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Only 15 months since the last post! Woohoo! Given that I found myself having a harder and harder time reading and writing over that period, I'm happy to forgive myself.
Most Love and Hate posts tended to take around four hours of pretty solid work to get to a point where, if I wasn't entirely happy with it's wording, I wasn't unhappy with it being seen. And I just don't generally have the mental energy to throw around like that. And if I do, well, I can be playing with my son, or trying to get back into writing fiction.
I wanted to try and get a few more under my belt before posting again, but what the hell.
Crazy People
There are people who are strange and odd, where their unusual outlook or way of doing things is so much a part of themselves that they are rarely aware of it, if at all. Then there are the 'crazy' people, the folks who regularly need to tell you that they are wacky, weird, strange, etc.
"But I'm mad, everyone knows that!" and similar phrases delivered again and again in a desperate attempt by the try-hards to make themselves feel special or unique. What they are is, at best, tiring, at worst, a pain in the arse.
It's their attempt to make one believe they are actually interesting, entertaining people and I hate it! I really hate it. You can take someone who is an otherwise reasonable mate, but the more they tell me how fucking amazingly strange they are, they more I want to beat them with burning rubber-tubing. Because I know people who are genuinely odd and interesting folks, and you know, not one of them ever feels the need to tell me again and again how bizarre they are.
Oh, once in a while the truly strange will acknowledge it, but usually only when it's directly relevant to something. Putting a bit of behaviour in context, or the sudden realisation that they really don't think in quite the same way. Their comments aren't about getting attention, they are about getting perspective.
The try-hards aren't just attempting to convince everyone else, they're trying to convince themselves. Real arists, geniuses, great lovers, tough people, humanitarians, famous folks, etc. know what they are, and are comfortable with that.
They don't feel the need to keep telling the rest of us.
Steve Irwin
There's a lot that can be said about Irwin and his attitude and perceptions of things. I don't know how many times I watched him handling some animal and telling it, "It's alright mate, it's okay," as it tried to bite him, and all I could think was "No, it's not okay Steve, it's just been pounced on and grabbed, as far as it's concerned, nothing good can come of this."
But you know, I really liked the guy.
Yep, he was a dill. I'm not entirely sure the sky he saw was blue and not orange with purple spots, but his heart was in the right place. For his many flaws, he cared about animals and the environment, really cared. You don't have to like the way he showed it, but don't say he didn't give a damn. A good portion of the money made from his TV career was poured back into animal conservation. He bought up huge areas of land in Australia and overseas so that they could be left undeveloped as informal 'National Parks.'
And most importantly, Irwin got people excited about conservation and the environment not by preaching to them, but by his sheer enthusiasm.
His death was a sad loss.
And love him or hate him, he did more in his forty-four years than most of us would manage in twice that.
Most Love and Hate posts tended to take around four hours of pretty solid work to get to a point where, if I wasn't entirely happy with it's wording, I wasn't unhappy with it being seen. And I just don't generally have the mental energy to throw around like that. And if I do, well, I can be playing with my son, or trying to get back into writing fiction.
I wanted to try and get a few more under my belt before posting again, but what the hell.
Crazy People
There are people who are strange and odd, where their unusual outlook or way of doing things is so much a part of themselves that they are rarely aware of it, if at all. Then there are the 'crazy' people, the folks who regularly need to tell you that they are wacky, weird, strange, etc.
"But I'm mad, everyone knows that!" and similar phrases delivered again and again in a desperate attempt by the try-hards to make themselves feel special or unique. What they are is, at best, tiring, at worst, a pain in the arse.
It's their attempt to make one believe they are actually interesting, entertaining people and I hate it! I really hate it. You can take someone who is an otherwise reasonable mate, but the more they tell me how fucking amazingly strange they are, they more I want to beat them with burning rubber-tubing. Because I know people who are genuinely odd and interesting folks, and you know, not one of them ever feels the need to tell me again and again how bizarre they are.
Oh, once in a while the truly strange will acknowledge it, but usually only when it's directly relevant to something. Putting a bit of behaviour in context, or the sudden realisation that they really don't think in quite the same way. Their comments aren't about getting attention, they are about getting perspective.
The try-hards aren't just attempting to convince everyone else, they're trying to convince themselves. Real arists, geniuses, great lovers, tough people, humanitarians, famous folks, etc. know what they are, and are comfortable with that.
They don't feel the need to keep telling the rest of us.
Steve Irwin
There's a lot that can be said about Irwin and his attitude and perceptions of things. I don't know how many times I watched him handling some animal and telling it, "It's alright mate, it's okay," as it tried to bite him, and all I could think was "No, it's not okay Steve, it's just been pounced on and grabbed, as far as it's concerned, nothing good can come of this."
But you know, I really liked the guy.
Yep, he was a dill. I'm not entirely sure the sky he saw was blue and not orange with purple spots, but his heart was in the right place. For his many flaws, he cared about animals and the environment, really cared. You don't have to like the way he showed it, but don't say he didn't give a damn. A good portion of the money made from his TV career was poured back into animal conservation. He bought up huge areas of land in Australia and overseas so that they could be left undeveloped as informal 'National Parks.'
And most importantly, Irwin got people excited about conservation and the environment not by preaching to them, but by his sheer enthusiasm.
His death was a sad loss.
And love him or hate him, he did more in his forty-four years than most of us would manage in twice that.
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"Hi!!! I'm crrrrrazy!" (BAD)
versus
"Hello. Did you know that artichokes have feelings for cockroaches?" (UM, WELL, INTERESTING AT LEAST)
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I've yet to meet anyone who told me they were crazy, or mad, who was even a patch on some of the more entertaining loonies I know. Even the ones who do outlandish shit mostly for the enjoyment of others don't tell people they are crazy, and God knows, some of them are pretty bloody weird!
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I'm not the extroverted type crazy though. It's only in the company of those I know and trust that I really let my hair down at all. (Not that it can go down very far at this length). I think I may be babbling, though not insane, merely sleep deprived so I'm going to do something about that now.
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When I think about it, I can truthfully say that I don't think anyone on my journal who I have met in real life does the 'I'm crazy!' thing.
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Nice to know it was the way I'd hoped. Yes, Steve was one of those guys. It's just hard to put into words exactly what it was about him, but he had everything needed to get something done, and found the best way for him to get as many other people interesting in what he was needing to do.
Crazy people are entertaining, but far too many of them are like your 'crazy people' that you hate, the try-hard crazy, rather than the Steve Irwin style of crazy.
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In fact, one of the things I've really been enjoying about these Love/Hate posts is just how many of them leave me wondering which topic is going to be which... ;-)
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For that alone, yes, his death was a sad loss,
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Of course, only time will tell what a lifetime in front of the camera will really bring her, but we'll just have to wait.
And wow, 15 months since your last post? Doesn't seem like it!
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I think the worst of it will be when she's firmly in her teens. As soon as she does something a little newsworthy, and i say that in the terms of the current low standard of our media, it will be "Wild girl Bindi's drinking binge!" and similar.
The stuff that normal teenage girls get to experience more or less privately will be headline news.
Yeah, 15 months. I've been adding to the Love/hate lists in that time, but the writing has just been too hard to manage. You know how deeply personal some of these posts get. And when I rant about something edgey, I try to give a fairly reasoned arguement, which is not always easy.
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I still remember the show where he was squatting down looking at some nearby rattlers, and then a noise of a rattler starts up. He looks around, then down, then up to that camera crew and mouths the word 'shit' as he realises that the rock he's squatting behind has a rattler under it.
This post is your fault, you know. Kept wanting to get a few built up, then post, but had been doing that for a while (got a couple of half done posts). Saw your questions, which I will answer shortly, and thought 'just do it!'
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Ah ha, so you did fall for my cunning plan!
:)
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Oh I loathed and destested Steve Irwin so much. A man who'd claim genuine interest for the environment on one hand and be one of John Howard's single-largest campaign donors on the other. A guy who'd hassle wild animals so much he ultimately died swimming on top of a stingray, yet claimed all the time he was terrifying and harrassing them that he loved them so much.
David Attenborough proved decades ago that you can get people excited about the animal world without grabbing the animals and swinging them around at the same time. And I'll take one of Attenborough's TV productions over Irwin's entire career.
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I don't think you can beat someone like Attenborough for class and quality. But since when did class and quality on TV get people's attention? I'm sure there were plenty of folks who tuned into Irwin hoping to see him get bit. Hell, his handling of animals irritated the fuck out of me!
As for the John Howard thing, well, I never said Irwin was bright, just passionate.
I keep looking at the Attenborough collections on Roadshow and thinking I should buy them.
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So I threw my prejudice machine into the mix and decided he was a fruit loop to be avoided. I wouldn't deride him; I just couldn't bring myslef to support him as I couldn't tell what weird tangent he would fly away on next.
I thought the manner of his death apposite, even if he hadn't disturbed the rays at the time. The way he handled animals he was going to suffer a provoked attack at some point.
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I just hate it. It's one of the most grating, withering responses I can think of. Everytime I hear someone say it I wish I was 15 or 20 metres further away.
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Seriously, stab in the face, with a rabid ferret.
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That's when you wish that the rabid ferret you were stabbing them with was holding knives, so it could stab them too.
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And it's not like you run around wearing a t-shirt with a big StrangeDave (TM) logo on it, or ask people to call you Strange Dave. And I've certainly never heard you trying to convince people you're weird.
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And I hate the 'we are so wacky!' thing too.
I realised I'd lost some tolerance for this sort of thing at GhengisCon. I had just arrived and asked what was going on (they were, as it turns out, cracking open the head of a demon god for the yummy candy inside, Cthulhu Pinata an awesome idea), and someone very fannish replied "One Word - Don't Ask". I said "thats not one word" and they replied "oh, but with me and my friends so many crazy things happen we just made it one word" and just started ranting at them "what, your friends aren't nmerate? You can't tell the difference between a word and a phrase? What?"
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It's right down there with the 'I got so mad I drove my fist half an inch into a brick wall' guys. I've heard that one about four times over the years from various fanboys, some who were old enough to know better than to come out with something so stupid. Having punched a van myself, and having to deal with the sore knuckles and aching hand for a week afterwards (the van was ok, not even a mild dent) I would be more likely to believe the statement if they followed it with, "Broke my bloody hand of course, felt like a total fuckwit."
I have used the, "I'm so crazy!" line, but only sarcastically. I always think of Rik from The Young Ones carrying on about how decadent they are when I use it.
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I've actually seen my best friend punch a wall in frustration (he was trying to get thousands of dollars worth of essential equipment for his business through customs at the time, and it wasn't going well). He was a pretty strong guy, and he didn't hurt the wall and did hurt his hand.
Rik is the perfect comedic reference, yes. Right on! Take that, Thatcher! *raises fist in air*
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I got the feedback that I was supposed to be phased by or demur to this action because I was an accountant in full business drag and had yet had time to do my wardrobe change (and supposedly a mind shift too) to a crime-conducting student. Bloody small-minded sensibilities!
I whole-heartedly agree with your Young Ones' Rik reference. ("We need you to blow up a panda." "Yeah, all right. Bloody zoos.")
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"You have to watch out for me, you know, because I'm a bit mad!"
Beat.
"Aren't I, everyone?"
Beat.
"A bit mad!"
Nobody says anything, so he lunges across the room into their faces blowing a raspberry and bugging his eyes and when they flinch away says "you see? mad!"
Can I submit another variation? I had a boss who had some deeply, deeply obnoxious mannerisms that made her unpleasant to be around and bad at her job. And when I saw anyone try to tactfully bring into the conversation that maybe a different sort of behaviour might be more appropriate she'd mug and grin and wink and say "Oh, well, I am a bit of a character, aren't I?"
From that day to this, anyone who picks out that term to apply to themselves goes on my red list.
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