Thanks for sharing

Jenn and I went out to dinner last night, and luckily we were seated near a loud, incessant talker.

I'm not sure how people become this way. Don't they have a single friend over the course of their life who says, "Hey, shut the fuck up for two seconds" ? This woman ate an entire meal without a break in her monologue. Her dinner partner started off with an occasional muffled "um-hmm", but quickly realized that her participation was completely unnecessary.

Here's what I learned about the loud-talker:

• She's not very good at her job, because...
  
• She never wanted to be a manager, but she wanted more money, and the only way to get more money was to become a manager, still...
  
• She's underpaid because she has so much responsibility (even though she's not very good at handling the responsibility, see above) so...
  
• She sees herself ending up in sales, even though...
  
• She doesn't like selling things, and doesn't think she'd be good at it, but...
  
• She likes to walk into a room and have everyone listen to her when she speaks (mission accomplished)
  

Oh there was more, much much much more, about her coworkers and their personality defects, their relationships with each other, and their incompetencies. Her incredibly important projects, the clients who love her, on and on and on. As the meal dragged on, I started to make slightly-above-whisper comments to Jenn about the loud talker. Jenn vigilantly steered me away from confrontation by changing the subject and asking me questions to divert my attention.

Here's a tip: No one cares about your work stories, they are the same as everyone else's freaking work stories. They are just Mad Libs without the humor.

[person] isn't as [adjective] as you, but they got the [noun] you wanted anyway.

Wow, intriguing. I'm fascinated. Do go on.