyone, be specific, and have a story to it. Not "I go to the gym" which is non-specific or "I go to the gym and work really hard doing compound movements" which has no narrative; "I'm trying to hit a 440lb back squat by this spring, I'm doing this crazy program Smolov my friend the powerlifter recommended to me, man it is BRUTAL let me tell you about the other day..." Everyone in the world goes for walks, I'm not even sure what your explanation of your walking means, everyone knows what the Appalachian or Pacific Crest trails are or what summiting a 14er means and most wish they did that and will ask about it. Reading is boring, I'm working my way through all of Proust's In Search of Lost Time is better, "You know, I just read the strangest thing in Kings 12:10 and it was so weird I went and looked up scholarship on it to make sure I was reading it right, Rehoboam really was saying his dick was bigger flaccid than his dad's was hard!" is a story people might remember.

-- If you're relying on people to get your "advanced sense of humor," what you're basically going to do is confirm people's prior judgments of you based on introductions/appearances. If I have a high opinion of you going in, I'll laugh at it. If I have a low opinion of you going in, I will give up on the interaction, not worth the effort if he's just going to troll. I'll leave it up to your own judgment whether you are consistently demonstrating high personal value in small talk encounters; it all depends on context. More than anything this applies with kids, drunks, and people seeking romantic partners.

-- As @naraburns points out, the goal is to find something in common much of the time, or at least something to talk about. I admire that you're a renaissance man, but you don't want to be too all-over-the-place to pin down. Stereotypes are nice, we can just slot new people right in next to the old people we already knew. If I see a guy at my rock climbing gym, and he looks like a classic rock climber with the hair and the patched Patagonia puffer jacket and the tattoos and the beat up Solutions I know exactly how to talk to him and what to talk about, I can probably guess his politics and his dating problems. He might also be a computer programmer or know As You Like It by heart, but I don't know how to slot those things in offhand. Ditto if I meet a guy at a church with mossy oak seat covers on his F150; he might also love poetry, but I don't know how to have that conversation with him right away, I'm more likely to talk to him about hunting. Leaning into a stereotype makes you more approachable, the more you insist on your snowflake status the more inscrutable you will be, which again is great if they really want to get to know you, less great if they're still making up their mind and think you might suck. Better to start with digestible chunks.

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