How I know I am getting old:
1. I RSVP when asked to. I can’t understand why you don’t. What part of Respondez, s’il vous plait do you not understand?
2. Don’t leave a voice mail? I won’t phone you back. I know your number is in my “recent” file. But you could have butt dialed by accident. If you leave a message, I know what you want and will phone you back with an update, not a “so why did you call?”
3. If I send you three times we can meet and you do not reply, I will book others into the spots. If you are surprised that I didn’t hold all spots for you until you make up your mind, you are too young to understand the practicality of time management.
4. If you think posting to my timeline on Facebook is a way to communicate with me about an important, personal subject, we need to talk. Talking is something old people do before texting and tweeting.
5. The answer to “Thank You” is “You’re Welcome.” Not, “No Problem,” because that means you thought I was going to be a problem and you grudgingly changed your mind but had to let me know I was a potential problem.
6. I do not understand, nor care to, the word “Juicy” stitched in bright pink, bold letters, with glitter, across your butt on your too-tight leggings. Whether you are a size double zero or a 2X, I’ve worked really hard on feminist issues like equal pay and you are turning back the clock on my hard work on your behalf.
—Quinn McDonald is beginning to think about the “good old days” and muttering “git off my lawn” at kids.
QuinnCreative 
Laughing out loud here. Yes, yes, a million times yes!
Thank goodness I’m not laughing alone!
I love your style Quinn! I’m really sorry I couldn’t make your class at Az Art last week. Maybe next time however, I did buy 2 of your books today and a fist full of Tombow watercolor markers. Whoot! You still made your way into my life girl. Thank you!
You will have a lot of fun with those markers. Write if you run out of way to use them!
You are not getting old…Manners have disappeared. Courtesy is an old fashioned word. People these days are from SLOBOVIA!! that pink JUICY pant says it all. do people not look a t themselves in a mirror before they go out??
A question I ask myself every day–did she not look in the mirror before she went out?
Love, love, love your response Phillippa!
Now how would she have seen that in a mirror? 🙂
Had to really laugh at the last one. I feel the same way
I love company.
I hear you sister! . . . loud and clear! As for looking like you’re inside your clothes trying to get out or maybe outside trying to get it? NOT attractive. Wear clothes the right size for goodness sake! Same goes for young men with jeans half-way down their backsides to the point where they have to walk with their legs wide apart to make sure their pants don’t fall down.
A young man was crossing the street in front of my car when his pants fell down. He grabbed them before I saw the Full Monty, but I had to laugh.
I agree with everything you’ve mentioned here. A little waitress where we eat, constantly replies “No problem.” to every one of our thank-yous. I find it really irritating!! And the ‘juicy’ thing? On ugh!
I don’t know who thinks the Juicy think is a good idea, but a lot of women in Phoenix seem to think so.
Jobiska, your comment “it is no different from a Victorian gent saying “not at all, my dear sir, I assure you it was no trouble at all!” is exactly what I have meant when I say “no problem”. But if people are going to misinterpret perhaps I should not do that. Now I think I am going to ask people how they interrupt the response “no problem”. : – )
You may find there is no thought at all behind it. That may be another objection I have. People say it because “everyone does.” Of course, I’m getting cranky over this again.
I don’t have a problem with “no problem”–and it is not a sign of “aging out”–it is no different from a Victorian gent saying “not at all, my dear sir, I assure you it was no trouble at all!” or the French “ce n’est rien” which has been around for a long time. To me it means “I hear your thanks, but you didn’t even need to say that, because I think you think you troubled me, but you did not, it was my pleasure to do this” rather than “I thought you were going to be a problem.”
But the rest…I hear you loud and clear!
We all have different buttons that can get pushed.
Happens to the best of us, doesn’t it? I say I have become an old lady with cats and plants (OMG -that is my grandmother!!! but that is not that bad a thing.)
It was inevitable. I come from a long line of curmudgeons.
So funny and so true! I have been guilty of responding with “no problem” but after reading your post, I have reformed.
I’ve done it a few times myself. Not paying attention!
What about someone walking in the middle of the road in this snowy time and SHE gives you the finger because you have had the audacity to blow your horn so you could pass her safely and she gives you the finger!!!! well this old lady stopped her car and asked her if she would like her children to know how she behaves when she thinks no one will know who she is, unfortunately for her she did no know I am one of her neighbors!!! I keep on saying cranky has become my middle name…. You don’t even have to use the computer to behave without any respect for others..
I’m just shaking my head. People used to ask us if our mothers knew we behaved like that–now we are asking adults if their kids know!
I suspect there are two parts of RSVP that might not be understood! 1. What it stands for. 2. What that means. I recommend trying “YDPLUKIYMUO” (yo, dude, please let us know if you’re meeting up, ok?)
But seriously, a new solution to texting/voicemail/timeline posting/scheduling is almost here and it’s going to be pretty surprising.
(The answer to “thank you” is also not “no, thank you“. Pet peeve.)
If the little piece of paper (or evite) gives a date and a bunch of initials, why can’t the same people who know what NSFW and FTW means know how to look up something that obviously has a deadline? And the “no, thank *you*” comes from an old comedy routine. Laurel and Hardy maybe?
I don’t know.
(third base!)
*Snort*
Cracking up at “YDPLUKIYMUO”! Now that’s something we will all understand.
Pete gets right to the point.
I definitely wrote that. 🙂 I half dread receiving Facebook friend requests nowadays because eight times out of ten it seems to absolve the ‘friend’ from any further obligation to communicate with me face to face. Thanks for brightening up my morning!
While I think email is dying out (largely due to a lot of cell phone spam), I think posting on various personal hubs is a really bad idea. The assumption that I’ll check FB as often as my email is a way to let the job run off the tracks.
Email volume is still growing, but the great majority of it (at least the email that’s visible outside private networks) is automatically generated mass mailings. Junk mail or spam. The volume of email is mind-boggling; some estimates are in the millions per second.
What I can’t figure out is how all those people got hold of MY email address.
I think I wrote that. 😉
Hah!
Thanks for the laugh Quinn! I feel so old and cranky these days…yesterday was an especially difficult day. Fortunately, I didn’t end up in jail for ramming, yelling at or hitting someone. I’m cracking up at “butt dialed” and “talking is something old people do before texting and tweeting”. You know me, I just want to hear the stories that go with each of these points because I know there are “juicy” tidbits involved!
It’s a rant. I’m having trouble with some contacts who cannot seem to use the phone or email. They leave messages scattered all over the place, and I have to read their minds to know what hubs they are using. Why anyone would post a personal work-related message on my timeline on FB is amazing to me. Not even a private message. [Shakes her head.]
And of course, I ran to your timeline to see the post, LOL.