"I have been but little in," said Ninian hastily...

So, I cam to an interesting realization today. Not earth-shattering, and perhaps not even a surprise to people who know me and are more observant about me than I am about myself, but interesting nonetheless.

I've long recognized that one of the things that motivates me is information. I love knowing things, and I love discovering things. And I love sharing what I learn. Anyone who has spent time around me has probably had to endure innumerable instances of my prosing on about something or other I've just learnt about, like the Time Ball on Calton Hill or just recently "Hurry Up" Yost. This underlies my fascination with history and with foreign affairs.

I love analysis; or, to put it in simpler terms, I love figuring out how things work. The amount of effort I'm prepared to spend on a problem is proportional to the amount of interest I have in the underlying subject. Reading a wiring diagram, yes; reading a relay logic diagrams, maybe not so much. This has a lot to do with why I find simulation and gaming so interesting and why I know a little bit a bout a variety of information technology subjects (but not a lot about any of them). I've picked up tiny bits of environmental engineering, of cost accounting, of export regulation from different jobs that I've worked and always found them interesting.

And I like order. I was never enough fascinated by the philosophical aspects of it to study advanced logic. But I do like sorting and organizing. I enjoy diagramming and mapping processes and (sometimes) purging and cleaning code, because it makes it tidy and orderly and that makes things work better.

But what I've not consciously acknowledged before is how much I love stories. Reading stories, watching stories, listening to stories, telling stories. Fiction, nonfiction, history, biography, jokes, ballads--I am addicted to collecting, experiencing, enjoying stories. I like losing myself in them; I like seeing the structure to them; I love the emotions that carry the audience through them and make the characters real. I love intricate, complex plots and simple, silly jokes. I can read or listen to the same story over and over again through many years, either finding new things in it or simply appreciating its elements anew each time I come to it. Maybe I remember all of it and great it's parts like old friends. Maybe it's all passed out of mind and I can have the fun of discovering it all over again.

I don't know quite what to *do* with this realization, but as I think about where I want to go and what I want to do with the rest of my life (which, believe it or not, I do actually do from time to time), it seems as if it will be useful information. Especially if I try buying into this "work at what you love" philosophy. I've always been a bit skeptical of it as seeming like too idealistic. But the more I think about how much of my life I spend working (eight hours out of twenty-four, plus time spent facilitating it), the more it seems foolish to devote that much effort to anything other than what one finds fascinating and fulfilling.

So, The Finn has been pushing me to think hard about my choices.

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An interesting perspective on how to deal with the vicissitudes of life, from the pastor of my local UU church.

Includes the passages:( Read more... )

I just bookmarked a page, and Firefox, as it will do, offered me a choice of most frequently used selections instead of laboriously selecting a specific folder.

The choices it offered me?

Pizza
Wargames & Military History
Erotica
Smut
[wargame] Terrain

Yes, I am a bachelor...