Natureboy

Hi all, NatureBoy here. (NB is an old nickname from when I was scout camp counselor xx years ago.) After registering a couple of weeks ago, I've been posting in Potato Hell to get my feet wet and learn a bit more about the Batoto community. By now as there's a small sampling of quasi-autobiographical material in P. Hell, I won't tell more non-manga related stories or post pictures here. Thank you very much for welcoming a stranger to your on-line home. I suppose it's past time to properly introduce myself. Pleased to meet you.

Although I try to read from scanlation group sites if there's a good on-line reader, Batoto has been my go-to site for general on-line manga reading since I first ran across a credits page suggesting the virtures of reading here. My thanks to the groups that include information on more ethical alternatives to the big aggregators.

I hail from various places around the U.S., plus toddler time logged as an Army brat in Stuttgart, Germany and various family connections to Thailand, India and Armenia. Based on some polls on Baka-Updates I'd guess that I'm older than at least 90% of you. Although I long lived by "work hard, play hard", I hadn't read much manga or watched much anime. I hated Astro Boy during my Saturday morning cartoon phase of childhood (sorry!), but did enjoy some anime titles on sleepless nights watching American cable's Adult Swim and its predecessor programming on Cartoon Network. When I developed a serious chronic illness in 2008 I could no longer sustain my workaholic lifestyle. I found myself needing a whole lot more 'down time' than before. After sinking a bunch of time into mindless flash games, I caught up on my back science fiction reading. Then I started watching more anime and reading manga on-line, and frequenting Batoto. That makes me a relative newbie to the world of manga. Please treat me kindly . . . or not.

A while back, a colleague chatting over beer suggested I check out the weirdness of Neon Genesis Evangelion. Watching that changed my perspective on the imaginative possiblilities of animation. (My favorite animated movies had been Fantasia, followed by the stop-motion Wallace & Gromit and various Tim Burton movies.) Right now my favorite anime series to have watched is probably Mushishi, with Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Kino's Journey, and Cowboy Bebop as runners-up. I'll admit to having the DVR set to record Bleach and Inuyasha to provide light filler.

Picking a favorite manga after reading several hundred titles is much harder. They are so diverse it's like choosing between Another Roadside Attraction, One Hundred Years of Solitude, and Focault's Pendulum, as favorite books. A sentimental favorite is Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind. I own a printed copy and really enjoyed it, but that may be because I already liked the movie so much. My favorite mangaka for her body of work is Yoshihara Yuki, and I generally prefer Japanese authored josei titles, for their emotional depth, versus most shonen, shoujo, or western authored-Japanese illustrated josei series and one-shots. I seek out completed josei series on Baka-Updates and at my favorite josei-shoujo scanlator websites. On the other hand the majority of my Batoto follows are classified as seinen. Go figure.

And, in case you hadn't already noticed, I tend to be a bit verbose (sorry). Thanks again for you hospitality.

No need to compare. Making that silly list was Potato Hell play. I have the luxury(?) of being able to pick and chose from stuff I learned in boy scouts through things first I taught myself and tried 30+ years later.

I didn't say how that driveshaft got bent in first place (My fault: Back seat driver says, "We should go back now." Me, "I'll keep driving. There's really no place to turn around here.") or how I needed to crawl under my car with my father-in-law's geologist's hammer and perform a near miracle of precisely applied leverage to avoid being stranded out in the desert. Yes I can start a fire in (light) rain with one match. I've done it. On the other hand, I'd much rather have spare matches and plenty of dry fuel. Having the people counting on you stamp and shiver while you fuss over a tiny glow and a lot of smoke isn't much fun. The joke about flooded tents was because I'm supposed to know where to pitch a tent, but more than once I've screwed up. One time I even tried to sleep on top of dry spring that starting running during the night. (The spot looked comfy setting up in the dark, and it was at first.) I woke up soaked and spent the rest of the night on a big rock huddled under a tarp with a bunch of kids I was supposed to be guiding. Working on an electrical panel that's live because the main breaker won't cut out is plain stupid. My martial arts kicks suck because I'm loose jointed and don't have enough body control. If I tried to defend myself that way, I could maybe injure my attackers through excessive laughter and I'd definitely have trouble walking the next day. Cooking: just don't ask about the time I tried to make a chicken mole without a recipe.

My mom's father could:

- field strip and clean a WWI bolt action rifle and survive a gas attack  (No way I want to try that!)

- hand set type and run a broadsheet printing press (Cool but kind of impractical today)

- design, build and use lapidary saws and polishing wheels (You should have seen his rock room. Wow!)

- build and maintain shortwave radio transmitters and receivers (The net is a lot easier way to contact people in faraway places and develop rich mutual misunderstandings.)

- facet gemstones in several different cuts (Who has access to raw gems these days?)

- call square dances (I learned some American folk dances in school, but . . .)

- collect and restore old TV sets (Ah . . . there's no content broadcast in spiral scan format. What's this for?)

- record music directly to vinyl (Impractical again, but watching the fine shavings pile up was fun as a kid.)

- identify minerals and do all that electrical stuff a hundred times better than I ever could

I could make similar lists for my parents and other grandparents, and I really admire them for it.

Maybe the point, if there was one, is about the satisfaction that comes with taking some control of your life rather than always being a passive consumer of other people's work. Not just producing what you're told to in your little post-industrial "human capital" niche. You don't have to live "off the grid" or grow all your own food to experience that satisfaction. Sometimes there's an epic fail, but the judgement to avoid those only develops when you (carefully) push the envelope in life. There's actually a lot evidence of that right here on this site. Batoto content is a monument to people, manga-ka and scanlation teams, with the courage and confidence to create something by your own choice.

OK this one's on me as the locus creepolus. It also illustrates the gulf between knowing a few useful expresions in a non-native language and true fluency.  (Also in honor of the OP, Katzen.)

Walking around a city in the southern U.S. at night, with my girlfriend. The weather is warm and there's just a very slight breeze. I happen notice a cat also out walking and say hello, in "cat". Cat answers warmly. As we keep strolling, the cat decides to wander the same direction. Pretty soon a few more cats come out of an alley and join the ambling conversation. I'm not clear on all the nuances, but get enough of the gist to reply appropriately, while also keeping up a quiet conversation in English with my girlfriend. Several more cats join us, while maintaining that feline "I just happen to be headed this way too." attitude. Another block or so and there are more than a dozen cats following us.  The latest recruits to this parade are now clearly "following us", not just strolling along near the same sidewalk. As I try asking, "What's so interesting?", my girlfriend says "Please stop that! It's freaking me out."  I admit it is starting to get a little creepy. Most of the cats leave when we stop walking for a moment and I try a combination of "Been nice chatting but we'd kind of like to be alone now." to the early companions and "Nothing to see here, please move along." for the late joiners.  By the end of the next block, all our walking companions have slipped back out of sight. Needless to say, we didn't continue on to the graveyard she wanted to show me. Instead we swung around back toward her welcoming apartment.

Honestly, I didn't have a fish in my pocket and the communication was all non-verbal. My translation between English and the local-cat-dialect was mostly unconcious. Never before quite realized how curious city cats could be about an unfamiliar human who spoke bit of their language, nor did I ever figure out just what I said that was so interesting to them.

Khrazy's gonna' hate me for bumping/hijacking this topic, but sometimes a man's gotta do . . . oh, huh?

In the list below, can you tell what's fantasy, cliche, satire, exaggerated bragging and/or autobiographical?

I'm so manly that I:

- actually read the directions

- make hay while the sun shines

- use power tools after 10 at night

- move large rocks with a crowbar

- prefer a walk-behind farm tractor

- drop a tree just where I want it to fall

- design, build and finish fine furniture

- fold maps back along the original creases

- can pack a moving box to be safely top-loaded

- catch and relocate snakes who have gotten into trouble

- have more than 6 different ways to sharpen metal tools

- know how to polish a hammer for ornamental metalwork

- identify rocks, birds, reptiles, insects and spiders for fun

- pour concrete footers for my own deck and walkway designs

- once straightened a bent driveshaft with a geologist's hammer

- start a fire in the rain with one match and no other artificial aids

- built a subwoofer because most of what's on the market is overpriced or crap

- think the error bars on global warming forecasts are too small, and can explain why

- mourn the loss of natural rope because, dammit the synthetic stuff doesn't hold knots as well

- do math in my head but think partial differential equations are why they invented computers

- help out friends who lose their keys when the only unlocked window is on an upper floor

- will spot just the right place to pitch the tent so it'll flood when it rains

- make up my own constellations when the sky is clear enough

- would rather play American football than watch it

- make rustic camp furniture from materials on site

- can fix the campstove or cook with wood

- did my own Unix system administration

- have more than two kinds of blowtorch

- wrote a term paper on punch cards

- am sticking with my first marriage

- hang pictures and repair plaster

- can stop the bleeding

- can grow tomatoes

- can register a GIS data layer

- can kill a groundhog with a 22

- change out my own truck leaf springs

- catch crabs with string and chicken necks

- tack close to wind and enjoy a broad reach

- cook meat on sharp sticks over an open fire

- keep using up the batteries on my cordless tools

- can straighten a bent nail while continuing to drive it in

- designed and built the irrigation system for a 1-acre vegetable garden

- climb trees with or without ropes, but think climbing spikes are for wimps

- know how to walk in circles, if the compass isn't liquid filled

- have married people, after helping them write their vows

- do my own (copper) plumbing installation and repairs

- can keep a “wet edge” while painting or varnishing

- work on live electrical panels and without a net

- read medical research for the hell of it

- pull fenceposts with my bare hands

- trade off type I and type II errors

- know how to treat “sour gas”

- repair earthquake cracks in masonry

- have more than three kinds of ladder

- know why leaves change different colors

- help my wife think up titles for her artwork

- view hurricane tracking as a spectator sport

- plant trees by the acre (or hectare if you prefer)

- can smell rain or snow and see tornadoes coming

- make sculpture from logs leftover by tree trimmers

- replace damaged cords and solder electrical repairs

- know how to make bamboo arrows and fire a crossbow

- can work wrought iron, so long as somebody else carries the anvil

- can guess how old a tree is by looking, and then check the answer

- can walk a straight line cross-country while keeping track of the distance

- have computer support people ask me questions about obscure OS problems

- analyzed room acoustics and built room treatments to damp the major resonances

- catch and eat oysters while standing in chest deep water (sauce is optional)

- went to a drum circle and had the organizer gave me a drum mute

- know when the bough breaks and where the bodies are buried

- check GPS distances by walking it, or firing lasers

- can write object oriented programs in Fortran

- create ICC files for my printers and scanners

- dig out the neighbors' cars when it snows

- pull my own wire and networking cable

- restored a 1984 Toyota Land Cruiser

- can use a machete but prefer an ax

- edit the Windows registry

- do my own taxes

- cast a circle

- would rather paddle or row than sail, and rather sail than ride

- swim around islands to chase my wife, who's part seal

- need to wash all the dried salt out of my hair;

and I'm also man enough to file, type, sew, cook, do laundry, clean house and listen.

Thank you for you attention. Guess away, if you like.

(late edit to fix some typos)

You're wearing a handmade raccoon (road kill) belt pouch, you park your car by the roadside and walk over to watch flood waters just pouring over a major dam. Awesome sight. Police are there in case traffic has to be diverted or the dam starts to fail. State trooper walks up to you, looks at your long hair, looks at your boots and ratty jeans, looks at the pouch. Thinking you might be packing he says sternly, "You got a permit to carry that?"  You say, "W-What? Oh no officer th-th-that's just a belt pouch."  After he walks away, you remember that under the camera you've also got some weed and rolling papers in the pouch.

Departing slightly from the "I can top that squick!" theme of this topic, I was wondering what's the worst thing I've ever heard, done or blundered into saying right after sex, but I can't remember. Can you say "repressed memories"? 

Worst exchange: With a virgin, some time after a rather clumsy bedroom farce involving exagerrated fear of pregnancy, painfully (for me) double condoms, and her strict father returning home earlier than she expected. We're walking down a city sidewalk headed for a supposedly romantic dinner. Me, whispering, "Did we really have sex?" Her, not whispering, "What do you think? I'm wearing a pad now." (implied, ". . . you asshole!")

Maybe close to the worst: I once had girlfriend bolt out of bed just as I came, scream, grab a robe, slam the door, and run off down the dorm hallway--leaving me naked in her bed wondering, "What the hell was that?" Some time later when she returned flushed, low voiced and satisfied, she tried to convince me I should be happy about it because she was thinking of me while playing in the shower.

(Our sex life was usually pretty damn good, usually coming together and like honeymoon levels of intensity for months at a stretch. We got fairly serious about each other for a while.  But in the "life really sucks" department: The sex got even better as the rest of the relationship was falling apart.)

My big sisters have some darling granddaughters. Would they count? 

Nobody replied.   I'll just do it.

Here's one of the youngest additions to our clan.

Spoiler

Winning hearts wherever she goes.

I couldn't resist posting something after the quibbling over Steven Hawking manliness.

Now here was one seriously heavy dude: 

Spoiler

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman

As for my personal (manly) heroes, I'd probably go with:

Robert H. Whittaker*

Robert MacArthur

E.O. Wilson

and the incredible botanist and hero of tropical conservation Alwyn Gentry

Spoiler

For an amazing man still working at his peak, there's Piers Sellers.

These five guys put their bodies and minds on the line for what they believed in.

* All scientists, guess I'm really tipping my hand here. BTW I just remebered that two of Whittaker's former students were in one of the photos I posted today in the cam whores topic. Oops.

Boogie:  I grew up seeing my sibs and mom suffer overtly degrading sexism and discrimination (not to mention the racist neighbor kids who called the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool "coon lagoon" during the big civil rights marches on Washington). Neighborhood cocktail parties went sort of like Mad Men, only without the sense of humor. Human XY's have held most of the cards pretty much since the Sumerians put up walls to defend the stored grain surplus. In North America and Europe it's been a century-long struggle just to even out the playing field by a little bit. In that context, a little gurl power over-reach is only natural in the next couple of generations--and mostly harmless by comparison.

Sorry if I don't automatically rush to the barricades to defend the sex less fair. Maybe it reflects a life of relative privilege, but my ego can handle some female hazing without having a special corner where I can cry femi-nazi. I've taken a lot more bullying and macho bullshit from insecure fellow men than from the women I've known, and usually found male acquaintences less likely than female ones to acknowlege their bad behavior when called on it.

So if "MensRights" is about parity in child custody/child support, and (on Batoto) the very human right to have and politely express an interest in other peoples' behavior, appearance, and tastes, then fine!  But if male self-esteem requires endless GAR posturing then we might as well all just crawl back in the caves and wait for the nuclear warheads to blow.

Can't believe what I just posted is sitting right below Kayley's animated sig.! Oh the irony.