There was a time I would lamented the need to be so explicit. But now, I'm just grateful the point got across. Communication seems to happen less and less reliably, with more error modes with greater negative emotional impact, and I worry that this implies the existence of some sort of inevitable drift between my brain and other people's brains. And I'm not sure if the solution is to bridge the gap, or just keep going and learn to accept inane resistance with some combination of stoicism and resigned amusement.