Re: Graphic converter query - transparency

Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:

> Woody <usenet@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> 

> > > > So it irritated you when you were what, 2 or 3 years old when you
could
> > > > understand it?
> > > 
> > > Something like that, yes - from re****ts that I have heard.  Yes,
really.
> > 
> > If you say so.
> 
> It's what I've been told.  <shrug>  It's not like I remember sitting in
> a pram myself.  Well, except perhaps a few times when many years too old
> for a pram and playing silly buggers like you do.

Sometimes it has to be done, agreed.

> > > Even when still in a pram, I apparently didn't take kindly to baby
talk
> > > and things like that, showing a marked tendency to look at adults as
if
> > > they were - or so I am told.
> > 
> > As if they were... what?
> 
> <heh>  Idiots, so I'm told.   The expression apparently said something
> like `What is this fool playing at?' - when I was lying in the pram,
> which I was not in for much of my life, oh no, my mother wanted me up
> and walking and generally looking after myself as soon as possible so
> she could spend more time playing netball and squash and not having to
> look after this horrible baby thing (my mother is quite open about
> disliking babies).

Hmm.. never liked them much myself, although my daughter was different.
I hate other babies though.

>  I had to grow up strong and self-reliant, I did,
> which generally meant I had to do everything for myself as soon as it
> was possible for me to do so.  I did not have kind, loving, sup****tive
> parents: I had parents whose interactions with me were generally limited
> to telling me what to do and then destructively criticising the outcome
> of everything and anything I ever attempted.

Thats a shame. I generally didn't have much undue critisism unless it
was about my lack of s****ting ability. Used to piss my dad off a bit,
being the s****ty type, but what can you do if you hate it.

> `Do it yourself.'  `Sort it out yourself'.  No guidance, no help,
> nothing but demands that I do everything for myself and violent
> criticism if I attempted something and failed to do it perfectly first
> time (and I always had to do without assistance).
> 
> Yes, that is partly why I'm the wreck I am today.  On the other hand, I
> was one of the few kids in the reception class at infants' school who
> could tie his own shoe laces.

That I could do.

> <rolls eyes>  I can remember the contempt I had for those who insisted
> that the teacher did up their laces even now, 36 years later...

I would have contempt for people who at 36 needed their laces done up
too!

> (some things stick in the mind, y'know?)

Yes. Being a really polite kid, one day when I was down town I hopped in
through the door of boots that was open. Some guy had a go at me as I
didn't let his girlfriend through first.

That was insignificant and 25 years ago - I don't know why it stayed
with me!

> > > > > > Now I have no real feelings about them either way. I certainly
don't
> > > > > > have the hatred for history I had when I was young.
> > > > > 
> > > > > Curious.
> > > > 
> > > > What that I don't hate it any more?
> > > 
> > > Curious that anyone should hate history.
> > 
> > <shrug> don't see why. People like and dislike all sorts of things.
> 
> <shrug> back.
> 
> And I don't see how anyone could dislike acquiring useful knowledge.

But many people do.

> Some things - history, mathematics, psychology, physics, economics,
> sociology, and so on - are all vital to understand to some extent in
> order to understand society and the world and make reliable plans for
> the future.

Other than a basic understanding, they are not vital. 

>  I can't understand how anyone could dislike learning about
> anything, let along the vital things that everyone /needs/ to
> understand.

Regardless of whether you can understand it or not, many people actively
hate any form of education.
I have been with the open university for several years and in that time
many people have asked why.

> And history is knowledge that's easy to acquire - surely no-one dislikes
> acquiring knowledge? 

Whether knowledge is easy to acquire or not depends on the type of
person someone is.

> > By
> > history in this context I mean things like old buildings,
insignificant
> > chunks of wood, those sort of things.
> 
> If that's what you mean by history, you're mad.

By your definitions I am anyway.

> btw, there's no history in an insignificant lump of wood.  If there's
> any history available from a lump of wood, it becomes `not
> insignificant' straight away. 

That is true, my mistake.

> And I for one am absolutely fascinated by
> prehistoric human archaeology.

I am interested, not fascinated.

> Old buildings are all about people and events involving those people and
> how they lived - you have no interest in that?

Depends on the buildings.

> I have seen the loft hatch that Samuel Crompton used to hide his
> prototype Spinning Mule to protect it from Luddite wreckers - would that
> not excite you, to see his loft hatch in his workroom in his house, the
> very same that he actually used himself?

Not in the slightest.
I would be interested in his story, images of how he lived etc, but a
loft hatch is a loft hatch. Does it matter if something interesting
happened behind that loft hatch or somehow other loft hatches of the
period are any less interesting?

> (I meant to go back one day when they had access to the loft space
> itself allowed - but missed it)
> 
> (Hall i'th Wood, Bolton - easy access from the A58; a short walk from
> Hall i'th Wood station)
> 
> <shrug>  Your weird ideas on this are most likely connected to your lack
> of reading.
> 
> > History of people, told by people can be interesting.
> 
> So the only history that you are interested in is that which is within
> living memory, yes?

Not at all.

<snip rest of pointless stuff>


-- 
Woody

www.alienrat.com