Well, I have gotten home from a lovely week in the North Carolina pines where I got to spend a lot of time with Brother Joe. We'd both shown up at Dani's place to make a combined Getaway expedition, and she took one look at the two of us and took pity on us, haled us up by the back of our collars and took us in in order to shake some sense into us.Well. also. we were both wetter than junkyard-dogs on account of the rain. I'd have to say it was effective, but in the course of that therapy Joe and I got to talk a lot, fueled by both inspiration and other fluids.

Now Brother Joe3, as you know, is the most salient and well-known of the various moderators of the Mudcat, This means that when someone doesn't like something that happens on the 'Cat, it has to be Joe's fault. Of course that isn't necessarily so, but he's taking point, so he gets a lot of the heat whether due him or not. And he's mostly a very patient and kind guy and tries to deal amicably with all kinds of idiosyncrasies and melodramatic chest-poundings and collisions of egos and what-have-you. And he's been doing this for a looong time.

So in the course of all these textual misadventures he has developed a certain amount of wisdom, which our late-night sessions allowed him to share with us while we were drying out (on the outside, anyway) at Dan's place.

Anyone who's known Joe for long will probably have a few gems or tidbits or knucklebones to add to this collection, but here are two of my selected favorites.

Most people aren't half as bad as other people think they are. And,

Most people aren't as good as they think they are.

(Humbly offered as a gift to the collective Wisdom of the Cat).

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