Life is open book open notes

I was sitting in my mo-heat class (that's momentum heat and mass transfer for all you non-Chem E geeks), and our professor was explaining to us that the test was open book open notes. And I thought to myself that the situation for the test was fitting since life is open book open notes. I can always look up the ideal gas constant when I'm not sure which version applies . . . except that, oh wait! It's not.

Conversation (hopefully) consists of about 95% of your daily human interaction (maybe much less if you are married . . .), and that's not open notes! That is spur-of-the-moment, off-the-top-of-your-head, gee-I-hope-he-thinks-I'm-interesting improvisation. I can really imagine some of the people I've met in undergrad and grad school wanting to wander around with a book of notes in order to make better conversation. For some of them, the notes would be simply English translations (I completely understand!); for others, notes on how to get girls to notice you; and still others, notes on how to talk to someone who does not understand the theory of relativity or the jokes on xkcd.com. I actually remember a kid in high school who had a list of general topics that were 'appropriate' to discuss with other kids his age. The problem he would run into was changing the subject after one of them ran out of steam. People started to look at him funny when he asked everyone what his/her favorite movie was, and half a minute later moved directly onto books read lately and then favorite bands after that.

I've watched and participated in conversations all my life (of course). I've been on the awkward silence end of the spectrum as well as the immediate connection end, and the best advice I think anyone can come up with is practice makes perfect. "What is perfect?", you might ask. Just take a look at preachers, politicians, and that guy at the office who gets along with everyone. Maybe it's an innate superpower they are born with. Maybe they are actually not humans, but an alien race. Or maybe they just liked to talk a lot and got really good at it.

So what?? Does this mean that years of open book open notes quizzes and tests have irrevocably stunted us in the area of spontaneity and improvisation? Well, yes, but you didn't really want to have a conversation with the girl next door about how Dubai's booming economy is surprisingly only about 5% due to its petroleum industry, did you? No, you wanted to tell her that you got an A on the physics exam, and if she wants you can tutor her later tonight . . .