I don’t get out much anymore.

I was reminded of why tonight. Put me up in front of a classroom, or in a group of people these days, and I feel like a monkey clashing his cymbals (or perhaps symbols) together.

Sure, it’s entertaining for a little while. But it must get tiresome fairly quickly. Perhaps there should be an explicit warning: don’t get him started, because you’ll never know how long it will be before he shuts up.

Aside: at one point tonight, responding to the suggestion that things look differently when you’ve read more, I answered that it wasn’t possible to continue my pace of reading without running out of room in my house. I don’t really think I need to read that much more—it’s just that I need to understand more. In hindsight I recognize the rampant egotism that this suggests. I meant it humbly, because I feel a little stupider, and a little more well-read each day. Reading a lot isn’t the same thing as being smart. Nobody seems to get that.