Water blowing

This is a literal translation from Canto-speak ("吹水" in Cantonese). It is a socializing behaviour in which participants chat and coverse without a specific direction.

An expert water-blower is said to be able to conduct meaningful turn-taking conversation with anyone at any time about any topic for any duration of time, without boring the chatting counterpart (the last part being the most important).

There aren't many expert-water blowers around, so do consider yourself lucky when you encounter a true guru in this area. In fact, I reckon I learn quite a lot from master water-blowers as they must have had read / heard / experienced so much to be able to just discusss on anything (some even outside of planet earth).

In the unfortunate event that if your superior / boss claims to be an expert, by all means agree to his / her self-declared skill level in the art of water-blowing. By that, I mean you'll have to pretend not to be bored by his / her non-chalants, give appropriate responses such as a follow up comment, idiotic question or present a professional snickering that does not seem faked.