What's That?

Have you every known someone who annoyingly repeats a little catch phrase without consciously knowing it? Back in junior high school, this one girl would transition all her sentences with the word, like, but she never made any comparisons. One of my friend's professors would always end a statement with the word, right, as if to as a question but never intending to do so.

Most of the time these nuances go unnoticed like white noise. But there are the select few who pick up on these quirks immediately, and fail to keep to themselves because the pain is too much for them to bear, thus have everyone else suffer along side with them.

Over the course of the week during our lunch hours, my friends and I have been discussing such a topic. Mitch Arends, one of my good friends in town, has a terrible habit of saying "What's that?" At first I thought it was because he was deaf. But after having it pointed out by another friend, I knew exactly what he was talking about. When Mitch calls me up on the phone, he is notorious for interrupting your responses with a habitual "What's that?" It makes me so mad to the point where I have to yell on the phone to tell him to shut up for 10 seconds so I don't have to repeat myself.

Two days ago, another friend tried to test Mitch by pointing to his shoes, and asked him, "What's that?" And without hesitation, Mitch quickly responded, "What's....thaaa...", catching himself in an awkward situation because he realized that he answered a question with the same question. Hahaha...you got served, Mitch. We don't have the heart to tell Mitch's wife about this because she'll probably divorce him if she knew.

What's that?