I'd like to get back to the beach.

1. What have you been putting off doing that you should be doing now? 

    I'm waiting for work, which is far and away the most annoying thing about my current career. We are at the mercy of an annoying hierarchy of people making decisions, and sometimes those decisions are very badly coordinated. I am (contractually) committed to being available for work during work hours, but there is no correlated commitment to either provide work or to pay for the down-time. It is frustrating, but does not happen often and is sort of understandable. 

    So there's nothing that I could be doing besides waiting, and so writing is completely reasonable under the circumstances. 

2. What's your favorite golden oldie song from any decade before you were born? 

    "Nevertheless" by the Mills Brothers. (Might as well choose a song from far before I was born!)

3. What five words or phrases in the English language would you like to lock in a box before throwing away the key? 

    a. "Loop" (because derivations of this word have choked the life out of business communications, e.g. loop in, close the loop, loop back)

    b. "Honestly..." (because if you have to point out when you're being honest, I don't ever want to hear anything that you say)

    c. "It is what it is" (because it is useless babble)

    d. "Laser focused" (because excessively exaggerated hyperbole is always and forever preferable to simple accuracy)

    e. "Don't take this the wrong way..." (because it's all but guaranteed that what follows will be thoroughly and intentionally offensive—and that any reaction that one could possibly give is mined with explosives and disaster)

4. "It's not what you know, it's who you know." Is that true? 

     that probably is true for people of a certain socioeconomic class, for those who live in certain geographic areas, and for some who work in particular fields. If you're rich, trying to succeed in the world of the rich-er, it's probably impossible to succeed without help from someone who can pull you up. If you live in a very big city, where the competition for absolutely everything is a little more fierce (or where the options are so vast that getting lost in the details is so likely), it's probably a big boost to have someone else's sponsorship, so to speak. And if one is an actor, singer, songwriter, visual artist, and so forth, then knowing someone who knows those who can buy what you're selling is imperative.

    For the rest of us, it's far less useful, and far less likely anyway. Nobody I know is capable or inspired to do that sort of intentional 'mentoring.'

5. What are the most northerly and southerly points you've visited on a world map? 

    E.C., in the cheese state, and Miami, Florida—if my estimations are correct

6. How many scout knots can you tie?

    I used to know a guy who was a sailor, the "weekend on a fancy vessel with actual sails" sort of sailor and not a "works on a ship to make money" kind of guy. He's also kind of an obnoxious, pretentious ass. He is convinced (or pretends to be) that everyone needs to know how to tie knots in order to survive everyday life. He taught me to tie a complex knot by giving verbal directions, and I succeeded...and then promptly forgot.

    So, in answer to this question, I could tie one knot, at one time, but no longer. And it has nothing to do with scouts.

7. Which character from show you watched as a kid brings back the happiest memories, and why? 

    Dr. Sidney Freedman, from M*A*S*H. Funny, thoughtful, smart, and the window through which other characters were seen in a different way.

 

[from 3000 Unique Questions about Me; the title quotation is by 'Sidney Freedman', from M*A*S*H]