IME it is kind of sound. I've known a couple of sane, stable people, who repeatedly found themselves in relationships with teh crazies (which, with all awed respect and admiration, and allowing for the fact that I don't know you at all, you roughly look to qualify for) to the point where they do appear to be actively seeking out the craziness.
And generally, the conversation with your AA buddy sounds like a wonderful moment for pointing, laughing, and asking incredulously "Did that shit ever work?"
to 3: you know, I bet it actually did work sometimes. AA is always telling you not to just randomly hook up with your fellow AA members when you come in, and they warn you because they think you'll do it otherwise. when you're sobering up you feel all tweaky and weird, and you maybe can't hang out much with your former friends who are all wastoids, and now you're seeing these other people for an hour or more every day and having emotional conversations with them? I bet lots of people latch onto each other all of a sudden in those circumstances. just not, you know, me and this dude. in retrospect I sort of wish I had come more correct, but since the whole rest of the conversation was about personal things I somehow felt awkward about saying, wait, but that's total bullshit. also, LB, it's fine for you to just come out and say I'm crazy. I think you've got plenty of evidence. I mean, you know Labs is gay, right? it's like that level of certainty.
Actually, what you said is pretty good. To tell him that he's calculating is mildly disapproving, and he'll probably wake up thinking about it at two in the morning: "Why the fuck did I say that? Fuck!" And now you know about him.
rather late in the game it occurs to me that Husband X's exes are pretty crazy. I never met the one who unexpectedly painted all the mirrors in the house black, but I like the cut of her jib.
I vote sound(ish), too. The problem with the theory is that we're all weird somewhere, and I don't think teh crazy is something that springs full-blown as "the crazy." It seems more like a case of cold water being warmed to boiling. So X doesn't have to start very not-balanced, he just ends up there.
And the thing about sex? Fucked up, and he knows it. Maybe this is a better way to put it: you've been pretty for a long, long time; if you suspect it was fucked up, it was fucked up.
People who date crazy people on purpose who are not crazy usually have some kind of HERO! complex, in which they believe that the love of a good person (ie them) is enough to help the crazy person become uncrazy and the sort of person they would like to actually date, if they didn't have that whole HERO! complex thingy.
I have not been a participant in that phenomenon from the HERO! perspective, needless to say.
yeah, it's kind of funny. I just haven't been hanging out with all that many new people in a while, barring spouses of friends who have little kids. now I have all these new acquaintances and guys are getting crushes on me and acting weird. I thought they had just stopped or something, like how men rarely yell stuff at you on the street in Singapore--there isn't a citywide ethos of hey-babying. making hissing sounds, some, but rarely compared to the US. anyway, yeah, dudes acting hinky. it's like old times. I should probably stop being such a flirt, but it's a little late in life to change. I saw crazyboy at a meeting after I wrote this and he was looking a bit kicked puppy dog.
Kicked puppy dog means you were harsh enough, I'd think. Although there is a risk that it may increase your mystique: "Dude, it was amazing! She totally called me on my bullshit!" But there really isn't anything you can do about that.
And I should say that there's nothing wrong with seeking out crazy people to be involved with, just that it argues that an apparent preference for the sane stable life may not tell the whole story.
Well, see? It will give him inspiration to clumsily chip a building brick into the shape of a heart, paint it black, and call it something like 'alameida no. 1'! He'll be rolling in the art school chicks in no time. You did the guy a favor.
(I quite like abstract art, but there are a lot of dishonest partisan hacks in the field.)
My brother says hooking up is called the 13th step.
I had a friend who consistently got involved with crazy women. A new one every month or two. After meeting 6 of his crazy girlfriends, when I was introduced to #7 I asked, "Are you crazy" and she very pleasantly said that she was.
He's go down the street and attract them like lint. I told him that he should hire himself out as bait for the mental health division.
His secret was that he was warm, funny, unthreatening, and completely unjudgemental and accepting. He had had a crazy mother and I don't think that he was a rescuer, he was just good at pretending that everything's OK.
The sex ranged from super to terrible.
One of the crazy women (#1 on the list, who never really left him) almost drove him crazy himself.
He's now in Israel straightening out his life. He reports that Israeli women are less inhibited than American women. He meets crazy women there too, but seems to have a sane girlfriend. He hopes that the Israeli Army has a special unit for nice but militarily useless guys like him. A different friend who spent some time there verifies that a lot of Israelis really dislike Woody Allen type Jews.
Yes, I knew an abstract artist who got married every three years. That's how long the marriages lasted after the wives figured out he expected 100% financial support. He never was successful, but if he had been, I'm sure that he would have traded up for a new wife classier than the one who'd financed him.
My brother says hooking up is called the 13th step.
Also the fourth goal of Peace Corps. The first goal is do your job; second is educate locals about the US; third is, when you come home, educate Americans about your host country. And the fourth is have sex with a host country national.
Always kind of regretted not achieving that one -- no one is prettier than young Samoan men. But I basically would have had to promise to marry the guy and take him home with me, and I didn't feel like being that kind of a creep.
Man, you try being 21, and trying to teach calculus to a class full of beautiful, muscular, 19 year-old boys. It was a good thing I was terribly unattractive by local standards, or goodness knows what I mightn't have tried to get away with.
This question is like the 'why do women date assholes instead of 'nice guys' ? question, and I think the answer is similar. We can probably find a handful of women who seek out assholes for their assholeness, and we can probably find (maybe a larger handful of) people who have a Hero! complex.
But most women who are attracted to assholish men are really attracted to other positive qualities, like confidence & charisma, that are strongly correlated with assholishness. I suspect it's similar for craziness; most people don't like having to be a crutch any more than women really like to be treated badly, but there are other qualities (spontaneity) that are desirable, which go along with craziness.
The wild and crazy people we fantasize about are not actually viable in the real world, and can be quite destructive to themselves and others. Or to put it differently, if they can be enclosed within a strictly bounded experience they can be wonderful, but not if they become part of our lives.
AA is always telling you not to just randomly hook up with your fellow AA members when you come in
It's just like academia!
I must quibble somewhat with the Hero diagnosis for Husband X, and not just because I happen to like Alameida quite a bit and can see why, craziness included and beauty excluded ("pretty," Tim, hmph), a man might love her. Not to mention the rather uncommon wit and brilliance. Anyway. I also want to quibble with the hero complex because my boyfriend is one of those guys who dates the crazy women (I am, of course, a rare exception. His "establishment" girlfriend, as he says). Coincidentally, he is also a former junkie. (He does have a bit of a hero complex, actually.)
Anyway, I think Cala has part of it. And I think that another part of it is that sometimes the men who like crazy women (like the women who like bad boys) are themselves very emotional, but also very contained. Very controlled by being good girls/good boys themselves, and yeah, there's something to admire about the spontaneity or the free display of emotion.
And I think that another part of it is that sometimes the men who like crazy women (like the women who like bad boys) are themselves very emotional, but also very contained.
So you think they present a button-down exterior, but have an inner craziness?
I meant "button-down". Such people are like a kind of shirt that Ladies Love Bean might sell: it has a collar that can be buttoned down, so you can be presentable with them at social functions, but also contains an insanely warm filling, so that you can just run out into a snowstorm without pausing to put on another layer if the feeling moves you.
really attracted to other positive qualities, like confidence & charisma, that are strongly correlated with assholishness
And this correlation can be so strongly associated in your mind, that when you find yourself acting with confidence, in any way, you find yourself constantly saying "Wait, am I being an asshole? I better pull back a bit, or drop the subject entirely."
You seem to think I'm making a pun on "button-down". As in down which is buttoned. Down. But I'm not. I'm imagining a shirt-thermal insulate-shirt sandwich. The inner warmth is concealed by the normal exterior, which gives no indication.
"Button-up" exteriors are those in which one's emotional buttons are right out in the open where they can be pushed by all and sundry, whereas "button-down" exteriors are those in which the emotional buttons are concealed (by being closest to the ground) until you obtain a certain degree of intimacy with them. On the soft underbelly, as it were; turtles have a button-down exterior.
On preview, pwned but I'll post it anyway. Also (I paste this in without having seen the results).
My suspicion is that it's often the reverse of people looking for "crazy people." Instead, it's that some people lack, either because of lack of prior exposure or because of comfort through exposure, a strong norm against being involved with "crazy people." Everybody's pretty weird, and we all worry incessantly about whether this weirdness or that weirdness is merely irritating or a bad thing.
It's not as if being involved with an alcoholic, for example, is such a strange occurance.
"Love for a crazy woman is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come." — Matt Weiner
All 40 proves is that people are talking about shirts, rather than describing other people. Either that or that, surprisingly, many of the people on the internet can't spell.
gaijin biker: it's not anti-motorcycle feelings, it's recognition of my own irrationally strong thing for guys who ride motorcycles. husband x learned to ride and bought a bike for this very reason, and it actually worked out for him, as you can see. which is kind of embarassing for both of us, actually.
B has a point (and 38 was a joke, people). But either is acceptable, meaning that since B was the aggressor in 33 Wolfson is entitled to respond proportionally.
Matt, your second link suggests strongly that "button-down" in the sense Ben used it is used that way only by mistake.
Also, if Ben would respond proportionally to my aggression, he and I wouldn't be having these arguments. But that's the kind of buttoned-down guy he is, alas.
"Love for a crazy woman is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come."
I amended that to read: "...is [riding] a snowmobile..."
— unless not making sense is the point of the quote.
Has anybody here besides me actually done this? Ride a snowmobile flat out, I mean.
No, Love, the passion, is the snowmobile. It's a Socratic metaphor, really
And you're along for the ride? What are the throttle, and the brake, and the handlebars? My passions have lacked these refinements. More like a passenger, hanging on.
I certainly didn't mean to imply that Husband X has a HERO! complex. I don't know him at all, and I'm sure he is splendid in all regards. My theory about the HERO! men is based largely on personal experience. Men think different and eccentric (a term I much prefer to crazy) are fabulous qualities until they realise that no, the person who thought it was hilarious fun to sing sea chanties while waving a toy plastic sword in the middle of the mall is always like that, more or less.
Eh, he could have meant it either way. It could have been a passive move on you. Seems to me he understood that what you said and so that's that.
This is the sort of stuff that still trips me up in AA (and less so outside AA). Come-here-Go-away types are very attractive to me. Social cues can bedevil me. What did she say? It gets me more often in AA because the mix of people varies way more than, for example, at work. A very heterogenous collection of folks, at least in DC & Boston. A big help for me is to listen to the advice of other men who I think are grounded. They are not right each time, but it gives me another perspective.
Today it isn't the not drinking that is a problem so much as living more sanely (which helps keep me away from many of my reasons for drinking).
Oh, 58 is surely correct. My sister married a hero guy. The problem with hero guys, I think, is that they tend to have control fetishes to go along with the heroism, and being controlled sucks.
I was watching a commercial just now at the gym (this will become relevant in a second) and it was one for some hotel chain. You have the Normals family walking along a fairground or something, and suddenly they are confronted with the Scary Black Leather Sid Vicious family. There is a standoff and for some reason (the sound wasn't on) the Normals family wins.
And my immediate reaction was that I would be far more frightened by the Normals family, because people who work that hard to fit into the expected social role are probably covering up some serious disconnects with reality somewhere. People who try to be normal are usually the very weirdest ones, and that's kind of what the hero guys are doing.
I had to go to AA in the mid-80's to save my ass from 132 years in prison, and I hated it with all the fire of all the suns in the universe. Apart from all the only slightly watered down Born Again Praise Jeebus stuff that grated because of being an atheist, it was exactly what Almeida is writing about that really did my head in: dealing with crazy people. I was constantly getting lectured about reaching out to others and I'd tell them "I'm just here to get my card signed so I can avoid 132 years in prison, I think y'all are fucking insane".
Winna, I think you misread that commercial. The dad's hair sticks up, bedhead from his great night's sleep at the hotel, in mimic of a radical 'do. On the boardwalk, the family confronts a group, large leader-guy, one girl, two smaller guys, more gang than family but of course balancing "our" family. The sense of danger comes from the implicit challenge dad's hair poses, perhaps as appropriated gang symbol, perhaps as the human equivalent of a Rooster's comb. Dad and leader-guy go eyeball-to-eyeball, and then l-g smiles, respectfully letting them pass. It's about the pleasure us bougie guys feel being accepted by our spiritual betters, not about "winning."
Ah, the A-frame relationship! From experience, I've noted that it's possible to play the HERO! role with the secret purpose of demonstrating that since a partnership consists of one HERO! and one Loonie...
But we are large, we contain multitudes. Either the HERO! or the Loonie can save the day under the right circumstances. Why not try out both parts? Having the HERO!-cape in your closet (or a clown-nose) is not the same as tattooing an "H" (or "L") on your chest.
As to the AA dude: you now have evidence IMV,VHO that he has two competing internal agendas. The self-deprecating remark was meant, I'm sure, as disarmingly honest; but at the same moment, he knew it would give you the creeps (because he's undoubtedly noticed you're sharp) and meant to sabotage his own urge to try seducing you (because he feels it would be wrong).
So I'm not saying this guy is Bad News through and through, exactly, since there may be more to him than your story; but he IS messing with your head. Even if he himself has not noticed. I'd recommend making sure that the next time you process together, there's at least one other stable-appearing AA person present throughout. If he deals with that without giving you the creeps again, he's probably a decent friend. Otherwise he's--wait for it!--a creep.
65: Don't know if you're being snarky or not, but I actually would have preferred to deal with those people drunk or when they were using. At least there was a certain consistency in that state; sobriety takes the lid off of all of their demons and I simply had no patience dealing with that. Note: I was busted for dealing drugs, I didn't have a booze/drug problem; I went to all those meetings to show the judge that I was willing to change and it worked.
ALSO, to 58:
Why apologize? I thought your comma placement made the comment funnier and more penetrating.
I think of punctuation generally as the spice of discourse (at least the written sort). Perhaps it's foolish of me, but I don't believe "that which is not compulsory is forbidden" applies to the comma (at least, not in informal writing): punctuation is how one compensates for the inability to cock one's eyebrow, fold one's arms, or otherwise cue nonverbally the rhythmic "beats" of conversation. Thus I justify over-punctuating like a motherfucker. (My last comment took 15 minutes.)
It occurs to me that instead of "alameida" and "Husband X," it could be "X" and "Xess." That appeals to me, for some reason. As does "Professor Griff."
65: Yeah, I'm pretty sure users would be consistently nicer to you if you were their dealer. You were meeting the crazy people in the work environment, where you had what they needed.
You mean you convinced the judge, or you changed? I wonder what was AA supposed to do for you if you weren't using? As a non-using dealer, I wouldn't expect you to have a lot of empathy for drunks or users, or get anything out of their stories.
The way the U.S. deals with drugs is so insane. But I suppose it would be a problem for the for-profit prison industry if drug use were decriminalized.
The Scary Black Leather Sid Vicious family looked like a family to me, although I suppose that betrays my bougie expectations about a mommie, a daddy and two-point-four kids. Caught in my own trap!
But why would they have to go head to head if there weren't some menace implicit in the Scary Black Leather Sid Vicious family? That's the expectation of the commercial, when in reality the guy with forty-seven piercings and a bunch of lewd tattoos is probably a pacifist vegan wearing the black because he loves the Smiths. As do we all.
I apologized for the commas because I fear the wrath of the b-dub and his lordly grasp on Strunk & White. And I much prefer the Loonie role, because in my mind all HERO! types look like Hank Rollins. I do not look like Hank, so I cannot be a HERO!
"Love for a crazy woman is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come."
Hey! 43 and later? That quote is by Matt Groening.
Am I really no fun and missing some joke? MATT GROENING!
Everyone but Wolfson is showing shocking ignorance of the canon, heebie. (Note that Wolfson added some words and attributed to me instead of Nietzsche.)
(raises hand) I recognized it only as "Something I have heard somewhere in the past", with no information about the author. 77 -- "strip" is the preferred usage but "episode" works. "Panel" is a group of judges.
I tried to post after Cala's 25. I think taht there are desirable qualities that go along with crazy, and I think it's this rather than a HERO! complex which draws a lot of men to crazy women.
I was semi-pwned by SCMT when he said, basically, that he doesn't think it's a conscious choice. You all mentioned spontaneity as teh obvious choice. I think that unless your crazy-meter is hyper-vigilant it can be much more muted than that, snd the woman might easily be described as "creative and unconventional."
You think you're just avoiding teh boring stiffs, but, really, you're getting a whole lot more.
I've dated my share of crazy women and despite being the hero, I do not have a hero complex. I'm just not good at telling people "no," and crazy people latch on to whomever will let them. Also, most people are able to keep teh crazy under wraps for a few months, so you don't realize just how completely insane they are until they already have a key.
6: I never met the one who unexpectedly painted all the mirrors in the house black, but I like the cut of her jib.
Sorry to use a cliche here, but this made me laugh out loud.
31: And I think that another part of it is that sometimes the men who like crazy women (like the women who like bad boys) are themselves very emotional, but also very contained. Very controlled by being good girls/good boys themselves, and yeah, there's something to admire about the spontaneity or the free display of emotion.
There is definitely something to this. Especially if you substitute "somewhat crazy" for "very emotional."
58: Men think different and eccentric (a term I much prefer to crazy) are fabulous qualities until they realise that no, the person who thought it was hilarious fun to sing sea chanties while waving a toy plastic sword in the middle of the mall is always like that, more or less.
Ah, yes. I remember that relationship well. But I would argue that, although they may lie on the same continuum, there is definitely a point beyond which "different/eccentric" no longer accurately describes things, and "crazy" becomes the more appropriate term. Different and eccentric are indeed fabulous qualities; full-blown crazy, not so fabulous.
There are three more reasons to think that husband X is one or two standard deviations away from teh normal: 1. He blogs in multiple places. 2. He teaches humanities at the university level. 3. He does 1 and 2 from Singapore.
One and two are probably overlooked here in the friendly confines of Unfogged because of where this discussion is happening and what, apparently, a number of us do. Three is important, though, because people do not pursue careers overseas with at least a fair amount of teh crazy themselves. (I say this from year 10 of living Over Here.)
There is, however, proverbially ample written evidence of husband X's sanity and levelheadedness. I'd guess that his crazy is not destructive but subtle and adventurous.
The mysterious A's craziness is also not all of a piece. Of course there's the incontrovertibly individual, but there's also the temporal and the regional. The early 1970s were a weird time to be growing up, and those of us who did can recognize distilled moments of a peculiar zeitgeist in A's stories. There's also the regional, which emphasizes A's alleged craziness because there are (or appear to be) so few southerners among the denizens here. Some things that A talks about are not at all beyond the norms of southern behavior; she's just been out of context for a long time now.
(On the other hand, I dated a woman who is probably one of A's cousins on her mother's side, and she was kinda crazy too, so maybe it's an extended-family thing. On the other other hand, I went to college at a place in Tennessee where a number of A's maternal ancestors are buried, and a lot of women there were like that, so maybe it's a regional thing after all.)
And the heroin addict who's been clean for like eight days? Stay away, I hope, since heroin buying is like potentially very fatal in Singapore-land, not that you don't know that already. Unfogged does not need to be doing a letter-campaign to Amnesty to save the mysterious A from the clutches of Mr Lee's gallows...
Reckon you should keep this guy in reserve, in case the thing with Husband X does not work out.
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 4:44 AM
No way! If the thing with Husband X doesn't work out, she should move in with me.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 5:20 AM
So, is this line of reasoning remotely sound,
IME it is kind of sound. I've known a couple of sane, stable people, who repeatedly found themselves in relationships with teh crazies (which, with all awed respect and admiration, and allowing for the fact that I don't know you at all, you roughly look to qualify for) to the point where they do appear to be actively seeking out the craziness.
And generally, the conversation with your AA buddy sounds like a wonderful moment for pointing, laughing, and asking incredulously "Did that shit ever work?"
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 6:11 AM
to 3: you know, I bet it actually did work sometimes. AA is always telling you not to just randomly hook up with your fellow AA members when you come in, and they warn you because they think you'll do it otherwise. when you're sobering up you feel all tweaky and weird, and you maybe can't hang out much with your former friends who are all wastoids, and now you're seeing these other people for an hour or more every day and having emotional conversations with them? I bet lots of people latch onto each other all of a sudden in those circumstances. just not, you know, me and this dude. in retrospect I sort of wish I had come more correct, but since the whole rest of the conversation was about personal things I somehow felt awkward about saying, wait, but that's total bullshit. also, LB, it's fine for you to just come out and say I'm crazy. I think you've got plenty of evidence. I mean, you know Labs is gay, right? it's like that level of certainty.
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 6:41 AM
Actually, what you said is pretty good. To tell him that he's calculating is mildly disapproving, and he'll probably wake up thinking about it at two in the morning: "Why the fuck did I say that? Fuck!" And now you know about him.
Posted by mcmc | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:05 AM
rather late in the game it occurs to me that Husband X's exes are pretty crazy. I never met the one who unexpectedly painted all the mirrors in the house black, but I like the cut of her jib.
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:11 AM
I vote sound(ish), too. The problem with the theory is that we're all weird somewhere, and I don't think teh crazy is something that springs full-blown as "the crazy." It seems more like a case of cold water being warmed to boiling. So X doesn't have to start very not-balanced, he just ends up there.
And the thing about sex? Fucked up, and he knows it. Maybe this is a better way to put it: you've been pretty for a long, long time; if you suspect it was fucked up, it was fucked up.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:17 AM
People who date crazy people on purpose who are not crazy usually have some kind of HERO! complex, in which they believe that the love of a good person (ie them) is enough to help the crazy person become uncrazy and the sort of person they would like to actually date, if they didn't have that whole HERO! complex thingy.
I have not been a participant in that phenomenon from the HERO! perspective, needless to say.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:21 AM
yeah, it's kind of funny. I just haven't been hanging out with all that many new people in a while, barring spouses of friends who have little kids. now I have all these new acquaintances and guys are getting crushes on me and acting weird. I thought they had just stopped or something, like how men rarely yell stuff at you on the street in Singapore--there isn't a citywide ethos of hey-babying. making hissing sounds, some, but rarely compared to the US. anyway, yeah, dudes acting hinky. it's like old times. I should probably stop being such a flirt, but it's a little late in life to change. I saw crazyboy at a meeting after I wrote this and he was looking a bit kicked puppy dog.
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:26 AM
Looking like a kicked puppy dog is good for his soul. Perhaps he'll go home and write a bunch of poetry and win the Nobel Prize for literature.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:31 AM
Kicked puppy dog means you were harsh enough, I'd think. Although there is a risk that it may increase your mystique: "Dude, it was amazing! She totally called me on my bullshit!" But there really isn't anything you can do about that.
And I should say that there's nothing wrong with seeking out crazy people to be involved with, just that it argues that an apparent preference for the sane stable life may not tell the whole story.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:38 AM
winna, he's a painter of abstract art already. (rolls eyes.)
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:38 AM
Well, see? It will give him inspiration to clumsily chip a building brick into the shape of a heart, paint it black, and call it something like 'alameida no. 1'! He'll be rolling in the art school chicks in no time. You did the guy a favor.
(I quite like abstract art, but there are a lot of dishonest partisan hacks in the field.)
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:49 AM
My brother says hooking up is called the 13th step.
I had a friend who consistently got involved with crazy women. A new one every month or two. After meeting 6 of his crazy girlfriends, when I was introduced to #7 I asked, "Are you crazy" and she very pleasantly said that she was.
He's go down the street and attract them like lint. I told him that he should hire himself out as bait for the mental health division.
His secret was that he was warm, funny, unthreatening, and completely unjudgemental and accepting. He had had a crazy mother and I don't think that he was a rescuer, he was just good at pretending that everything's OK.
The sex ranged from super to terrible.
One of the crazy women (#1 on the list, who never really left him) almost drove him crazy himself.
He's now in Israel straightening out his life. He reports that Israeli women are less inhibited than American women. He meets crazy women there too, but seems to have a sane girlfriend. He hopes that the Israeli Army has a special unit for nice but militarily useless guys like him. A different friend who spent some time there verifies that a lot of Israelis really dislike Woody Allen type Jews.
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:54 AM
Yes, I knew an abstract artist who got married every three years. That's how long the marriages lasted after the wives figured out he expected 100% financial support. He never was successful, but if he had been, I'm sure that he would have traded up for a new wife classier than the one who'd financed him.
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:57 AM
My brother says hooking up is called the 13th step.
Also the fourth goal of Peace Corps. The first goal is do your job; second is educate locals about the US; third is, when you come home, educate Americans about your host country. And the fourth is have sex with a host country national.
Always kind of regretted not achieving that one -- no one is prettier than young Samoan men. But I basically would have had to promise to marry the guy and take him home with me, and I didn't feel like being that kind of a creep.
Posted by Anonymous | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:12 AM
Whoops, that was me.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:13 AM
I drink because I can't come to terms with teh g4y, Ala.
So the guy read this post? I feel bad piling on and saying that he's icky, but not enough to stop me from saying: ick.
Posted by Fontana Grooneyhoffer | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:14 AM
I appreciate not letting people think that it was me.
I've heard that underage Samoan guys really pack a punch, though.
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:16 AM
god, no, he didn't read this! he was just looking generally kicked puppy. at me.
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:17 AM
Man, you try being 21, and trying to teach calculus to a class full of beautiful, muscular, 19 year-old boys. It was a good thing I was terribly unattractive by local standards, or goodness knows what I mightn't have tried to get away with.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:19 AM
I've heard that the Samoans have no concept of "fashionably thin".
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:29 AM
They do have a concept of "unattractively bony and pale," though.
Posted by Anonymous | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:33 AM
All the dieting you did to make yourself attractive to those 12-year-olds was counterproductive.
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:56 AM
This question is like the 'why do women date assholes instead of 'nice guys' ? question, and I think the answer is similar. We can probably find a handful of women who seek out assholes for their assholeness, and we can probably find (maybe a larger handful of) people who have a Hero! complex.
But most women who are attracted to assholish men are really attracted to other positive qualities, like confidence & charisma, that are strongly correlated with assholishness. I suspect it's similar for craziness; most people don't like having to be a crutch any more than women really like to be treated badly, but there are other qualities (spontaneity) that are desirable, which go along with craziness.
Posted by Cala | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 8:57 AM
I think Cala has got it.
The wild and crazy people we fantasize about are not actually viable in the real world, and can be quite destructive to themselves and others. Or to put it differently, if they can be enclosed within a strictly bounded experience they can be wonderful, but not if they become part of our lives.
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:01 AM
it's a darn good thing I'm just a character on the internet, then!
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:10 AM
I am appalled by your anti-motorcycle prejudice.
Posted by Gaijin Biker | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:13 AM
Present company excepted.
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:14 AM
If alameida is just a character on the internet, then we can write fan fiction about her!
Posted by Cala | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:16 AM
AA is always telling you not to just randomly hook up with your fellow AA members when you come in
It's just like academia!
I must quibble somewhat with the Hero diagnosis for Husband X, and not just because I happen to like Alameida quite a bit and can see why, craziness included and beauty excluded ("pretty," Tim, hmph), a man might love her. Not to mention the rather uncommon wit and brilliance. Anyway. I also want to quibble with the hero complex because my boyfriend is one of those guys who dates the crazy women (I am, of course, a rare exception. His "establishment" girlfriend, as he says). Coincidentally, he is also a former junkie. (He does have a bit of a hero complex, actually.)
Anyway, I think Cala has part of it. And I think that another part of it is that sometimes the men who like crazy women (like the women who like bad boys) are themselves very emotional, but also very contained. Very controlled by being good girls/good boys themselves, and yeah, there's something to admire about the spontaneity or the free display of emotion.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:26 AM
And I think that another part of it is that sometimes the men who like crazy women (like the women who like bad boys) are themselves very emotional, but also very contained.
So you think they present a button-down exterior, but have an inner craziness?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:35 AM
Perhaps. I was thinking, inner vulnerability protected by outward lack of emotional display. Why? Were you thinking of anyone in particular?
Also, it's "buttoned-down."
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:38 AM
I meant "button-down". Such people are like a kind of shirt that Ladies Love Bean might sell: it has a collar that can be buttoned down, so you can be presentable with them at social functions, but also contains an insanely warm filling, so that you can just run out into a snowstorm without pausing to put on another layer if the feeling moves you.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:42 AM
really attracted to other positive qualities, like confidence & charisma, that are strongly correlated with assholishness
And this correlation can be so strongly associated in your mind, that when you find yourself acting with confidence, in any way, you find yourself constantly saying "Wait, am I being an asshole? I better pull back a bit, or drop the subject entirely."
Posted by I don't pay | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:44 AM
Then it doesn't make sense to say "button-down exterior, but inner craziness," b/c after all, the inner warmth is inherent in the button-down itself.
Also, L.L. Bean? Eh.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:45 AM
You seem to think I'm making a pun on "button-down". As in down which is buttoned. Down. But I'm not. I'm imagining a shirt-thermal insulate-shirt sandwich. The inner warmth is concealed by the normal exterior, which gives no indication.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:46 AM
"Button-up" exteriors are those in which one's emotional buttons are right out in the open where they can be pushed by all and sundry, whereas "button-down" exteriors are those in which the emotional buttons are concealed (by being closest to the ground) until you obtain a certain degree of intimacy with them. On the soft underbelly, as it were; turtles have a button-down exterior.
On preview, pwned but I'll post it anyway. Also (I paste this in without having seen the results).
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:47 AM
My suspicion is that it's often the reverse of people looking for "crazy people." Instead, it's that some people lack, either because of lack of prior exposure or because of comfort through exposure, a strong norm against being involved with "crazy people." Everybody's pretty weird, and we all worry incessantly about whether this weirdness or that weirdness is merely irritating or a bad thing.
It's not as if being involved with an alcoholic, for example, is such a strange occurance.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:48 AM
Also (I paste this in without having seen the results).
"Button-down" has about 7,500,000 more results.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:50 AM
Or, the second time I follow the link, 9 million more.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:50 AM
Okay fine. Alameida, listen to Matt and Ben about what men who love crazy women are like.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:51 AM
"Love for a crazy woman is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come." — Matt Weiner
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:52 AM
All 40 proves is that people are talking about shirts, rather than describing other people. Either that or that, surprisingly, many of the people on the internet can't spell.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:53 AM
If the ice weasels are going to come, you're going to want to be wearing a fleece-lined button-down shirt made by the fine folks at L.L. Bean.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:54 AM
gaijin biker: it's not anti-motorcycle feelings, it's recognition of my own irrationally strong thing for guys who ride motorcycles. husband x learned to ride and bought a bike for this very reason, and it actually worked out for him, as you can see. which is kind of embarassing for both of us, actually.
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:57 AM
B has a point (and 38 was a joke, people). But either is acceptable, meaning that since B was the aggressor in 33 Wolfson is entitled to respond proportionally.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:57 AM
I claim no expertise as to men who love crazy women.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:59 AM
people are buttoned down, and shirts are button down, and weiner is banned!!!
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:00 AM
Matt, your second link suggests strongly that "button-down" in the sense Ben used it is used that way only by mistake.
Also, if Ben would respond proportionally to my aggression, he and I wouldn't be having these arguments. But that's the kind of buttoned-down guy he is, alas.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:01 AM
The unarmed observers always get taken out.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:01 AM
"Love for a crazy woman is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come."
I amended that to read: "...is [riding] a snowmobile..."
— unless not making sense is the point of the quote.
Has anybody here besides me actually done this? Ride a snowmobile flat out, I mean.
Posted by I don't pay | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:04 AM
no, but it sounds really fun. like a motorcycle on the snow!
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:08 AM
I amended that to read: "...is [riding] a snowmobile..."
No, Love, the passion, is the snowmobile. It's a Socratic metaphor, really.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:11 AM
If the ice weasels are going to come, you're going to want to be wearing a fleece-lined button-down shirt made by the fine folks at L.L. Bean.
Yeah, and remember to close your eyes.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:11 AM
and remember to close your eyes
Sigh. You buttoned-down men.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:13 AM
No, Love, the passion, is the snowmobile. It's a Socratic metaphor, really
And you're along for the ride? What are the throttle, and the brake, and the handlebars? My passions have lacked these refinements. More like a passenger, hanging on.
Posted by Anonymous | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:21 AM
I certainly didn't mean to imply that Husband X has a HERO! complex. I don't know him at all, and I'm sure he is splendid in all regards. My theory about the HERO! men is based largely on personal experience. Men think different and eccentric (a term I much prefer to crazy) are fabulous qualities until they realise that no, the person who thought it was hilarious fun to sing sea chanties while waving a toy plastic sword in the middle of the mall is always like that, more or less.
At that point, they tend to become irritable.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:25 AM
I wish I could delete about eighty commas from that comment. Alack for comments that can't be edited.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:27 AM
Over-commaing by others makes me feel that my own punctuational flaws aren't too far outside the norm. It's a good thing.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:34 AM
Eh, he could have meant it either way. It could have been a passive move on you. Seems to me he understood that what you said and so that's that.
This is the sort of stuff that still trips me up in AA (and less so outside AA). Come-here-Go-away types are very attractive to me. Social cues can bedevil me. What did she say? It gets me more often in AA because the mix of people varies way more than, for example, at work. A very heterogenous collection of folks, at least in DC & Boston. A big help for me is to listen to the advice of other men who I think are grounded. They are not right each time, but it gives me another perspective.
Today it isn't the not drinking that is a problem so much as living more sanely (which helps keep me away from many of my reasons for drinking).
Posted by md 20/400 | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:34 AM
Oh, 58 is surely correct. My sister married a hero guy. The problem with hero guys, I think, is that they tend to have control fetishes to go along with the heroism, and being controlled sucks.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:38 AM
I was watching a commercial just now at the gym (this will become relevant in a second) and it was one for some hotel chain. You have the Normals family walking along a fairground or something, and suddenly they are confronted with the Scary Black Leather Sid Vicious family. There is a standoff and for some reason (the sound wasn't on) the Normals family wins.
And my immediate reaction was that I would be far more frightened by the Normals family, because people who work that hard to fit into the expected social role are probably covering up some serious disconnects with reality somewhere. People who try to be normal are usually the very weirdest ones, and that's kind of what the hero guys are doing.
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:46 AM
I had to go to AA in the mid-80's to save my ass from 132 years in prison, and I hated it with all the fire of all the suns in the universe. Apart from all the only slightly watered down Born Again Praise Jeebus stuff that grated because of being an atheist, it was exactly what Almeida is writing about that really did my head in: dealing with crazy people. I was constantly getting lectured about reaching out to others and I'd tell them "I'm just here to get my card signed so I can avoid 132 years in prison, I think y'all are fucking insane".
For some reason, that didn't go over too well.
Posted by Henry Holland | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 10:56 AM
64: Yeah, imagine what they'd be like drunk.
Posted by mcmc | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 11:51 AM
Winna, I think you misread that commercial. The dad's hair sticks up, bedhead from his great night's sleep at the hotel, in mimic of a radical 'do. On the boardwalk, the family confronts a group, large leader-guy, one girl, two smaller guys, more gang than family but of course balancing "our" family. The sense of danger comes from the implicit challenge dad's hair poses, perhaps as appropriated gang symbol, perhaps as the human equivalent of a Rooster's comb. Dad and leader-guy go eyeball-to-eyeball, and then l-g smiles, respectfully letting them pass. It's about the pleasure us bougie guys feel being accepted by our spiritual betters, not about "winning."
Posted by I don't pay | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 11:58 AM
Ah, the A-frame relationship! From experience, I've noted that it's possible to play the HERO! role with the secret purpose of demonstrating that since a partnership consists of one HERO! and one Loonie...
But we are large, we contain multitudes. Either the HERO! or the Loonie can save the day under the right circumstances. Why not try out both parts? Having the HERO!-cape in your closet (or a clown-nose) is not the same as tattooing an "H" (or "L") on your chest.
As to the AA dude: you now have evidence IMV,VHO that he has two competing internal agendas. The self-deprecating remark was meant, I'm sure, as disarmingly honest; but at the same moment, he knew it would give you the creeps (because he's undoubtedly noticed you're sharp) and meant to sabotage his own urge to try seducing you (because he feels it would be wrong).
So I'm not saying this guy is Bad News through and through, exactly, since there may be more to him than your story; but he IS messing with your head. Even if he himself has not noticed. I'd recommend making sure that the next time you process together, there's at least one other stable-appearing AA person present throughout. If he deals with that without giving you the creeps again, he's probably a decent friend. Otherwise he's--wait for it!--a creep.
Posted by Rah | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 12:40 PM
65: Don't know if you're being snarky or not, but I actually would have preferred to deal with those people drunk or when they were using. At least there was a certain consistency in that state; sobriety takes the lid off of all of their demons and I simply had no patience dealing with that. Note: I was busted for dealing drugs, I didn't have a booze/drug problem; I went to all those meetings to show the judge that I was willing to change and it worked.
Posted by Henry Holland | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 12:42 PM
ALSO, to 58:
Why apologize? I thought your comma placement made the comment funnier and more penetrating.
I think of punctuation generally as the spice of discourse (at least the written sort). Perhaps it's foolish of me, but I don't believe "that which is not compulsory is forbidden" applies to the comma (at least, not in informal writing): punctuation is how one compensates for the inability to cock one's eyebrow, fold one's arms, or otherwise cue nonverbally the rhythmic "beats" of conversation. Thus I justify over-punctuating like a motherfucker. (My last comment took 15 minutes.)
Posted by Rah | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 12:43 PM
It occurs to me that instead of "alameida" and "Husband X," it could be "X" and "Xess." That appeals to me, for some reason. As does "Professor Griff."
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 12:59 PM
65: Yeah, I'm pretty sure users would be consistently nicer to you if you were their dealer. You were meeting the crazy people in the work environment, where you had what they needed.
You mean you convinced the judge, or you changed? I wonder what was AA supposed to do for you if you weren't using? As a non-using dealer, I wouldn't expect you to have a lot of empathy for drunks or users, or get anything out of their stories.
The way the U.S. deals with drugs is so insane. But I suppose it would be a problem for the for-profit prison industry if drug use were decriminalized.
Posted by mcmc | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 1:08 PM
The Scary Black Leather Sid Vicious family looked like a family to me, although I suppose that betrays my bougie expectations about a mommie, a daddy and two-point-four kids. Caught in my own trap!
But why would they have to go head to head if there weren't some menace implicit in the Scary Black Leather Sid Vicious family? That's the expectation of the commercial, when in reality the guy with forty-seven piercings and a bunch of lewd tattoos is probably a pacifist vegan wearing the black because he loves the Smiths. As do we all.
I apologized for the commas because I fear the wrath of the b-dub and his lordly grasp on Strunk & White. And I much prefer the Loonie role, because in my mind all HERO! types look like Hank Rollins. I do not look like Hank, so I cannot be a HERO!
Posted by winna | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 1:26 PM
Apo:Rollins as Kent:Superman?
Posted by md 20/400 | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 1:29 PM
"Love for a crazy woman is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come."
Hey! 43 and later? That quote is by Matt Groening.
Am I really no fun and missing some joke? MATT GROENING!
Posted by heebie_geebie | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 6:05 PM
Everyone but Wolfson is showing shocking ignorance of the canon, heebie. (Note that Wolfson added some words and attributed to me instead of Nietzsche.)
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 6:09 PM
Everyone knows where that's from, people. Some things are so obvious they should be able to go unsaid.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 6:40 PM
You may think that, B, but there are people running around—in academia—who have never seen the grad school episode* of School Is Hell.
*Strip? Panel? What the hell do you call this?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 6:44 PM
(raises hand) I recognized it only as "Something I have heard somewhere in the past", with no information about the author. 77 -- "strip" is the preferred usage but "episode" works. "Panel" is a group of judges.
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:02 PM
76: ouch.
Posted by heebie_geebie | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:12 PM
77: Well, they aren't people who've worked with me, because that panel was on my office door for ages.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:32 PM
Strip, whatever. Anyway, in the horrible event that anyone here hasn't seen it, here it is.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 7:40 PM
I tried to post after Cala's 25. I think taht there are desirable qualities that go along with crazy, and I think it's this rather than a HERO! complex which draws a lot of men to crazy women.
I was semi-pwned by SCMT when he said, basically, that he doesn't think it's a conscious choice. You all mentioned spontaneity as teh obvious choice. I think that unless your crazy-meter is hyper-vigilant it can be much more muted than that, snd the woman might easily be described as "creative and unconventional."
You think you're just avoiding teh boring stiffs, but, really, you're getting a whole lot more.
Posted by Bostonaingirl | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:01 PM
I've dated my share of crazy women and despite being the hero, I do not have a hero complex. I'm just not good at telling people "no," and crazy people latch on to whomever will let them. Also, most people are able to keep teh crazy under wraps for a few months, so you don't realize just how completely insane they are until they already have a key.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 07-29-06 9:53 PM
6: I never met the one who unexpectedly painted all the mirrors in the house black, but I like the cut of her jib.
Sorry to use a cliche here, but this made me laugh out loud.
31: And I think that another part of it is that sometimes the men who like crazy women (like the women who like bad boys) are themselves very emotional, but also very contained. Very controlled by being good girls/good boys themselves, and yeah, there's something to admire about the spontaneity or the free display of emotion.
There is definitely something to this. Especially if you substitute "somewhat crazy" for "very emotional."
58: Men think different and eccentric (a term I much prefer to crazy) are fabulous qualities until they realise that no, the person who thought it was hilarious fun to sing sea chanties while waving a toy plastic sword in the middle of the mall is always like that, more or less.
Ah, yes. I remember that relationship well. But I would argue that, although they may lie on the same continuum, there is definitely a point beyond which "different/eccentric" no longer accurately describes things, and "crazy" becomes the more appropriate term. Different and eccentric are indeed fabulous qualities; full-blown crazy, not so fabulous.
Posted by My Alter Ego | Link to this comment | 07-30-06 6:41 AM
But, surely, even those who routinely fall for crazy women must have their limits...
Posted by Scott Lemieux | Link to this comment | 07-30-06 11:16 PM
There are three more reasons to think that husband X is one or two standard deviations away from teh normal: 1. He blogs in multiple places. 2. He teaches humanities at the university level. 3. He does 1 and 2 from Singapore.
One and two are probably overlooked here in the friendly confines of Unfogged because of where this discussion is happening and what, apparently, a number of us do. Three is important, though, because people do not pursue careers overseas with at least a fair amount of teh crazy themselves. (I say this from year 10 of living Over Here.)
There is, however, proverbially ample written evidence of husband X's sanity and levelheadedness. I'd guess that his crazy is not destructive but subtle and adventurous.
The mysterious A's craziness is also not all of a piece. Of course there's the incontrovertibly individual, but there's also the temporal and the regional. The early 1970s were a weird time to be growing up, and those of us who did can recognize distilled moments of a peculiar zeitgeist in A's stories. There's also the regional, which emphasizes A's alleged craziness because there are (or appear to be) so few southerners among the denizens here. Some things that A talks about are not at all beyond the norms of southern behavior; she's just been out of context for a long time now.
(On the other hand, I dated a woman who is probably one of A's cousins on her mother's side, and she was kinda crazy too, so maybe it's an extended-family thing. On the other other hand, I went to college at a place in Tennessee where a number of A's maternal ancestors are buried, and a lot of women there were like that, so maybe it's a regional thing after all.)
And the heroin addict who's been clean for like eight days? Stay away, I hope, since heroin buying is like potentially very fatal in Singapore-land, not that you don't know that already. Unfogged does not need to be doing a letter-campaign to Amnesty to save the mysterious A from the clutches of Mr Lee's gallows...
Posted by Doug | Link to this comment | 08- 1-06 3:18 AM