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It’s The Little Things #5682

I bought my first pair of Skechers Shape-Ups five years ago after trying a pair on and experiencing an absence of pain from an ACL injury. Seriously. Tossed the cane. Really. I’ve been through more pairs since then, but my most recent purchase of another pair of Shape-ups brought me a couple of little surprises, one REALLY good one and one “WTF?!?” that was easily remedied.

Really good? Memory foam insoles. Oh, my heavens! I have become used to the great joint cushioning the Shape-ups provide, but now, my feet seem to ride on air! I want to purchase enough pairs of these shoes to last me the rest of my life. *heh*

OK, the “surprise” that needed remedying: The shoes came laced wrong. There’s a tongue-retention device on each shoe’s tongue, but the shoes came without the laces run through those provisions. Why? It’s there for a reason (a Good Reason, IMO–because it’s very useful!). Quick delacing to the point where the laces coule be run properly and it was fixed. NOT a problem.

Wonderful shoes.

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Why Did I Not Realize This Before Now?

Somewhere around 50 years late? *sigh*

OK, I was a fairly bright (never so-called “genius” level bright, but not intellectually dim, either) teenager. Oh, I was completely clueless, ignorant and could almost be classed as a zombie in all regards except for intellectual curiosity. A genuine nerd before such things were so labeled. An Odd, if ever there were one. I did have friends, but that’s ALL due to their friendliness (well, perhaps save for another Odd I connected with due to his parents’ long-standing friendship with my parents, and their awareness of our similar Odd-ness *heh*).

So, there I was at fourteen pitching the idea that my parents spend some of “my” money (long story involving an insurance settlement for injuries directly and completely caused by a neighbor’s stupidity and paid for by their car insurance) to buy a set of The Great Books of the Western World. Sold it. They bought the set. It thereafter “lived” by my bed until I got married, its authors works my constant companions.

Slide ahead a year from the purchase. I had just about completed a recovery and rehabilitation from the damage done me by “New Math”–said rehabilitation at the hands of a great math teacher (thank you, Mrs. Heinz, wherever you are!) via a year of high school geometry. Maths became enjoyable again. And then. . . Newton’s Principia Mathematica, though not in Latin (a language I still have no real facility with). Why not? It was really just an extension of geometry, since ALL Newton’s development of calculus in it were geometrically-inspired, driven, and derived. Oh, I won’t say I mastered Newton’s developments as an autodidact at the age of fifteen. No, I certainly did not, but. . .

Fast forward to my first year of calculus class. The teacher drew me apart after the first exam and required me to retest on the material, using different test problems, because I had scored 100% without writing in any of the intermediate steps between problem and answer, and I could offer nothing except, “Well, it seems obvious.”

So, retest. Same results. Puzzled him, and even I was puzzled as time went on and I saw other students I knew were brighter than I was have to work through the steps.

Just this evening, prompted by a mention of Newton’s approach to calculus in a novel, I recalled how much fin working through Principia had been a couple of years before that calculus class and the light dawned: I wasn’t just “seeing the answer” through some sort of intuitive insight. No, it was just the echo of having played around with Newton a couple of years before.

Now, I’m not as mentally sharp in intellectual pursuits as I was when I was a teenager, but I still enjoy working through concepts, and yes, even maths, to arrive at new and interesting ideas or learn new things about, well, just about anything. I’m still curious and enjoy poking the bear of my ignorance, prodding it into learning something new, so at least I still have that. No, I don’t learn languages as easily as I once did, and yes new concepts take a wee tad more effort to work out than I recall once being the case, but such things are still fun.

Still, why the heck did it take something like 50 years for me to make the connection between playing with Principia and the way calculus seemed so easy? Cluelessness. *heh* I still got it!

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Sometimes, Basic Skepticism Isn’t Enough

When I was first exposed to the Internet, I had already had exposure to BBSes, mailing lists, and more. Those ARCHIE, VERONICA and GOPHER searches offered me amazing tools to dig into academic and other resources for information and just knocked my socks off.

So, I’ve always viewed the Internet primarily as a research tool. When doing research on any academic topic, the general procedure, back in those long ago days of yore when colleges and universities were repositories of knowledge and literacy, and training grounds for critical thinking, involved a LOT of sifting and winnowing, comparison of purported facts, sources and documentation, and the eventual selection of most reliable sources and facts.

I guess I just unconsciously and tenaciously hung onto the misconception that most–or at least many–folks treated presentations of information on the Internet that way for some time, but slowly I began to realize that–by far–most folks just turn to “information” received from Internet organs for confirmation of their biases, not for real information.

And then I woke up, looked around me and realized that the relationship between most folks and (most) information has been that way all along, and getting even more so as time has passed.

Sad. Real stories are much more powerful than fiction, but ready acceptance of lies by lazy, bigoted, ignorant folks seems to be more powerful still.

Discouraging.

Along with the Internet being used as a disinformation organ by so many, in similar manner to the way the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind uses TV, radio, movies, newspapers and magazines to spread propaganda and plain bald-faced lies, the schools have been churning out both illiterates and a-literates at an alarming rate, “products” who lack even the basic tools to see that they are willing, even complicit, victims of the Dunning-Kruger Effect who think they are competent to discern truth from lies, fact from fiction, etc. . . but are not.

Tired of all the stupidity passing itself off as punditry (and being lapped up by the sheeple). Tired of social media devolving, as such things do, into nothing but stupid repetitions of the latest fantasies or silly “memes” that are little but propaganda for the a-literate.

Just tired, period, I guess.

Maybe I’ll take a nap.

Meanwhile, I’ll continue to trust Internet sources to be untrustworthy until they demonstrate their material is reliable.

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Almost heaven. . .

. . . but not West Virginia.

(slightly) Early lunch. Sitting back with a nearly perfect grilled cheese sandwich (on rye bread w/sautéed onion), some tomato slices, corn salsa and chips.

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*sigh* Is It Just Me?

While reading my pdf copy of Korsybski’s “Science and Sanity,” I found myself wanting to correct minor errors of punctuation, probably introduced by the conversion from hardcopy and not caught by the line editor. The text itself seems perfectly logical–if dense and sometimes even obscurantist (though I am assured that is by design)–and without any obvious errors. It’s just that periods in the middle of sentences irritate me.

Or. . . did Korzybski do that intentionally for that reason? Just to thump that bone on folks like me? I’d not put it past him. . . *heh*

BTW, naturally each chapter in the pdf copy is separately password protected (because the copy I have is available only in discrete chapters), so I can’t correct them w/o cracking the password (probably doable with the tools I have on hand or can access), but that’s just too much like work. *heh*

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Well, Glad That’s Settled. (I hope. . . )

Watching a Holmes rerun–actually a pretty “not all that bad” show. (The “Mary Watson, Assassin” episode) Turned to my Wonder Woman and asked her if she had been an assassin all throughout our married life. Glad she said, “no,” (though with a sly smile; what does that mean? *heh*), cos that would’ve required Grand Master level dissimulation. . . 😉

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We Need More “Assisted Living Facilities”

But of different classes.

I think the time has come to establish Assisted Computing Facilities for people who are too stupid to own or operate computers, but who nevertheless own or want to operate them, to live in.

“Here, dearie; let me make that mouse click for you.”

And then, of course, it is long past time to establish Assisted English Facilities for self-made morons who butcher both spoken and written English to live in. ( Yeh, I’m looking at 80% plus of people on social media, bloggers, published authors and their editors, etc.). It’s a HUGE market. Every time some self-made moron butchered the English language in speech or text, that moron would have his own “editor” to slap him on the knuckles with a ruler and berate him with a correction. The morons would never learn, of course, but the individual “editors” would at least enjoy themselves.

The problem *sigh* with the Assisted English Facilities would be finding enough people who are actually literate in English. Oh, well.

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It’s. . . the little things

1981-1989 was consumed by work. I paid attention to “news” only whenever it had strictly local or serious national import, so I missed ALL details surrounding news of a serial killer’s apprehension in 1988–an event that might have been interesting to me. . . had I caught a few pieces of information–because it wasn’t of local or national importance. Yeh, yeh, it was news, but not really in any way important except to the community where it happened. (Network–and now cable–“news” manufactures national “importance” to local stories all the time, but it’s a fake “importance”.)

What was interesting to me, years later when I learned about details, is that the guy started his killing two years after I had moved from the area where he was operating. “The area”? I once lived four blocks from the house where the guy lived and killed, just barely out of the “good part of the ghetto” (as it was often referred to by its denizens). When we (my Wonder Woman, our daughter and I) moved from the area, we were living in the “good part of the ghetto,” five blocks away from the (future) “kill house” and working (my Wonder Woman and I; our daughter was not yet a year old *heh*) three blocks from where the guy ended up killing six men.

Missed it by that much.

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A Reader’s POV

I read a lot of books, by most folks’ measures. In the last few years, the mix has skewed more strongly toward fiction, partly as a result of reading so many articles and blog posts online–a real mixed bag of (mostly) non-fiction. I do still read non-fiction books, though, although the mix there is tending more toward DIY books of various kinds, now, with fewer and fewer sci-tech, philosophy, history, and suchlike.

How many is “a lot”? Generally more than one/day, a little more than twice as many as the average American reads each year,* according to some, but nothing to brag about. The only reason I say as much is that I think–perhaps–I have some sort of feel about what’s being published nowadays, both from “traditional” publishing and “indie” publishing, and I have to say, it’s mostly crap.

You read that right. I read more than a book a day, but I start and “circular file” at least 2 more that aren’t worth my time. And what makes them not worth my time?

  • jejune plots, characters, dialog, and narration that could be better done by the average lobotomized fifth grader
  • execrable English: everything from words misused (MANY of them!) to grammar apparently straight from a reference titled, “Stupid English for Stupid People”
  • an insulting lack of homework/research done and overall dumbfounding ignorance about topics keyed to plot or characterization (example: when a writer doesn’t know the difference between a semi-automatic firearm and a revolver but is writing a character whose weapons proficiency is key, it’s insulting)
  • baffling, completely, totally and absolutely stupid lack of internal agreement: Hey! That truck the character is now driving was a mini-van on the previous page!

And that’s just considering the fiction. On non-fiction, consider instructions in a DIY book to do things on a project in a way that WILL NOT WORK, CANNOT WORK, ARE COMPLETELY STUPID. Insulting the reader or targeting stupid people as the writer’s intended market? Either way, crap.

And no, let me repeat: these issues are not limited to “indie” books. The standards for both text and editing in books being published–by whatever means–is in the toilet nowadays.

But. . . of the books I give a shot at my eye time, one in three is still worth reading, so there’s that. *sigh*

Still, that’s slightly better than the one in five or six links to new (to me) voices on the Internet that are worth reading. That’s ~16%-20% of the links I follow from articles, searches, etc. Not bad, really, when talking about the interwebs. So, why I expect better from published (by whatever means) books? Because these writers expect to be paid for their writing. If they’re going to be paid, they ought to make sure they have the chops to write well and they ought to do their homework and PAY FOR LITERATE copy editing and line editing, since few writers are capable of performing those tasks themselves. (I have read advance reader copies–pre-editing–from a few writers that are remarkably clean, well-edited already by the writers, but such writers are few and far between.)

Note to writers: LEARN how to write. If you want to write in English, LEARN THE LANGUAGE. No, growing up speaking it doesn’t count. READ a LOT of well-written text. Concentrate on writers who can really write. No, not writers who write like you do. (In another recent post, I suggested a couple of writers whose command of English exceeded that of 99% of writers today. That sort of writer.) From there, proceed to writer who really challenge you, but STAY AWAY FROM SUCKITUDINOUS FICTION! After a few years focused on well-written text, then try writing again. Next: Find editors/proofreaders outside your circle of friends and acquaintances, editors/proofreaders who are more literate, better-read than you are. Pay them what they’re worth to fix your crap.

That might make an otherwise bad piece of dreck worth reading, IF you do the rest of your homework and either have an interesting story to tell or a useful skill to impart.

Maybe.

One of the funniest/stupidest things I’ve seen in a recent “slush pile reject” was a repeated misuse of “ridden,” as in “the bullet-ridden car” referring to a car that had been thoroughly riddled with bullets. A sure sign of an a-literate writer whose exceptionally weak verbal vocabulary exceeds that of his reading vocabulary. The rest of the thing wasn’t any better, but I did waste 20 minutes on it, just to be as fair as possible.

*Excluding those who claim to have read no books, the average read (by those who have read any books at all) is generally reported as ~7. Oh, no reference/link? Use your search-fu, Grasshopper. 😉