Yeah, I use them a lot. Yeah, I just noticed that I keep using them in my blog titles. Yeah, I’m slightly self-conscious about it.

What? Are they pretentious . . . or irritating . . . or confusing?

Um. Oh well. Yeah, I say “um” a lot, too. And an “oh well” is due during the explication at least every other major theme. Because, well, what are you going to do? It is.

And I like to use dashes, and parentheses (and other parenthetical devices–like the dashes [though not strictly in that sense]).

If you heard me talk, if you could see my thoughts, it would make more sense, I think. The “um”s though–I think (I hope) I actually write those more than I speak them, ’cause, um, “um”s are irritating to listen to. I just think that they signify uniquely in writing. The parentheses, the ellipses, the dashes, et al.–those are indigenous. “Um” might be more of a colloquial affectation. I’m more comfortable writing that kind of thing than saying it . . . sometimes.

Sometimes when I write, I hear a cooler version of me saying the things that I wouldn’t ever quite say. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not. Yes and no.

And sometimes when I speak, those things come out anyway, and the cooler me cringes, because they just sound wrong stumbling off of my tongue.