Learning by the cat method.

My cat peed on one of my books. It was a direct result of my testing Mark Twain's claim that if you hold a cat by the tail you will learn things you cannot learn any other way. That cat was out for revenge. We both learned from the experience.

What I think about learning something new is that it's also a good idea to start at the bottom and work your way up. The only exception is swimming. In swimming you should start on top of the water and try to stay there. That's the whole point of swimming. Swimming is something everybody should know how to do. There are some who never learn how. I'm a pretty logical thinker so it also stands to reason that any body lined with fat would float and therefore swimming would be easy. I know this to be untrue. Take my corpulent body for example. It does not float and consequently I can't swim. I've preached many long stirring sermons to myself exhorting the virtues of posessing that lifesaving ability. But the awful truth is that I just never got the knack of synchronizing my arms and legs. Instead each limb operates independently and seems totally unaware of what the other three are doing. The result is ugly. The last time I was in a pool I beat the water madly into a froth of foam as I sunk slowly to the bottom. This amazed the lifeguard and the small crowd who had gathered at the edge of the pool to watch. After reviving me the lifeguard told me kindly that it wasn't my fault that I couldn't swim. The crowd nodded in silent unison at his thoughtful comment and many smiled encouragingly at me and I felt better about myself.

So the long and short of it is that I don't venture into water above my knees. I will admit to being afraid, but not of water. I'm afraid that there is something very big with sharp white teeth deep under the water that is going to rise up and bite me. I am sure there are others out there like me.

As I have been going through the krl2pt0 training I have been offered up a splendid opportunity to find those other people like me. In addition, I've listened to podcasts, signed up for a del.icio.us account and collected websites on many of my interests, fears & phobias and have stumbled across an assortment of astounding and startling information that I had never given much thought.

I have to admit to being significantly cranky a few times when I was struggling with a particular assignment that was proving to be more formidable than trying to get a toilet seat cover to stay on long enough to get seated on it before the whole thing slides into the water or the floor. Sometimes I felt wildly befuddled by it all. I have a history with IT things. Normally when someone from IT tries to elucidate me to the wonders of the virtural world an odd fuzzy buzzing emitts from somewhere deep within my brain until I can't hear a thing they are saying and my lazy eye begins to wonder. Shortly I begin to feel like an abysmally stupid pinhead and spend my time smiling and nodding encouragingly, trying to pretend I'm not a dimwitted booby.

But this time it is different. I have the feeling that if I keep at it that damned buzzing will stop and I will end up learning a lot and I'll be quite chipper and pleased with myself. I've already had an exhilarating learning experience with a podcast on zombies. I learned the darnest things and have a completely new outlook on that hatchet in the library closet that is part of our disaster kit. It is kept right next to the courier boxes. Tune in next week for the rest of the story.

Carrying water in a sieve & Dear Abby

You won't put out a fire by carrying water from a well in a sieve. I'm not a certified firefighter nor a pyromaniac and I've not tried it out, but I'm pretty sure this is true. There are other truism bantered about that I would just as soon not try out either. Ignorance is bliss is one of them.

I knew a man once who everyone considered a little light in the noodle. In fact, his whole family was considered light in the brain department. I have no idea why this was so. It just was. Their family name was Hereford. Like the cow. I'm sure this was coincidental. I recall my father telling the story of this family driving down a country road when the back seat door of the car flew open and one of the three kids in the back seat tumbled out. As the story goes, they didn't know what to do and after an loud argument between the parents and the two remaining children they stopped the car to discuss what to do next. After more deliberation they concluded that they should back up the car and see if they could find the missing youngster along the road somewhere. Of course they ran over him while backing up.

Please keep in mind that this is supposed to be a true story and that this family was an unfortunate a group of related innocents who would easily qualify for the featherweight division in mental expertise. They were not ignorant. They were all stupid, my father said, and sadly there was nothing that could be done about it.

As I venture valiantly into the world of social bookmarking, tagging and tag clouds, I keep the Hereford family in mind. I do this because it plainly shows the difference between those who can, those who can't and those who won't. I have a lot to learn and if I keep at it some of it will slide off but some of it will stick. As my father would say, I don't have the Hereford excuse for not learning.

"It's true that a little learning is a dangerous thing," Abigail Van Buren said, "but it still beats total ignorance." I think Abbey has a point.

My feet used to be small; another musing

When I was born my feet were very small. The older I get the larger they grow. If this continues by the time I'm planted six feet under the soil my toes will be sticking out of the ground.

Of the new do-hinkey's I'm going to be learning this year why my feet are expanding is just one among many questions that have occurred to me since reading the article on 43 things to learn about. I've decided to start close to home. I'm determined to learn how to unlock the lock box that holds the key to my house should I forget or lose my keys. I think this is a smart move. Next, there is my digital camera that currently I can only turn on and off, then I'll learn to adjust my car radio & discover what all those mysterious buttons & dials really do. I'm going to make myself sit down and read that 108 page book on my new cell phone. I'm sure that phone can do surprising things like maybe teleportation. {If I'm suddenly gone then you'll know that this is the case.} There is such an array of new tools, implements, paraphernalia, phobias and accouterments to learn that the list will be endless. It is a time to be glad. A time for change.

There is nothing quite like change. Change can be good as long as it doesn't invlove something on me sagging. I'm determined to retool my cognitive & emotional functions to embrace an altered terra firma. I think the word I want is reformation. Yes. That is it! There will be a reformation in my life. Now I'm really up for and dedicated to making a change. It will be a giant leap forward. It doesn't matter if I feel like a puny turtle trapped in a biosphere of warp-speed rabbits; I've been given the tools to jump aboard, to learn, to grow and to pass it on to others. Hey, it kinda' sounds like fun.
The more I learn the more I like it.

Butter My Butt & Other Musings

Well, butter my butt and call me toast! Old hounds and nublings can stumble upon the darnest stuff on and in this newfangled electronic world & there seems to be something hot off the griddle nearly every dang day! Makes me wonder what bizasrre, peculiar, curious and modernized oddity will crop up next. I do believe that this unfamiliar gadgit has transformed and reinvigorated my lazy brain into an unrelenting industirious and diligent erudition gismo, wanting to launch itself into the vast uncharted waters of this callow titillating world. It is my goal to soon become a crackerjack prodigy or better yet a genius or maestro mavian adept at and practiced in the intricate details of e-everything. If not this, then what? Prehaps spimply able to swim with some confidence into unsettled lands and return to shore without getting lost. This would do.