When I taught college writing, I told students to write like they talk.

I didn’t mean write like you really talk.

If we taped and transcribed our conversations, we’d quit reading after the first page. In everyday conversation we use filler language to give our brains precious seconds to catch up with our words, we backtrack to fill in details we previously forgot.

From time to time we expel word farts.

For example:

“Like, Carol and I were driving, you know what I mean? When this badass cop, I mean really badass, six foot tall in navy blue, nazi jackboots, you could tell he wanted to bust anyone to put another notch in his badge. Where was I? Oh, yeh, he pulls us over, we were driving seventy, like, I mean…we were in Dripping Springs which is about twenty miles south of Oak Hill, if you’ve never been out that way? No shitting? Man…