On the radio someone is commenting on the fact that videogames can be educational. This is new? We had educational videogames when I was a kid! Operation Neptune anyone?

Anyway, I'm blogging at this strange hour because I want to record two analogies I thought of in the shower.

1. Why I don't like being thought of as "someone who is on a diet", even though I have been watching my weight for the past few months: Dieting is a temporary unpleasant chore. I don't want it to define me. For example, suppose your kitchen floor is dirty, so you start scrubbing the floor. As you're doing this, the phone rings. You answer the phone, and your friend asks you what's up. You say "I'm just scrubbing the floor". From then on, you're thought of as a person who scrubs the floor. You're given a bucket and brushes for your birthday. When a fun activity is planned, they don't invite you because they thought you'd rather spend the time scrubbing the floor. Whenever they see you doing something else, they say "What are you doing? Why aren't you scrubbing the floor?"

2. Why I don't need a religion: Suppose that when you're a kid you have a dog. It belonged to your parents before you were born, and it's just a part of the household. It's rather surly and grumpy and keeps trying to frighten you. Your parents say it's just being friendly and playing, but it looks to you like it wants to hurt you. This isn't helped by the fact that your parents keep making you scoop the poop from the backyard even though you don't like this dog. Then you grow up and move out of your parents' house. You find that, living on your own, you're relieved to be free of that dog, and you don't feel that you're lacking anything not having a dog in your life. Would you assume that a) you just haven't found the right breed of dog for you yet, or b) you don't need a dog?