Being Boring Strategically

Being boring? Who, me? We first may exclaim; but there's the sense afterward: maybe. How can we tell? Is there some boroscope we can turn to to give us our momentary B.Q. (Boring Quotient)? No, being boring, like halitosis or having your the top of you bra show, is something that people immediately notice but nobody gives you a kind hint that you can use then and there. Therefore, you have to look for these tell-tale cues, in which people might betray their being bored by you.

Obviously, the thing that most will do with this information is to correct their behavior: change the topic, learn to be more interesting, perhaps more histrionic. Anyway, this is done because being seen as boring is a BAD THING. However, this is not always the case. Back when I was at Franklin High, I got into trouble, and was summoned to the Assistant Principal's office. There the person in question asked what my excuse was. So I answered. And gave a long and involved answer. I managed to skirt the question, talk about fantastic mitigating circumstances, and in general produce a huge quantity of verbiage. I noticed that after a while, he seemed to be listening less well, so I kept on talking and talking but still not getting to the point. He must have thought that I was the world's greatest scatterbrain, despite my grades and activities! The non sequiturs, the anecdotes, the et cetera remarks made it seem that I could never get on topic; but he was a mannerly Tennessee gentleman, I'll give him credit for that! He was not going to be rude and cut me short without allowing me to fully explain myself. Finally, he did. He let me off the hook. No punishment. Nada. Ta-da! You might say that I talked myself out of trouble, not by my adroit use of language or my superlative reasoning, but simply by quantity!