Nutgraf

At first, this one made me shake my head a little. Then I thought I got it. Then, much like someone grappling for a bar of soap in the bath (simile courtesy of the late, magnificent Douglas Adams), I lost it again. Still, it’s pretty great.

Well, I’ve always been fond of Tom Waits’ advice from the song Telephone Call From Istanbul: “Never trust a man in a blue trench coat; never drive a car when you’re dead.”

Then there was the truly terrible piece of advice that an old drunk in Chiang Mai gave me, which was “Never let anyone tell you you’re wrong.”

That was Colin, a 5 foot 6 retired Scottish firefighter. He tried to convince me once that the song Country Road was actually about the western part of regular Virginia. And since he was, in his mind, never wrong, I couldn’t convince him otherwise.

So maybe better advice would be “always assume you’re wrong and be pleasantly surprised when you’re right.” Or, more optimistically, “question everything.” If something seems too easy, it’s probably going to end up costing you (a lesson I learned in Bangkok, but that’s a story for another time).

– Gabe

What the heck are we doing and how can you get in on it?

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