Smuel's good morning extravaganza

I appreciate hearing about your experiences and your perspective.

Actually that reminds me of another of the things I like to rant about, which is that the skill of teaching is also, somewhat ironically, something that can't be taught. To be a good teacher requires two things - knowledge of the subject matter, and the ability to put yourself in the shoes of someone who doesn't already know the subject matter.

One of my maths teachers at senior school was supposedly some kind of maths wunderkind, like he'd got a degree in Maths from Cambridge University in a year less that it normally took. Looking back on it, a lot of things that you hear as a kid are probably nonsense that has been made up by another kid for fun but which then earnestly gets repeated around the school, e.g. Jojobobo's "teacher cooked her own cat" story. Anyway, my point is that this guy was good at maths, but he was a terrible teacher. He couldn't explain anything, besides going through the rote explanation in the textbook. If you asked him to clarify, he would just repeat the same explanation again, word for word, but louder. If you still didn't understand, the volume would increase, until he was shouting across the classroom. After a while, we gave up asking him to clarify anything, and just resigned ourselves to being yelled at during the "now you do it" part of the lesson, for supposedly not having paid attention during his initial explanation. He actually kept me after class one time and gave me a lecture about how I was clearly being lazy and should be more conscientious, which given how I was as a child was hilariously misjudged. Fortunately I was old enough by then to realise that he just didn't know what he was doing and I was able to laugh it off afterwards.

My other maths teacher at that time was a delightful, rather timid woman, who you could catch making mistakes occasionally, and would sometimes clearly struggle to remember all the intricacies of the actual maths. However, she was a first class teacher, if you didn't understand something she would approach it from a different angle, or draw an analogy, or drill down to find the step where you got lost. She had the ability to teach, and the other guy didn't, plain and simple. It's probably related to empathy, and I don't believe any amount of teacher training could change it.

In summary, there seem to be certain things that are an innate talent, e.g. creative writing, composing, teaching, and people either have that ability (to varying degrees) or they don't, but you can't educate someone into having it if they don't.

Good morning.

 

I've just been shopping and I bought some toilet paper for the first time in about a month. I have never felt so self-conscious buying toilet paper before.

I guess now I'm part of the problem.

Good morning.

 

That's a very courteous response to a reasonably shitty rant, so thank you.

I mean it wasn't so much a story, as the teacher divulged this information to her entire form. My school was split into forms (forms = groupings of about a quarter of the year) where we would be registered for the day, etc.

I could understand a rumour if it just comes out of one or two people, but to come out of a whole class's worth? While I appreciate it's not impossible, the balance of probability is this teacher cooked her cat by accident and then traded it as an anecdote with kids.

I would say issues with people are down to empathy in general. Some people plainly down give a shit.

For example, with my PhD supervisor at the time I had to go for psychiatric appointments with my partner - and I told him this at the time. I never mentioned about my OCD, but I think it would/should have been obvious at the time that there was something larger wrong with me as well

And yet even with the knowledge that I am a stressful home environment and my partner is bipolar, he was keen to ride my ass all the time and not inquire ever. His dismissive attitude and public dressing-downs of me along those lines is what gave the post-docs he employed the license to treat me like a moron in the first place - yet I can't fathom quite how as an even half-way compassionate person can invest so little in people personally to really and truly not give a shit.

Lack of empathy I guess it was it boils down to. I still find it unconscionable that people treat people like that, and I always have, and despite thrashing against people on here from time to time (and apologies for when I've done so, sincerely) I still try not to treat anyone I know like that.

I think my biggest issue is when I can't rationalise why something has happened in any capacity, but I think I've settled into the fact now that for a lot of the stuff that's gone on for me either people have their own problems that make them act like that - or people are just plain fucking dicks. It may not be a good rationalisation, but it's a rationalisation nonetheless.

I have seen toilet paper in stores for about a month, so you're a lucky man!

Good morning.

 

Today was the first day when the shops seemed back to normal. Still no eggs, but otherwise reasonably stocked. I guess everyone finally ran out of fridge and under-the-sink-next-to-the-toilet space.

Good morning.

 

During the night I woke up and thought of an incredibly witty one-liner to post in this thread. Then I went back to sleep.

Now I can't remember what it was.

Good morning.

 

I guess I killed the forum. Sorry guys. I mean, I arrived here, and then about 9 years later, boom, everyone else has gone. Coincidence? You decide.

Well not literally you, clearly, since you're not posting here any more. But the figurative you.

Good morning.

 

Don't flatter yourself, we were killing this forum long before you arrived.

 

I think the real irony is, given that Arcanum was always a good and fairly marketable IP, it will eventually get rebooted - probably. Then we all get pissed off with the new crowd and go our curmudgeony separate ways anyway - probably.

What this forum is in the meantime - well I'll always find it interesting (I was trying to come up with a term more creative/insightful - but I couldn't muster the energy. These days I can't even muster the schadenfreude).

Good Morning!

And P.S. If there was someone to blame for this forum's demise, I was always blame Smuel. I mean, it's definitely not me - obviously.

 

What a beautiful relic this is. HWLFP is a relic within the relic. I am now unknown and unseen to most. But you will remember me. HWLFP will never die...



Cough

 

Wait, are you Gross or HWLFP? Or... both?

Well, whichever. Welcome back. And good morning.

 

Thanks Japes. This is HWLFP, just took a pot shot signing in with an old email. Why this accounts called what it is is a mystery to me. I have longed for personal contact with Gross to give him one last heartfelt apology. Maybe, explain a few circumstances. Alas, many thanks for your warmest reception of me to date.

 

I think I speak for everyone here (i.e. just myself) when I say that we believe in stories of redemption. And thus I tentatively extend a laurel and a hearty handshake to you, HWFLP. Let the past be in the past, bygones, etc.

Good morning.

 

At this point I hardly remember the specifics of your antics when you were playing the heel, and maybe that's for the best. I also remember thinking that Smuel might be just another iteration of HWLFP when he showed up here, but I'm mostly convinced now that he's a separate entity.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm the last real forum member left, and everyone else is a Dark Elf puppet account.

Good morning DE.

 

For clarity's sake I think the "antics" extended to earning the trust of a schizophrenic so he could fake his own death as a joke, going to the extent of getting his own friends/family in on the joke to corroborate.

I'm not okay with that, in addition to the simple fact that it will have been unlawful both in the US and UK. If you are here for the purposes of old-school trolling, you can take this as your skinful of moral panic if you wish - but really I just wanted to make it clear that some things are quite firmly not okay, even if you have developed as a person since and feel remorse.

Saying that, I'm not happy to hear you're struggling with addiction/depression in the other thread. Having read around these kind of coronavirus social issues, a lot of support groups (AA, NA) rely on face-to-face interaction and social obligations where you have to be physically present to encourage ongoing sobriety - which FaceTime/Skype/Zoom doesn't really satisfy. I hope you manage to see isolation through without falling into bad habits, and by all means feel free to stick around.

Good morning.

 

Jojobobo I completley agree with what your saying. Something like that is never ok and I would not expect you or anyone else to think otherwise. I appreciate you speaking your truth about this.

 

Normally I'd be with the moral guardians too, but in ytzk's absence I've taken on the role of hippy Jesus figure, hence the talk of forgiveness etc. I've even gone so far as to not shave since the start of the coronavirus lockdown, to accentuate the effect.

Peace out, homies, and good morning.

 

This has always been a fairly straight-talking place as you're aware, so rather than act as though everything is alright I thought I would be plain. It is important not to condone acts such as that, as often as we can as people.

That said, it has been around 10 years and I'm sure we're all different now to when we first joined. I'm not a bygones-be-bygones kind of guy, but of course people can grow and in that time I'm sure you likely would have done. There's really nothing more to say about it.

Good morning.

PS I have also forgone shaving Smuel, but I can't speak of any Jesus-like qualities it's bestowing on me.

 

Absolutley and yes I think I joined when I was 16 and I'm now 30 which is crazy.

This used to be a small connection for me to the "outside world". Now it serves as a reminder of a dark time of my life.
It does make me happy to see the house still standing if only populated by a few.

 

Is it not written:

"Yea though the child doth join the forum, 'tis the man who doth put away the sock puppets."

Now let us resume the normal business of the forum. As it is written:

"Behold, 'tis thy mother, and she doth make merry with yon Roman soldiers!"

Good morning.

 

Well that was an unexpected twist.