If you liked this, please share it!
26 Responses to A Little Less Conversation
Leave a Reply
Buy my new book!
Shop for Savage Chickens Gear
Visit the store for mugs, t-shirts, and other fun stuff.
Thanks for the technical writer savage chicken. It’s been a great way to stop conversation for 28 years!
Best regards,
Karyl Severson 🙂
You forgot the most important: “I’m a programmer.”
Draw chickens.
“….a little more action please”
This works for me:
“I’m a high society reporter.”
This makes me feel like Doug agrees with me.
&=^
I’ve always found that telling people I’m a tax collector ends most conversations.
“I exhume bodies for autopsies” is effective also.
Or how about “I empty the shredders at a big Wall Street firm…”
You mixed up the glasses in the last panel. The 1/4 full glass should be in front of the technical writer! Trust me, I know.
I wonder if I should learn how to draw chalk outlines instead…
i like to turn the lights on and off on airplanes at night. i also blink the lights at last call (drinks) and during intermissions (blinking the lights to tell people to take their seats).
Sometimes it works, but sometimes a person actually responds with “Oh, how cool!” and then I have to wonder whether they are being insincere, or are genuinely crazy. Probably just insincere (aka “polite”)
Yes, the blank stares and “Oh, what’s that?” are priceless. My standard response is, “I write the equivilant of vacuum cleaner manuals for mainframes in terms that my mother-in-law can understand.” – dz “Technical Writer/Knowledge Engineer”
Let’s hear it for all the tech writers! Yeah! Great conversation stopper, fer shure. 😉 Thanks for a really fun one – one I can hang in my cubicle.
Make that POST-it in my cubicle. 😉
“I’m a minister” works really well, too.
Long ago quite truthfully I could say, “I castrate rats.” Worked every time. Now my day job (clinical research coordinator for cancer trials) and my freelance job (scientific editing/writing) also work well as fantastic conversation killers. Thanks for so many personally meaningful panels over the last week (I too have finally finished my move, but not my unpacking…)
HEY!!! We chalk outline drawers have a very interesting job! The tricky part is drawing the outline while doing an interpretive dance… 😛
Woo-hoo! “I’m a Technical Writer” stops ’em dead in their tracks! But hey… we love it!
🙂
*sigh* I’m afraid I’m going to have to write a procedure to explain to my coworkers why this is funny. 😀
Close, but no cookie. I chuckled to myself, but then I thought, “Hey, that’s not what many an old school technical writer would have replied.” Instead, they would have said, “Actually, that question is not grammatically correct.”
How very true! I usually get a puzzled face and have to explain what I do. The explanation “I write” usually allows me to pursue the conversation in another direction 🙂
Heh, I’ve _so_ been there! Thank you for a great cartoon.
[…] Yikes! Three word intros. That will probably take me a month to prepare. Right now, my mindset would say: Communication. Communication. Communication. As for a presentation, what will happen if I say I am a technical writer or technical communicator? Will I stop all conversation? […]
My answer would have been “I eat people who ask questions.”
Hee hee hee. Go Technical Writers! I usually say, “you know those old VCR manuals you can’t read? I DON’T write those!” Usually gets a laugh.
Excellent! I have so much to look forward to in the way of stopping conversations!
OMG I thought it was just me!
Doug,
I just love this cartoon and your creations in general! Surprisingly enough, I have found that many people have no idea what a tech writer is and actually want you to give them more info. Amazing but true!
Melanie
A tech writer for 20+ yrs.