Said Epaminondas: Yes, but can she catch, gut, clean and cook a wild salmon?
Responds Midnight Rider (pinching someone else's stuff, as usual):
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
-Robert A. Heinlein
It would appear that, as a human beng, I, Midnight Rider, have some catching up to do. . .
3 comments:
I can die. The "gallant" bit will need to be judged by others.
Others from Heinlein.
You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don’t ever count on having both at once.
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded--here and there, now and then--are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty. This is known as “bad luck.”
And this:
In a mature society, “civil servant” is semantically equal to “civil master.”
Hmmm....
mom might be able to help you with the pitch manure part...
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