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<blockquote>[size=+1][font=book antiqua, times new roman]Commit yourself to lifelong learning. The most valuable asset you'll ever have is your mind and what you put into it. —Brian Tracy

Get over the idea that only children should spend their time in study. Be a student so long as you still have something to learn, and this will mean all your life. —Henry L. Doherty

There is divine beauty in learning, just as there is human beauty in tolerance. To learn means to accept the postulate that life did not begin at my birth. Others have been here before me, and I walk in their footsteps. The books I have read were composed by generations of fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, teachers and disciples. I am the sum total of their experiences, their quests. And so are you. —Elie Wiesel

The most important function of education at any level is to develop the personality of the individual and the significance of his life to himself and to others. This is the basic architecture of a life; the rest is ornamentation and decoration of the structure. —Grayson Kirk

Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime. —Chinese proverb

You can get help from teachers, but you are going to have to learn a lot by yourself, sitting alone in a room. —Theodor Seuss Geisel, a.k.a. Dr. Seuss
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Those people are all schmucks. And I believe them.

My best time to draft is between midnight and 4am. Über allen Gipfeln ist Ruh. It’s just “settled” at that time of day. I can feel secure in the knowledge that others aren’t having too much fun while I’m hunched over a drafting table.

Of course, I can think of better things to be doing at 4 a.m. than drafting.

It also becomes problematic when one wants to participate in “normal” society. Especially in the 9 to 5 sector (to which I sadly belong). But I can’t help it; I have always been a procrastinator and a night person. Pressure produces results.

An advantage of going back to school, eleven years after I first entered college, is that I have the opportunity to rediscover my CD collection. There’s so much music (mainly from 1994 to 1997) I’ve been neglecting! Yet four weeks into the semester, I find I’m already exhausting my library.

You can’t just listen to any old CD when you (stand up to) draft at midnight; the requirements are stringent. I don’t make the rules; I simply follow them.

Nothing too fast: it evokes a nervous energy not conducive to the concentration required to be a perfectionist.

Nothing too slow: it’s between midnight and 4 a.m.; can’t fall asleep.

Nothing too demanding; although Philip Glass and the Kronos Quartet are fine artists, they really deserve the respect of an attentive audience.

Nothing too simple: I’m a grownup. I’m doing “smart stuff.” Adolescent pop is annoying.

Nothing too dark: Nick Cave, Peter Murphy, and This Mortal Coil can all have my children, but lusting after them while doing homework isn’t very productive. Nor is lusting after every boyfriend I ever slept with while listening to their music. But that’s neither here nor there.

Nothing too peppy: it’s 4 a.m.; please don’t make me want to slit my wrists.

So with what does this leave me? A drafting table yearning for the subtle pressure of my wrist and the controlled weight of my pelvis, pressing up against its straight, straight edge. And Radiohead.

I’m coming, Sweet Straightedge!
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