Saturday, December 27, 2008

Help I've Been Tagged - Again!

Tēnā koutou katoa – Greetings to you all
Wordle blimp - 7 things you don't really need to know about me
Sue Waters has tagged me to list
7 things you really don’t need to know about me.

Truth is, I’ve already put a comment on Diane Cordell’s post, though she didn’t tag me, and I said it all there.


Ah but, being tagged means I have to write a post about it - if I accept the challenge. Then I think, “What’s this got to do with elearning?" Hmmm.

Oh well. Whatever. ‘Tis the season. I accept.


Here are 7 things you really don’t need to know about me:

  1. Despite my love of words, I'm hopeless at languages. When at school I got 11% for Latin and 17% for French.
    Parliamo Italiano?


  2. Though I don't have a fear of heights and I like hill climbing,
    I don't like rock climbing or mountaineering. The only similar sport that I dislike more than these is potholing. Potholing gives me the hebes.


  3. Of the many years spent in three different countries, I enjoy living in NZ the best - that's why I've lived here for 34 years.
    I was born in Scotland, but it is too cold there in the winter. Malawi is nice - called Nyasaland when I lived there as a child.


  4. At Downstage Theatre in Wellington in 1980 I had a part in the play, The Suicide, by the Russian playwright Nicolai Erdman, director Phillip Mann. It was a long play, almost 3 hours, and the season ran for 4 weeks. The play was extremely successful, with a cast of 16 actors and one fiddler. I was the (token) gypsy fiddler. I never spoke a word on the stage, which was fortunate, but I appeared first on the stage in scene 1.

  5. The only reason I was 7 years studying at university was procrastination. At a time when I was about to go on to study teaching, after I had graduated the first time, I was offered a post-grad grant. I went into teaching 3 years later.

  6. When my oldest son, Nicolas, was just over 2 years of age, he could catch flies in mid air. He never harmed them. He caught a wasp once, examined it closely, then let it go and wasn't stung. Only recently, I found that I had the same ability, though in over 50 years I'd never tried to catch a fly.

    I found out that I had this dubious talent when my daughter, Hannah, kept a pet female brown tree frog, Rocket, in a large vivarium. Rocket needed live food and lived for almost 4 years on what I caught for her - a record age for female Australian brown tree frogs, who live in the wild for only 16 months on average.


  7. I was born Church of Scotland. I've studied several religions, including Buddhism. My wife was the Anglican parish secretary for years in Island Bay where we live, and continues to attend Church regularly. My youngest daughter, Catriona, travelled to Fiji this year, and lived there for almost a fortnight while she pursued her Anglican mission.

    I've played music at the Church and read readings. I've read the Bible - a goodly book that I enjoy reading - and know many quotes. But I'm not religious in the least. I stopped attending Church with my wife a few years ago as people got the wrong idea. They couldn't understand my acceptance of the Church versus my personal belief.


Ka kite anō – Catch ya later

9 comments:

diane said...

Ken,

By being a good cyber friend and commenting on my blog, you pre-wrote your own posting!

You are a complex and interesting person, and I always enjoy reading about life in Middle-earth.

Blogger In Middle-earth said...

Kia ora Diane!

Isn't it great to have friends? And it's great to have cyber friends!

You are right. I did pre-write my own posting. This isn't too new to me though, for I have done a bit of this before.

But in this case, I would probably not have put it in a post if Sue hadn't tagged me. I only discovered this today.

So thank you Diane! I didn't have to think about what I put in this post :-)

Catchya later

Anonymous said...

Heya Ken - yes I was a bit wicked :)

Good to see that you had pre-planned your post by writing a comment on Diane's.

Don't tell anyone but I also failed badly at language. Totally bummed out in English Literature at High School and fortunately sat English exam which I just past or I wouldn't have been allowed into University. Really totally unfair that you can do well in the Sciences and struggle with the written language! (File that under RANT).

Anonymous said...

Oops slip of the old fingers meant that comment was posted before I entered my details! Another Rant!

That is my comment above!

Blogger In Middle-earth said...

Tēnā kōrua Sue and Sue.

My you're both true to form this month. This rivalry thing - I don't know!

I didn't get an English qualification for university entrance at all, so I was a complete and utter bummer. And I didn't actually get accepted for university, at least, not to begin with.

I applied for and got a place at Heriot-Watt College, Edinburgh. It became a university when I was completing my first year in Chemistry. When it was passed round, I signed the clipboard for an honours degree, otherwise I'd have caused an awful administrative commotion.

But I obviously made amends in English, for when I submitted my research thesis 7 years later, it got a highly commended for the literacy. The Chemistry wasn't too bad either ;-)

Catchya

V Yonkers said...

The only failing grade I got in High School was Spanish and I had 3 years of remedial reading in grade school. I find it interesting that not only am I fluent in Spanish and French and speak German and understand Portuguese and Dutch, but I can read in all of those languages.

That is why I went into language teaching and communication. I felt that if I could learn the language in context, then it had to be the way that language was taught in schools that had been my barrier (and failure in school).

Blogger In Middle-earth said...

Kia ora Virginia!

I guess there are lots of different factors that assist the learning of a language.

I've heard it said that we are all born liguists - I'm inclined to believe that.

But we have been reminded of the power of practice in Malcolm Gladwell's recent 'Outliers'. I can think of no finer practice for a linguist than to be using her language in context - and I'm not a linguist.

Best wishes

Cammy Bean said...

Potholing?! My imagination is providing lots of interesting visuals for that sport. I must investigate...

Blogger In Middle-earth said...

Kia ora Cammy

Don't dig too deep - you might never get out again!

No. Caving is not for me. Even writing about it does my head in. I guess that's why my ancestry had nothing to do with mining, even though I came from the heart of the mining districts and was born in Cowdenbeath, THE mining town in Scotland in the mid 40s.

Best of 2009