View RSS Feed
Via EmailConversation
How to Sound Convincing While Saying Nothing
This is how you need to look and sound when you’re talking WAY over your head. The narrator and writer is Bud Haggert. He was the top voice-over talent on technical films. He wrote the script because he rarely understood the technical copy he was asked to read and felt he shouldn’t be alone. The explanation of the Turbo Entabulator is totally untrue, but sounds reasonable. It sounds authentic. [Description from YouTube.]
Another version of the story says that the speaker was winging it. Give the guy credit for keeping a straight face, which at the end, is more than the guys in the audience could do.
Now check out THE TURBO ENTABULATOR.
A Story About Attitude
There once was a woman who woke up one morning, looked in the mirror, and noticed she had only three hairs on her head. “Well,” she said. “I think I’ll braid my hair today.” So she did and she had a wonderful day.
The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror and saw that she had only two hairs on her head. “Hmmm,” she said. “I think I’ll part my hair down the middle today.” So she did and she had a grand day.
The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror and noticed that she had only one hair on her head. “Well,” she said. “Today I’m going to wear my hair in a pony tail.” So she did and she had a fun, fun day.
The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror and noticed that there wasn’t a single hair on her head….
Efficient or Fun? Pick One
Sometimes it doesn’t pay to be efficient. Take this morning…. I approached the Safeway checkout lines with my 2 items. Two express lines were open.
Line #1: Tami is my favorite checker. She’s friendly to everyone, and we’ve both taken PSI Seminar, so it’s fun to have that in common, to check in on a deeper level.
A couple people waited for Tami’s register, so being efficient, I picked the register with no customers:
Line #2: Maile the checker always seems to be bored out of her gourd, and I’ve never seen her smile. When she mumbled, “Thanks for shopping at Safeway,” I didn’t believe she meant it.
I left the store trailing a dark cloud. What was I thinking? For a few more minutes of my time, I coulda had a V-8. I mean, I could have enjoyed checking out with Tami. I could have left Safeway with a laugh instead of a lesson.
20 Thanksgiving Gratitude Quotes
Intrigue-master Sam Horn compiled the best 20 Thanksgiving quotes about being thankful. She writes,
“If the only prayer you ever said was ‘Thank you,’ that would be enough.” – Meister Ekhart
You’ve heard the saying “out of sight, out of mind?”
Keep these quotes “in sight, in mind” so you and your loved ones can live in a state of gratitude year-round.
Gratitude quote #1: “When you drink the water, remember the well.” – Chinese proverb
Gratitude quote #2: “When I started counting my blessings; my whole life turned around.” – Willie Nelson
Gratitude quote #3: “Make yourself a blessing to someone. Your kind smile or pat on the back just might pull someone back from the edge.” – Carmelia Elliott
Gratitude quote #4: “Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” ~ William Ward
Protected: Red TV
When Is a Thank-You Call Unwelcome?
One of my favorite charities called this morning to say Thanks. Normally, I’d appreciate a call like that, especially since they weren’t hitting me up for money.
But not at 5:15 AM.
Who calls at that hour? It’s never good news. The ringing woke me up. Wrong number? No. When I heard a woman’s voice leaving a message, I ran for the phone. That meant dashing down the stairs and rushing to the kitchen, just in time to hear the voice wishing me “happy holidays”….click.
Who called? The Heifer Project. I love these folks. I love giving chicks, rabbits, goats and bees to people around the world. I love knowing that I help people help themselves. I make it possible for poor folks to send kids to school or plug a leaky roof. And I appreciate a thank-you.
But not at 5:15 AM.
Strictly Business: How to Lose Customers, FAST!
How to squeeze more bucks from customers and put your business’s trust at risk. A guest post from Philip E. Humbert:
I had an astonishingly bad experience with a major clothing store this week, and I want to tell you about it. Perhaps it will remind all of us that perceptions count and integrity matters.
As a favor to my wife, I agreed to call a major catalog retailer and order some fall and winter outfits for her. I figured it would take 10 minutes to call the store, order the items, bill the credit card, and be done with it. And it might have, except for one little thing.
At the end of the call, the order taker asked permission to “include information about our travel club” in the shipment. I wasn’t interested and vaguely replied that would be fine. She then repeated the offer and said she needed a specific yes or no. That got my attention and I started asking questions.
A Wise and Surprising Answer to a Good Conversation Question
“If you could live anywhere in the world—and if money was no object—where would you live?”
I’ve asked this conversation question many times and never received a surprising answer. But one author did. Read an excerpt from The Road To Happiness by Mac Anderson and BJ Gallagher, and watch that answer take an unusual turn:
“On one trip about ten years ago, I was making conversation with the taxi driver, asking him my usual questions about how he came to live where he lived. Then I asked him a hypothetical question: ‘If you could live anywhere in the world—and if money was no object—where would you live?’
“Without hesitating even for a second, he replied, ‘I live in my heart. So it really doesn’t matter where my body lives. If I am happy inside, then I live in paradise, no matter where my residence is.’
Conversation Tip: A Father Learns How to Talk to His Daughter
Excerpt from a terrific article by David Whyte, published in Oprah:
1) Do I know how to have real conversation?
A real conversation always contains an invitation. You are inviting another person to reveal herself or himself to you, to tell you who they are or what they want. To do this requires vulnerability. Now we tend to think that vulnerability is associated with weakness, but there’s a kind of robust vulnerability that can create a certain form of strength and presence too.
There are many tough conversations, but one of the most difficult is between a parent and an adolescent daughter, partly because as a parent we are almost always attempting to relate to someone who is no longer there. The parent therefore usually tries to start the conversation by offering a perspective that the daughter finds not only out of date but also unhelpful; the daughter then replies by way of defense with something just a shade more unhelpful, and so the process continues. A year or so ago, I found myself in exactly this dynamic, my daughter’s bedroom door slamming shut just as I was just about to say that last, deeply satisfying unhelpful thing.
How to Charm a Bureaucrat
You could subtitle this story “The Charming Wheel Gets the Grease.”
My partner, Gaelyn, just arrived from Mexico with her new boat. The next day she went to the harbormaster’s office with her registration paperwork.
The sour bureaucrat at the counter (I’ll call her Jan), looked like she’d been sucking lemons. Responding to Gaelyn’s question about getting a slip (a place to put her boat), Jan shrugged her shoulders and exhaled noisily, as if to say, “I’m overworked, I have many important things to do, and you are bothering me.”
As Gaelyn handed over her papers, she said to Jan, “Oh, I love your ring! It’s really beautiful!”
Jan brightened immediately.
The next day when Gaelyn went back to the office, Jan acted like a new woman: friendly and helpful.
That’s Gaelyn’s story, and she’s sticking to it.
——-
