realize everyday things that I am clueless about and (re)educate myself on those matters

http://www.michaeldougan.com/blog/C20361149/E42437595/

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20050207/news_lz1b7altoids.html

http://readymade.com/project/altoids_tin_challenge_winner/

sold my first item and shipped it off. still alive. had something set up wrong and had to figure out what, and how to fix it, but now it’s set; it’s all good.

the money went to daughter’s elementary school, for the library.

I’ve seen someone (god, I wish I remembered who) who sold various things they didn’t really need on eBay to fund a Kiva loan, which is what I want to do next :D

even though it does not double as a shoe.

my phone is friggin complicated. BUT I must do a little dance this morning as I finally got the computer to acknowledge its existence, when connected by USB. which comes in handy when one is trying to upload music/courses/poetry to the mp3 player on said phone. (honestly, all I wanted was a PHONE!)

the computer I’d been trying forever on had a slightly older version of Windows Media Player. the computer I tried today had a slightly newer version. and therefore had no problem.

I am probably the only person in the world learning Russian and German from a phone, but, you know, that’s me. _{and at least I am not studying foreign languages via shoe.}

(also I did list something for sale on eBay yesterday, a big first for me. although, gotta say, it’s been almost 24 hours and apparently it’s selling right now for $2.25. not exactly getting rich here… obviously more things I need to figure out in that dept.)

I’ve used Craigslist twice, and only to give stuff away; I’ve used PayPal for the first time ever yesterday afternoon.

but I am closer and closer to actually putting something on eBay (I opened an account at least) to sell.

probably one of my courses; in order to buy another course, of course.

this is huge for me _{I am that big of a dork, yes}

I still don’t tag journal entries on LiveJournal or my goals on 43things; not hardly at all. but I have been feeling out tags on LibraryThing (here) and been discussing it (and this article ) with my friend who goes by starexplorer.

I know, I go off on completely different tangents than most people would, but tagging for me gets me thinking about subjective vs objective reality and how humans both construe their world and imbue it with meaning.

recently for my anthropology class I was introduced to the idea of Etics and Emics which is very much related, to me. this led me to read a bit more about tagmemics in general…

to me, this is fascinating stuff. and part of the big picture of why I am both drawn to tag things and yet remain inherently wary of tagging anything at all.

basically, I overcomplicate everything, even the idea of tags :)

but I am tagging! as you can see on LibraryThing, maybe I am tagging with a vengence.

ok, sure, you describe your entry (picture, whatever) in terms that will help you find it later if you are searching for it… but what makes a good tag, what can you tell about a person by their tags, and what’s the difference between tagging and other forms of organization?

I understand the basic idea but only in an ephemeral way; I think I am missing something here. there’s no gut-level comprehension of why this is even necessary. (hence my almost complete lack of tags on this site, LJ, etc.)

enter Shirky’s article about how Ontology is Overrated to illuminate, or confuse, things further.

maybe I’ll sort this all out after all. if I start tagging things, I guess that means I did.

eta, after reading: ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I guess I was spoiled by Google (if you put fateaccompli + X into Google, you get Me, and the related entry, because I have a unique user name. try it with “fateaccompli elephants ostriches”). I still am not sure it’s worth it for everything, like goals. I mean, there are only 43 goals on my list. I think I can read through all of those in one sitting. and if I wanted to search through all goals on 43things, the search will only pull up what other people have marked with that tag, not what the things I would mark with that tag… but I’m starting to see how that could be useful (via the Google search model). I think it would be more worth it for books or journal entries, for sure.

Probably my problem is that I don’t organize things consciously; it’s all just kind of floating around in the ether until I intuitively pull it up. I put things in order without thinking about the order much. I have to work on being aware of my internal classifications/associations, so to speak. or something.

I definitely understand the There Is No Shelf statement. that describes my entire life :D

how long exactly can people go around ignoring an elephant in the living room? recently I have been surveying a conversation involving such an elephant, and it’s really just amazing, just amazing how subjective reality is for some people (or, really, all people in some situation or another, for we all do this)... if we pretend the elephant isn’t there, why then, it simply isn’t there. um, or, er, that’s the vibe.

I don’t mean to judge from afar, from my almighty position on high or something, but my initial attempt at testing the waters in said conversation left me completely ignored as well. not disputed, mind you, just unacknowledged and ignored. apparently if the elephant doesn’t exist, then nobody who believes in the elephant exists either, or at least, we can’t hear them if they are talking about the elephant.

even the people who acknowledge that there is an elephant… they only do so on their terms. I mean, when your entire living room is knee-deep in elephant manure, I guess sooner or later you admit there’s an elephant. or, at least, you admit that there is manure.

where that came from, well, we can’t be too sure. we won’t commit to any specific cause whatsoever. after all, manure is naturally occurring, and as long as there have been animals on the planet, there has been defecation, and as long as there have been human habitations, there has been the chance that somebody will track manure in, etc. surely you cannot presume to tell me that there is more manure in the living room now than at any other time in the history of the Earth.

? eh, what’s that?

certianly there is not a blessed thing that we as inhabitants of the living room can do about the manure piling up in it.

and even if we could do anything about it, it’s not our responsibility to do so.

and even if you say you can prove scientifically that there is an elephant, and that this elephant is the cause of this manure, and that we can do something about said elephant and therefore said manure, and that we are responsible for doing such a thing, I don’t have time to look over your arguments right now. why should I believe you when other people find some excuse not to?

???

it’s enough to make one think the living room is populated entirely by ostriches with their heads in the sand (at least, we hope that’s sand) and said elephant. (I know, I know, ostriches are just as likely to bury their head in the sand as elephants are to wander into random living rooms, but stay with me here.)

so, me, I’m thinking, gods upside down! if the issue is important (and the said issue is muy importanto), and people (not me, you understand, or at least, not just me, but many, many concerned people) are going out of their way to explain the issue so that everyone can understand it, to get everyone involved in a dialogue about addressing the issue and coming up with a solution that works as best as possible for everyone…

why why WHY are people (intelligent peers!) shrugging it off and saying that they are not particulary interested in finding out anything about it at all (if they even acknowledge the situation in the first place)?

to be sure, denial and the manipulation of reality into one’s subjective little world is a hallmark of all humanity, across the board, and indeed might be one of the reasons humanity has survived at all

_{(seeing as how mental manipulation is just as important as physical manipulation with tools etc.. or to be more obvious: it’s good that humanity doesn’t recognize itself to be a bunch of mostly flabby creatures without fangs, claws, speed, strength, stamina, etc, compared to any other creature esp predator out there… insanity has taken humanity a very long way. kept us alive long enough at least to make tools et al.)}

and yes we are all guilty of it at some point or another…

but it’s not always a virtue…

gaah!

however, I committed myself to Practice And How Am I Like This? when judgementalism, impatience or annoyance raise their smug heads

so this whole elephant-and-ostriches phenomenon is part of the reason I have this goal (realize everyday things that I am clueless about and (re)educate myself on those matters).

to commit myself to being more open to the idea that

there are many things I don’t know much about

and to the undeniable importance of learning more about those things which might very well be important

if only to be able to think for myself.

instead of believing whatever I hear.

or instead of believing only what I want to hear.