For a matter of consideration I throw
out the idea that we as a society are too far to the left on shortening the
meaning/ wording on phrases. I am not referring to the common speak of
teenagers of the day which cut out as many letters as possible to save on
texting fees. I am however referring to the practice of signs once very clear with
precise wording now being cut down to minimal levels of words to save money.
For my proof I give you the below picture of the sign which hangs over every
bathroom door in my office
As you can see the sign’s intended
message is met clearly allowing one to infer that employees are required to
wash their hands. The viewer,having some understanding of society and a modicum
amount of common sense, would see the sign’s location and infer that the
washing it happening after an employee uses the restroom. The problem that I
have with it is that due to either cost of space the message is shorted so that
you have to think about it. Not that thinking is bad, but honestly you could go
any direction with this if you where trying to be literal about it.
For instance whose hands are you
washing? Do the employees wash their own or randomly grab someone and demand to
wash their hands? I could see (through the clouded shroud of my own madness)
roaming bands of my co-workers scouring the cubicles and offices snatching
hands away from lunches, or phones, or at the very least the latest internet
videos. The horror of it, as the madness progresses and we are left with the
weaker of the techs screaming in pain as they try to struggle away from the
paper cutter which has been modified to resemble a French revolution ear guillotine.
Drawing more fear than the screams is the jangle of severed hands strung
loosely via Ethernet cable around the necks of those strong enough to not be
put before the blade. Eventually I would assume that rough exchange rates would
be established based upon size or finger count, or attached jewelry which of
course would lead to trading over the best food stuffs from the vending
machines. Give or take the age of a hand I would give a guess that my own would
go for a cookie ice cream sandwich with a soda or coffee on the side.
Moving on, another note about the
sign is that is does not give a time frame of when the hand washing should be
done. Do we do it after we use the bathroom? Maybe we do it before we go just
in case you have to wipe and you blew your nose earlier in the day. Again the scenario
that runs through my mind is a bunch of techies who do little or no cleaning around
their work space given a pass to not wash their hands after use noting to themselves
that they can just do it when they get home. Worse case we end up with a super
germ which has been passed from gamer hands via keyboard via snotty wipe
combined with cheetoes and code red and brough to a simmer with an office
internal environment which lacks air conditioning. The hypothesized germ which
I have named IT virus (short for internal terror) would most likely eat away at
the part of the brain that signals complaints or idiotic yammering about emails
not working, which for us as techs is fine but for our bosses it is a loss of
revenue and finding a job right now is not cool.
Also leaving the time frame for
washing open could lead to a subconscious response to wash hands at random times
of the day, such as while riding a bike, or reading a book. In both cases you
are going to end up with a bad trip and a loss of personal goods. Worse yet you
could be having the sexy times with your partner and boom you have to wash your
hands. That leads to awkward conversations about hygiene, smells and the
overall loss of personal goods (as he or she smashes your things in reaction to
your inability to explain why you had to wash your hands).
All and all I would say that the
thought thread that developed when I first saw the sign was fun but
unproductive. So I leave it to you to ponder. Should we cut back on wording for
the sack of price or space only to end up making the already borderline insane
guy begin planning a fair open trade exchange based on the length of say
fingernails on the open market?
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