"Anywhere with less than eight million inhabitants is a wilderness"

I said that and wished I had n't. You know the pause before a conference call starts, the holding space where the early joiners circle and chat before everyone else joins, exactly where this piece of nonsense made it's debut. Fully formed, it just popped right out.

I have a sad talent for the unforgivably preposterous comment. And this one does n't only hit all those buttons, it's got an uncomfortable metropolitan sneer that, believe me, I'd not intended.

Engage brain, fit the words together, try the sound of them privately, weigh the sense, then broadcast. New mantra.