Michael walked into his office and sat down on the divan, which is a kind of chair. He ran his hands through his hair – something that people tend to do when they are stressed or worried – and cursed under his breath. That presentation had been his one chance to impress the board, which is a name for a group of people who make decisions about important things. He had stayed up all night planning, but somehow it had all fallen apart (which is a metaphor* meaning that the presentation hadn’t gone well).
The worst case scenario was that he would be fired. This meant that he would lose his job and wouldn’t get paid money to go to work any more. And that would mean a change of lifestyle – no Ferrari, no Armani suits and, worst of all, no more blow. “Blow” was the name Michael called the drug cocaine, which is white powdery stuff that he liked to put up his nose.
* A metaphor is when you describe something as if it was something else, like a presentation “falling apart” as if it was a physical thing.
The act of putting "blow," or cocaine, or white powedery stuff, up one's nose, is done for the purpose of getting "high." (Which is self-explanatory, as that is obviously the target audience for this style of writing.)
ReplyDeleteIn these parts, d00d, a divan is a kind of sofa. Unless we are talking the Ottoman Empire here.
ReplyDeleteSorry would you explain this story in more detail please? thank you.
ReplyDelete:-)
What is 'walked', please?
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the world of technical writing! Where every word over 2 syllables is an opportunity to lose half of your readers. (let's see...4 words of 3+ syllables => 6.25% of your are still reading. Congratulations! (crap, just lost another 3.125%))
ReplyDeleteSeriously, this is my job. And my audience refuses to be underestimated.
woah. is this a story or a kind of definition of terms in paragraph form? haha. :D
ReplyDeleteHehehehe!
ReplyDeleteOh man, the metaphor explanation took me back to Eggers, when he discussed the literary devices he was using and had people break out of character and etc in his Heartbreaking Work. (Except that, I thought, was pretty cool, whereas this is badly awesome.;))
Wait, where's the part where you underestimated your audience?
ReplyDelete:D
I'm having Lemony Snicket flashbacks.
ReplyDeleteyes. defintely a series of unfortunate- that means not very nice- events.
ReplyDelete"Events" is a word which here means "things that happen."
ReplyDelete(For the record, I've never heard the term "blow" used for cocaine.)
What MarcT said x2
ReplyDeleteI hope Uncle Jennie isn't serious, there was even a movie called Blow!
ReplyDeleteFry and Laurie had an excellent sketch along these lines
ReplyDelete(...a sketch being a brief, typically comedic, skit or routine, often performed as part of a larger program.)
I'm thinking more of "Airplane" - a flying contraption used to transport people and objects - but that's not important now.
ReplyDeleteUh, sorry I'm kinda confused... What is "describe"? There're too many big words in this!!!
ReplyDeleteUh... my teacher writes with white powdery stuff.
ReplyDeleteIs that cocaine?