What I Learned Today
What I Learned Today
(This will be a collection of likely short entries over time. Many mundane, or only interesting in that, for someone of my age and “supposed” intelligence, I don't already know “that”. Why I'm keeping track of these I'm nor sure yet, at this beginning. I think perhaps mostly to laugh at myself - that and, I've been learning recently that I have much less memory than before, and this will give me a place to keep track of what I want other people to teach me. Lastly, for anyone bored enough to read this particular topic, maybe there will be a nugget in here that they don't know either. Who knows?
--------Some entries will be about life, many will be about technology or acquiring other tidbits of knowledge in various areas, and some will show what I'm interested in at the time. )
Life lessons/ People Lessons: 12/7/2010
>> There is probably no point in asking a young drummer, who is mostly a computer guy anyway, anything about music theory. It was a pretty rudimentary question, actually, and after the third try rephrasing the question, I was teaching him! Still didn't have my answer, though.
>> If the librarian at the reference desk seems to be an idiot within the first 30 seconds, she doesn't get any smarter five minutes later, nor two hours later, nor on your 53rd question (which I wouldn't have had to ask if she knew the answer to #1!)
>> It is much more exhausting to judge everything on its own merits and not just accept what the general crowd embraces. And exhausting to not just espouse brand loyalty. I have to wade through a lot of true junk, and search in so many more places to end up with the same amount of likes as the idiotic public.
What I Learned Today - 12/7/2010
>> I'm not the only one who doesn't know “how many years are in a generation”. It popped into my head today, has done before, but this time I actually asked that almighty, know-everything resource - Ask.com. (Sarcasm here, of course - because, if you didn't know it, Ask.com is answered quite often by the general public - well, not the very stupidest, of course, since they don't know how to use the internet, nor spell “Ask” - and some even pronounce it “Ax”.) But apparently, it's a question with several answers.
What I'd Like to Know Today
>> That young drummer mentioned above (my waiter) claimed all you need to play Rock music on the guitar is four chords. FOUR? I thought it was only THREE. What's the fourth one? I know 1, 4, and 5, or 5(seventh).
>> I need to find some Germans. I want something translated that seems to be full of slang, so free translation websites I've found aren't helping. And I need just someone who can pronounce a few lines.
>> Cordless Headphones: I've recently learned that there is such a thing as cordless headphones for my laptop. I'd like to know prices (cheap as I can stand the quality of), brands, types, and if there is anything difficult or anything I should know about before making such a purchase.
>> Miss Fussy here is having doubts over whether I know how to use the words “its” and “it's” correctly in every case. It's bugging me. Off to search the internet for a grammar website. I've looked before, unsuccessfully.
>>(Note: 12/10/2010 - Found out via YouTube rather accidentally that the almighty fourth chord I didn't know was 6(minor). Stumble around enough and you just might learn something. Funny that it came just when I wanted to know.)
What I learned today - 12/15/2010
>> Never ball up your cheap earbud-type headphones and shove them in your pants pocket for a moment unless you spent considerable time back in the seventies learning the stupid “art” of Macrame....and would enjoy the “challenge” of indulging in this art in reverse for at least ten minutes.
What I Learned Recently - (before I started keeping track)
>> Generation “Gap”? = It is pretty nigh impossible to impress young people with recent historical anything, even extremely intelligent ones. (It's not that I DIDN'T know this, but I'd never really tried before.) They just can't step out of their own reality far enough to grasp any other reality or context. That, and they SO don't care to try. What I DID learn that surprised me, is that it's even hard for my own age group and even ME to do this.
I was getting my first real exposure to the Beach Boys, upon the prompting of a friend, who told me my musical education was incomplete without it. Now, I'm “supposed” to be somewhat in tune with music as a topic, and I used to think, before just this, that I was rather perceptive and able to step outside myself. And yet, even though it was firmly pointed out to me some things that were so amazing about this group, in that they were the first, made such innovative strides in the business, how music today is still built upon their work, that sort of thing - still, having not been there at the start, and catching up so long after, and having been exposed to what has come after as a continuing RESULT of that groundbreaking - even I was having a really difficult time hearing it in the music and being suitably impressed. So, my result was less of a music lesson and more of a life lesson. I find what I learned about myself both interesting and embarrassing.
>> What I already knew - in the above situation, for example, I knew that I would judge what I heard ONLY on its merits. This would be easy in the above case, since I was not involved from the beginning and not burdened with any hero-worship, or whatever allows the general idiot-public to fawn over everything a musical group presents simply because of previous fame. I have always been far too honest to get away with this comfortable stance - choosing something based on sheer stubborn brand loyalty. In fact, in teaching small children/raising teenagers, one of the best lessons to teach them is to BEWARE of something that is widely and wildly popular, and to distrust multiple sequels of something. That's just the creators riding out that gravy train for as long as possible, milking out every penny until they actually have to produce something new. Usually, each sequel is worse than the previous, after all, it doesn't need to be all that good. Half the population will buy into the product like mindless lemmings. But I've digressed.
What Someone Else Didn't Know
(Thought I'd add this as a sub-topic, because SOMETIMES, only rarely though, I meet someone more ridiculously stupid than I am. Gee, that sounded awful..... Actually, just sometimes, what other people just learned is amazing or very funny, so I thought I'd save a space for those times.)
For Example:
Big Funny !
(Granted, as a society, we have divided knowledge along certain lines. Gender is one definite example. For some reason, we expect every male to know exactly what's wrong under the hood of the car, and every female to know exactly how to make even a sick baby shut UP in the middle of the night. Divorce throws a huge and sudden monkey wrench into this. Uh......what's a monkey wrench?)
My friend Annie, found herself in such a situation. Actually, I found her in a situation, and to me it was HILARIOUS !!! It was funny even if you DIDN'T know the answer to her problem. In fact, others of you may have tried the same thing, or just given up. That's was what was so hilarious to me - that she didn't just give up, and what lengths she went to.
She was “squatting” with me for a few months while her divorce was in the works, and therefore, she didn't have her own possessions, nor know where all of mine were. (Small excuse, since the answer was at her fingertips, as you'll see.) Another bit of background you need to know is that I don't “drink”. Nothing, ever. She's not a lush, mind you, but she does have a beer now and then, etc. So....I come home from wherever to find her grunting and straining in her effort to open a bottle of wine. No corkscrew anywhere, of course, and she's wondering how ANYone can get past 40 years old without a corkscrew. And she's turned the kitchen upside down (neatly) and wracked her poor, over-stressed brain. What to open it with? How many ideas can YOU come up with? In a 1-bedroom apartment, with no garage, basement, husband/tools, etc. She'd even wandered a bit amongst the sewing room items in desperation, I think. Here's where I found her... Over by the balcony, with the sliding glass door just open enough to allow the cord to go through without losing the cat.....
Cord? What cord? The cord to the ELECTRIC DRILL, of course! How else do non-drinkers or the terribly desperate open a wine bottle? But here's the kicker....Having never held a drill in her whole life and hardly ever even seen it in action (Her ex was quite different from mine - a drinker instead of a putzer.), she didn't really even notice that the drill had the Phillip's Head screwdriver bit in it, or she had no idea where to look amongst my tools for that little plastic case with the bits, NOR did she have a CLUE about what a “drill chuck” was. When I mentioned the word “chuck”, her eyes lit up, and she said she was about to do just that.....”chuck” the bottle off the balcony in frustration ! She was standing in a hilarious little pile of chewed up cork bits, and so determined !!! Just adorable!
What I Learned Today - 12/19/2010
>> Did you know that the top row of keys were arranged so the typewriter salesmen could easily type the word "typewriter"?
>> Canned ravioli is questionable “cuisine” at best. (Who doesn't already know that?)
Later on, I was not feeling well for some reason.
And, in case you ever wondered, the er... flavor is not improved in reverse.
(This will be a collection of likely short entries over time. Many mundane, or only interesting in that, for someone of my age and “supposed” intelligence, I don't already know “that”. Why I'm keeping track of these I'm nor sure yet, at this beginning. I think perhaps mostly to laugh at myself - that and, I've been learning recently that I have much less memory than before, and this will give me a place to keep track of what I want other people to teach me. Lastly, for anyone bored enough to read this particular topic, maybe there will be a nugget in here that they don't know either. Who knows?
--------Some entries will be about life, many will be about technology or acquiring other tidbits of knowledge in various areas, and some will show what I'm interested in at the time. )
Life lessons/ People Lessons: 12/7/2010
>> There is probably no point in asking a young drummer, who is mostly a computer guy anyway, anything about music theory. It was a pretty rudimentary question, actually, and after the third try rephrasing the question, I was teaching him! Still didn't have my answer, though.
>> If the librarian at the reference desk seems to be an idiot within the first 30 seconds, she doesn't get any smarter five minutes later, nor two hours later, nor on your 53rd question (which I wouldn't have had to ask if she knew the answer to #1!)
>> It is much more exhausting to judge everything on its own merits and not just accept what the general crowd embraces. And exhausting to not just espouse brand loyalty. I have to wade through a lot of true junk, and search in so many more places to end up with the same amount of likes as the idiotic public.
What I Learned Today - 12/7/2010
>> I'm not the only one who doesn't know “how many years are in a generation”. It popped into my head today, has done before, but this time I actually asked that almighty, know-everything resource - Ask.com. (Sarcasm here, of course - because, if you didn't know it, Ask.com is answered quite often by the general public - well, not the very stupidest, of course, since they don't know how to use the internet, nor spell “Ask” - and some even pronounce it “Ax”.) But apparently, it's a question with several answers.
What I'd Like to Know Today
>> That young drummer mentioned above (my waiter) claimed all you need to play Rock music on the guitar is four chords. FOUR? I thought it was only THREE. What's the fourth one? I know 1, 4, and 5, or 5(seventh).
>> I need to find some Germans. I want something translated that seems to be full of slang, so free translation websites I've found aren't helping. And I need just someone who can pronounce a few lines.
>> Cordless Headphones: I've recently learned that there is such a thing as cordless headphones for my laptop. I'd like to know prices (cheap as I can stand the quality of), brands, types, and if there is anything difficult or anything I should know about before making such a purchase.
>> Miss Fussy here is having doubts over whether I know how to use the words “its” and “it's” correctly in every case. It's bugging me. Off to search the internet for a grammar website. I've looked before, unsuccessfully.
>>(Note: 12/10/2010 - Found out via YouTube rather accidentally that the almighty fourth chord I didn't know was 6(minor). Stumble around enough and you just might learn something. Funny that it came just when I wanted to know.)
What I learned today - 12/15/2010
>> Never ball up your cheap earbud-type headphones and shove them in your pants pocket for a moment unless you spent considerable time back in the seventies learning the stupid “art” of Macrame....and would enjoy the “challenge” of indulging in this art in reverse for at least ten minutes.
What I Learned Recently - (before I started keeping track)
>> Generation “Gap”? = It is pretty nigh impossible to impress young people with recent historical anything, even extremely intelligent ones. (It's not that I DIDN'T know this, but I'd never really tried before.) They just can't step out of their own reality far enough to grasp any other reality or context. That, and they SO don't care to try. What I DID learn that surprised me, is that it's even hard for my own age group and even ME to do this.
I was getting my first real exposure to the Beach Boys, upon the prompting of a friend, who told me my musical education was incomplete without it. Now, I'm “supposed” to be somewhat in tune with music as a topic, and I used to think, before just this, that I was rather perceptive and able to step outside myself. And yet, even though it was firmly pointed out to me some things that were so amazing about this group, in that they were the first, made such innovative strides in the business, how music today is still built upon their work, that sort of thing - still, having not been there at the start, and catching up so long after, and having been exposed to what has come after as a continuing RESULT of that groundbreaking - even I was having a really difficult time hearing it in the music and being suitably impressed. So, my result was less of a music lesson and more of a life lesson. I find what I learned about myself both interesting and embarrassing.
>> What I already knew - in the above situation, for example, I knew that I would judge what I heard ONLY on its merits. This would be easy in the above case, since I was not involved from the beginning and not burdened with any hero-worship, or whatever allows the general idiot-public to fawn over everything a musical group presents simply because of previous fame. I have always been far too honest to get away with this comfortable stance - choosing something based on sheer stubborn brand loyalty. In fact, in teaching small children/raising teenagers, one of the best lessons to teach them is to BEWARE of something that is widely and wildly popular, and to distrust multiple sequels of something. That's just the creators riding out that gravy train for as long as possible, milking out every penny until they actually have to produce something new. Usually, each sequel is worse than the previous, after all, it doesn't need to be all that good. Half the population will buy into the product like mindless lemmings. But I've digressed.
What Someone Else Didn't Know
(Thought I'd add this as a sub-topic, because SOMETIMES, only rarely though, I meet someone more ridiculously stupid than I am. Gee, that sounded awful..... Actually, just sometimes, what other people just learned is amazing or very funny, so I thought I'd save a space for those times.)
For Example:
Big Funny !
(Granted, as a society, we have divided knowledge along certain lines. Gender is one definite example. For some reason, we expect every male to know exactly what's wrong under the hood of the car, and every female to know exactly how to make even a sick baby shut UP in the middle of the night. Divorce throws a huge and sudden monkey wrench into this. Uh......what's a monkey wrench?)
My friend Annie, found herself in such a situation. Actually, I found her in a situation, and to me it was HILARIOUS !!! It was funny even if you DIDN'T know the answer to her problem. In fact, others of you may have tried the same thing, or just given up. That's was what was so hilarious to me - that she didn't just give up, and what lengths she went to.
She was “squatting” with me for a few months while her divorce was in the works, and therefore, she didn't have her own possessions, nor know where all of mine were. (Small excuse, since the answer was at her fingertips, as you'll see.) Another bit of background you need to know is that I don't “drink”. Nothing, ever. She's not a lush, mind you, but she does have a beer now and then, etc. So....I come home from wherever to find her grunting and straining in her effort to open a bottle of wine. No corkscrew anywhere, of course, and she's wondering how ANYone can get past 40 years old without a corkscrew. And she's turned the kitchen upside down (neatly) and wracked her poor, over-stressed brain. What to open it with? How many ideas can YOU come up with? In a 1-bedroom apartment, with no garage, basement, husband/tools, etc. She'd even wandered a bit amongst the sewing room items in desperation, I think. Here's where I found her... Over by the balcony, with the sliding glass door just open enough to allow the cord to go through without losing the cat.....
Cord? What cord? The cord to the ELECTRIC DRILL, of course! How else do non-drinkers or the terribly desperate open a wine bottle? But here's the kicker....Having never held a drill in her whole life and hardly ever even seen it in action (Her ex was quite different from mine - a drinker instead of a putzer.), she didn't really even notice that the drill had the Phillip's Head screwdriver bit in it, or she had no idea where to look amongst my tools for that little plastic case with the bits, NOR did she have a CLUE about what a “drill chuck” was. When I mentioned the word “chuck”, her eyes lit up, and she said she was about to do just that.....”chuck” the bottle off the balcony in frustration ! She was standing in a hilarious little pile of chewed up cork bits, and so determined !!! Just adorable!
What I Learned Today - 12/19/2010
>> Did you know that the top row of keys were arranged so the typewriter salesmen could easily type the word "typewriter"?
>> Canned ravioli is questionable “cuisine” at best. (Who doesn't already know that?)
Later on, I was not feeling well for some reason.
And, in case you ever wondered, the er... flavor is not improved in reverse.