I was on Kim Hill’s programme on Saturday Morning, talking about a range of things. Not entirely sure what the agenda was for having me as a guest, except that I’m a New Zealander in a far off place. Since it was that broadly focused, we skittered from topic to topic, taking in things as diverse as the peculiarities of British ‘Committee Society’ and the value of vinyl over CD.
On listening back, it struck Bobbie, then me — and some other people who even emailed me to let me know — that I say ‘kind of’ rather a lot.
It’s a bit of a crutch phrase. Like ‘umm…’. I’ve had a range of them through my life. It used to be ‘y’know…’ and before that it was ‘basically’. Normally, I don’t resort to them if I’ve prepared a presentation well — but if I’m being interviewed, they just fall out to fill space while I think of what I’m going to say next.
In other words, if you hear me say ‘kind of’ more than a few times, I’m having a bit of a deer-in-the-headlights moment. One correspondent suggested Toastmasters as a place to learn how to circumvent my public speaking challenges. I’ll give it some thought. I mean, I don’t really have difficulty with public speaking in the terrified and seized-up way that some people seem to — but it’s always nice to improve.
Listen to me say ‘Kind of’ on Kim’s programme. Here’s the mp3.
In other news, I finally got down to London to visit my new baby nephew (Zac Dawson). That’ll be the last time we go down to stay with them before my sister, her husband and their two boys take off back to live in New Zealand again.
It was sunny, ‘kick-the-ball-around-in-the-park’ weather in Wimbledon all morning, and then — on arrival back in Birmingham around 5pm — a snowstorm. Where did THAT come from?
Nice again this morning, and the snow’s melting. Back to work.
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