i am surrounded

by pompous academics.

I'm in a local eatery. Near me is a professor from a department you may know, pompously pontificating to two grad students whom I don't recognize. The first couple times I caught references I knew--to a prof, or a specific brown bag--I inadvertently looked up. Fortunately this has had the effect of causing him to lower his voice considerably.

At the very next table is a different professor explaining very basic computer concepts to another professor. He's talking as slowly and clearly as if the other is hard of hearing and doesn't speak English, though neither of these seems to be the case. It's grating on my nerves.

First he was explaining what a "pdf" was (including the comment, "PDF stands for.... I can't remember," which I'm certain is bullshit because almost nobody knows what PDF stands for, and who cares) slowly and laboriously; now he's explaining wireless ("the young lady behind us is connected to what is called a WAAYERRRRLESSS network... that means...")

This also wouldn't be so annoying if he didn't sound so smug about what is obviously a much smaller granule of knowledge than he seems to assume. He's not using all the "right words," yet he seems incredibly condescending.

It's like... a friend told me a story about a guy she had sex with, who said, "this may be uncomfortable because my ____ is so large," but it wasn't large at all; "on the small side of average," was how she put it.

That's exactly what this is like. "Don't be intimidated by my massive brilliance at computers," except, yeah, you know what a pdf is, big fuckin' deal.

Enough whining. Back to work.