Smart? Maybe not..

I think there are many decisions in life that are not between right and wrong, but between the “smart” choice, and the not-so-practical choice. In general, I’m a pretty practical person. [I wear my seatbelt, even when I’m in the backseat.] There are some times, though, when I have made the other choice.

Por ejemplo,

The smart thing would have been to major in something more "useful," or career-related, in college, like education, business, or nursing. I chose to major in English, because I wanted to.

The smart thing would be to not go in debt, but I did, in order to study abroad.

The smart thing would have been to keep working at a well-paying job at a prestigious university. I quit to work another summer at a children’s camp.

The smart thing would be to go to a church close to my house. I became a member and got involved at a church that is 45 minutes away from where I live.

So do I make "smart" decisions? not always.

But I don’t regret any of it one bit.

Getting to read and write as homework was ideal for me. I may never really use my English degree to make money, but I don’t care. There, I said it.

My study abroad experience was one of my favorite experiences. Ever. I did something that no one, including myself, ever thought I would, practically on a daily basis for 3 whole months. Three years later, I finished paying off that loan. Completely worth it.

I had a nice job. A nice job that bored me. A nice job that had little relevance to my Christian walk. I lived a nice little existential life for 9 months. And I hated it.

I fill my car’s gas tank about twice a week. It may be expensive to drive 45 minutes each way to church functions, but I found a church that I love. Really love.

Call me crazy all you want, but I’d rather be crazy than stuck with a miserable life.

Just because I’m curious (not fishing for comments), has anyone else done anything not-so-practical? Or done the “smart” thing and regretted it?

The SarcMark

Today, my best friend texted me about a new punctuation mark (she knows me so well). It's a sarcasm punctuation mark, created by a company called Sarcasm, Inc. It looks like a swirl with a dot in the middle. You can download it to your computer and put it after sarcastic sentences, in order to let people know that you were, in fact, being sarcastic. Here's my thought-process on the topic:

Upon first seeing the text: Is this a joke?

I googled it. There were news articles. I concluded that it was probably real, but remained skeptical.

Then I thought, Yes! I've been saying they need one of these! With some people, you just never know. This will come in handy.

Two minutes later: Wait, this is going to make us stupid. Without the mark, one has to work to carefully craft a sentence where sarcasm is conveyed. It can't be too subtle, or too obvious. Sarcasm, without the mark, takes wit, creativity, and talent.

One second later: I won't use the mark. I will rise above.

At this point, I began to get upset:You know what else? People are going to start using "sarcasm" for everything now. All those kids on facebook are going to start commenting on everything sarcastically. And it won't be witty sarcasm. It'll be lame. Now that everyone can be sarcastic, there is no talent required. The SarcMark will follow the same path exclamation marks have--overuse will ruin it.

After reading an article or two about it: I think this is a joke. Does a company called Sarcasm, Inc. even exist? And if so, wouldn't this be exactly the kind of thing they'd joke about?

An hour later: This will not catch on. Most people are in agreement with me, making sarcastic remarks about the sarcmark, not using the sarcmark. Thank goodness.

I think there are some valuable lessons here: 1) Sarcasm takes talent and, most importantly, wit. 2) This talent is not shared by all. 3) That's what makes it so wonderful.

[Side note: I know you've heard a lot about it today, but let's continue to keep Haiti in our prayers. There are lots of ways to help by giving money. Samaritan's Purse, World Vision, World Relief, the Red Cross are all taking donations. Definitely pray.]

Confession: I am a nerd. Want proof? Here ya go:

One of my life-goals is to own a printed copy of the Oxford English Dictionary. The OED is currently at 20 volumes with a price tag of $995. It's amazing. It's ridiculous. I want one.

This desire began sometime during college. I learned that Webster, though perhaps the standard American dictionary, was not by any means the best English dictionary. That title belonged to the OED. In fact, the OED's website is subtitled "The definitive record of the English language." The OED not only has definitions of a word, but the history of each word, as well as historical quotes to back the information.

When I lived in England, there was a TV show based on the OED. I'm serious. It was called Balderdash and Piffle and was used to gain new research on some words and to add some new words to the dictionary. This woman would pick a word and go explore the history and meaning of the word, including travelling, interviewing people, etc. I watched two episodes of Balderdash and Piffle and can easily say that it was one of my favorite shows on the few channels we got. It's okay, I know I'm a nerd.

As much as I would love one, I can quickly think of a few reasons not to get my own copy of the OED.

First, it's $995. And there are children in the world who've never even seen a book, much less know how to read one. $995 could probably do something about that.

Second, language is constantly changing. Language isn't set, like math (which is wonderful), so the rules, and the words themselves will evolve with time. This means that dictionaries also have to evolve. The OED is currently only in its second edition (Merriam-Webster is in its eleventh), but I know that the moment I purchase mine, they'll begin work on the third edition.

Third, they have an online version. Well, scratch that. I just learned an online subscription is $295/year. Crazy. In only 3.3 years of payments like that, you could have your own, physical, book-scented copy.

Moving on...

Fourth, twenty volumes is a lot of bookshelf space.

Fifth, how often will I actually research a word's history? Hard to say.

So you see, I will probably never own my own copy. However, I still think it would be awesome to have one.

Yeah, Yeah 2009. Blah Blah...2010!

While I'm not much of one for cliches (how do you get that accent sign?), I felt that it would be entirely wrong to skip right over a new year post.

....though, I suppose I did skip Christmas (Hope yours was happy!)...

A new year, though. I mean, that's right up a blogger's ally (like I said, hate cliches.). And there are so many directions to go with it...stuff done in the old year, stuff to do in the new year, lessons learned, resolutions, experiences. And lists! I love lists.

So, here's my new year's post:

2009 was a year, to say the least. So many things--first things, last things--happened. I really did attempt to list them all out (because, I love lists...are you keeping up with this?), but even I got bored, so I scratched that.

2010 is super exciting. And I think I'll leave it at that for now. (I would tell you my resolutions, but I read somewhere that if you tell someone your goal, you're less likely to do it, which only kinda makes sense, but I'll go with it.)

To sum it up: 2009=a year. 2010=super exciting.