Pledge drives produce conflicting feelings in me, and I can’t be the only one. I’m talking specifically about the pledge drives that radio stations do, as I rarely run across the TV ones, and even more specifically about a station here in town. I realize that non-profit stations need to raise money somehow, but there has to be a better way, doesn’t there?
Most of the chatter they do to try to convice you to chip in can be pretty much summed up in the last thing Kramer says in this quote from an episode of Seinfeld entitled “The Pledge Drive“:
Nana: Hello, I’d like to speak with Jerry. This is his grandmother.
Kramer: Oh, uh, Nana. Hello.
Nana: Tell Jerry I’m sorry, I’m going to have to write him some new checks.
Kramer: As long as you’ve got your checkbook out, how about forking a little over to PBS? You watch the station, don’t you? You don’t want to be a freeloader.
Here’s this station that I’ve been sort of nonchalantly listening to when BAM! – pledge drive week. Now, rather than just listening, I’m being confronted with the fact that by not chipping in, I’m being an awful, awful person.
Sure, I realize this sort of thing is a necessity. It’s nice to not have to hear commercials all the time, and the people that work at the station should get paid for what they do. In fact, there was a time in my life where I really wanted to work in radio. I still wonder every now and again if I’d have been any good at it. So I can understand that part of it.
But the hassling! These normally friendly people are saying things like “Only 5% of our listeners have donated” and “If you’re not a part of this, you’re missing out” and all it sounds like to me is a couple of knuckle-cracking thugs looking around and saying, “Nice radio you got here. Be a shame if anything happened to it.”
So I’m equal parts ashamed and annoyed, the first because I can’t bring myself to donate and the second because I can’t bring myself to stop listening to them badger me. I’m some sort of sadistic freeloader, which seems like a contradiction in terms.
The good thing is that the pledge drive is over now. I guess we’ll see if there’s still a station to listen to in a month.
I’m sure most of you know the story of Job or have, at least, heard of “the patience of Job.” On top of the hardest time he’s ever gone through, he’s receiving really bad advice from his so-called friends. I can just imagine that he’s had just about enough of their idiocy when he says the following:
Doubtless you are the people, and wisdom will die with you!
Job 12:2 (NIV)
It’s one of my favorite insults – not only in the Bible, but just in general. It’s “Ooh, la la, Mr. Smartypants” and “Look at the big brain on Brad!” all wrapped up in one.
While I was looking for that one, I found this one, the sequel:
I enjoy these for a couple of reasons, but the biggest one being the texting shorthand, this all-encompassing form of communication that all teenagers use all the time. The “big” news networks frequently trot out a list of abbreviations that “all the kids are using,” and I know I’m not the only one that looks at the lists and says, “Nobody in the history of texting and IM has ever used that one!” It’s like the kid they got to give them the inside scoop was playing games on them and just making stuff up.
In 40 years I’ll be like the grandma in that second clip, texting my buddies down the hall at the nursing home instead of taking the trouble to get my walker and risk breaking my hip by going down the hall to actually see them. I text enough that I recently had to up my data plan for my phone, as I was going to go over the 1500 I was allotted monthly. Somewhat tellingly, at the same I was doing that, I also lowered my voice plan, as I wasn’t getting anywhere near the limit on that one. I did, in fact, halve my voice plan, and it’s still more minutes than I’ve been using on average.
It should be noted that I don’t just use texting to avoid talking to people – it’s also a useful tool for scheduling and reminding, and its big brother, multimedia messaging, is a handy way to document events as they happen by letting me send pictures to Flickr, other people, or my email account.
There’s a few reasons I like sending and receiving texts on my cell phone. First, it’s convenient. I pretty much always have my cell phone nearby, whereas I don’t necessarily have a computer or a pen and paper handy. When the thought crosses my mind that I need to do something when I get home, I know from historical events that I will most likely forget it by the time I get home. If I text a reminder from my phone to my email, I’ll remember to do it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gotten home from being out, saw that I had an email waiting, and said to myself, “I wonder who it’s from?” before opening it to find that I had, indeed, forgotten what it was I needed to do.
Second, it’s unobtrusive. You’ve been in a store, a library, a theater, or maybe even church when someone’s on their cell phone yapping away – we’ve all been there, and most of us have even been the person in question. It happens. Someone conversing via text isn’t forcing you to be a part of their conversations about grocery lists, kids sports schedules, or, worse, medical conditions. Assuming the person has their phone set to silent or vibrate (as opposed to, say, a Murloc), they’re not making any noise at all. And to the receiver, it’s like getting a voicemail without the hassle of having to dial in to hear the message – “Oh, Mark’s going to be late because his cat killed the UPS guy. He says we should start without him.”
Third – and this is what I like most about texting – is that it makes you consider what you’re saying carefully, at least it should. A well-crafted text message needs to consider there’s no room for non-verbals, so it needs to say what it means to say. I actually consider this a plus, by the way, as I think non-verbals sometimes get in the way of what I’m trying to say or understand. Further, text messages are limited. If I go over 160 characters, the message gets split into two messages. I have to choose my words carefully, and there have been many times I’ve edited a message to get it in under 160, turning my Dickensian tomes into Hemingway blurbs. It helps me consider more specific words that do in one what I had done in three or five, and I’m sure there are some of you that wish I’d learn that lesson for blogging, too.
The side effect to all that is that I am thinking about what I’m saying. There’s no “off the cuff” texting: you type what you mean to type (unless you’re using predictive texting and aren’t paying attention to the screen, that is!). For me, that means I’m considering what I’m texting before I text it, something I’m not as good at when I’m talking. I can’t count how many times I’ve typed something out only to erase and edit it before I send it.
Furthermore, texts you get from me are 99% readable English. I don’t use “u” for “you,” “l8r” for “later,” or “(=o=)” for “TIE Fighter.” I capitalize and use punctuation. I may occasionally use a “btw” or an “lol,” but those have almost passed into the vernacular at this point. I’m not the fastest texter, but I hope to be an accurate one. Getting a cell phone with a full QWERTY keypad has helped me a lot in that regard, and in a lot of ways I’m a better text-typer than an actual typer.
I know that texting cannot be a replacement for talking to someone, but it can be a good supplement to the relationship. I receive status updates on my phone throughout the day from Twitter and Facebook, and knowing what my friends are thinking throughout the day when I can’t be with them all the time helps me feel more connected to them.
So please know that if I’m texting you, it’s not me blowing you off, it’s me communicating, just like you might pick up the phone to ask someone how many bags of chips to bring to the party. I’ll still talk to you, and I’ll even meet you for lunch or Starbucks. Just don’t be surprised if I get a few texts while we’re there.