Monday, October 12, 2009

the email theory

it was a scene out of a sitcom about twenty-something single, working women. we could have been (younger versions of) carrie, samantha, charlotte and miranda. or susan, lynette, bree and gabrielle. or maybe rachel, monica, phoebe and...err...one other person.

the point is, we were at a bar overlooking the city of kayelle on a friday night, in work-appropriate clothes - unlike the suspiciously juvenile-looking girls in backless dresses and sky-high heels on the arms of equally juvenile-looking boys who looked like they didn't really have the money they had just spent there - and we were discussing "the email theory".

we called it a theory because, like the theory of evolution and string theory, there is a sense of mystery and controversy about it and no real way of proving that it's real. it's not gravity. there is no apple.

anyway, the theory is that one can judge a man's interest by how quickly he replies one's emails. it appears deceivingly simple - email a member of the male species and if he responds within an hour, the chances of you two exchanging wedding bands increases significantly. if he sends in a reply by the end of the work day, the forecast for that that relationship is fair, with a chance of a drink next month. however, an email that arrives a couple of days after you send in your electronic equivalent of a toe-testing-the-water indicates a very grim prognosis indeed.

of course the content of the email must not be work-related. none of that "dear [insert name], please send in your proposal for the impending project by noon or face the wrath of [insert name of office...err...witch]" stuff. unless the words proposal, project and wrath are euphemisms and you are the office...err...witch.

this all took place over a couple of overpriced lychee martinis and hysterical laughter while dodging the burning looks of a pair of lovebirds next to us who behaved like they were in the running for the most-inappropriate-amount-of-pda-in-a-non-club-location award, so none of us took any of it seriously. we went home that night relatively satisfied with our conclusion - which was that there is no conclusion - and promised to patron another bar overlooking kayelle the next time carrie/rachel/lynette came back from her secret european location.

and that is the story of the email theory. the end. thank you.

lishun at 5:19 PM

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