this is me …. Also a ariting game I play …. I lost something I thought I should of won and when I asked why :
"To be honest you need to clean it up and tighten it up.
You need complete sentences, you need better grammar.
You need better description and explanation and scene setting. It’s all rushed, and messy and incoherent.
I’ll say you tried to tweak the formula and go for it, but it still all falls apart and reads like a really weird 10 year old who has no idea what he’s talking about."
it hurt ……
Fishing. The only one’s who are happy with my skill are the fish.
After one of my rare catches, I divided the cost of the boat, the marina slip, maintenance, insurance and registration by the weight of the fish. I told my wife even the Trumps don’t eat fish this expensive.
I consider myself a pretty bad writer - my output is reportedly okay according to sources 90% of whom I’d expect to lie to be polite about it, but I’m just so damn slow. Three steps forward, two steps back, three steps forward, two steps back, three steps forward, realize something that I hadn’t accounted for and throw out all the steps and start over again…
Yet I keep coming back to it. It’s not about making something for others to read; it’s about spending time with my characters and the world they’re in.
I’m a mediocre dancer.
I love doing it. I’ve been doing one sort of dance or another all my life. I’m not terrible. And yet, I’m not (and will never be) at a level that corresponds to the time and money I’ve put into the hobby over the decades. Videos of myself make me cringe. Still it’s fun.
My singing is similarly “ok.” Not bad, but definitely not good. And yet, last week I spent money on an karaoke app so I could spread my bad singing across the internet!
Dinsdale, my music teacher, who was otherwise a pretty good one, did not realize that when she sang dictation, her initial note wasn’t the one she intended but a whole note lower. My Dad’s ears were “good for holding his glasses”. And apparently one thing you suck at is motivating people.
I’ve got a good ear (definitely not from Dad’s side) but about as much range as a frog and, thanks to permanent rinitis, the nasality to go with. I love singing but I refrain from doing it when anybody can hear, unless it’s to keep a child distracted.
Cooking. I love to cook, but never ever use a recipe. I just throw things into a pot and turn on the heat. One of the more common things I cook is chicken soup. Or at least it starts out as chicken soup. Add some fresh garlic, onions, celery, carrots, broccoli, cabbage, dill and whatever else I have on hand, plus a variety of spices. Sometimes a little tomato sauce. With all those veggies, there’s very little room for the actual soup. So it’s more like a stew. But I like it and my husband loves it.
Board games, like Settlers of Cataan, Puerto Rico, Carcassonne, House on Haunted Hill…
I love examining them, I love designing them, and I love playing them, but it always seems like I screw up the first turn and struggle to catch up. Even if I start off right, I’ll inevitably commit some fatal flaw or have insanely bad luck and totally screw up my chances of winning. Monopoly? I’m the guy who lands on Park Place with hotels, then rolls snake eyes to land on Boardwalk. Then, Income Tax and lose my $200 for passing Go. Everybody laughs at me.
Even computer games like Minecraft: I’ll find that pocket of monsters, lose my shit, and be unable to get it back before my loot rots. 5-year old kids run circles around me. Damn kids. I found out about Trimps in the Game Room forum a couple years ago. I still can’t get past level 175, and the other players are zooming past level 400. There’s always some essential path that I cannot see or understand, but it’s evident to every one else on the planet.
I’m good at Scrabble because it doesn’t involve any long-term planning. I just have to use my superior knowledge of words. But but but I WANT to be the puppet master who controls everybody’s fate. I WANT to be the brash player that manages to talk the other players into leaving me alone and letting me win.
No idea where the fuck THAT came from, or how the first 2 sentences apply to reading an electric tuner or basic uke chord charts. But assuming that last line is directed at me, good thing I’m not particularly interested in motivating many folk to do much of anything - other than to leave me alone!
I’m one of the “guitar people.” I like to play bass guitar…but can’t. My younger brother has played for over 30 years and he is very, very good. My older brother has played for almost 40 years and he is very good. I’ve tried for almost eight years and I suck. Strangely, I have several (very nice) bass guitars and at least five combo amps. People keep giving me basses and amps for some reason. They know I’m trying to play, so they’re helpful. The problem is that I don’t have the deep love for it or the discipline. I just noodle around for a few minutes and then go on with my day.
I’ve thought about starting another thread titled “things you are good at but don’t like to do.” I have plenty of those.
I’m another one with no musical ability. I enjoy singing, but confine it to along with the radio in the car, with the volume cranked up so even I can’t hear it when I go flat or off key. I pick up various musical instruments and make stabs at learning how to play them, but my sense of timing is terrible, and I can’t seem to figure out the rules of music, let alone follow them. The only time I’ve ever been complimented on the sounds I produce from an instrument was when I was randomly plucking the strings of a 5 string kantele.
But I have taken some Great Courses on music theory and the sounds of instruments, so I can both hear more and understand more, thus appreciate more, when I listen to a piece of music. But improving my sense of rhythm and timing? How do I do that?
But there was only one other dude in my age group, and that guy was obviously in great shape. However he was running with his girlfriend, who looked like she wasn’t comfortable running trails. Either one of them could have beat me on pavement.
My wife made me stick around to get my medal. It was a little embarrassing.
