Never heard of her, before this thread.
Do you know what kind of books Spider Robinson writes?
As someone who travels regularly, I’m just as shocked as you. Then again, I hadn’t heard of Nora Roberts 'til last year, and she churns out like five best-sellers a month.
To everyone who raised their hands or otherwise indicated that they are unfamiliar with Mary Higgins Clark, I have only this to say:
I am so f&cking envious of you
I thought he mostly wrote on the web, these days.
The only reason why I know of MHC is because one of her works came up when I was looking for fiction based on the life of Ted Bundy. I’ve never actually read any of her stuff and have no desire to. I would be mildly suprised if the average person who isn’t a crime fiction reader has ever heard of her. Maybe she’s big in California? Have any of her books been made into movies?
I feel like I’m invisible. Come on people! I already told you what she writes! PAY ATTENTION TO ME!
Yeah, we know, but this is the wilful ignorance thread. Sheesh.
Hey. How you doin’?
Actually, she may not have any ambition to be an eye doctor (let’s hope!). I had a friend who did the same job and it was just a job to her, not a stepping stone. She didn’t know anything about eyes before she started working there and didn’t know much more when she quit. She went to work at a place that sold hot tubs and jewelry after that (yeah, both things at the same place).
She’s had a few of her books made into movies, the Lifetime made for tv sort. Complete crap.
Tedious ones?
Half joking, but only half
A friend’s brother once dated a spectacularly ignorant girl. She came over for dinner, and regaled them with stories, because she loved to talk.
She told them that her uncle got cancer because he “ate an orange when he was in the Vietnam War.”
After a long moment of stunned silence, my friend and her parents tried to explain to the girlfriend that what had probably happened was that her uncle was exposed to Agent Orange in Vietnam.
No no, she insisted, he got cancer because he ate an orange in Vietnam.
My friend’s family tried to explain to her what Agent Orange was, and how people exposed to it were known to have higher rates of cancer, and how some U.S. Vietnam Vets had sued over this issue. My friend is very nice and tactful, as are her parents. The girl got hysterical and insisted that she had not misunderstood–that her uncle really got cancer from eating an orange in Vietnam.
I had a girlfriend once in middle school who could not be convinced that there were two separate words: deaf and death.
She was adamant that her Grandmother was going death.
Her work is often sitting next to the checkout line in grocery stores, above the candy or chips. So it’s perfectly possible to get accustomed to her name without reading her.
Heh…as I started to read this, I was mentally preparing a reply that would rebut you, saying you know, that isn’t really WILLFUL ignorance. She just misheard. Then I read the rest of it. 
This example might not be completely willful, but is so spectacular I just have to share it.
10th grade (about 15 years old, for those not from the US) biology class, we are filling out diagrams of the water cycle. On a big sheet of paper with a pond, an arrow coming out of the pond pointing to a cloud, an arrow coming out of the cloud back to the water. There were little labels where you were supposed to fill in the parts of the cycle. VERY simple assignment, mostly intended as busy work. I’ve just completed it and am talking to a friend when a girl next to me asks me for some help. Ok, fine, but I was a little confused about how there could be questions about the water cycle.
So, I ask her what the problem is. She points to the “cloud” shape, and says she doesn’t know what this is supposed to represent.
Me: “It’s a cloud, for condensation.”
Her: “Oh, I thought it was mud.”
Me: (sounding slightly strangled, from holding in hysterical laughter) “Is there mud in the sky where you come from?” (she had moved in from out of the area)
Her: “Well, isn’t that were the earthworms come from?”
I’m not sure how I managed to hold the laughter in, but eventually the story came out: She thought earthworms lived in mud clods in the sky, then fell to earth with the rain.
It sounds like one of those ideas that you get as a child and then never really get direct information against, because… well, not many schools have a segment where they explain the origins of earthworms.
I know. My friend did say that they had a protracted discussion about it though.
Also, I left out the part about how, at the same dinner, the girl insisted that there was a pregnant rooster on her grandfather’s farm. She also refused to be disabused of the notion that roosters and chicken are two separate species, and that there are male and female roosters.
Really??? Wow. I didn’t know that. I thought rooster=male chicken. :smack:
snerk You’re my type of gal Ana.
I’m flattered, but is there a reason why my avian confusion should intrigue you so?