What ARE You?

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

Or Return of the World’s Worst Blogger

 

The problem, my dear readers, is that this blogger hasn’t found a way to twin herself so that she can clean the house (she only knows one mode of cleaning – hyper cleaning) and go shopping AND blog and write all at the same time.

Which is how it happened that I woke up at seven am this morning and went “we have no real food in the house, and the snow is starting to fall, and tomorrow is Christmas Eve which means the store will be a zoo.

So I rolled over and told my poor long suffering husband “now, now.  We have to go now.”

So, we went and because I want to try marinating turkey in port wine but I’m not so far gone I want to use $20 on the marinade, which is about the cheapest I could do, (Grandma used the Three Old Friends brand, but it’s like one fifty a litter in Portugal) we went by the liquor store and got some cheap domestic port.  Then we went ahead and got some beers, since Robert is on vacation and he’s my beer buddy.

And we’re just back now, of course.

I had planned to have the introduction for the first of my raiding party – the friends who are going to have permanent rotating guest status on Mondays – but considering how late it is, it wouldn’t be fair to him.

I have picked up over the last year or so the habit of putting down on a piece of paper titles for blogs I plan to do in the future.  The only one I have staring at me right now is “what ARE you?”

Now, I’m sort of assuming when I wrote that I had some idea of what I was.  I mean, I have mirrors and everything.  Truly.  I have a vague idea of what (and who) I am most mornings, unless I’m struck with late-stage novel.

It’s entirely possible, of course that what I meant to do is ask you what your alternate form is.  I know that most of you who are also in the diner claim to be part-time animal shifters, which is why I ended up with an Evil Penguin as a semi-permanent diner fixture.  And the least said about the raccoon the better.  (I’m not toots, Pat, and I’m writing as fast as I can.)

I think what I meant to write about was this: We all of us have things that we love more than our own lives, things that inform and build who we are.  I’ve found in writing that if my characters don’t have that – what we’ll call the motivating principle – they read “thin” or devoid of personality (which often happens when writers forget they’re writing people and just want to put down “and then this happened next.”)

There is a sentence in Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s The Little Prince that I’ll quote from memory (and mentally translated from French) and which might not be exactly right, but is the right gist:

What I loved in this little prince was the lover for a rose that shone through him even as he slept.

I think that’s what we who are religious are supposed to do – our commitment to G-d is supposed to be so all powerful that he shines through us into the world.

Then there are kids and spouse, and those of us lucky enough to have them, have them just beneath our commitment to the Almighty.  But then…

There is always something that, some motivating principle.  In Grosse Point Blank (deal) the assassin character says all assassins have a motivating principle, like “no more dictators” or whatever.  But all of us – at least those of us who don’t feel the anomie of daily life, and don’t feel lost in the world.  There are other things – things we love, things that shine through us, like the love of the rose through the little prince, even when we’re doing nothing.

I think I know what I am, what shines through me so deep within that I couldn’t change it and couldn’t uproot it if I tried.  To be blunt, I think if you cut me, I bleed red white and blue.

I am aware of that both as a strength (I know what I am, but who are all you zombies?) and as a liability.  Because when someone touches that thing you love above all things earthly, it can’t help but stab at you, no matter how strong you think you are.

So… I know what I am.

But what are you?

 

182 thoughts on “What ARE You?”

  2. A dragon, of course. [Wink]

    Seriously, I’m not very introspective or at least I’m afraid of being introspective as I have a tendency toward brooding and getting “down in the dumps”. [Sad Smile]

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  3. And if you could clone yourself, you’d end up arguing over which one of you did what. :-p

    Me, hmmm. Wife, mother, poor house-keeper, fairly decent, but unenthusiatic cook. Sometime writer, blogger, committer of bad poems, etc.

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  4. Today? Mostly about wore out. The upholstery’s shot, the oil needs changing, the tires are bald and the drive train gears are so stripped that I am just spinning my wheels trying to stay in place.

    We don’t even want to get started on what the radio insists on playing.

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    1. I’m worn out, too, but for me, that’s because I spent all my energy yesterday moving about a ton and a half of rocks from the creek (by hand, with help from older son) so I could get out of my driveway.

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    2. Come to think of it, I was always a mentor as a business executive, constantly bringing folks along in their careers. I’m naive enough to think that’s still worthwhile

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              2. Really? According to everyone else the worst are the ones that get started and then abandoned to clutter up space; like the frame, axles and tongue of a dismantled horse trailer in my back yard, that has been waiting two or three years to be redecked into a two place snowmobile trailer. Myself, I think the worst ones are the ones where I actually buy supplies, then never get started on the project.

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                1. I’m a rather ruthless declutterer so if I have the materials, I usually get it done so that the stuff isn’t taunting me.

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          1. Any accusation that I may not make much progress on my many projects is base calumn…Squirrel!!

            What? Oh. Um. There you go then.

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  7. I don’t know anymore, and that scares the fire out of me, and is probably a large chunk of why I’m in the emotional (and thus physical) mess I’m in. What I thought I was, I’m no longer “highly competitive” enough and can’t become competitive because I’m not competitive enough to be hired to . . . Yeah. Thppppth. And a publisher informed me that I’m not that other thing I thought I was, either (she advised that I should “try joining a writers’ group.”) I feel a bit like a tumbleweed these days. *shrug*

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    1. Having had a lot of the megrims knocked out of me this afternoon, I think I’m a storyteller. Some stories come from the historical record, some from my imagination (with the help of history), and others probably come from that place in my soul that smart people stay out of.

      For several people I’ve been the rock of stability in their world, and the highest praise I ever received from a superior has been, “You are a model of honorable conduct for us.” I’ve also been the person everyone looks to when the fertilizer hits the impeller. And right now I’m looking for the bottle of Vitamin I because I lifted a shovel full of ice wrong this morning. I know better, too. :(

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          1. I think she should get him to draw her next author portrait. I’m sure Dan would approve. *tries to look innocent*

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  9. My first thought was freedom. From five years old until I left home, I felt like I was a wild animal in a trap and I was doing my dang best to chew my leg off so that I could be free. Everything I planned (reading, college, Navy) was for the express purpose to escape and be free.

    Except that isn’t the principle — When I look deeper, my freedom was always accompanied by movement. When I was in the Navy, I lived for the days that I took my car and drove around the northern Honshu Island (Japan). When I was in Panama, I lived for the days we left our normal lives to the Chiriquí province or other places. I didn’t even have to go far to feel relief.

    It has been hard since I began my chronic illness journey. My freedom of movement and independence has been curtailed. I have learned to find my freedom in other things– reading, writing, and short day trips.

    It’s not that I like to shop… I shop because it means that we can drive to the store and I can watch the mountains, birds, bushes, and animals.

    If you cut any deeper you’d find that I have that desire to be free to fly when I watch a hawk circle. I want the freedom to run like a gazelle and feel the breeze brush my face. I want to see new things and new people. Freedom of movement? I don’t have to see new things even– I need to see variety.

    I would rather watch a roadrunner trip past me because he didn’t realize I was there than to talk to friends.

    I have done things to people who have tried to tie me down– that I am not too proud of doing– Still I would do it again because being forced to fit into a round hole hurts too much.

    So it is amazing that I found a man that understands this need in me and is there to point out the birds and drive me around when I would rather watch than drive.

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  10. What am I? Well, that’s gotten a lot more complex in the last year or so. Writer, and thats partly because of you. Mother, but that’s complicated this year. Blogger, reader, lover, student, befuddled, bewildered, and bemused… Sometimes I think I know, and others, I’m afraid to look.

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  11. I think that what you are trying to explore is the concept encapsulated in the idea of a “vocation”, something that you’re “meant to do”, your true calling, or what have you.

    If you’re uncomfortable in daily life, and have a feeling that you “should be” doing something else, you’ve haven’t found your vocation or you’ve lost it. I’ve felt that lack since I left the service to retire–Every morning, I wake up and feel like I’m AWOL from something I should be doing, instead of everyday life. It’s a dislocating feeling, let me tell you.

    From that, I’ve concluded that I had a vocation, I was in it, and I enjoyed it. Now that I’ve “lost” it, life lacks a certain savor. Not to mention, a certain meaning…

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      1. No, a vocation is more “what do you need to do” — I do agree that if you have one and you don’t follow it, it leaves you a little maimed. For decades, I tried to fight the writing. The writing won.

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              1. Dave! Hadn’t seen you in a while! May have just missed your comments, though, as I’ve been running ragged. Hope you and the lady in your life have a very merry Christmas, and the writing goes on!

                There’s this upside to indie: once you have the books uploaded, they generate sporadic income whether you feel you’re making progress on the next one or not, without requiring constant attention. (I used this line to try to console my Calmer Half after he chopped ten thousand words of rewrite and looked ready to tear out his hair. Hope it works better on you!)

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  12. What am I?

    Frankly, I have no idea. You say, “We all of us have things that we love more than our own lives, things that inform and build who we are.” But I simply do not have deep-running emotions like that. Oh, I can get happy, or angry, or admire the beauty in the rose, but to have that as a guiding light? Nope, not me.

    I guess just about the only thing i have is that, even though I may go on hiatus from trying, I can’t simply give up. No matter how many times I try to do something to better my position and get shot down, I always try again after the sting has dulled.

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  13. I think I’d like to be a builder. Not of houses or roads or bridges, not necessarily, but of something more living, something which then could go on developing and growing after I’m gone. I suppose parents have something like that, but since I have never been a particularly nurturing type I would have wanted something different. Maybe something like perhaps the first people on a colony might have. Unfortunately there is not much of that type of activity going on right now, no chance to start building something on virgin territory, being able to make up your own rules as you go on.

    So I’m not. And I’m not quite sure what I am, besides frustrated.

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    1. Manager.

      Not in the business sense, but the literal sense– “one who manages.”

      The current culture doesn’t favor good selection of those these days, so when they do show up it’s a permutation of the business-manager type thing.

      “Ranch Wife” covers a lot of the same ground.

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      1. “Manager”?

        Oh, in my dreams, perhaps. Mostly I cope — I’m a coper.

        And, because I like things that are elegant, with an inherent grace and beauty, I guess I’m a bit of an aesthetic.

        Which would make me a copacetic.

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        1. I wish too – I always get the job and it is just not that fun. I am much happier if you left me alone to do my own thing and not have to worry about other people’s business.

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          1. The reward for a job well done is… another job.

            Whoever first said “If you want something done, give it to a busy person” may have been right, but I still want to shoot ’em.

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            1. Oh yeah. “She multitasks – give her the project that was due last week.” Someday that’s going to be added to the list of Famous Last Words, up there with “They can’t hit an elephant at this dist—”.

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  14. I am a loving father. A worker. An independent thinker. An over-enthusastic pain in the neck. A person whose debate technique has been compared to being beaten with a blunt object. A good friend. Someone who won’t give up on himself regardless of how many times others have. A stubborn F*** who is going to write this/these novel(s) even if I’ve been told that I can’t do it, that I only THINK I’m good enough and that it’s too much for me. In related news, I’m also a divorced man who hates the fact that he doesn’t live with his kids anymore.

    (And… I’m also the guy who got a mention on PJMedia and couldn’t get any of his family to understand why I was getting such a kick out of it. Whatever. I enjoyed it.)

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  16. I’m a capable, creative, but unfortunately, quite lazy mister fixit. In other words nothing gets done until it absolutely MUST. I married an enabler who ensures that all the routine tasks of living get taken care of on a timely basis. She is also the one who kicks me into gear when something must be fixed.

    Then again, I am a rock. I have always been the dutiful, son, brother, husband or father to be latched onto when the sea that is life gets rough.

    Everything else seems insignificant.

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  17. I don’t know. More and more I feel like I’ve just acted out a succession of roles. I’ve joined a church recently, and one of my greatest fears is that I’m simply acting like Christian, with no inkling of what faith really is.

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    1. What’s wrong with that? Wouldn’t faith come to you if you do the correct acts often enough?

      Unfortunately I think that might not help you, because that’s more of a Jewish than than a Christian pov. In Orthodox Judaism the important thing is that you did the correct thing no matter the motivation. Very few doctrinal beliefs in Judaism, there are some. It’s all doing the correct or not doing the incorrect or bad thing.

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    2. “Fake it till you make it” is often quoted, but there is some validity to it in matters of faith.
      A person’s beliefs are extremely personal, and not always lined up with a churches Doctrinal Statement. But don’t worry about it. The Bible says God judges the heart. Let Him be the decider. And mostly – I’ve found that if I concentrate on doing the things I oughter, I don’t have time for the tings I oughter not.
      And remember – God doesn’t condemn doubts, but does expect us to look for answers.

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    4. I hear ya. I’m at the same place, myself. I’ve found, though, that if you can read the Bible, really READ it, and not just skim it because “oh, I learned/read about/ was explained this verse in Sunday School”, but really read it and ask whether that passage actually applies to you and HOW it really applies, you’ll find that a lot of the accepted beliefs of …well…every major religion that I’ve ever studied are not…*quite*….exactly what the Bible says. Good ways to live, yes. Sound Biblical doctrine, not so much.

      But I still struggle with who I am, what I’m supposed to be doing, where God wants me to be in life. I feel like I missed the boat somewhere, or my boat is tied up right next to the sub at the end of Das Boot.

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        1. Er — that’s not a personal “you” — it’s meant to mean the reader in general, who is indeed warned.

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    5. “Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our Enemy’s will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.”

      The technical name for this state is the “dark night of sense.” When there are no sensible consolations assuring you that you are on the right path. This is how faith is forged, by trusting God when He appears absent.

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      1. I do not believe God is absent. I just have the sense that there is a maze between myself and Him, and I’m wearing a blindfold. I do not believe works alone will be sufficient, but I try to do them because they are worth doing and because I hope the doing of them puts me in a better position to find faith. As a Protestant, I suppose I am not supposed to believe in Purgatory, but I would not object to finding myself there someday; it would indicate that He found something in me worth salvaging.

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        1. I believe God could have dropped all knowledge about Him into our heads but that would have given us knowledge but no understanding. It’s like reading about how to use the drill and bow method to start a fire and then actually starting one. So hopefully with the bow and drill of the Bible and good works we can rub them together and while often failing every now and then getting a spark and maybe by the end of our lives have a small bit of tinder on fire which is a better understanding of God. As long as we honesty do our best God will understand after all He created us.

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        3. So far as I know, Purgatory was reasoned out of God’s love and comments about being purified well before the Protestants and Catholics split.

          Probably the best place you could look for stuff from the early Church fathers would be catholic.com — it might help you to read what early folks had to say.

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        4. *Note: What follows is NOT Catholic, or any other theology. Except in the broadest sense of the term.* I’ve spent my life, trying to understand how to relate to God, and what He wants from us. (Further note: David Weber seems to have a pretty good handle on this, In his books. Read “War God’s Own, and War Maid(?),” to see what I mean.) As I see/understand “Purgatory,” it’s rather simple. At Birth, we are issued a set of clothes/armor/something (use your own metaphor here). Every good deed polishes/makes it nicer. Every bad deed, dirties/dings it up. God tells us that it’s perfectly all rigt to wear it, *as is* in Heaven. No one will care. But, we do, so we spend how ever long it takes, to make it look new again.

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  20. You know that old hermit with the long beard and the lantern who wanders about looking for truth/honest men/etc.? I’m the version with a 1911 strapped to my leg and a giant MagLite roaming the darkness and going “Ha! Got you, sucker!”, whacking truth on the head, and sticking it in my harvesting bag ;-)

    I’m not active in research but I still consider myself a scientist. That’s the frontiers of truth-seeking. I consider software testing to be a very applied version of truth-seeking as well. Writing…well, part of truth-seeking is communicating truth so it is understood. If my stories are “true” they will make sense and fit comfortably in the mind in such a way the reader is immersed and sees what I see. And then the giant MagLite turns on….

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  21. You know, nothing stymies a conversation like saying, “Well! Let’s have a nice chat now!”
    Kinda freezes the mind faster that ice cream.
    Who am I? Akin to What I did For Summer.
    would-be fiction writer (if only I can transfer the boring writing for the good stuff!)
    I’m a grampa 3X over, and the grand daughter are getting prettier every day.
    Married to someone I really don’t deserve, and have been for 30+ years
    a renowned cook – my potato salad has been appreciate across the US!
    and generally quite content.
    No grand vendettas, no consuming passions or hatreds, no rationale for aberrant behaviors other than being an odd.
    BORING. But I make my grand daughters happy.

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    1. After reading over what everyone else has posted (in reverse – Merlin has nothing on me!) I have to identify with most of them in one way or another. I don’t know if that makes me a chameleon or not.

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  22. Smart, shy, always planning, and _finally_ doing. Imaginative, artistic, creative. Desirous of a time machine so I can back and _kick_ my younger self and tell her how totally awesome she is, and would she please realize that _before_ she’s old and fat?

    Never did any shape-shifting, but the combination of T-rexes showing up in too many stories and my two-fingers-of-each-hand typing method makes me think that my subconscious is telling me that’s probably a good thing.

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      1. I’d have to ride herd on myself for at least 2 and maybe as many as 5 years to instill some discipline in things like going to classes and doing homework, so I could continue on the course I had planned.

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    2. NO ONE is ever “useless”. We can always shoot you and use you as a door prop, or refer to you as “this is what happens if you don’t do Xxxx”. Then there’s the greatest humiliation of all — being used for fertilizer. 8^)

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  24. I just spent 2 hours having a 30 minute MRI done on the possible fracture in my right wrist. For the 30 minutes inside the tube, lying still while the atonal beeps, groans and bumps of the machine tried unsuccessful accompaniment, I whiled away the time mentally singing/performing Michael Card’s “Job suite” 3.5 times (at 8-10 minutes duration I figured I could gauge my time in the tube and rehearse simultaneously). The machine made its beeps, bumps and groans in the wrong key, BTW.

    Does that say anything about what I am?

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    1. You’re a musician at heart!
      I found the MRI put me into a nice meditative state. I was starting to find patterns and was disappointed when they shut it down. I used to fall asleep on the hatch over a big turbocharged Cummings on the last fishing boat I built. The high scream of the turbo harmonized with the rumble of the exhaust rather well.

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  25. I think what I meant to write about was this: We all of us have things that we love more than our own lives, things that inform and build who we are. I’ve found in writing that if my characters don’t have that – what we’ll call the motivating principle – they read “thin” or devoid of personality (which often happens when writers forget they’re writing people and just want to put down “and then this happened next.”)

    I will observe, philosophically, that when I first started to write I had to write “and this happens next” and get to the end. Then, when I turned around, and looked at the story intact, that was when I figured out WHY they were doing it.

    I don’t think they trusted me with the info without the confidence builder of my having finished the story. 0:)

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  26. Also, the January book is The Last Unicorn.

    Reading starts Jan 1. Nominations for February’s theme will begin December 29.

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  27. I’m A Crank.

    I’m anti Drug War, but my drugs of voice are nicotine and caffeine.

    I’m for Gay marriage, and Gay pride events mostly appall me.

    I think that abortion should be legal, and confidently expect that those who champion this position politically are going to bring about the opposite in my lifetime.

    I spent some years being a pacifist werewolf named Tanglefoot. Every Saturday afternoon.

    I believe that the history of post-Colonial States is a strong argument for the return of Colonialism.

    I’m a strong believer in the Second Amendment, and don’t own any guns (nobody who’s scared of power saws is a good candidate for gun ownership).

    I blame my parents, who exposed me to James Thurber and S. J. Perelman at an early and impressionable age.

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    1. Quibble. Nobody who’s *not* a little scared (or at least respectful of) power saws should be around those, either… or had better have their Obamacare paid up.

      Mew

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      1. My old boss called that “respecting the dangers of the equipment.” A two-ton press doesn’t much care that a finger got mashed up with the rod it’s forming anymore than the laws of physics mind that some idiot human thinks they can levitate a one-ton pickup off their body when the jack (no stands) shifts.

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        1. There is no gravity- the Earth sucks. I’ve still got all of my fingers, but I don’t wire back the guards on skillsaws and I don’t use seatbelts on my surfboats either.

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      2. The table saw and I have a deal. I treat it with the same respect with which I treat rattlesnakes, and it lets me keep my fingers and does not kick the wood back into my gut.

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          1. I’ve worked a couple places where “leaving the snakes alone” was not a good choice: rattlesnake basking in the sun on the threshold of the airport terminal just as a bunch of passengers were arriving, for example. We tried to catch (carefully) and relocate them if we could, killed them as a last resort.

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            1. First choice, leave them alone with a wide berth, if that isn’t feasible it devolves VERY quickly into killing them. I am not a snake handler, when I catch a poisonous snake it is going to be sans head.

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  28. I’d have to say that I’m the sum of all the things I’ve been in the past — from a Louisiana farm boy to an Air Force Academy cadet to an airman/NCO to … The list is long. It’s ranged from the manual (bowling alley mechanic) to intellectual (imagery analyst), from temporary/part-time to 60+ hours a week. I enjoyed many of the things I’ve done, but I’ve also had dull, repetitious jobs that I absolutely hated. Some of the things I’ve done were formal, well-defined jobs; others were informal, a couple to the extreme. I always did my best: sometimes I succeeded, other times I didn’t even come close. I don’t think I’m unique, but I doubt that there are many people that have had quite the variety of experiences I’ve had. At the same time, there are others that have had far more experience. I am in awe of such people.

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  29. Me? I’m a cat and a systems engineer. I am remarkably apathetic, I love playing with my prey, and I hold entire businesses worth of data in my paws…

    Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, I caught a bad case of ethics.

    Mew

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  30. What am I? Gee, the last time I responded to that particular question, I was in high school and supremely confident that I was about to die in a few months. *chuckle* We live, we learn. *grin*

    While I’m tempted to steal CF’s line and say “useless!” that’s not quite the truth every day (though some days more than others). The truth is I’m pretty average.

    I wake up early, work hard, make mistakes (I’m about as flawed as anybody out there and more than quite a few- and I know it), fix ’em, love my family to pieces, kick back with friends every now and then, cuss way too much when I hurt myself or mess up too badly, love a fast drive on a curvy road, distrust most anything government wise, do my best to give my word sparingly (and always keep it, much as possible), avoid conflict where I can but be decisive when it can’t or shouldn’t be avoided, and do my best to live up to the example of duty, honor, and manhood my father and grandfathers have set for me and generally failing, but success at that will be gauged more by refusing to give up than by allowing failure to defeat me. I’m also apparently a fan of run-on sentences, if you can believe that *grin*

    I delve into politics, where no man is clean and everyone’s motives suspect, more from the viewpoint of a natural cynic than anything else. Y’all know what, at the core, a cynic is? An idealist, filled to the brim with outrage over the defilement of sacred innocence (or perhaps ideals that *should* remain sacred, but we humans are not perfect), but also disgusted with the fact that no one seems to notice or care. Fighting that basic reaction is an every day task. True optimism means first looking what’s real square in the face and calling it by its right name, then refusing to fall to apathy and fear. Takes guts, it does.

    I know there’s plenty of time I ought to keep my mouth shut but open it anyway. I look back at things I said before sometimes (the internets never forgets) and think “why the heck did I say that?” Or “I said that? Really? Because that’s actually kinda cool. Huh.”

    I’m also a a last chance. I tend to pick up stray people every now and again and set them on their feet, on their way. Some successes (couple of them have jobs for the first time in years, and have kept them- personal responsibility ftw). Some failures (couple others need to be in jail for society’s and their own good, I’s sorry to say). I hold doors for folks, dig cars out of the snow, carry bags for old folks and harried moms like your average guy does. I cuss a blue streak at idiot drivers and pedestrians in the privacy of my truck, a habit I’m trying like heck to break.

    I’m a fixer because knowing how things work and keeping them working smoothly is one of those things my grandad impressed upon me young as something a man does, if he’s going to take responsibility for him and his. I’ve since learned there’s other ways that are just as honorable and right, no shame in them, but I like the path I’m on there, I’ll stick with it.

    I used to write, well, a lot, when I was a lot younger but I kind of lost the knack about fifteen years ago. I’m thinking about picking that back up again- hell, if I can sell enough for a week’s worth of gas every now and then, it might be fun. *chuckle* I worry that if I get too into it, it will kill my reading pleasure the way playing and studying music killed my ability to really enjoy music for years. Eh, life’s a risk anyways.

    I’m sitting in a room piled to the ceiling with books because part of me is unspeakably lazy. Oh, when I actually *do* clean I get down to bare wood, then clean that, the walls, the windows, the ceilings, etc. I don’t put off things like engine maintenance and personal hygiene, but cleaning is a solitary thing for me, and most of my time is taken up with other things and people (a most convenient excuse). I’ve learned to employ my procrastination to get things done, like when I should be doing my taxes, I clean, when I should be cleaning, I do laundry, and so on. It gets things done. *chuckle*

    I’ve also got this arrogant and rather pedantic streak that comes out when I least expect it, evidenced above. Flaws, ya know. Fortunately for me, whenever I get to thinkin’ I’m hot stuff because I did something good or a pretty girl smiled at me that I, too, am mortal. Rather, that I’m just a guy like many others out there, trying to do my best, failing, picking myself back up and trying again, occasionally succeeding, trying to do right by folks, and making the most of the flawed vessel I’ve made of myself.

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    1. Question from something you said the other day, why the heck would you pack an engine (don’t remember the type, small block Chevy?) through your house to put it in your bathroom? Those things are heavy and dang awkward to move around by hand. I can see having it in your mudroom or whatever other room is at your outside door, but not packing it into your bathroom.

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      1. Easy cleanup, and it’s close to the back door. Had a problem with raccoons getting into things and didn’t want to clean fur and guts out of the valve covers (again).

        Heavy? Oh my yes. But convenient, warm and dry, easy cleanup and I wouldn’t have tried it with a small block- this was just a 1.8L, so rather easier to manage. Getting it back out I used a wheelbarrow-like thing I built for another job. Think it was only about 280/300lbs valves and accessories, the block itself was a bit lighter and handier going in.

        Was only for about three awkward days and, not considering unexpected feminine sensibilities of the time, worth it for the near flood that happened about that time.

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      1. Who isn’t? Aside from Chuck Lorre, who anyone whose read his vanity cards knows is a profoundly stupid man.

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      1. “Not good, malfunction.” (made a gesture on Second Life for that)

        “You cannot run out of time…Time is infinite. You… are finite. Zathras… is finite. This.. is wrong tool.”

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    6. …and the best mindworm from JMS in the series: The Shadows are what cats are looking at when the are intently watching nothing.

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    7. ” Every spacefaring race has two things in common. First, they have a food identical to what humans call “Swedish meatballs.” “

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      2. Our family has a tendency to call Swedish Meatballs “Breen”.

        On Tue, Dec 24, 2013 at 1:47 PM, According To Hoyt wrote:

        > SPQR commented: “” Every spacefaring race has two things in common. > First, they have a food identical to what humans call “Swedish meatballs.” > “” >

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  33. Heh, “Who are you?” and “What do you want?”

    I like to know things, and I like to be right. not right by forcing my opinion, but by having the facts and reasoning.

    It pays off at work, as I make a lot of waves to get things fixed in a system that is supposed to correct mistakes, but is more often paralyzed by bureaucratic inertia. (My latest triumph was to get the work orders changed to drill holes in a part BEFORE it is installed on the fuselage. It’ll be another five planes before it actually happens though.)

    I like to acquire skills so that I can do things, and I like to have the tools necessary to do them. I aspire to do my work as perfectly and professionally as possible. I have very little tolerance for people who don’t do the best they can at what they are working on (don’t get me started on those slackers on First Shift).

    Unfortunately, lately I haven’t had the time or motivation to apply my tools and skills, which feels like kind of a waste. And worse, feeling guilty about unfinished projects is a DE-motivator, I tend to avoid them rather than try to complete them.

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  35. What am I?

    A recovering Blueshirt. A problem solver. Probably smarter than you. Definitely more obstinate. One who makes stupidity painful. Walking cat post and Opener of the Food Cans. Sarcastic. Irreverent.

    You know, an American.

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    1. Lets see, He’s a pretty easy going guy, quite content to live his life in peace and not too concerned about what others think, somewhat disrespectful toward authority but still very patriotic.

      But what happens when someone tries to deprive him of Life, Liberty, or the pursuit of Happiness? There’s Hell to pay!

      Who does that sound like?

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    1. Well if you removed chubby and bald that would almost describe me. Not sure if I am proficient enough at most trades to be considered a Jack, but I’ve found that most of these so-called Masters that you pay to do something, aren’t much better. So if something is going to be done not-quite-right, well, I’ll probably do it myself. Because if I’m paying someone to do something I expect it done right.

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      1. Reminds me of when my dad had siding put on his house. He started in by telling the head guy that he wasn’t going to get paid until he agreed it was done right. The guy assured him that his crew were professionals.

        Dad kept checking on them while they were working, and after making them go back and fix some things that they did the lazy way, and being assured over and over that “my crew are professionals”, dad finally told the guy, “You may be a professional, but I’m a perfectionist. Part of my job, before I retired, was going back and fixing the things that the professionals screwed up.”

        He said the guy never mentioned “professionals” again.

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        1. Sounds like my richest cousin. The fencing or roofing crew (forget which) was doing a horrid job and he lit into them about how to do it the best way, and was right … they figured he’d not know (how often do really rich folk know how to do things anyhow) and went with the looks good but lazy way … but learned he was a poor fella like me for years and did some construction to pay his way through accounting in community college, not to mention all the work for the family over the years. The only reason he hired someone was he now didn’t NEED to do it himself. He might be a CEO, but he helped his Dad do the roof on his tractor shed a few years ago.
          The other thing was he doesn’t do the typical “I know what I’m doing and you will do it this way” like a lot of “rich” or “knowledgeable” folks do then go on to prove they do not know diddly. He let them start and prove they were going to do it right (and they didn’t) before stopping them before it became a problem.

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            1. I’ve had to correct Electrician’s work and have never read or trained for the work. I only watched my Dad do the work a few times and, silly me, read the diagram on the motor. But, common sense is no where near common these days, and training only seems to give one a title to lean on.

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              2. And then you get the Ford I looked at the other day. Runs fine, but I was replacing the battery in it and did a double take when I saw the black wire hooked to the positive and the red hooked to the negative. I did a quick eyeball trace and sure enuf that is right, but whoever used a red ground in conjuction with a black positive either has a quirky sense of humor, or needs some sense slapped into them.

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      3. the few times I will pay someone else to do something is if I have no tools to do the job (like home AC work … though now, I’d likely go buy the gauges and make a vacuum pump) or it requires a license to do and I cannot get away with not doing it.

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        1. possibly. others at work have it. I have a fever, headache, and the snotworks are on full production. I got home lastnight at 5:30 and woke for a few minutes at 9:30, and then woke at 5:30 am so I went into work hoping it would not be so bad. It was, and the manager basically chased me out of there. Got home at 10:45 or so and have been sleeping since.

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  38. I think that’s what we who are religious are supposed to do – our commitment to G-d is supposed to be so all powerful that he shines through us into the world.

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  39. I thought I had something interesting to say on this, but once I wrote it out I realized it wasn’t likely to interest anyone but me, and I despise public omphaloskepsis. So I shall limit myself to two brief notes. First, that this is a worthwhile question, and we should stop from time to time to consider it. Second, that I am a Hun of Hoyt’s Horde and your (vosso) friend, may the Author have mercy on you.

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      1. I think she’s repairing wing spars again. Or fabricating sheet metal parts (BTDT, got the hearing loss to prove it.)

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        1. Did you ever get tapped to be the one holding the bucking bar inside the Cessna’s tail for installing the nifty pop-out push-here handles? There wasn’t even a lottery; I just got a look from every male in the shop with “You’re the smallest and thinnest person here.”

          I hate it when they say that. Whatever follows is guaranteed to be a “learning experience.”

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          1. SB2C fuselage because “you’re small and flexible.” Also got shoved into wing roots for the same reason. And here I thought they’d asked me to help because I was cute and charming! *wry grin* That’s when I learned the importance of hearing protection – it was almost an hour before I could hear people talking.

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      2. I am the worm that turns…

        Actually, I’ve just finished a couple months of 50-60 hour weeks, having tied off a massive project we’ve been working on since February as a success. I now have four glorious days off, and am planning on spending any moment alone in a comfy chair, wrapped up in blankets, with lots of hot tea, a kindle full of things to be read, and the internet to amuse me when I’m tired of books or napping. And maybe taking Calmer Half to the zoo, or the world food market, which is like a zoo full of exotic animals already dead and available to eat. I am going to be supremely boring, and that’s wonderful.

        Of course, being boring will only continue to be excellent until I get bored. But I expect after the week of meetings with “lessons learned”, I’ll have about six projects to spearhead improvements (don’t ask where the pole that supports the spearhead is going to be shoved), and between that and changing all of Calmer Half’s books to show ‘also by author’ with live links, and setting up a release schedule to take things out of Amazon Select and upload to other online retailers, and remodelling the kitchen, unpacking the last of the stuff from the last move, and contemplating repainting my plane and building raised garden beds, I think I’ll avoid getting bored.

        If not, I’ll come up with something. It may involve organizing a machine gun shoot – been thinking about throwing one for a friend, and I don’t have as many months before it gets bloody hot here as I think I do…

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