People are irritating
2006-08-20 - 3:14 p.m.

I've been doing some extra work during the past few weeks so we can afford to go to the beach next month, and we decided on a place to stay and made the reservations last night. We're renting through the same real estate place as we did last year but the house we had last year is already booked, so we found another place a little bit north of there. I think we'll like this place even more than the place from last year because it has everything that one did PLUS a pool table. I like the fact that the hot tub is right off the main living area upstairs, too. Now, I just hope the hot tub is actually working when we get there this time. (It was broken half the time we were at the beach last year.)

I transcribed a bunch of interviews yesterday regarding a really convoluted theft claim. There had been about half a dozen people living in this house prior to the theft and all of them had to be interviewed because they all potentially had the same motivation for stealing - they were all drug users. Unfortunately, most of the interviews were in-person, so the tape recorder was placed between the interviewer and interviewee and I couldn't hear either of them very well. Plus the interviewer was talking really fast and stumbling all over his words. Grrrr....

I've probably mentioned this, but it always tickles me (or annoys me, depending on my mood) how people will just keep blabbing and saying the same thing over and over again as long as the interviewer lets them. I think most of the time the interviewer is taking notes and they don't say anything right away after the interviewee finishes speaking, so the interviewee thinks the interviewer doesn't understand or maybe wasn't listening, so they go on to say the same stuff again (and again and again) until they get some kind of response from the interviewee. I suspect that the interviewer just let's them talk until they're done writing/typing their notes and they're not even listening any more, but I still have to transcribe it.

It also tickles me how often people don't answer the question that they're asked. (I'm guilty of this, too.) I guess they don't really understand the question so they answer what they THINK the question was, but in some cases I know they're also avoiding the question.

For example, the interviewer might ask, "How fast were you going when the impact occurred?" and the person answers with something like, "I was coming to a stop, so I couldn't have been going very fast." So the interviewer says, "Yeah, but how fast do you think you were going?" and on and on until the person finally gives some number or flat out says, "I don't know." I do realize speed is a tough thing to estimate, but often times people say they were stopped when what they really mean is, they were stopping or just starting to move from a stop.

As I was falling asleep last night I was dreaming about transcribing and I had to sort of wake myself up and say, "Okay, stop transcribing!" Thank goodness I have a couple days off.

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