“Alive and vertical” is my variation on that first one there. Sometimes I use “very low baseline” as an afterthought, because some folks seem confused by it.
I also say “I know English wasn’t my first language, but I could have sworn this made sense. Maybe we’re speaking different English.” I speak English just fine, without any trace of accent (beyond Chicago), but that makes people take a step back and pay attention to what I said or wrote.
Scumbags like that tend to last longer than we’d think possible. It’s unnatural.