Knowing it All

I have…an associate, let’s call him…with whom I don’t particularly enjoy conversing. Over the course of our relatively new acquaintanceship I have not only lost interest in discussing things with him, I straight up avoid situations in which I will have to talk to him at length. It’s not a great way to live, especially since I see this person all the time. But it just can’t be helped. For my sanity, and for the sake of all of the things I have to get done in a day, I have to reduce my interactions with him to an absolute necessary minimum.

Let me introduce you to Mr. Know-it-all. Mr. Know-it-all has an answer for everything. He has examined every situation that exists from every perspective known to man. He has been there, done that so many times that everything is just a plain, boring fact to him. There isn’t a fallacy you can present to him that he hasn’t already defeated in combat. There isn’t a speculation he hasn’t been introduced to and leveled to the ground. In every conversation he will drop it on you– bombs of wisdom. You present your argument and with a flick of his tongue he will detonate a fact with a tone so grand that it will annihilate any point you were trying to make.

The problem is that these bombs of wisdom are encased in so many assumptions and so much hubris that it’s toxic. I don’t have a problem learning new things. I do have a problem with someone assuming that I didn’t know something already and that I need to be taught. I don’t have a problem with having intellectual conversations. I do have a problem with having to put up with intellectual conversations that force you to treat logic that is clearly subjective as objective. I have a problem with having to treat every conversation like a graduate school research paper, especially when I don’t agree with the professor’s version of correct and incorrect. I’m not interested in having conversations rigged with so many logic landmines that I lose no matter in which direction I tread.

What I’m saying is that it’s exhausting. 9.5 out of 10 conversations with him are like this. No matter how innocuous I may think a topic is, he still manages to blindside me with a patronizing response. Just when I think we’re trotting along nicely, conversing civilly, he’ll come out of nowhere and negate my argument in that tone of voice.

You would think that someone like this would be a social pariah. That he would have been put in his place a long time ago. That he would live alone under a bridge eating every unsuspecting goat that came along. But no. He does very well for himself. So I ask myself, is it just me? I’ve observed him in conversations with other people, however– he does the same to them. He always has an objection to every point anyone makes. I wonder if it bothers other people the way it bothers me. There’s no way to tell. If other people have noticed they must be doing the same thing I do– uttering a Homer-esque “D’oh!” in their heads and moving on because who has the time?

Perhaps he’s the kind of person that just gets off on verbally sparring with people. Perhaps all he’s trying to do is capitalize on exchanges with people and really get into it, you know? Maybe if I indulged him and went off on every single tangent with him I’d find, at the end of that long, maddening, winding road a form of intellectual redemption. Maybe I’d find the holy grail of his silence and deference at some grand point I made. Maybe the problem is not so much him running his mouth, but the fact that I’m not willing to play along. Maybe I’m impatient with him. I don’t know– it’s possible. But I’ll be honest with you. I’m not willing to find out. I 100% guarantee that I will just continue to run for cover every time I see him come my way. I guess I’ll just never know what victory against Mr. Know-it-all feels like.

Girl at Sink

There is this absolutely filthy sponge at work. This sponge sits at the office sink presumably so we can wash our coffee cups with it. Over time I have noticed its hue go from yellow (the original color) to beige, to deep tan, to brown.

Someone in this office is to blame for this sponge’s mutation from cleaning utensil to scum of the earth. Someone does something so naughty with this sponge– but I can’t identify what that naughty thing is. I can’t figure out how the sponge got so dirty if all we wash here are empty coffee cups. If all we have are mugs and spoons, and we constantly refill our cups and use the spoons only once, then all utensils that reach the sink are empty an minimally soiled. What exactly is it that this sponge is scraping up? Where is it coming from? WHO IS TO BLAME?

It doesn’t matter though. The sponge fits within my diabolical plan quite nicely. You see, under the sink there is a cabinet. In this cabinet there is a clean plastic container. Within this container there is a nice, clean, yellow sponge. This is the sponge that I use when I clean MY coffee cup and spoons. When I am done with it, I pat it on its spongy bottom and put it back in its safe place.

The reason I don’t throw away the filthy sponge is because it is a DECOY. It sits there, on the edge of the sink, all wet and grimy, for a reason. It is there to serve as a reminder that whoever uses it is gross and should reevaluate their choices in life. As long as it’s there and it continues to be used no one will look for another sponge to use and mine will remain safe. And clean.

Also, the decoy sponge serves as part of my sociological experiment. HOW LONG is it going to take before someone else becomes outraged at how dirty it is and demands a new sponge? I know no one else is using mine because it is always dry when I use it myself. That means people CONTINUE to wash their cups and spoons with that piece of trash. It amazes me. Don’t they know that the only thing that separates us from lesser beings are our clean sponges?

The day someone discovers my secret will be a day that lives in infamy.