Arvid Huisman.

Years ago, I came across a little acronym that helps me almost daily: K.I.S.S.

It stands for “Keep It Simple, Stupid.”

How much easier life would be if everyone just kept things simple. Someone, or something, always seems to come along and complicate things.

I remember a time years ago, when I returned to the office to find a message to return a call. I learned that I was dealing with a hot shot salesman.

He told me that my timing was “fortuitous” and asked that I allow him to “elucidate” the value of his offer. I wanted to say, “Keep it simple, stupid!”

A few days later, I told a friend about the phone call. He passed along a list of common phrases written both in the English you and I speak, and in “bureaucratese.”

The list was so good, I held onto it.

You or I might say, for instance, “Turn out the lights when you leave.” The same statement in “bureaucratese” would be “All personnel must extinguish illumination before departing premises.”

Here is a pop quiz. See if you can figure out the following “bureaucratese” statements.

a. Your writing of recent date at hand and contents duly noted. Kindly allow this to serve as a reply thereto. Consideration of your proposal will be an agenda item of the executive committee this week. Be assured your letter will command the attention of the committee members present.

b. An evaluative study will be implemented to become the generative means by which we may articulate identifiable maximizing goals.

c. The employment of sulfuric acid as a purgative for pipes clogged with residue is inconsistent with metallic permanence.

Have you figured them out? If not, here are the same statements in our language.

a. I have received and read your letter and I think your proposal has merit. I will discuss it with our executive committee and let you know our decision.

b. We will try it and see what works.

c. Sulfuric acid eats the heck out of pipes.

The United States does not have a copyright on bureaucratese.

A notice to householders from a city in Australia read, “Refuse and rubbish shall not be collected from the site or receptacles thereon before the hour of 8:00 a.m. or after the hour of 6:00 p.m. any day. . . .”

That would have been better understood if it read, “We will collect your garbage between 8:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m.”

In an article in the California Law Review an essay by Richard C. Wydick gave writing advice to attorneys.

“To grip and move your reader’s mind,” Wydick wrote, “use concrete words, not abstractions.”

He went on to give an example of how a modern environmental report may describe one of the Old Testament plagues on Egypt.

First of all, the King James account of the plague: “As the Lord commanded… (Moses) lifted up the rod, and smote the waters that were in the river… and all the waters that were in the river were turned to blood. And the fish that were in the river died; and the river stank and the Egyptians could not drink of the water of the river; and there was blood throughout all the land of Egypt.” (Exodus 7:20-21)

Now, here is Richard Wydick’s “bureaucratese” version of the incident.

“In accordance with the directive therefore received from higher authority, he caused the implement to come into contact with the water whereupon a polluting effect was perceived. The consequent toxification reduced the conditions necessary for the sustenance of the indigenous population of the aquatic vertebrates below the level of continued viability. Olfactory discomfort standards were substantially exceeded, and potability declined. Social, economic and political disorientation was experienced to an unprecedented degree.”

It’s scary when 17th century writing is easier to understand than contemporary language.

When someone tries to complicate your day, just remember “K.I.S.S.”

Tell them, “Keep it simple, stupid.” Or, in some cases, “Keep it simple, sweetheart.”