In the classic Seinfeld Season 5 episode called "The Puffy Shirt", Jerry gets into a bit of hot water when a lady asks him to wear her designer pirate shirt on national T.V.. Because the woman speaks with a volume so low that no sound waves are actually created when she moves her lips, hijinx ensue when Jerry finds out what he unwittingly agreed to do.There are several folks who I know who seem to be directly related to the puffy shirt lady. Even when everyone who they try to engage in "conversation" repeatedly tells them to freakin' speak up, their volume level remains unchanged. I have long since given up on even caring what they were trying to communicate. I figure that if they can't find a way to make themselves heard, maybe by carrying around a portable "karioke"-type microphone machine, then I will not waste my time trying to make sense of what they are going on about. Heck, I would even settle for them using an alternate form of communication, like the classic Monty Python skit of The Semaphore version of Wuthering Heights, although I am sure that they would use flags of microscopic size.
I did not use to think this way. For years I tried my best to foster communication and to repeatedly ask them to speak up and try again. However, one day I went on a tour of a noise-filled utility pump room to gather some important information for an upcoming inspection at work. If I didn't have the slightest chance of hearing a single utterance in a quiet meeting room, it was almost comical (in a this-is-a-total-waste-of-time way) in that small space that was roughly akin to standing about a foot away from the intake manifold of a Lockheed-Martin F-22 Raptor. From that moment I vowed that I would put up with this nonsense no longer. I publically declared that I would not wear the puffy shirt, it looks ridiculous.
