That's my old man. It really came home for me during a "conversation" with mixed company a good eight years or so ago when he dropped "...and that's when I knew the CIA was involved." The girlfriend of the guy we were visiting with immediately snapped her eyes to me, and whatever it was that my face betrayed, her facial expression turned to a sneer. Because I knew it was bullshit and she knew that I knew it was bullshit.

A few years before that, he went with me to a mechanic who re-machined the headers for a truck I got that had been overheated. He jawed his ears off for a good twenty minutes. We both knew that the guy's 20-something year old son had just committed suicide a few weeks prior. The whole time, the guy had a blank, stone face and said nothing while the old man bragged about the different engines he'd built and cars he'd owned. Eventually, the old man decided he'd bloviated enough and said "alright, nice to meet you! You guys settle up, I'll be in the car." I looked at the mechanic and he looked at me as the front door closed, and he said "boy, he sure likes to talk." I simply replied "I'm sorry about that. What do I owe you?" He told me the total, I paid him and said "thank you, sir." That was the extent of our conversation.

I made the decision to relate that to the old man when I was done and he said, lamely, "I was just trying to make friends" and I responded "what about his demeanor indicated that you were making friends, or that he even wanted to talk? You know his son just committed suicide, what makes you think he gives a fuck about what cars you've owned?"

Some people just like to hold court and be lauded in a social setting. I'd prefer to sit and listen. One of my grandfathers was a man of few words, and when he had something to say, it was worth listening to him. In person, I'm more like him. When writing, there's virtually no end to the flow of my verbiage. I wish I could balance the two.

These guys can fix all that......

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FfGbPyJLOlc

Got a good laugh reading through this one cause it reminds me of the guys around here (forum) who have to play "can you top this" with threads.

My division manager lacks the capacity to interpret social cues or just doesn't care. It's common knowledge among employees to not go in his office past 3:00 lest you be stuck there listening to him pontificate on whatever well past time to pull choks. Not only that but he will cause meetings and subsequent scheduling of meeting rooms and other peoples meetings to get out of whack due to his babbling. The capper is his PowerPoint slides, they are the antithesis of PP intent. There should be a hand that automatically comes out of the PC and smacks you in the face followed up by a nastygram from Microsoft if you ever choose 8pt font for your slides.

Lol, Sir Talksalot is also employed where I work.

While I don't talk a lot in social settings I do have a lot of trouble picking up on body language and other clues that are obvious to most people due to my social anxiety. I can sometimes make people uncomfortable when I do try to participate in conversations and I always walk away self analyzing what I said to death.
I hope people don't view me as rude or obnoxious but it sure makes me keep to myself more than I like.

There are proven and established methods that work effectively to lessen social anxiety.

I don't trust any man that talks more than a woman.

I was new at a job and no radio was allowed so people would talk while they work. It was technical manufacturing work.

I would be seated near a group of women who would one up each other in terms of what they did. “At such and such a company, I pulled zits out of gnats’ asses.” (Very precision work.) Then someone would chime in with a more precision type of work. The topic would change from day to day but the game was the same. And it would go on for quite a while until I decided to join in.

I would come up with the ultimate that no one could trump and it shut everyone up and the game would end.

And the station I was working on was the microscope with my back towards them. My statements were in the form of “One summer I had a job as xxx and I was doing yyyy.”

This went on for weeks until I said, “One summer I was interning at the Serengeti where I was tagging geckos with microchips.”

There was the usual silence. Then one of the women asked in a quiet soft and slow voice, “Rey, did you really do that or are you kidding us?”

I turned around to face them with the biggest smile.

Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DorE2lZqQzc

I just hate sitting in a doctor's small waiting room for an hour or hour and a half struggling to tune out the middle aged woman who feels compelled to grace her captive audience with her life history and that of her children and generations of ancestors without stopping to take a breath. She usually seems to focus on the victom seated next to her, but is intentionally speaking loud enough that everyone has to hear.

It seems like a compulsion. You can see by the anger in her eyes that she knows no one wants to here it but she is obsessed and just can't stop.

There must be a medical term.

quote:

Originally posted by Brazos Dan:
I just hate sitting in a doctor's small waiting room for an hour or hour and a half struggling to tune out the middle aged woman who feels compelled to grace her captive audience with her life history and that of her children and generations of ancestors without stopping to take a breath. She usually seems to focus on the victom seated next to her, but is intentionally speaking loud enough that everyone has to hear.

It seems like a compulsion. You can see by the anger in her eyes that she knows no one wants to here it but she is obsessed and just can't stop.

There must be a medical term.

Oops! Another of my peeves, people who spell "here" when they meant "hear".

quote:

Originally posted by Brazos Dan:
I just hate sitting in a doctor's small waiting room for an hour or hour and a half struggling to tune out the middle aged woman who feels compelled to grace her captive audience with her life history and that of her children and generations of ancestors without stopping to take a breath. She usually seems to focus on the victom seated next to her, but is intentionally speaking loud enough that everyone has to hear.

It seems like a compulsion. You can see by the anger in her eyes that she knows no one wants to here it but she is obsessed and just can't stop.

There must be a medical term.

A life unfulfilled.

quote:

Originally posted by Brazos Dan:

Oops! Another of my peeves, people who spell "here" when they meant "hear".

While you’re at it how about victim?

I worked the polls earlier this month. One of the other poll workers with diarrhea of the mouth never shut up the entire 14+ hours!! It was yap, yap, yap, yap, yappity yap, yap, yap, yappity yap yap till we wanted to knock the clown upside the head! I told the election authority I will no longer work the polls if this idiot is asigned to the same precinct as I am!!

Brazos Dan— could be Pressure Speech.

Had a chip on his shoulder little 5 foot tall Somalian at work. Knew it all, run his mouth constantly. Obama and free healthcare and free housing for all kind of crap. Started every other sentence with "in MY country". OK then, why the fuck are you here?

He went off on a tangent one day at lunch about how much better his countries food was than ours... bla bla bla... on and on.

Finally I told him his food looked like something my cat threw up.
I though for a bit there I was going to have to fight the little shit he got so mad.

After he realized every one in the lunch room was laughing at him and that I had a foot and a 100 pounds on him he finally shut up and sat back down, was funny as shit.

quote:

Originally posted by sigmonkey:
Who didn't throw in?

I don't believe in it.