Horse 1156 - "Likes" Per Minute

And I was like talking to Mesha and she was like crying and stuff and Mr Wilson was like in our faces and like "Stop talking when I'm talking to the class" and like "You need to be quiet". I didn't say anything like but Mesha was still crying like and I like didn't say anything, like, just be cool, like and we like left the room by like the back door and stuff...

I completely understand that English is an evolving language and I am also fully aware that especially in the last 20 or so years, the word "like" has increasingly been used as not just a comparative or a verb but as a hedge, a quotative and a particle of discourse. Whilst I can't necessarily do anything about these uses except metaphorically bang my head on the coffee table, it does provide in my opinion a useful guide to the relative inanity and or stupidity of the conversation.

My somewhat informal research has involved me eavesdropping on conversations which I otherwise would not and taken part in and not wished to do so either but have been more or less forced to overhead because some people in public spaces are quite boisterous. Due to the proximity and loudness of these conversations either on the train or the bus, I have devised what I think is an appropriate speed limit for stupidity; measured in "likes per minute" of ten.

At 10lpm it appears to me that the person speaking actually begins to lose the meaning of what they are trying to say. A 10lpm conversation is annoying and is just bordering on the edge of stupidity.

At 15lpm, conversation has more or less broken into Valspeak and makes the speaker sound like a total dolt. The Bard himself said through the voice of Emilia in Othello: "O gull! O dolt! As ignorant as dirt!" This I think sums up a 15lpm conversation most eloquently.
At speeds above 15lpm, my personal level of irritation is quite high and I have a latent desire to punish the offender with a decent thud to the back of the head with a some great tome. I would suggest a hard cover copy of Ulysees by James Joyce.

If you do find yourself speaking at a rate of more than 10lpm, do yourself and everyone else a favour and either desist or preferably stop talking altogether. If you really can not express yourself without resulting to such verbal dross, then perhaps a decent education is in order. Huzzah!