I’d argue that there’s a difference between “not liking to talk” and “not liking to talk to my students”. I always take the time and effort to listen and talk with my students. After all, they’re why I get up in the morning. I’ve dedicated my whole career to them. But I’m a bit more impatient with adults who try to bogart my time.
It’s not that I HATE to talk. I just prefer silence to mindless chatter.
If someone starts telling me a boring story in minute detail, I like to interrupt them, and do the same back to them: I either ask them for MORE detail, or I simply pretend to completely misunsderstand them, by paraphrasing what they just said in a manner that makes no sense whatsoever.
Monty Python had the skit where some guy started bleeding profusely from a superficial wound, as did SNL’s rendition of Julia Child after slicing her finger during a meal prep.
Knowing I was going to be around one of these chataholics, I’d love to hook that apparatus up to my ear and after they’ve droned on for awhile, all of a sudden start having blood squirt profusely out my ears. Maybe I could implore them to “take a breath or something” and walk away. If two or three of us did it in succession to the same person, I’d think we’d have quite an impact on them, not to mention getting in a good chuckle.
Anybody got a camcorder?
I’m sorry, my brain just melted :: falls forward onto the laptop ::
(Dieter/) “Your Prattle has become Tiresome.”(/Dieter)
I wait for them to finish and then say something rude in a passive-aggressive sort of way. I may launch of into a similarly mundane story, only make it as boring and patently absurd as possible, until they stop me.
Eventually people don’t even talk to you any more. It’s a great system.
I myself have the common decency to stop talking to someone if they begin displaying all the obvious signs of disinterest.