# I don't have one. I'm just commoner \[Am I strange?\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [February 25, 2014, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265 "2014-02-25T22:58:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/41 "2014-02-27T01:19:40Z")
> [@Hollow\_mask](#): > > Title. Geez…all you smart people and no one is familiar with silliness ? > > weren’t any of you ever young ? Never mind, go back contemplating your naval. > > And don’t tell me I meant navel. I meant your big boats. > > Never let the child inside you die. And don’t murder him, either. Don’t waste our time. The rule here is to choose a title that described the subject of the thread. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/42 "2014-02-27T03:40:13Z")
I’ve edited the title a bit to reflect better what the topic is actually about. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/43 "2014-02-27T03:49:28Z")
I have two. ---
**Author:** ![Hollow\_mask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Hollow\_mask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hollow_mask)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/44 "2014-02-27T07:44:50Z")
> [@kambuckta](#): > > Irony and playfulness are much valued traits 'round here. **Please stay.** Heh, we’ve all embarrassed ourselves once or thrice on the boards…give it a couple of days, and your _fox-passes_ will be forgotten and forgiven! > > Depending on which part of the world you inhabit, either kick back with a coffee (morning) or a beer/vodka/cask of chateaux shabby (evening, as it is here in Aus). Pretend it’s like an **Opinion Expo** …wander through the aisles, you can taste the wares of those that appeal and give others a wide berth. Jump in with something to say (nobody minds if your opinions are ‘out there’) but be prepared to back anything you claim to be true up with evidence. > > Hey, I’ve been here nigh on 13 years now…been kicked out once, and threatened with eviction on a couple of other occasions, but like a dysfunctional family, I’m curiously drawn back. > > Hope you find your stay equally interesting **Hollow mask** 😛 Thanks a lot. That sounds like great advice. My pace is too fast. I do find this interesting, though. You sure sound like an Aussie. I like the way you guys express things. Yeah, I’ve been kicked off or out of a lot of things, too. All the families I know are dysfunctional I’m in Omaha, ne, for some reason. No, it’s ok I guess. Cold ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/45 "2014-02-27T15:04:58Z")
> [@Hollow\_mask](#): > > Maybe some of you should read the Marianne Moore Quote again. I have that disease. We all do, or we wouldn’t be posting. Lighten up, eggheads. Or don’t, I don’t care. I admire humility in others, but I seldom touch the stuff, myself. Even the great Steven Hawking finds the time for mirth, and he CAN’T laugh. I like to get along with others, but it is surely not something I can’t do without. Stephen. ---
**Author:** ![GrizzRich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7ba0ec/32.png) [@GrizzRich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrizzRich)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/46 "2014-02-27T15:15:12Z")
Judging from your user name… are you a Richard Dawkins fan? ---
**Author:** ![Hollow\_mask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Hollow\_mask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hollow_mask)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/47 "2014-02-27T19:49:45Z")
Yes. Am I banished ? ---
**Author:** ![Hollow\_mask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Hollow\_mask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hollow_mask)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/48 "2014-02-27T20:15:05Z")
I have written two confessionals, just now, but was logged-out before getting them posted. I’ll try again. I’ve read my posts and the replies and am embarrassed . I didn’t dream I was, or could even be, such a pedantic bore ! I was wrong. Several tried to warn me, but I was more interested in trying to impress than in learning. Thanks for trying. I should have read the rules before wading-in. I felt like a big fish, in the fishbowl of my little world. Out here at sea, it’s painfully clear I am a minnow. Yes, I’ve read most of Dawkins’ books and I stole the name from one. Trying to burnish my self-image. Didn’t work. Can’t get anything past you guys. I don’t want to be banished to the wilderness and I can’t return to my fishbowl. My contrition feels genuine. Apologies to all. I’m not worried about my soul. I don’t think I have one. But the state of my awareness concerns and alarms me. Self-deception is the most convincing kind, I guess. Anyway, I hope this helps. ---
**Author:** ![Hollow\_mask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Hollow\_mask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hollow_mask)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/49 "2014-02-27T20:39:48Z")
> [@Hollow\_mask](#): > > You should. Self-importance is my favorite target. I guess this stupid statement requires my suicide. I think I’d rather be murdered. Wouldn’t blame anyone for squeezing the trigger. I probably deserve it. Kinda’ even wish for it. Don’t worry about hurt feelings, seriously. When I’m wrong, which, it turns out, is far more common than I had thought, I like to be corrected. It’s the only way to improve. It won’t pain me, too much. I am difficult to insult. My ego seems impenetrable. And I want to learn. I have always held far too high an opinion of myself, based on I don’t exactly know what, so a little blood-letting would probably help my condition. Or, maybe even a decapitation. You guys decide. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/50 "2014-02-27T21:02:46Z")
I think I’m witnessing coherence being sacrificed on the bloody altar of cleverness, but I can’t be sure. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/51 "2014-02-27T21:04:48Z")
This thread makes me uncomfortable because I can see myself in the poster. I hate myself yet I obsess about myself and then it is still all about me. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/52 "2014-02-27T21:05:32Z")
> [@Idle\_Thoughts](#): > > I’ve edited the title a bit to reflect better what the topic is actually about. Which is…? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Hollow\_mask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Hollow\_mask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hollow_mask)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2014, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/53 "2014-02-27T23:08:40Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > I think I’m witnessing coherence being sacrificed on the bloody altar of cleverness, but I can’t be sure. I’m not quite sure how to interpret this, either, but I like the way it’s expressed. If you mean fake, or insincere, no. I ask that you accept it as offered. I’ve never heard of that alter. You seem far more clever than I. And, no, that is not sarcasm intended. I’m really not used to this medium, nor in discourse at such level. “I’m not that clever, kid”(somewhat obscure reference which reveals more than it obscures, I hope). I call this honesty. Plus coherence. Yeah, you can be sure. I’m a lot of things, but I’m not a liar. Unless there’s some necessity for lying, and I can’t think of one, presently. If there is one, it’s somewhere deep into my subconscious. Though I left the faith long ago, the practice of confession remains. Damn Jesuits. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265/54 "2014-02-28T02:18:57Z")
Some people have made the mistake of seeing Shunt’s work as a load of rubbish about railway timetables, but clever people like me, who talk loudly in restaurants, see this as a deliberate ambiguity, a plea for understanding in a mechanized world. The points are frozen, the beast is dead. What is the difference? What indeed is the point? The point is frozen, the beast is late out of Paddington. The point is taken. If La Fontaine’s elk would spurn Tom Jones the engine must be our head, the dining car our oesophagus, the guard’s van our left lung, the cattle truck our shins, the first-class compartment the piece of skin at the nape of the neck and the level crossing an electric elk called Simon. The clarity is devastating. But where is the ambiguity? It’s over there in a box. Shunt is saying the 8.15 from Gillingham when in reality he means the 8.13 from Gillingham. The train is the same only the time is altered. Ecce homo, ergo elk. La Fontaine knew his sister and knew her bloody well. The point is taken, the beast is moulting, the fluff gets up your nose. The illusion is complete; it is reality, the reality is illusion and the ambiguity is the only truth. But is the truth, as Hitchcock observes, in the box? No there isn’t room, the ambiguity has put on weight. The point is taken, the elk is dead, the beast stops at Swindon, Chabrol stops at nothing, I’m having treatment and La Fontaine can get knotted. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-have-one-im-just-commoner-am-i-strange/682265.md?page=2)