I'm mystified that you took my, what to me was a completely innocuous, comment "on the chin".
I was tempted, once upon a time, to change my online name to either "Someone" or “Another Poster.”
Then I decided that I might be held accountable for any number of horrors, so refrained.
Did you feel slighted because I couldn't remember who had posted about the train disaster?
No, Gil, I didn’t feel slighted, nor was I “angry, annoyed, resentful, irritated or even vexed.”
I accepted that you had no idea who’d posted something about what’d happened in Lac Mégantic, so it was water off a duck’s back—no worries, mate.
The thing about perceived subtle intonations is that they are often projections by the reader. Like Linda mentioned a while back, we read the words without visual and aural cues so it’s easy to do...
The choice of words, and the way they’re put together to form a sentence (if they are, that is), is usually a good clue, irrespective of visual issues.
Emoticons, although ostensibly used to help convey and/or clarify meaning, can also be employed sarcastically.
I’ve wondered what purpose the Devil icon, for instance, is meant to fulfil; are we meant to interpret it as something whimsical and facetious, or as evil incarnate?