Oh yeah. My dad's favorite aphorism for figuring out where people are coming from is "watch their feet", meaning look at what they do rather than what they say. My corollary is that the principle is particularly applicable to oneself.
No one's outing themselves, Ogged. You've failed.
That's the worst bit of helpful advice I think I've ever read.
The key to the mind-cleansing part of this exercise was to exclude those things that I don't actively put myself in a position to do, even if I enjoy them.
Yeah, why do all those gay men keep sucking your cock?
5: There's always "Lie still and think of England".
3: Take time for wonder.
Enjoy simple pleasures.
You only fail if you fail to try.
If he's only your half brother, it's not really incest.
Don't you become a worse person simply by trying t be a better person?
Do a lot of people really kid themselves into thinking believe that "helping people" is fun? I'd believe "fulfilling" or "important", but fun?
My specific list isn't important . . .
Au contraire, mon frere. Spill.
10: I find helping people fun.
Even if the people I'm "helping" don't think so.
Let's all use this thread to help ogged become a better person. Surely that will be fun?
look at what they do rather than what they say
Empirical observation of the past 72 hours of my life suggests I really, really like changing infant diapers.
This is the problem with the principle of revealed preferences, btw.
14: Fuck no.
What the hell do you take us for, o earnest (or o-earnest) one?
8:
Work like you don't need money.
Love like you've never been hurt
Dance like no one's watching.
Sure we did, we just aren't revealing the results either.
15: you left out an "into" after "changing".
19: Dammit Jake, you're screwing up our alibi.
15: Well, yes, it works better with some sorts of decisions than others.
This is the problem with the principle of revealed preferences, btw.
But that was the point of "reached a point in my life." In my twenties, who could tell what I really wanted to do and what I was just trying out or aspiring to do? By now, I can see what I've done. I take your point that circumstance can skew the results, but unless my circumstances are going to change drastically, I'm not sure it really matters.
The last bullet in my father's always cocked-and-loaded self-esteem-puncturing gun was always "You do what you want to do."
Just as little me had explained all the reasons why I hadn't obeyed his commands or done compulsory-caring things like written a thank-you note to Grandma, he would say that, meaning, I see who you really are by the depravity and carelessness of your selfish actions.
Oh, sure, he's probably right, in some sense, but it kinda creeps me out to think about everything people do that way.
"Helping people" is quite vague (one might argue that maintaining a blog people like has helped those people). You mean something more specific like "volunteering for charitable causes," right?
"Helping people" was just a (bad) example. It could have been "sex," for all it matters.
7: Don't forget about the power of the accent. Oh, when I think of England...
27: Sex as something you'll listlessly enjoy but not particularly seek out?
It's not listless enjoyment. You can enjoy things tremendously when they happen, but still not seek them out.
There is also the question of states which are essentially byproducts.
I'm not sure how this exercise is different from the "Things, The Awesomeness Of Which You Might Have Momentarily Forgotten" post.
You might like something a lot but not more than the potential high costs of getting it, especially in the face of low probability of obtaining it even once you've paid the cost. That doesn't necessarily reveal that you don't care about some of the nice activities you might get to enjoy if things went well; perhaps you are just risk averse, or pessimistic, or John Emerson.
it was instructive that an honest look at what I've done excluded stuff like "helping people,"
I hope you didn't exclude kicking a man when he's down. 'Cause that's kinda fun. Sometimes. Depending on the man.
32: It's inventory season for OggedCorp.
Yes, one should not reject out of hand the possibility that one is John Emerson.
24: I think you missed one, Clownae (Hint: it involves the internet).
. . . . for all it matters.
It matters. It matters very much. Tell us your list!
It probably is more charitable to get silly naked with the awkward boys who need encouragement than it would be with the debauched rakes who don't. [smacks self. again.]
Okay, I'll go first.
I really like making and drinking tea.
Who's next?
I'm not hiding my list, I just thought it would be boring, and distract from your own inventorying. I came up with
Hanging out with friends.
Working out.
Winning.
Reading.
Listening to music.
Great views.
Watching good TV/Movies.
Like I say, it was helpful for what wasn't on it. The one thing I couldn't decide about was writing, which I've always done in some form, but that might be just a matter of happenstance.
I really let my ninja army go to shit. I feel bad, but you know, I was doing other things.
Something to think about.
24: I think you missed one, Clownae (Hint: it involves the internet).
Yeah, okay, so Unfoggedification goes on the list. Also I omitted "playing music" which is a big source of fun these days.
41: I guess I don't understand how a list like this differentiates any of us, significantly, from any other person. Sure, there are a few differences here and there, but I'm not sure most of our lists aren't pretty much all the same damn stuff.
Why does it matter if it differentiates us?
43: I was kidding anyway. I have a very complex relationship to tea that is not entirely pleasant.
It seems strange to me to list "hanging out with friends" as a hedonistic activity -- it falls clearly into the category of "stuff I do, in which I take incidental pleasure". Meeting up with strangers and near-strangers from the internet, now that is a hedonistic activity.
I really like making and consuming things to eat and drink.
As to the point about what's not on one's list being revealing, isn't a big reason why things like "helping people" are valued pretty highly (at least with lip service) because they're not part of most people's general inclinations, i.e. they're trouble to do and most people don't want to do them, so people who actually do them get respect, and the people who don't talk about how noble such acts are?
46: It seemed like you were drawing novel conclusions about yourself based on your list, but maybe I was reading too much into it.
And "winning". I mean WTF?
This reminds me in a funny way of Lynne Twist's The Soul of Money, which is a bit oversimplified but also a useful way of looking at the world. Her basic argument is that we (Americans, specifically) really do put our money where our mouths are.
This last year I've put a ton of time into improving my Spanish. Now, part of that might have been because I made a small financial investment, but I think most was because that's what I really wanted to do.
Conversely, I keep claiming that I like to go to concerts, and in fact I appear to have fun when I actually go to concerts, but...well...I don't go. Just one in the entire last year.
So yeah, a bit useful, maybe.
(doggedly on-topic post brought to you courtesy of earnestness)
If this project is to figure out what you currently enjoy for the purpose of figuring out what you expect to enjoy in the future allow me to suggest something: if the list has changed over time, the most reasonable thing to expect isn't that it's now reached its final form, it's that it will continue to change (whether it will continue to change at the same rate it has in the past is an interesting question, but I don't feel like discussing derivatives).
I have a very complex relationship to tea that is not entirely pleasant.
Are you sure this reaction isn't instead to something that is almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea?
53: Is it super-lame to argue that the best things in my life are free?
Geeze, clearly I should not post when I'm this tired. The Twist argument is that money signifies where your beliefs/values lie BETTER than your words do. Actions speak louder and all that.
I'm going to bed.
I have a very complex relationship to tea that is not entirely pleasant.
Tea is constantly flirting with you and then you discover it's married?
OT: This is a great article about the relationships military personnel form with their robots. Surely someone's beat me to this.
*The admiration of my peers.
*The delicious refreshment of nature.
*The comfortable solitude of high-minded shit like books and art.
*The reliable thrill of buying other kinds of cool shit.
*The body-punishing relief of vigorous physical exercise.
*Sweet delicious booze.
60: I'm always trying to recreate the perfect tea experience every morning, with very strong Taylors of Harrogate Scottish Breakfast and milk, and the delight grows as the tea-to-milk ratio increases, except for that, when it gets too high, I get suddenly violently ill.
M/tch, I think you were looking for the post where ogged argues that the best way to respect disabled athletes is to hurt them.
63: Kind of like Stan's relationship to females on South Park!
In fact M/lls is looking for that post, but he hasn't hit upon the right search terms yet.
64: I am. Feverishly! How'd you know???
money signifies where your beliefs/values lie BETTER than your words do. Actions speak louder and all that.
Maybe, but taking action doesn't necessarily mean spending money. I really enjoyed going to museums when I was in high school, and spent a huge amount of time in them, but I never spent more than Metro fare to do so since the museums themselves were free.
Except for "winning." While obvious, I'm forced to ask: this is something you've done a lot of?
It's hard to miss "site:unfogged.com basketball retarded" in the referrers, M/tch.
Do you see "being interesting" on my list, B?
71
Makes sense to me. I think he means he will go to great lengths to win.
Excellent. Ogged, James B. Shearer understands you.
since the museums themselves were free
I get the impression this is a DC attitude. Chicago museums are great, and yeah, you can get breaks (coupons, student discounts, etc.), but museums normally cost some amount of money, no? A strongly suggested donation at the least.
I like contemplating ben moping.
Not that I seek it out, but it is pleasant when it happens.
But you like moping too, ben, so I don't see what the problem is. Consenting adults and all, you know.
I like sitting on my ass. And napping. And talking to people. And annoying Ogged.
69: And when you were in high school, perhaps the main currency you had to spend was time (which, remember, is money, so they say)?
Dammit, where the hell is that thread about ogged beating up the mentally challenged?
85: One could, instead, lie down. Or sit on someone's lap. Or on a pillow. Or the cat.
perhaps the main currency you had to spend was time
No, my part-time drug dealing netted a fair amount of cash. I put almost all of it into a retirement account, though. Curse this financial prudence of mine.
85:
WILLIE: ...What is it with you? Somebody drop you on your fucking head?
KID: On my head?
WILLIE: What, are they gonna drop you on somebody else's head?
KID: How can they drop me onto my own head?
WILLIE: Not onto your own h -- ARE YOU FUCKING WITH ME?
88: Or ben's face.
87: Here it is. Still apalling.
No, my part-time drug dealing netted a fair amount of cash. I put almost all of it into a retirement account, though
Probably the best definition of Generation Awesome I've yet seen.
Something else for my list: pwning ogged.
Thanks though, ogged. See, you really do like helping people!
Here ya go, M/tch. Now don't say I've never done anything for you.
Yeah, I think that is the blog equivalent of getting all Kobe on their asses.
I was thinking of it as victory.
You think of LOSING SPECTACULARLY as victory? Okay.
Chicago museums are great
Chicago people the fucking Ghiberti doors are coming your way! Get drunk and go see them. That's a source of pleasure.
I don't know if the pleasures you routinely enjoy necessarily define what you value -- which I read as the impetus for the exercise. I mean, yeah, to an extent. But there are a lot of pleasures that I personally would quite enjoy but don't nearly often enough, not for lack of valuing these things, but for lack of time and opportunity and resources.
Yeah, yeah. Sex being one of those. Charming, engaging men who buy you dinner and tell you they are attracted to you and then go all gentlemanly with the goodnight hug/kiss are rather unbearable even if, realistically, they're being quite sensible. The point being not only that I am pitiable, but that sometimes the pleasures we value dangle just beyond our reach.
Not just sex. But also less obvious things like lying on a beach with a good book. Or on the couch with a good book. Or savoring good food at a great restaurant. Or preparing great food in my kitchen. Or sleeping in on Saturday morning. Oh, to sleep, perchance to dream! Maybe that the pursuit of such things is impeded by responsibilities means deep down I take greater joy in being responsible than any of those things. But that doesn't sound right.
(Lest that sound too whiny, the pleasure I do manage: snuggles with my baby girl, dirty finger nails from digging up weeds, raking the garden patch as if I knew how to tend the soil when I know all I'm really doing is making my own variant of a zen garden spotted with patches of basil and collard greens and thistle, strong coffee with raw sugar and whipping cream, New Tree chocolates.)
Okay, see? Gardening? You can totally have it, DK.
Yeah, see, I call it gardening to make it sound respectable. Really, it's just glorified playing in the mud.
Yeah, gardening is one of those things that I like to think that I like to do, but the available evidence suggests that I really don't. I grow a little basil because I love pesto and a few fruits because they take care of themselves, but that's about as far is it goes.
-Crushing my enemies
-Seeing them driven before me
-Hearing the lamentations of their women
I like driving my car over flowerbeds. I like the crunch.
Get off my crunchy flowerbeds!
Not quite on the cars/gardens thing. I once had an uncle who got an old car stuck in the mud of his farm field and who then decided that ploughing it under with his tractor was the only answer.
Sweah ta Gawd!
I think he was on the retard team that kicked Ogged's ass one year.
Old man Stanley is growing cereal.
Snap, Crackle, and Pop are just a front. I do all the work.
procrastinating
listneing to music
being sad
I'm going to attribute my inability to come up with a list of this sort to my youth.
I'm going to attribute my inability to come up with a list of this sort to teo's youth.
Fuck the available evidence, and fuck any conclusions deduced thereof. People aren't rational, and neither are their behaviors. What people actually do is a poor indicator of their desires. I myself would like to write a 12-part detective series mirroring the the structure of The Second Coming, but do you see me taking creative writing classes? No, I'm sitting here writing comments and AI code.
You do what you want to do.
Speaking as someone with some fairly severe deficits in impulse control, decision making, and executive function, this statement is so wrong it's not even 'wrong', it's just nonsense. It fails to engage the real problems. And I believe it with all my heart and all my soul. Or, at least I do when I'm depressed.
My doctor recently doubled my Prozac dose.
Note: I am reading this thread and posting this rather than work on my resume for a job working with my BFF on game programming for OMG$ / hour.
31: There is also the question of states which are essentially byproducts.
New Jersey, for example.
OK, here's a real answers:
The recent JE spends most of his time on the stupid internet, and that's a real problem (no joke).
JE from 25 year ago to 5 years ago:
1. Reading and occasionally writing
2. Listening to recorded music
3. Drinking
4. Spending time with family / old friends
5. Masturbation (no crying).
1,2,3 often at more or less the same time, 3 and 4 often at the same time.
The JE of 40 to 25 years ago also spent time on political activism, working out, hiking and backpacking, smoking dope, and relationships.
My list:
1. Reading (fiction and non-fiction, academic and non-academic)
2. Listening to music (live and recorded)
3. Playing music [on the guitar] (both at home alone, and in public with other people)
4. Photography
5. Watching TV/movies
6. Spending time with my wife
7. Spending time with family/friends
8. Cooking
9. Drinking
10. Internet stuff
11. Walking
12. Museums/galleries
11 normally combined with 4 and 6 and sometimes 7 and 12 and usually takes up most Sundays. 1, 2, 3, 4 and 8 would be most days.
No implied order of preference in the numbering. There are other things I like -- travel, for example -- which I don't really do very often.
3 and 4 often at the same time
Wait, don't you mean "4 and 5"?
As has already been mentioned, these lists all look pretty similar since we all mostly like doing similar stuff i.e. sport, hobbies, spending time with people we like/love, etc
Forget to mention sport on list, since I do some at least one evening a week.
Tove Jansson defined happiness as a combination of love, work, steak, and coffee.
131 -- where, in a memoir?
Our lists are bound to be fairly similar because we're all the kind of people who spend a fair bit of time in an online community, which is in fact a pretty rare type. Among my friends, I'm the only one who does anything like this. And we don't include, as far as I know, any, say, entrepreneurs, who might presumably have things like "starting a new project" or "making a deal" on their list.
TJ covered the list for entrepreneurs in 109.
Having children greatly complicates this exercise, since you tend to spend your free time doing what they enjoy, rather than what you enjoy. That said, I enjoy getting bent.
136: Mmm. I'm finding this kind of depressing, because what I've done for the last seven years is work (including Internet timewasting at work), chase around after the kids, and read or watch TV before falling asleep.
It's not that it's that bad, but there's something kind of depressing about being told that I really don't want to do anything else, or I'd be doing it.
On the subject of stuff we do and in doing, take incidental pleasure, might I just mention that it's really satisfying to find an elusive bug, and particularly nice when the bug involves a race condition in a multithreaded application?
134: I'm glad you've found your voice again, ogged, after your crushing "victory" of last night. I was afraid that maybe I had silenced you forever.
I think that when you're exhausted from work and parenting, this question doesn't tell you so much. But it does tell you something about your true feelings about leisure-type activities of relatively similar costs. Like, apparently I am more generally interested these days in making soup and doing crosswords than going to (most) concerts, judging by the choices I tend to make. Alternately, this at least reveals that I am profoundly lazy, though that is not really news.
136, 137, 139: Agreed. And yet, there's no question there are plenty of parents out there who find time to do all the fun things they enjoy and maybe not so many of the fun things the kiddies enjoy. That you are prioritzing the kiddies does, in fact, reveal something significant about you.
142: Er, 139 s/b 141. I need to prioritize some coffee!
Sleep. Sleep is really important to me, and when you add up responsibilities and the amount of sleep I think I need, that's pretty much 24 hours a day.
141 & 142. Telling in that regard is what start-em-young, grass-roots activities you have your kids in, to the extent of participating/organizing them yourself. Many of my friends have their kids in soccer or baseball like this, because it's important to them. We've had our kids in performances & recitations, and taken them to plays & concerts in almost exactly the same way, it occurs to me.
146: Good point! And on that note, as I will be helping coach my daughter's baseball team for the first time this year and my recollection of the sport is approaching 20 years out of date, I hereby solicit any recommendations any of you have for good resources on how to teach fundementals to the little rugrats.
re: 147
Snootily pointing out that baseball is a boring sport and they should play soccer instead is, I'm guessing, not the advice you are looking for?
Baseball season follows soccer season in these here parts. She does both. Besides, baseball's America's Pasttime, you friggin' furriner!
re: 149
Ah, OK, that makes sense.
I must admit, Americans must get tired of foreigners telling them their national sport is crap ...
I think the appreciation of the sport must be cultivated. Playing is fun because it requires some athleticism and only a very little endurance/stamina. Not like soccer, which looks awfully tiring with all that running. Watching baseball at a stadium is fun because you can enjoy the beer, the hot dogs, the conversation with people around you, without missing very much of the game. Not like soccer, where it seems you'd have to be paying attention like all the time.
Watching baseball on t.v.? God help me, I can't explain that.
I don't like eating/cooking. The mate goes crazy, because she likes restaurants, and I really would have one meal a day of a ground chuck patty w/cheese, salad and an orange...every day, forever. Hate alcohol, love caffeine * sugar.
Sex is more hassle than its worth, although I like being horny.
I have always, since I was able to walk, loved walking. Sidewalks in neighborhoods, alleys, parks, deep forests. I hate driving. Indifferent to travel, correction, dislike travel as in exotic places. Why? I haven't seen the neighborhood two blocks down yet, or the parks in X city 5 miles North.
Charming, friendly, kind, generous to strangers, literally given the shirt off my back multiple times:I just don't like relationships.
Addicted to the internet.
151: It does have awfully high barriers to entry -- soccer, you can just tell your kid to go play, and they can play some immediately. Baseball takes a suprising amount of skill before you can really play at all. As a non-athlete married to one, I can't imagine successfully coaching Sally and Newt up to the standard they'd need to play Little League around here.
It's just that you have more respect for baseball than you do for soccer, apparently.
I suspect my dislike of baseball is partly through exposure to it as a televised sport.
We play rounders in the UK which is broadly similar to baseball. We played it as kids a fair bit. Soccer was boys only, but in the summer evenings we'd sometimes allow the girls to join in and then we'd play rounders. So I suppose I can see how baseball would be OK to play. Watching it is interminable.
I played softball extremely badly for a couple of years. If your team really sucks, you end up running more.
ttaM, foreigners can't quite appreciate the phenomenology of baseball. Time is supposed to slow down during a game.
Ttam's right. Baseball sucks. At the end of the day, yes, it qualifies as a sport, but so then do log rolling competitions.
Don't try to hoodwink the foreigner, JM.
Baseball is a beautiful thing, haters. (And ttaM, it evolved from rounders.) One's appreciation of it as a spectator sport is directly proportional to one's knowledge of the fine points of the game as well as one's emotional involvement as a fan of a given team. The 2004 ALCS was an epic narrative vastly superior to many works of fiction.
Speaking of time slowing down, has anyone got advice to give me about playing and appreciating music when not high? I mean I like listening to music in my straight head, and I like it even better if I have previously listened to the same music high; but my experience of the music seems like a pale echo of the total identification I felt for it during the previous listening; and this goes double when "listening to" -> "playing". I think the reason for this is the time-dilating effect of the marihuana, which slows down the beat of the music enough that I can get inside it and examine the nuance. Is the solution just to listen to and play slower music? But I like fast music. I'm hoping somehow, as I get more familiar with each particular piece of music, I will be able to get this time-dilation thing happening on my own, without the chemical support.
"logrolling" works very nicely as a euphemism for masturbation.
One's appreciation of it as a spectator sport is directly proportional to one's knowledge of the fine points of the game as well as one's emotional involvement as a fan of a given team.
Ttam, that's American for "How often in your youth your dad buggered you while screaming 'I'm coming home! I'm coming home!'" and watching ball games on TV.
I can see how baseball would be OK to play. Watching it is interminable.
I agree, but this is also my exact take on soccer (and I grew up playing both sports, thank you very much).
Apostropher and SCMT get it exactly right. Rugby seems promising; I wish they'd show it on regular cable.
161 -- A problem I definitely have experience with. Some partial solutions: Cut out the dope for a while; you learn to use it less as a crutch for making sense experiences more intense. Find some droning, Eastern-influenced music where time doesn't mean what it means in Western music -- ragas are good, or something like Eliane Radigue or LaMonte Young's Well-Tempered Piano. Last, learn to appreciate the insights and experiential qualities you can only get from music while not stoned; the two states do give you different kinds of access to music, and I think it's healthy to be able to balance them.
Er, I guess I've now revealed at least one item on my list.
What a bunch of cowards. No one else listed masturbation.
I agree with the premise of Ogged's post, though. It comes from Sartre perhaps: you are what you do.
In an alternative universe there exists a JE who maintained his fitness, traveled internationally, solved his relationship problems in a non-nihilist way, continued to spend time in the wilderness, and mastered the Mongolian language. But the actual JE is what I listed above.
Some of my choices were forced, of course, but I am what I ended up being.
It's sort of unrealistic thinking that the real you is the one who inherited millions and never had to work, or the one who whizzed to the top at Harvard.
Count me among those who find this whole idea depressing. Forget the preferred leisure activities part of it, it's the larger point. What do I need an invitation to go all "Dockery and Son" on myself for? No thanks. I prefer to keep my eyes carefully averted from the topic of what I'm like.
"I will be able to get this time-dilation thing happening on my own, without the chemical support."
I think an eclecticism, a very varied mix worked and works for me when I quit dope. Bach violin sonatas followed by X(LA punk, kinda) followed by singer/songwriters followed by slow bop followed by reggae etc.
But I can remember loving Schoenberg "Concerto for 18 Instruments" on acid and now it is forever lost. The Mahler 9th still sounds good.
ttaM, SCMTim has just given a perfect illustration of the sociopathic gutter sensibilities of people who prefer the manufactured enthusiasm of pro basketball to the pastoral pleasures of America's greatest sport. Take note.
I realize that I disagree with zillions of Americans here, but in general I find sports on TV to be uninspiring. In person is where the fun is.
Jesus hates black people, but I guess we already knew that.
173: I'll take that one step further. Even live, I've always thought sports were far more entertaining to play than to watch.
Rugby seems promising; I wish they'd show it on regular cable abolish American football entirely and replace it with rugby.
Ah, but there my aforementioned profound laziness comes into play.
far more entertaining to play than to watch
Hence, gambling.
the pastoral pleasures of America's greatest sport.
See. baseball fans can't keep themselves from thinking about sheep. IYKWIM. AITTYD.
abolish American football entirely
Ok, you're on the fringe.
In person is where the fun is
Having been to basketball games in a 22,000 seat arena, where all the players appear an inch and a half tall, I dispute this as a blanket statement. However, live hockey is vastly more exciting than televised hockey. Turns out that television makes that sport seem much, much slower than it actually is.
(Note to 178: I don't get a kick out of gambling. I sometimes like playing sports but not to anywhere near the degree I see some people enjoying it. But I think gambling, for people who like it, is a vicarious way of participating in the game at stake.)
the pastoral pleasures of America's greatest sport
I wouldn't call Ultimate Fighting "pastoral," exactly.
I'm with you, McQueen! Down with American football!
all the players appear an inch and a half tall
Sell one of those kids or kidneys and shell out for good seats, man.
Down with American football!
This is like Israel/Palestine discussions, where you find out that people who seem perfectly likable are actually moral monsters.
It's true, basketball is a bit of an outlier. In-person street ball rocks though. And NFL football is not salvageable no matter what you do.
That's okay, really. They show it on my big-ass TV, complete with replays and the ability to pause, rewind, and fast-forward. Moreover, in my house, $5 buys six beers instead of one, the bathrooms are clean, and no waiting in long lines of automobiles to leave.
That's okay, really. They show it on my big-ass TV, complete with replays and the ability to pause, rewind, and fast-forward. Moreover, in my house, $5 buys six beers instead of one, the bathrooms are clean, and no waiting in long lines of automobiles to leave. s/b "I'm thinking of voting Republican next time around."
The 2004 ALCS was an epic narrative
So, so true.
I like reading, thinking, teaching, writing, fucking, and certain kinds of listening/talking. I cook, play ball, drink, eat, listen to music, and watch movies.
I'd say I like hanging out with friends, but, honestly, this isn't always true. There are some people I can spend loads of time with and it's fabulous, but a good portion of my friend relationships are extremely stressful. I am not always the pleasantest person to spend time with, which works out fine if you know what you're getting, but some of my friends keep expecting me to back them up when they say stupid shit. Sure, they're friends, but come on. Sometimes the best I can do is a nice smile and silence.
"This is like Israel/Palestine discussions, where you find out that people who seem perfectly likable are actually moral monsters."
Just the other day, an otherwise normal guy at the gym turned to me and said, "they should just kill all of those Palestinian people, women and kids too. They are just a bunch of rats and killers. Get them while they are young." He was serious and said it in a "how 'bout those Yankees!" kind of way.
He was offended that I was offended.
Sometimes the best I can do is a nice smile and silence.
You could also fold your hands on your lap and say "Why, bless your heart dear, I've never thought of it that way."
Maybe I'm not doing it right, but I feel like my list would be way too long. Things that surprisingly aren't on it, though: working out, drinking alcohol, doing outdoorsy stuff, buying anything, watching theater, watching movies, watching tv, cooking. Things that are, though, which pleases: international travel, taking photos, reading blogs, having spirited discussions with family, friends, and people on the internets, sex, going to concerts, writing, laying around, talking.
Jesus hates black people
Ogged's suggestion that Hispanic blacks are less black than African-Americans is clearly intended to exacerbate divisions among minorities. Fairly typical brown person's self-loathing behavior, I'm led to believe (cf. Dinesh D'Souza).
I measure blackness in terms of vertical leaping ability, which is the established scientific norm. How does Jesus measure?
191: I've found a very effective response to that sort of thing is "My wife/mother is Palestinian." Then just stand there and see how long it takes them to say something else.
191: That's common where I teach among students who went to Yeshiva. They'll use it in a paper or a classroom response as some commonplace from which to make some other argument, like, "Just like Palestinians, the Yahoos are not really actually humans, and wiping them out would be doing everyone a favor," etc., as if they're just clarifying what they mean in a way that anyone would understand. Yet I tend to see very little actual interpersonal hostility from those students toward the non-Jewish half of the class, most of whom are openly practicing Muslims from the Middle East.
I guess this is an extreme case of the kind of conversation that I don't know how to react to. When you're taking for granted that your interlocutor, like you, thinks "midwesterners" are hideous fundamentalist Philistines, or that men like sex and women don't, or that some group of people on earth makes genocide look good, they're not really having a conversation that's about back-and-forth; they're trying to write you into their script without asking if you feel the same way.
I watched a woman in a Costco in Queens accidentally get bumped by a black employee, and she started seething to me about "reverse racism" and how black people were ruining her neighborhood with their bumping-into-you-as-if-it's-nothing ways. I tried to back out of the conversation by saying, look I'm really not someone you want to talk to about that, which made her even more vehement and furious. She ended up screaming at me and walking out--not because I called her racist, but because I didn't nod along with her racism.
Baseball apparently makes SCMTim fantasize about homosexual incest and bestiality. What would Sigmund say?
How does Jesus measure?
I thought you'd never ask.
Thinks .... that men like sex and women don't....
Whenever I hear a woman claiming that she enjoys sex, or that women in general enjoys sex, I always ask myself: "What's her vagenda?"
Actually, I think the same thing when I hear a woman claim she doesn't enjoy sex.
201: The vagenda is in your mind, Emerson. Take the red pill.
The whole universe is in my mind, AWB. I contain multitudes.
200: And when I hear that, I just figure someone's doing something wrong.
204: Actually, I figure someone had a really shitty childhood (whose shittiness was somehow very different from the shittiness of my shitty childhood).
200: I pity her for not having sex with me.
205: Isn't that just blaming the victim...?
Maybe they've just had shitty sex.
Shitty childhoods can explain anything.
207: Why "blaming"? There needn't be a moralistic component to being asexual, and I was kidding in 200. Some of my best friends, etc.
210: "Blaming" in the sense of "Well, if you're not enjoying this, it must be something defective in you." But really, I was just kidding.
And no, there's nothing wrong with being asexual. But I submit it's entirely possible for someone who believes themselves to be contentedly asexual to discover otherwise (to their delight or dismay...) with the right stimulus.
212: This is possible. I just feel that, for at least the (three) asexuals I know, it's usually tied to really complex body issues and/or past sexual abuse, not some insufficiency of physical stimulation. This is probably not true for everyone.
Oh, I agree. By stimulus, I did not mean purely physical stimulus. Asexuality springing from complex body issues/past abuse is different than asexuality that springs from just being wired that way. The former strikes me as a bit sad; the latterjust different strokes for different folks.
214: Different nonstrokes . . .
Let's call AWB a slut again. Anybody?
My list isn't much different from anyone else's--higher on music, lower on sport--but there's a continuum of performing/showing off/flirting/being the center of attention which gives me a lot of pleasure which seems otherwise underrepresented.
216: Oh noes! I may have to relinquish my post as Defender of the Rights of Woman to Have a Libido!
I don't know if I am asexual, although others have thought so. And I hinted at it in my first comment: after orgasm, pretty women (and guys, I am a little bi) might as well be tree stumps for a couple weeks. And looking at pretty people is one of my major pleasures. I would rather stay horny.
My single friend who's asexual happens to be female (and a very good friend), and she claims that it's not just sex; she isn't attracted to anybody for kisses or snuggling or hair grooming or anything. She's as close as I've ever met to a brain on a stick and seems perfectly happy to be that way. She's also a walking clinical example of Asperger's Syndrome, which complicates things.
I think ogged has a good point. The top of my fun list would be:
-surfing/skateboarding
-reading/learning new things
These are the things that, if I was prevented from doing, I would get cranky.
The remainder of the fun list are things that I do but that I can give up for my adult responsibilities without being cranky.
- drinking
- going to fancy restaurants
- watching football
- listening to music
- going to concerts
Going to concerts is a good example because it is something that I stopped doing for 10+ years and recently started doing again when I found out that headliners in SF typically play from 10:00 -12:00. I can go after the kids are asleep and still get home to get enough sleep myself for work the next day. It is really no more difficult than going to see a movie. On the other hand, I can see myself completely stopping
There are lots of things I enjoy that don't currently make the grade.
Things that "fun" isn't the best word for include:
- working
- doing nice things for my wife
- watching my kids
That mostly just an issue with the word "fun" because I am usually pretty content and happy when I am doing these things.
My fun list includes MANDOM, logrolling, stalking fictitious ex-boyfriends and their dogs on Piedmont Avenue and then pitching a story about it to Modern Love, and shiny things.
Also, some other things, which in the context of this thread would sound like "I like long walks on the beach."
Apropos of masturbation = fun, you can participate in some thesis research on "The Roles of Sexual Arousal Regulation and Sexual Drive" at UBC by answering this questionnaire.
I wish that I could say that I like to read, but I don't do that much of it (unfogged and blog comments aside). I used to read all the time. There was a period where I couldn't concentrate well enough to read for long stretches of time.
I don't really like writing, and--even more than reading--I like talking to people about what I've read.