# Are you a Grasshopper or an Ant? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 25, 2009, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880 "2009-01-25T03:33:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![shiftless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9c0ed/32.png) [@shiftless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shiftless)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2009, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/41 "2009-01-27T17:14:49Z")
A complete ant, married to a somewhat grasshopper with one compete grasshopper child and one that has an ant temperament but who is being lead down the grasshopper path. Ants will tend toward grasshopper behavior because it is so rewarding with no immediate cost. Grasshoppers, in my experience, can only learn the hard way and that never happens if they have enough ants around. ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/42 "2009-01-28T03:25:40Z")
worst of both I guess like the ant I store, but I store things that aren’t important and drown in clutter like the grasshopper I don’t save what is important like money, and I wait til the last minute to get important things like gas ---
**Author:** ![Kayeby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9de0a6/32.png) [@Kayeby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kayeby)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/43 "2009-01-28T08:53:59Z")
I’m an Ant. I have a Grasshoppery way of splurging on things that are important to me, but I never feel guilty because I don’t go into debt and I’m frugal in most other ways. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/44 "2009-01-28T09:04:28Z")
Total grasshopper. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/45 "2009-01-28T13:36:45Z")
An other Anthopper checking in. I’m real anal about Xamount of my paycheck goes to 401, Xamount goes to savings. then Xamount towards living expenses. Anything left over gets spent in about ten seconds flat on things like dining out and good times up at the bar. If I happen to come into any bonus money, like profit sharing, income tax return, ect… Forget about it! I get REALLY stupid with my money. One time on vacation my Ex-wife laid into to me because I tipped the roomservice guy a $20 for bringing me a $4 slice of pie! Hey I didn’t have change! ---
**Author:** ![Grasshopper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f19dbf/32.png) [@Grasshopper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grasshopper)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/46 "2009-01-28T14:36:13Z")
Well, uh… tough one. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![3acresandatruck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/e79b87/32.png) [@3acresandatruck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/3acresandatruck)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/47 "2009-01-28T14:57:46Z")
> [@Kayeby](#): > > I’m an Ant. I have a Grasshoppery way of splurging on things that are important to me, but I never feel guilty because I don’t go into debt and I’m frugal in most other ways. Yes!! I’m like that, except you explained it better than I ever could. I posted on the occasion of my last Grasshopper Incident, when I purchased the rusty old hulk of a Plymouth to stick in the yard in back of the house. Just because I liked it. ---
**Author:** ![Wile\_E](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c37758/32.png) [@Wile\_E](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wile_E)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/48 "2009-01-28T16:01:58Z")
> [@jackdavinci](#): > > worst of both I guess > > like the ant I store, but I store things that aren’t important and drown in clutter > > like the grasshopper I don’t save what is important like money, and I wait til the last minute to get important things like gas This is more like me. I don’t really fit either category. I think I’m more of a potato bug. ---
**Author:** ![anu-la1979](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/47e85d/32.png) [@anu-la1979](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anu-la1979)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/49 "2009-01-28T16:12:14Z")
I am an ant-it really hit home yesterday when I realised that I had enough cash to buy myself a Macbook even after I paid off my rent and utilities for this month. Every other paycheck in its entirety goes to my student loans (minimal), my credit card (no balance) and savings. I have 2 laptops, neither of which works properly (my Vista laptop gave me the blue screen of death in 2 weeks and has been fixed multiple times already) so I really do need a new computer at some point. Of course I struggled with the decision for hours and then got worried about not saving enough and not being responsible after which I finally transferred half the funds to my savings account across the country and decided to save up for the Macbook across several paychecks. :rolleyes: The one thing I wish is that I had taken a few risks that would have paid off in the longterm even though I would have spent more money at the time. The two biggest being that I got into really great prestigious grade inflating private schools for undergrad but chose to go to my public Canadian school because it was more or less free, and the second being that I got a job at the Chicago Board of Trade after my 1L year of school but I was worried about having to rent an apartment in Chicago AND pay the rent on my Champaign apartment which insisted on a one year lease (subletting is very difficult because the town is dead over summer). So I stayed in Champaign and worked for some public service agencies. I really shouldn’t have done that. So yes, I am an ant, but I’m trying to temper it by taking smart risks when necessary. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/50 "2009-01-28T18:35:30Z")
> [@blondebear](#): > > Another reason that I see myself as a grasshopper–because I’m psychologically unable to adapt to any kind of lock-step, go-along to get-along (hive) mentality. I’m too stubborn and independent for my own good. How does not planning for the future equate to being free spirited and independent? I don’t see how any part of that fable speaks to “do like everyone else to be safe”, unless you’re reading in a modern interpretation of ant behavior (“ant-like conformity”) on top of what’s there from Aesop. Me, I’d rather be the Octopus (from the Futurama version of the fable, _The Grasshopper and the Octopus_). “All year long the grasshopper kept burying acorns for winter, while the octopus mooched off his girlfriend and watched TV. But then the winter came, and the grasshopper died, and the octopus ate all his acorns. And also, he got a race car. Isn’t any of this getting through to you?” OK, in reality, I seem to be a hard working grasshopper, or else a very spendthrifty ant. While I do make sure to take care of the “big picture” stuff first, I let the “little picture” stuff more or less handle itself. I’d equate a desire to be “independent” to being debt-averse: nothing makes your life more “dependent” on a particular source of income (i.e., a job) than having a lien. I don’t get into debt and avoid it as much as possible: I pay my credit cards off each month in full, buy used cars with cash (no credit) and drive them for 7+ years. The only debt I carry is the mortgage on my house, which I made sure was small enough that my family could meet the monthly payments on just my wife’s salary if I should lose my job (she’s a tenured faculty member at a state university, which is as secure as it gets), and I prepay the hell out of it every month while I can (at the present rate, we’d pay off the 30 year loan in about 13 years). And I put in a maximum pre-tax contribution towards retirement and my children’s college funds. At the same time, the money I do have left over goes into my checking account, which then gets hit on without much thought (my credit cards auto-pay from checking). Purchases go into mental categories of “Necessity”, “Small”, “Medium” and “Big”, and I monitor it every couple of days to see if I’ve overdone the Big/Medium expenditures or if a ton of Small/Necessity expenses have taken me over the top. My goal is to finish a month at least flat with what I had going in. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2009, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/51 "2009-01-28T18:44:16Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > Me, I’d rather be the Octopus (from the Futurama version of the fable, _The Grasshopper and the Octopus_). “All year long the grasshopper kept burying acorns for winter, while the octopus mooched off his girlfriend and watched TV. But then the winter came, and the grasshopper died, and the octopus ate all his acorns. And also, he got a race car. Isn’t any of this getting through to you?” Hmmm. This sounds similar to the Muppets version, in which the ant gets stepped on, and the grasshopper hops into a sportcar and drives to Florida for the winter. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2009, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/52 "2009-01-29T03:30:22Z")
The Grasshopper survives in the 1934 Disney version (can’t have the main characters dying–that would upset the kiddies!) The Ants take pity on him, but the 'hopper _ **does** _ change his tune: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmtSprLhfKI](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmtSprLhfKI) ---
**Author:** ![PotLuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bbce88/32.png) [@PotLuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PotLuck)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2009, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/53 "2009-01-29T16:31:57Z")
> [@CaerieD](#): > > An ant, in a family full of grasshoppers. Me too, and I dread the day when my shiftless brother(s) show up on my doorstep expecting me to pick up where our parents left off and provide them with free room and board until the day they die. (I call this emotion “pre-bitterness”.) ---
**Author:** ![Mojo\_Pin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Mojo\_Pin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mojo_Pin)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2009, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880/54 "2009-01-29T23:09:57Z")
Grasshopper, sadly. I’m still young enough yet! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-you-a-grasshopper-or-an-ant/482880.md?page=2)