Look, it's so easy to accuse a communicator of hypocrisy. No one can take advantage of even a fraction of the communication opportunities that crop up every day. Just trying, you'd go insane. Similarly, not every exchange in the course of one's day will be executed with optimal candor and power—or anything like it. Any critic, and surely any self-critic, may follow around any communicator and find, during the course of any day, a lot to second-guess.

But there are moments—as a parent, as a spouse, as a friend—when communicators blow communications in ways that constitute hypocrisy to the point of hilariousness.

I've recently taken over the management of a small but urgent plumbing project in the condo building where I live. The dude is coming in an hour, actually, to do a job that will involve shutting down the water in our seven-unit building for two hours. I am the only person in the building who knows this. I think I'm the only person in the building who's home today. But I have no way of knowing that for sure.

But I haven't sent out an e-mail to everybody warning them that the water is going to be off. Why? I haven't had friggin' time to send an e-mail or deal with any backtalk I get, because I've got to: a.) deal with the plumber himself. b.) finish a magazine story I'm working on. c.) blog, about communications!

I'm laughing as I write this. I am not merely a hypocrite, but I am, as Charles Dickens described Uriah Heap, I think it was, "a cathedral of hypocrisy."

Readers, can you match this?