An Example of Gory Details

I have been familiar with the phrase ‘gory details’, as anyone has been who has read newspapers or watched TV.

However, today I saw this phrase with a completely new meaning. It was quite a revelation. This is how it goes:

Even if you have severe constraints on resources due to funding (I sympathize…), I recommend not discussing them in quite as gory detail as you do. A very brief mention of the amount of effort invested to date is sufficient.

Gee, thanks for the sympathy. Now I will be able to run my next project on this great resource.

And these are the gory details (complete and unabridged) to which the above quote refers:

Since x has so far mostly been the result of individual effort and it is a non-funded project being undertaken on part-time basis, there were the most stringent resource (financial, temporal, etc.) constraints.

(Only the names have been changed).

Quite a lesson in Semantics. Or is it Pragmatics? Perhaps both. Great. Very original.

By the way, another lesson I have learnt over the years is that your project is not a project unless it is funded.

Without funding, your work is illegitimate, at least in the research community.

Oops! Sorry for the gory details. Obscene. Vulgar. Indecent. Pervert. Lewd. Salacious. Detestable. Repulsive. Repugnant. Abhorrent.

 

 

(I will add more context for this post later).