On "brb"

I saw an AIM away message of one of my friends a while ago that said: "brb, shower". And it gave me a crazy thought. How long are you allowed to be away when you say "brb"? How much time needs to elapse before you should have said "ttyl" or something similar? Maybe it depends on the situation, or the people talking, or even how they're talking.

For me, "brb" usually means I'm going to get a snack, or take out the trash, or go do Number 1. Something simple and trivial. But if you tell someone, "I'll be right back, I'm just gonna go take a shower," don't you think you should be spending a little more time lathering up?

I'm sure it's wrong to set a concrete "brb" time allotment; I think a number of factors are involved. I think the situation, or the subject matter of the conversation, plays a big role in determining how much time you have to get back. For instance, if two girls are ferociously typing away about what that one boy said to that girl about that other boy who has a crush on girl number one, you better be right the fuck back. Would you take a shower in the middle of this conversation? Of course not. However, if two friends are just having a normal, everyday conversation with no real substance or purpose, saying "brb" and then being away longer than expected isn't such a terrible crime. That kind of casual conversation doesn't really need to be resumed or finished, and if the one friend gets tired of waiting and leaves to do something else, not much is lost.

I think there is often a desire to keep a sense of continuity between two parts of a conversation, which is why someone would want to say "brb", even when saying "be right back" seems not to be the case. A better abbrv, then, would be "bbl". It seems that saying "be back later" gives a better sense of returning to complete a conversation than does "[just] talk to you later" (emphases added).

I think there's even a difference between online conversations and txting. Txting etiquette, however, is an entirely different beast, and I don't have a txting plan that allows me to investigate this without taking out another mortgage on the house.

What if my friend had actually meant that he was going to a baby shower!? Then he really would have been wrong to say "brb"!

I don't really have any definitive judgment one way or the other; I'd really love to hear your crazy thoughts on this.