I’ve made a hobby out of beating myself up. An article from Study Hacks has opened my eyes a bit:

“There is a lot of meaningful living to be done when you give yourself the time.”

Overachieving: since when did being over-anything become a virtue instead of a vice?

What is clear to me is that any cultural practice that uses shame as the guiding force to redirect young peoples’ sexual impulses is dangerous. If you are someone who truly believes that abortion is murder, then it behooves you to fight against a culture that makes young women feel horrifically ashamed–to the point of self-mutilation–when they find themselves pregnant and not married.

When I happen upon an unflushed toilet, I flush it twice.
The first for sanitation; the second for spite.

Think twice before fermenting your urine in a public toilet. Besides, when you flush, you’re giving back to the environment.

A white person that claims affirmative action “gave” their potential job or graduate school admission to a minority.

They’re both the same argument. They both refuse to take responsibility for themselves. They both fail to create change.

Typecast for April 8, 2008

The Brother Word Processor

Dr. Lackmann has taught undergraduate and graduate meteorology courses here at State since 1999, after stops in New York, Canada, and Washington State. A prolific researcher, some of his current investigations deal with using computer models to improve the forecasting of severe storms, hurricanes, winter weather, and climate change.

Tonight, we will discuss severe weather safety, try to debunk some common weather myths, and maybe even get a quick discussion on climate change. We look forward to hearing your comments and questions for Dr. Lackmann!

Many people want to be authors, not writers. They want to have written, not to write.

I’m particularly reminded this day of a few simple lessons from Random, a hobbyist pipe maker. My musings are paraphrased from his collected writings.

• People delight themselves too often with minutiae. Sure a pipe’s style is as important as the style of a man’s clothing. But if a pipe doesn’t smoke well, you’ll never use it. Likewise the details of any system–managing to-dos, chores, research, or bill payment–can become so enthralling that the point is missed and the benefits of the system are no longer enjoyed.
• Call it what it is. Maybe having a bowlful of ash helps the last bit burn down. Or maybe it just tastes like sour ash. Recognize the importance of accurately assessing the features of a system or any part of your lifestyle. You can only convince yourself that a pile of turds is gold until you try to mint it.
• Maintenance can only fix a problem. Tinkering with your pipe may be fun. Tamping, cleaning, relighting, stirring ash… who has time to smoke? If you’re afraid of hurting your pipe, you’ll never smoke it. Use what you have… by all means use it. Fixing every last detail won’t bring you as much happiness as enjoying what you have. Don’t care about your systems, they exist to work for you, not to be nurtured by you. If it isn’t broke, don’t look for a reason to fix it.

Random always struck me as a very practical guy. I think he’d grasp the idea of diminishing marginal returns quite well.

I just put away my white laundry when I received inspiration from my socks. I realized that there were basically three people in the world:

• People who match their socks.
• People who do not match their socks.
• People who… well, read to the end to find out.

People Who Match Their Socks

People who match their socks have simple logic: assuming you do not have an entire load of socks, organizing your socks on the front end helps you match quickly and accurately. Even if your entire wardrobe of socks has just been washed, matching on the front end can save you time when you’re in a hurry.

The humanity of it is equally as simple: people like this tend to look for ways to do things better now in order to save themselves work later. More importantly, these people look for systems in things and may impose an order on something that isn’t quite ordinal.

I would wager these people also organize their closet by pants, shirts, and types of pants and shirts–perhaps even by season. These people are marked by purposed intent in almost every action.

People Who Don’t Match Their Socks

People who don’t match their socks have simple logic: assuming have all your socks in one drawer, it should be relatively easy to pick out matching pairs of socks based on length and looks. The matching itself is made easier by variability in design. Matching is made less important by having many pair of similar socks. Both of the preceding scenarios decrease the potential gain over matching at the front end. People who match ad hoc probably randomize the amount they were each sock, likely making for even wear, tear, and soiling (similar to rotating your tires).

The humanity follows as easily: people like this tend to deal with problems as they emerge, and are willing deal with these potential future problems because they save time getting an initial task done. They probably do not value perfection as highly as the previous group, Order is a non-essential luxury they forgo; however, they may experience more stress if something goes wrong on the back end–not enough time, missing single socks, etc.

I would wager that these people see no need for imposing order on any collection in their life: projects, to-dos, wardrobe, computer files, etc. They enjoy the benefits of finding what they need when they need it by searching the wide field and surveying the big picture.

How This Applies to Me

I’m recently convinced of my own problem with perfectionism. Coupled with the horrible habit of not starting anything I can’t finish, I tend to tinker with a system instead of actually doing work. I’m the kind of guy that would reorganize his entire wardrobe–not just his socks–when he can’t find that one particular shirt he needs.

A Conjecture

The person who doesn’t match his socks will gradually replace the one who does in the digital age. As improved searching and the concept of tagging come into widespread use, the average individual will derive less benefit from a meticulously planned hierarchical structure, at least digitally. Even in the paper office, the average person will find it much easier to have an A-Z file than specific folder names, opting instead for “tagging” folders based on immediate use instead of long-term filing. Long-term filing will be culled and the remnants scanned–and tagged–to be digitally stored and searchable.

Oh, And By the Way…

The third kind of person? The one who has all matching socks. But they aren’t any fun at all.

At least not as fun as a guy who can finish a triple while musing on life… and the humanity of sock sorting.

There is no catching up. There is only catching on.