Answers to "Ask me Anything", Public Edition

[pne]

Here are answers to the ask my anything poll recently, except for a couple which will be going into a friends-only entry.

jordik asked: What century other than the current one would you like to have lived in? No idea. The twentieth, perhaps, since it's most similar to the current one -- I like it when things are the way I know them.

isabeau asked: What is your favorite kind of pizza? (toppings, not brand) Hm. I think there'd be pepperoni (as in the kind of salami) that's turned a bit crunchy during baking, mushrooms, and red peppers on it. I don't have a ready-made answer, though.

muckefuck asked: Wie ist das Wetter in Wolfsburg? Durchwachsen! Die Temperatur war heute abend 9°. Gestern abend hat es geregnet, aber heute war es bedeckt. Die Sonne hat, glaube ich, heute nicht geschienen.

kait_the_great asked: How long have you had Martin? Ooh -- for several years. Stella got him at some point, but because I ended up playing with him more, she gave him to me eventually. Five years, perhaps? I'd have to ask her.

joyitude asked: I don't really have any specific questions, honestly. Hm...what makes you happy? :) That's a tough question -- I have a hard time looking into myself and seeing what makes me tick. Some answers off the top of my head: spending time with Amy. Spending time alone. Having things keep going smoothly. Writing code. Knowing I have friends. Seeing a pregnant woman. Seeing a pretty girl. Having a woman smile back after I've smiled at her. Seeing the sun shine.

darth_spacey asked: What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow? African or European?

angelsk asked: What is your favourite sandwich filling and why? I never know what to pack on sandwiches when we go travelling! Possibly cheese, though, something along the lines of semi-mature Gouda or Maasdammer. And when I go to Subway, I like things with bacon.

bluewingedcat asked: Blargle? Snarf!

nitaq asked: Wyt ti'n siarad cymraeg? Dw i ddim. (And I had to look that up.)

ibneko asked: What is the meaning of life? I think that depends quite a bit on the individual -- that different people will have different answers. I think I'm still elaborating my own answer.

fishgreenlittle asked: What is your job/career? I'm a software developer for a medium-size company, and have been with them since I finished school -- two-and-a-half years of Ausbildung (traineeship?), then I came back to work for them after my mission. If I had my way, I'd continue to develope software for the foreseeable future -- I have no particular desire to move "up" into management, for example.

eridanusus asked: If you could be any language what would it be? Lojban, perhaps -- precise but useful.

volantwish asked: Why don't you use filters to read you friends page? :p I do! Kind of. I have a Default View filter. I also had "support" and "priv" filters which I used when I was still active in support (for general support communities and supporthelpy communities, respectively), which I'd read more often than my main friends page. I also have a "comics" filter which I usually forget to check these days.

I have this thing, though, where I try to keep all personal journals in my Default View. I think that at the moment, this is the case, and off the top of my head, I can only think of one personal journal who was on my friends list but, for a while, not in my Default View (after I had defriended the journal, then added it a bit later but left it off the DV). That journal is currently back in my DV, though.

I suppose I don't want to separate people into "the inner circle" and "the great unwashed masses", or something like that, or where to draw the line. What I do do sometimes if I haven't had time for quite a while to read my friends page is to read certain people's journals directly. (Not that many -- perhaps half-a-dozen.)

Perhaps I should start thinking about it, though, and/or move more communities and feeds off my DV into a special filter.

How do you (all of you) read your friends pages? What kind of filters do you use?

livredor asked: Is the new poll system really any different? I haven't noticed a difference. What has changed? Was there an announcement somewhere?

spongebobjess asked: What color socks are you wearing? Dark grey at the moment, with a pattern of dark red and dark blue squares.

aquariumgirl asked: Would you say that it's very unusual for people to have more than two children where you live? What do you think about that? I'd say it's unusual for people to have more than two children where I live -- I think "very unusual" wouldn't start until about five, maybe four, though.

In general, I think larger families are good. However, hereabouts it's often hard enough to make ends meet with one or two children if only one parent is working, and that obviously influences how many children people choose to have. As does the age at which one starts having children, after having developed one's career or lived out some of one's fantasies or enjoyed time just with one's spouse.

I'm not sure trying to make people have larger families would do any good, and I'm not sure how much encouragement would help. But making it easier to have larger families might. I'm not sure what forms that could take, though.

nyssa asked: why are the text boxes so huge when i'm browsing on my phone?? They're like 3x the size of the text! I like to change the default width from 30 to 50, because I like slightly larger boxes when I fill out polls in my browser. I never thought about people using devices with very small screens to read them. So it's not a ploy to annoy you! But on balance, I think larger text boxes are better for the larger number of people. (Anyone feel free to disagree: basing other people's preferences on mine is not the surest way of things.)

arthur_sc_king asked: What calling do you have now in church? I'm first counsellor in the Elders Quorum Presidency. As part of that calling, I give the "Teachings for our Times" lessons on the fourth Sunday of each month. I also play the piano in priesthood meeting, though I've never officially been called to do so.

denial_land asked: Children -- are they worth it? (I am not being sarcastic at all) I suppose it depends on what you expect from them. Support in your old age? Happiness? A challenge? Companionship? Exercise? (I was surprised when I learned that some people got a dog specifically so that they themselves would get more exercise, because they'd feel compelled to walk the dog every day but would probably not otherwise have gone walking.)

I think having a child can be very rewarding at times -- seeing your child learn things, spending time with them, playing with them. Part of what I like about it is the bonds of love that usually form between parent and child -- things such as looking at them lying in bed asleep and smiling because of the love you feel for them, or having your child come running into your arms when you come home because they love you. Or having a family hug before you go to work that reminds you that you, all together, are one little family.

Children can also be annoying at times, though, or seem needy or clingy -- especially if you, like me, are the kind who likes time for themselves, and you might sometimes wish that children come only at well-defined times, when you're not busy with something else. And that ten minutes of playtime are enough.

I suppose it's also something that shapes your character a little and makes you more sensitive to the needs of others, at least if you'll let it.

It's a balance. Whether the balance will be more on the positive side or the negative side depends, I think, to a large degree on the child, on you, and on your expectations. There's no one-size-fits-all answer.

nassus asked: What colour is the sky? In northern Germany? Usually bluish-white. I'd say the most common situation is for it to be overcast.

sparkofcreation asked: What's the cutest thing Amy has said lately? Stella told me tonight about how Amy and she had spent the last two days at my parents' home, and how for supper, Stella had had Ginger Ale in a glass with tigers on it. Amy had had water in her own blue bottle, but after a while, she said, "Amy auch Tiger Wasser" (Amy also tiger water), which Inka (my step-mother) apparently found quite funny!

Other than that, I can't specifically recall anything recent. One of my all-time favourite moments, though, was coming home from work -- I opened the door, Amy saw me and exclaimed happily, "There she is!".

I found the wrong pronoun very amusing! It came from playing hide-and-seek, so when Amy would hide and I'd try to find her, I'd obviously use "she". That was quite a while ago, though.

tungol asked: If you could know one language that you currently don't, what would it be? Maltese, at the moment.

nondescript asked: Do you and Stella want another kid? Sometimes, yes.

It's something we've both gone back and forth on over the last year or so. Stella's more in favour of another child, but she prayed about it a while back and got the distinct impression that we shouldn't have another child (or at least, not yet).

Part of this might be that I like space and time for myself, whereas if we had another child, I'd have to spend a fair bit more time with Amy than now, since Stella would be taking care of the next child. So I think that it partly depends on me.

jainaerin asked: have you ever eaten a lemon covered in sugar? No, I haven't. Nor a grapefruit with sugar, for that matter.

Comments

[denial-land.livejournal.com]

Thank you for your answer. That was very insightful.

[nyssa.livejournal.com]

Ah, the width was fine. :) Sorry, I was unclear. They're much, much taller than the text is (for example, my question fit entirely into one box, because of the fact it was four times the height of the text). I was mostly being silly anyway. Don't mind me. :D

[pne.livejournal.com]

They're much, much taller than the text is

Oh! Bizarre. I have no idea why they'd do that.

[darth-spacey.livejournal.com]

The great secret that nobody wants you to know is that they both fly at 11 m/s, give or take variations between individuals.

[nitaq.livejournal.com]

Shame, I'm still looking for someone to talk to.

[pne.livejournal.com]

What about muckefuck?

[nitaq.livejournal.com]

muckefuck has answered to one of my welsh questions. That's nice, but in writing just isn't the same as really having to try to say something. But then my welsh isn't good enough to actually talk.

[lnbw.livejournal.com]

A better answer to the swallow question! (http://www.style.org/unladenswallow/)

[pne.livejournal.com]

Ooh, clever!

[eridanusus.livejournal.com]

How do you (all of you) read your friends pages? What kind of filters do you use?

We have a filter for all personal journals and a couple of low traffic communities (customers suck snark, multiplicity, I'm not sure if there are others on there...), and then the higher traffic communities are bookmarked in a folder on the toolbar. We were going to try having separate filters for each of our friends, but there's enough overlap that it would just be too much of a hassle.

[volantwish]

Everything, but my really high-volume communities is on my Default View. I do have a smaller filter, though, that I use when I am traveling and can only spend short periods online or when I come back from a trip and I want to catch up.

[pne.livejournal.com]

Hm. That sounds like a plan.

Thanks for the idea!

[wingflutter.livejournal.com]

I have another question for you now. How many languages do you speak at home with Amy (and Stella, for that matter)?

[pne.livejournal.com]

I speak only English with Amy.

When she speaks German to me, I'll sometimes accept it (usually repeating what she said in English) and will sometimes ask the question again if I know she knows the English word for it, and she'll usually repeat herself in English then. But she's fairly good at speaking English back to me when she knows the words. (She doesn't have both German and English words for all things -- and sometimes she'll use only English or only German for one thing, regardless of whom she's addressing, if that word is easier to pronounce.)

And I speak pretty much only German to Stella.

Occasionally, I'll try to speak English to her, but that usually doesn't last long -- mostly because (a) it's something I'm not used to and haven't made into a habit yet, so I'll forget and switch back to German, and (b) her English is very basic, so she doesn't always understand me. (Though she says she's learning English just from hearing me speak to Amy, and she thinks she might understand English about as well as Amy does at the moment.)

Speaking English to Amy was also weird at first, and it took a while for it to become a habit, so I suppose it could work with Stella. But if I really want to communicate something and be reasonably sure it was understood, that'd be harder. (After all, with a baby you usually don't care whether it understood what you said, since you don't expect much comprehension for the first umpteen months anyway. So it's easier to speak a language the baby doesn't understand - yet.)