Experts, Egg Hunts and Einstein

Ever feel so scattered that you simply can not focus on one thing?  If you're a crazed multi-tasker like me, you'll relate to knowing that as I write this post several distractions are pulling me away from time to time.  Besides, checking my e-mail, the weather, my horoscope and celebrity news, I have started a load of laundry, thought about what might work for dinner tonight and answered a phone call from school.  (I always panic when I see the caller ID indicating my oldest son's Elementary School.  At first, I thought it's the nurse.  Then, the voice announced that it was the school librarian.  I blurted out, "The book's in his backpack!" to a pre-recorded message about a school activity happening tonight.)

Anyway, back to what I was saying, scattered thoughts (see what I mean?) ...  I'm pulling from an old post in which I linked a bunch of random thoughts together by beginning each idea with the same phrase:  "I'm no expert, but ..."  It was a fun post and worth reading for a laugh (but don't go there now!).

I'm no expert, but isn't an egg hunt supposed to be fun?  Ask my oldest son and he'll tell you an enthusiastic yes.  He came away from the township run local event with a pail full of plastic eggs containing candy.  My twins, as seen in the above photo, did not fair as well.  My twin boy got off to an amazing start, only to trip some twenty-five yards away from me.  His plastic bucket cracked and his entire loot spilled forward.  For him to recoup his losses, it would have taken a group of very empathetic three to five year old's.  Only one three to five year old was concerned, his twin sister.  Everyone else snatched up the spilled eggs at a rate so fast that it left their parents' wondering why they can't clean up their toys as quickly.  "It's supposed to be fun," I told my bitter and disgruntled twins as they counted a meager five plastic eggs between them. Oh, well ... better luck next time.

I'm no expert, but that's because I haven't implemented the 10,000 hour rule.  For a book club I've recently joined, I've begun the first few chapters of Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell.   Basically, among many other factors, to be a success, it takes 10,000 hours of practice on (here's where my problem comes in) the same task.  Multi-taskers and scattered thinkers everywhere are doomed to non-expert status.  Yeah, yeah.  But, I wonder, do these successful people know about the weather, check their e-mails, be informed about important events (such as the latest celebrity gossip), have clean laundry or even have any idea what to feed their kids for dinner? 

I'm no expert, but Einstein, in my opinion, was.  Einstein had a sign hanging in his office at Princeton that said, "Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts."   I'm not a hundred percent sure what this means, but it's motivated me to stop trying to figure out how I can accumulate 10,000 hours as a writer to be a success!  I think, in some convoluted way, I said something like this to my pouting twins on the day of the egg hunt.  "It's not how many eggs and candy you get.  It's just cool to get out here and do it!"  They weren't buying it.  Maybe if I added, "Einstein thought so!"  No, they still wouldn't have bought it.

Finally, I leave you with this photo I snapped of our resident chipmunk.  Here he is peeking out on April 1st (a.k.a. April Fool's day) after a winter of hibernation to be welcomed not by green grass and robins, but by more snow:

I'm no expert, but I think in chipmunk language, he's laying on the expletives.  "What the *#^% !"

Have any "I'm no expert, but..." thoughts?  Add your own.