Sometimes when I read a text, an online post, a drift message, or an email, I am appalled by the writer’s spelling and grammar. Most of the time, I chalk it up to autocorrect and multi-tasking. Besides I can usually figure out what they meant to say.
Except for those times, when I cannot. It seems to me that certain people on forums I frequent often post some gibberish that sort of makes sense but then goes down some incomprehensible rathole or at best, into a rant that doesn’t seem appropriate for the online discourse.
When reading one recently I was thinking, this woman is a real a$$hole. She’s always angry and has a one-track mind. Everything is not always about the patriarchy and men holding women back. Furthermore, I cannot even follow the logic of some of her sentences.
Then a thought occurred to me – I’ll bet she’s drunk.
Duh.
Of course she is. From what I know about there, she’s an articulate, highly educated professional.
I suspect she’s goes online after having a few drinks, reads something she disagrees with and bangs out a hasty response on her laptop or phone.
I used to do this back in the day when I got drunk at night. However, after sending a few bizarre drunk emails, I created a rule for myself that I somehow managed to follow – never email anyone after my second drink.
It kept me from embarrassing myself.
As for this particular woman, I no longer read anything she posts on the forum. When I see her name, I just skip her diatribe altogether.
I never enjoyed talking to drunks. Or for that matter, to ranting lunatics.