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elorie
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
I cannot change a diaper and I have no plans to learn how. I'm not sure why this is not only in this list, but given pride of place as the very first thing. This is not an important life skill when one has no children and is sterilized.
I cannot plan an invasion and I would really rather everyone just left each other alone.
I cannot butcher a hog and would probably become an ovo-lacto vegetarian if I had to live off the land. I might eventually come to terms with killing fish, but I don't think I would be capable of killing a bird, reptile, or mammal unless it was that or starvation, and even then, a lack of skills and strength would get in the way.
I cannot conn a ship. LOL, the very idea! I can see how this might be useful to know, though.
I cannot design a building. Any shelter I built would be very crude indeed.
I can write a sonnet, but not a good one.
I can balance accounts. This I can definitely do. Yeehaw.
I cannot build a wall that is worth the name, except out of Lego. Are you an inch tall and made out of plastic? No? Bummer.
I cannot set a bone.
I don't think I can comfort the dying, although I've never tried.
I can take orders, although I first have to internally agree that the person trying to give them has the right to boss me around. I take direction from work supervisors just fine; my mother has not been able to tell me what to do since I was about nineteen.
I don't give orders very well. I am one of those people who takes a while to trust others to do a good job, and would often rather do something myself than delegate.
I can cooperate, but I am not "a team player" in the outgoing, encouraging sense. I prefer to divide up a task logically between people and then be left alone to do my piece.
Solve what kind of equations? Algebraic? Trigonometric? Expressions in integral calculus? I have learned to do all of these things in the past, although all I can do now off the top of my head is very basic algebra, solving for the third side of a right triangle, and the most elementary differentials. (I never did wrap my head around analytic geometry very well in the first place.)
Analyze what kinds of new problems? I think, maybe? You'll have to be more specific.
I've never pitched manure in the sense meant here, and probably don't have the endurance to do it for very long, but I might be able not to stab myself or others with the fork.
I cannot program a computer, at least not in any current language, or to do anything much beyond "Hello World". (Does this include writing basic HTML? I can do that, although my skills stop around tables and frames.
I can cook a tasty meal.
I cannot fight efficiently.
I have no idea if I can die gallantly as I have not tried that, although a "gallant" death doesn't sound like one that appeals to me. "Peacefully" or "quietly" would be more like it.
5.5 out of 20. Yay! I suck!
elorieA human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
I cannot change a diaper and I have no plans to learn how. I'm not sure why this is not only in this list, but given pride of place as the very first thing. This is not an important life skill when one has no children and is sterilized.
I cannot plan an invasion and I would really rather everyone just left each other alone.
I cannot butcher a hog and would probably become an ovo-lacto vegetarian if I had to live off the land. I might eventually come to terms with killing fish, but I don't think I would be capable of killing a bird, reptile, or mammal unless it was that or starvation, and even then, a lack of skills and strength would get in the way.
I cannot conn a ship. LOL, the very idea! I can see how this might be useful to know, though.
I cannot design a building. Any shelter I built would be very crude indeed.
I can write a sonnet, but not a good one.
I can balance accounts. This I can definitely do. Yeehaw.
I cannot build a wall that is worth the name, except out of Lego. Are you an inch tall and made out of plastic? No? Bummer.
I cannot set a bone.
I don't think I can comfort the dying, although I've never tried.
I can take orders, although I first have to internally agree that the person trying to give them has the right to boss me around. I take direction from work supervisors just fine; my mother has not been able to tell me what to do since I was about nineteen.
I don't give orders very well. I am one of those people who takes a while to trust others to do a good job, and would often rather do something myself than delegate.
I can cooperate, but I am not "a team player" in the outgoing, encouraging sense. I prefer to divide up a task logically between people and then be left alone to do my piece.
Solve what kind of equations? Algebraic? Trigonometric? Expressions in integral calculus? I have learned to do all of these things in the past, although all I can do now off the top of my head is very basic algebra, solving for the third side of a right triangle, and the most elementary differentials. (I never did wrap my head around analytic geometry very well in the first place.)
Analyze what kinds of new problems? I think, maybe? You'll have to be more specific.
I've never pitched manure in the sense meant here, and probably don't have the endurance to do it for very long, but I might be able not to stab myself or others with the fork.
I cannot program a computer, at least not in any current language, or to do anything much beyond "Hello World". (Does this include writing basic HTML? I can do that, although my skills stop around tables and frames.
I can cook a tasty meal.
I cannot fight efficiently.
I have no idea if I can die gallantly as I have not tried that, although a "gallant" death doesn't sound like one that appeals to me. "Peacefully" or "quietly" would be more like it.
5.5 out of 20. Yay! I suck!
no subject
Date: Jan. 16th, 2008 10:05 pm (UTC)From:Steer it. I would guess "conn" comes from "control" but I don't know. I'm not up on nautical terms.
cob (monolithic adobe)
What can be "monolithic" about adobe? Not built out of blocks? Like if I made a giant pinch-pot and then turned it upside down and carved a door in it?
Thanks for mentioning this, though. I'd always been picturing corn cobs for some reason, and confused as to how those could be used as a building material.
no subject
Date: Jan. 16th, 2008 10:20 pm (UTC)From:> carved a door in it?
The spaces for the doors and windows are created/sculpted while the wall is still wet and pliable, so you don't have to carve them in later.
> what can be monolithic about adobe?
Right, it's not built out of blocks. The mix of clay, sand, and straw is fashioned into loaves which were called "cobs" in Britain. The cobs are worked into the wall so there are no seams.