On Mon, 21 May 2012 09:54:36 +0100, Invisible wrote:

>>> I enjoy doing it. And then the day after, my fingers hate me... ;-)
>>
>> That sounds about right for the first 6 months or so.
> 
> Just like playing the guitar, or probably any other stringed instrument.

I don't have any experience with the guitar (so Warp will probably 
correct me as he does and is pretty good from what I've seen), but I 
think with the frets, you don't have to apply as much pressure as you do 
on a fretless instrument, so it probably doesn't induce the same amount 
of pain or trouble when you're out of practice.

But both probably build the callouses so you don't have the pain. :)

>> You seem to have a good grasp on maths, programming, playing the pipe
>> organ (as you said, there's something you play on it that's "wicked
>> hard"
>> - so clearly you don't /suck/ at it), writing, and dancing.  And that's
>> just from what I've seen you post here about and blog about.
> 
> Well, there's being "good at" something, and then there's being "great
> at" something.
> 
> I can play the Widor toccata - just not very well. I can write computer
> programs, but according to Warp and Darren I suck at that. I'm competing
> in a national dance competition, but I don't exactly expect to be
> bringing home any medals. The list goes on. Basically there's a whole
> range of things that I'm vaguely good at, but nothing that's really
> going to /impress/ anybody.

I'm impressed that you're willing to try different things.  A lot of 
people who get into your mindset stop trying new things because they're 
afraid of failure.  Courage isn't the same as being without fear.  
Courage is having fear and doing something anyway, taking the risk to try 
something new.

> It's a pity really, because impressing people seems to be what I'm
> hard-wired to want to do...

Most people want to impress people.  The trick is to just keep doing the 
thing you like doing and get better at it.  You're only 30 years old - 
contrary to what you believe, that doesn't make you an "old man".  You've 
got decades ahead of you, and there's a good chance that you'll (a) find 
something you feel you excel at, and (b) you'll be good enough at it that 
people will say "wow" often.

>> It's certainly a truism that the more you know about something, the
>> more you realize you don't know everything about it.
> 
> I know, right? So you go to a dance class, and you learn the Waltz. And
> there are, like, 3 steps in it, and nobody can do it. At all. And
> eventually, after a few months, you get to the point where you can do
> those 3 steps. And you think "hey, I can Waltz!"
> 
> And over time, you come to realise that, actually, to Waltz /properly/,
> you're supposed to stand a certain way, hold your arm a certain way,
> step in a certain way, sway a certain way, and basically that thing
> you're doing is NOTHING LIKE how a Waltz is actually supposed to look.
> You can't Waltz, you SUCK at the Waltz! :-/
> 
> It seems that everything is like that. When I was a kid, I used to write
> computer programs in BASIC, and I thought that made me a programmer.
> Then you have people tell you "hey, global variables are evil" and "GOTO
> is evil" and "your code is completely non-maintainable" and basically
> you realise that you're doing it HORRIBLY WRONG.
> 
> It seems in every sphere, the more you learn, the more you realise that
> there's so much stuff you don't know that it seems impossible that you
> could ever learn it all. You haven't even STARTED!
> 
> Truly, the greatest knowledge is in knowing that you know NOTHING.

They say "ignorance is bliss" - and there is a certain amount of truth in 
that.  But ignorance leads to lots of bad outcomes as well, and I for one 
would rather have a chance at a better outcome than to be blissfully 
unaware of facts.

Jim

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