If You Don't Know, Shut Up

I wish it was legal to shoot people. I know not everyone can be intelligent, but when it comes to idiocy some people go far beyond the call of duty. Now, I'm rather okay with those who wear their lack of intellect on their sleeve. It's easy to notice, you know what to expect every time they open their mouths, and you are ready for it. Forewarned, forearmed and all that.

The people that truly annoy me are the ones that conceal their simpleness. Like U.S. Navy Seals on a covert mission, their stupidity invades your Abbottabad of supreme wisdom and attacks when you least expect it, leaving you disoriented and trying to figure out where the last 30 minutes of your life just went.

Case in point: I have a friend who purports to be intelligent. However, in reality he knows pretty much close to nothing. The problem is, he always pretends he knows more than he does, which really wastes everyone's time when we eventually discover that that particular topic, or any topic on Earth for that matter, is not his forte at all.

Because I cannot download my corporate emails on my Blackberry in Zim (despite the bastards at Econet promising to install a Blackberry server since January), I recently resumed using my second line from Telecel on my Nokia E71 after reading in the paper that they - finally - were offering 3G connectivity on a test basis. Telecel are so slow - if cell phone network operators were piss Telecel would be those last few drops that you shake off your dick at the end of a long pee. Econet would probably be the odorless fart that comes out before the pee. And Net-one...well, Net-one just drips down your leg when you're already back at the bar.

But I digress.

So I tested my Telecel line and, slap me on the ass and call me Sarudzai, the 3G actually worked! My phone downloaded all my emails, but I now needed to know one thing: how do I change the settings to enable me to send emails? So, because my friend, let's call him Dave to protect his identity from the Idiot Police, conceals his stupidity like a g-string on an overweight chick, I mistakenly thought he would have the answer. Here's a transcript of our actual sms exchange, not edited whatsoever:

ME: Dude, wats e outgoing email server for telecel?

DAVE: U don't put in all that. You just put in the access point name, like where u put econet.net for your econet, and just enter "internet" for telecel.

ME: I hav to send email. I can surf fine.

DAVE: The outgoing server depends on your domain. Is it gmail?

ME: No. And no it doesn't, it depends on the ISP. On my laptop it's mx.263.co.zw coz my broadband provider is 263 Technologies. On econet it's smtp.ecoweb.co.zw or sumthn lyk that.

DAVE: Oh. Its for outlook?

ME: Well, for the built-in email client on my nokia. Same as outlook, u could say.

DAVE: Try imap.telecel.co.zw.

ME: K. Did you make that up?

DAVE: No. Lol. Email clients always use either pop3 or imap servers. Always.

DAVE: If its a pop3 server, incoming is pop.telecel.co.zw, outgoing smtp.telecel.co.zw

DAVE: Difference is that a pop one downloads and then deletes from the server. The imap doesn't.

ME: So... how come my 263 one is mx.263.co.zw?

DAVE: I have no idea mate.

ME: But you said Always. Why did you say that then?

DAVE: Go away.

ME: If u don't know, next time just say I don't know. You've wasted 15 minutes of my life that I'll never get back.

DAVE: No. I've given you the valuable knowledge that what I thought worked doesn't. Now you'll never have to try it again. Knowledge.

ME: You've given me the valuable knowledge not to waste my time with idiots. Idiot.

DAVE: Go away.

ME: Okay.

Jesus. With friends like this, is it any wonder I'm always cranky? Please, it's really not too much to ask - if you don't know something, don't waste other people's time pretending you know. Shut the hell up and let us get on with our lives.

zakeozim@gmail.com

www.zim-madness.blogspot.com