2002-04-24 -

Mediocrity: Threat or Menace?

I got really honked off at someone today over Usenet, and it got me to thinking. What the hell is so wrong with being mediocre at something you enjoy?

I was asking about paintball gear, and another fellow claimed that the thing I was looking for was unecessary. I countered that it helped me overcome some flaws in my game, and before long he was suggesting that if my game sucked so bad, I should find another sport. And boy, did that steam me.

If people are depending on you to do something well, then yes, do it well or get the hell out. I don't have a lot of sympathy for crappy doctors or airline pilots. But we're talking about hobbies here. If there's a competency cap for paintball, should we also require people to hit 80 by 45 or get the hell off the golf course?

It pisses me off because this sort of thinking would basically target my lifestyle. I'm only really good at one thing, and that's the thing I do for a living. At most of my hobbies I'm somewhere in the middle. So I feel like this wanker is basically telling me to drop my life and go back to bed, and I'm getting pissy about it.

The pissiness has been with me the whole day, with unpleasant consequences. Julie said a couple of things tonight that, coupled with my bad mood, had me sitting on my couch for a while wondering if our relationship could ever really work. I only kicked it by focusing hard on the fact that I was taking them out of context and dropping them right in the middle of my bad day. I'm sure I'll feel better after I talk to her tomorrow.

Still, anyone who pages me tonight is gonna get grumped at.

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