How Did We Get Here From My Original Question? 🤷🏻‍♀️

Does anybody else ever ask a very specific question and then receive an answer so painfully obvious that you immediately regret opening your mouth? Because I swear some people respond to questions like they’re being paid by the word but penalized for useful information.

For example, if I ask, “Which cars get the best gas mileage?” I am not looking for someone to confidently respond with, “The ones that use gas.” Oh wow. Incredible. Groundbreaking information. Thank you so much for that beautiful contribution to society. I had no idea gasoline was involved in gas mileage. Next thing you know, someone’s going to tell me tires are round.

And somehow these kinds of answers happen everywhere. In emails. At work. In casual conversation. Online. You ask a direct question hoping for a direct answer, and instead you get something so vague and unhelpful that you actually end up with less information than when you started. It’s like people hear the question, panic internally, and then just throw random words into the air hoping something lands.

Honestly, work emails are where this reaches Olympic levels. You’ll write a carefully worded message with bullet points, screenshots, dates, highlighted sections, and maybe a small prayer to the communication gods themselves. Then someone replies with, “Please advise.” ADVISE WHAT, GERALD? THAT WAS THE ENTIRE PURPOSE OF THE EMAIL. Or my personal favorite: asking three questions and only getting an answer to the one question you already knew the answer to. Absolutely magical.

And can we talk about how exhausting it is having to re-ask the same question three different ways just to get actual information? By the third attempt, I start sounding like I’m negotiating hostage terms. “To clarify, I am specifically asking WHICH VEHICLE MODELS HAVE THE BEST MPG RATINGS.” Suddenly I’m writing emails like a disappointed customer service robot trying to remain polite while internally screaming into the void.

The funny thing is, I genuinely think some people believe they’re being helpful. Their brains probably go, “This person asked a question. I know words. Let me combine them.” Meanwhile, the rest of us are sitting there rereading the response like we’re trying to decode an ancient prophecy.

At this point, I’ve realized communication is really just a daily survival game. Half of adulthood is paying bills, and the other half is trying to get people to answer the actual question you asked in the first place. And honestly? Some days I deserve a trophy just for not replying with, “Thank you for your absolutely useless response.”