Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Give cyber Tourettes a try!...

There's an old fellow who wanders around Tonbridge muttering to himself. He grunts and occasionally swears at passes by. The other day I was on the other side of the road and couldn't help looking at him; I could hear him grunting at me under his breath "...what you f'in lookin' at..." Now some people who didn't understand might get offended by such behaviour. Not me though. He can't help himself of course as he has clearly got Gilles de La Tourette Sydrome, better known simply as Tourettes. It is described in medical dictionaries as a condition whereby sufferers are prone to involuntary grunts and tics, often vocal. In effect, I suppose, people who suffer from this condition are saying what's on their minds. Probably it's on all our minds but we just learn to control it, some better than others it has to be said; we've all met people who say they "speak as I find!" But that is different to Tourettes, that is called being from Yorkshire or Lancashire! Blogging is, to some extent, a kind of modern day Tourettes. Let me explain: it allows us to voice things which are on our minds, but we wouldn't necessarily want to air those thoughts in polite company; especially so if your comments are made anonymously. You can let rip, sound off, get things off your chest. So go on give cyber Tourettes a try!...

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