Lelanophilus

Pretending to not know things that everybody knows is a fun game that is super easy to play.  You just feign a lack of knowledge and keep a straight face.  Eventually you let on that you knew all along what they were talking about, which will put them at ease since normal folk don’t like believing that their friend is an idiot.  The trick with letting them know that you know is that the best way to do it is by pretending like you really don’t know it but are acting like you do so as to save face.  Oh gosh!

For example, one time I was home teaching with Addison and he said something offhand about Google and I interrupted in order to ask him what he meant by that.

“What did I mean by what?” he responded.

“Just … what is a Google?” I clarified.  He didn’t believe that I didn’t know what he was talking about but I am pretty good at straight-faced, good-natured incomprehension and I soon had him explaining to me what exactly a Google is and what you can do with one once you’ve caught it.

“How can you not know this?” he asked, at the end of his explanation, “Aren’t you a computer scientist?”

“Ha ha, yeah you got me.  I was just joking with you!  I know all about the Google,” I admitted.

“Oh … good, you had me worried.”

“Yeah yeah, I use it all the time to be … for to Google stuff and things,” I stated confidently.  “How … how do you spell it by the way?” I added as I pulled out a pen.

Another time I was having folk explain to me what Facebook is.  I acted pretty incredulous and they did their best.  Of course, I finally acted like I knew all about what a Facebook is with too much enthusiasm.  “Oh yeah,” I bragged, “I’m pretty popular and I’ve filled like three or four Facebooks.  Yeah, I would say I’ve definitely got three full Facebooks and a fourth that is getting pretty full.  Yeah.”

The only problem with this game is that when I really don’t know nothing about nothing I have to work real hard to convince people of my ignorance.  They say you shouldn’t cry wolf, kids, but what they don’t tell you is how consistently hilarious it is to do so.