A Personal Rant: "Enough Details, Already!!"

I drove through the snow this morning from Midland-Barrie-Orillia to Toronto's Pearson Airport, button-pushing across the AM and FM bands as I went.

Following the drive, one word is driving me to distraction: details.

It's the name, of course, of a fun magazine to pick up now and then and the details they print are always worth the price, but the word must mean something extra special in Canadian, because every radio station contest and promotion had more details, which I was supposed to listen for.

Websites contained even more details that I was being asked to search for. Car dealers promised more details "in store," retailers told me to ask their clerks for more details, traffic reports teased more details in just a few minutes, newscasts held out the promise of even more details a little later, weather personalities always had just a few more details coming up, air personalities seemed to have little to talk about but details on this or that.

Folks, folks, folks. Here's a quick tip: we all already have too many details to cope with in our daily lives. No one has time to wait, listen, go to a store, visit a car dealer, click on a website just for the promise of still more "details."

My favorite radio station's call letters are "WII-FM." (what's in it for me?)

I don't want details. I want you to relate to me, engage me, entertain me, inform me. At the very least, before using that word one more time, radio, please grab a Rogets and vary the words you use next time you're tempted to promise me "details" on anything.

Even better, condense those details into a few seconds, make it painless and fun and tell me what it is you think I'd be interested in. If you're hiding behind the word "details" because you know that I won't be interested, why waste my time? Or yours?