# What were you THINKING? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 13, 2023, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532 "2023-10-13T19:36:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 288
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6043 "2025-12-17T15:28:02Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Ayn Rand? That’s the one that wrote about orcs or something? No, that’s the other one. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6044 "2025-12-17T15:31:33Z")
She never had that effect on me, but I guess Heinlein influenced me starting at age 12? I wasn’t that impressed by Ayn Rand. For books that English teachers had us read, she was better and more interesting than most, but overall nothing great to me. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6045 "2025-12-17T15:31:41Z")
I guess those are the rules which are the exception that proves the rule. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6046 "2025-12-17T15:39:44Z")
Why do we keep rehashing other threads in this thread? ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6047 "2025-12-17T15:46:03Z")
What are they THINKING? ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6048 "2025-12-17T16:27:56Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Until English has mutated enough that Rand is as challenging to read to folks then as Shakespeare is to us now > [@hajario](#): > > Atlas Shrugged What’s all this slagging of Rand McNally and their atlas? I’ve found them to be very helpful guides to get me where I need to go in the past, though these days I rely on GPS. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6049 "2025-12-17T16:37:14Z")
> [@solost](#): > > What’s all this slagging of Rand McNally and their atlas? I want my atlas to be precise and confident, I don’t want one that just shrugged. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6050 "2025-12-17T16:45:24Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > I want my atlas to be precise and confident, I don’t want one that just shrugged. When you’re somewhere deep in Texas, even an atlas will give up hope on figuring out how much there’s yet to go. ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6051 "2025-12-17T16:53:01Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > When you’re somewhere deep in Texas, even an atlas will give up hope on figuring out how much there’s yet to go. Your atlas shrugs as your windshield fills with bugs (CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP) Deep in the heaaaart of Texas ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6052 "2025-12-17T17:39:58Z")
Sorry. Just a little self snark ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6053 "2025-12-17T17:55:24Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Until English has mutated enough that Rand is as challenging to read to folks then as Shakespeare is to us now, new people will keep discovering her BS and being sucked in by it. I was interested in reading that thread but I haven’t gotten around to it. Though from skimming the gist consensus seemed to be, “No, she’s not misunderstood and she sucks.” Which is more or less where I came down anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6054 "2025-12-17T18:43:24Z")
Very nice. 😁 ---
**Author:** ![scudsucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scudsucker/32/14101_2.png) [@scudsucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scudsucker)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6055 "2025-12-17T19:26:16Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Rand is as challenging to read to folks then as Shakespeare is to us now I think Geoffry Chaucer, rather than Shakespeare. And even then, she is unintelligible. \* sidenote: my mother speaks quite fluent Middle English, but then again she was an English teacher. I studied Chaucer at school but never really got the pronunciation right. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6056 "2025-12-17T20:16:07Z")
Not for lack of trying. 😁 ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6057 "2025-12-17T22:38:21Z")
We had to recite by heart – what was it? – the first 18 lines of the General Prologue with proper Middle English pronunciation in my Chaucer class. I enjoyed it. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2025, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6058 "2025-12-17T23:09:51Z")
I remember my older sister had to study that as a senior in high school, she would practice pronunciation on us at dinner. This was the mid-60s. Two years later, not a whisper of Chaucer in my senior English class. Was it optional for the teacher (my teacher was not very erudite, I would say), or had the curriculum changed? I didn’t even think about it at the time, now I wonder. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2025, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6059 "2025-12-18T00:12:27Z")
> [@carrps](#): > > We had to recite by heart – what was it? – the first 18 lines of the General Prologue with proper Middle English pronunciation in my Chaucer class. I enjoyed it. Nerd! That would be cool. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2025, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6060 "2025-12-18T00:25:06Z")
> [@carrps](#): > > We had to recite by heart – what was it? – the first 18 lines of the General Prologue with proper Middle English pronunciation in my Chaucer class. I enjoyed it. I must have been under-educated. I recall no such experience. In fact I recall no exposure to Chaucer at all, although I got lots of Shakespeare in high school and later, serendipitously, in university in a class taught by a great Shakesperean scholar. Have always loved Shakespeare, never understood Chaucer. The guy probably never learned proper English! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2025, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6061 "2025-12-18T04:15:39Z")
Same here. I had to recite from memory Marc Antony’s funeral speech and got a B because I missed two words. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2025, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532/6062 "2025-12-18T06:39:24Z")
> [@carrps](#): > > We had to recite by heart – what was it? – the first 18 lines of the General Prologue with proper Middle English pronunciation in my Chaucer class. I enjoyed it. Damn, I had to do that in my high school English class. I did not enjoy it, but as far as I remember I got it right enough to pass. Totally aside from anything else: that teacher had married one of his ex-students shortly after her graduation, and his ex wife still taught at the same school. He was a total creepster, but somehow you ended up still liking the guy. I’m glad he never started a cult. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532.md?page=287) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-were-you-thinking/991532.md?page=289)