Ah, the benefits of a liberal arts education.

[madbaker]

I woke up this AM as I often do, with Galen sitting on my chest licking my chin. Except that I had forgotten to set my alarm last night, and it was an hour later.
Aargh.

I made it in on time (more or less), but I forgot quite a few things - like my breakfast - in my rush to get showered, dressed, and on the road in 15 minutes.

Yesterday I was talking to a sales rep, and I offhandedly referred a process as "Kafkaesque". (I had asked them to add a security; they said it was another company's responsibility, and that company referred me back to the first.)

I got a blank stare.
So I expanded a bit: "Franz Kafka? The Trial? Troubled individuals in an impersonal world?"

Blink, blink.

(sigh) S'pose sometimes I'm too edumacated for my own good. Or at least too literate.

Current Book: Elizabeth Moon, Trading in Danger

Comments

[fionnbharro.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised that "Kafkaesque" was lost on your sales rep.

The word is pretty much mainstream, I thought. And if I remember correctly, Jeremy Irons was in a movie a few years back called "Kafka" -- he's a pretty mainstream actor, isn't he? So, most people should be familiar with the title and therefore the name Kafka, right?

I think most people of average intelligence and educated in EuroAmerican culture would know of Kafka.

Oh, wait -- it was a Sales rep you were dealing with..... THAT explains everything. Shame on you for thinking you're overedumacated, when the answer is much simpler than that.

[caprine.livejournal.com]

It reminds me of the hideous moment in the late nineties on a personal-ad date when the fellow commented on a volume in my bookcase, Confederacy of the Dead, that it looked interesting.

"It's fabulous," I said. "Civil War horror stories--it even has a piece by William Burroughs."

"Who?"

"William Burroughs. Junky? Naked Lunch?"

"Who?"

And this guy went to UC Berkeley. Apparently when you go to UC Berkeley and major in petrochemical engineering you absorb no culture whatsoever.