Skip to main content

Hedonist vs Bon Vivant

I like living well and enjoying life. I think of myself as a hedonist but I rarely call myself that because to other people that seems to mean "shortsighted idiot who has zero concept of consequences and is incapable of learning from their mistakes."

Because most people seem to think "hedonist" means "drunkard and drug addict who sleeps around casually and has zero sexual ethics "

Excuse me? I like my fun without regrets.

Hangovers, STDs, jail time and other ruinous consequences for shortsighted behavior are absolutely not my idea of "fun," thanks.

The expression bon vivant seems to do a better job of conveying what I mean which is that I like eating well, good conversation, nice clothes and similar pleasantries. 

I like living well and bon vivant is French for "person who lives well." (Literally "good liver.")

If you want to communicate effectively, it's pointless to try to insist your audience is wrong about what a word means. Your time is much better spent finding a word or phrase they will interpret as meaning what you hope to convey.

Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Me and Languages

My mother's mother came from a low level German noble family. Mom was born and mostly raised in Danzig, a very cosmopolitan freistadt (independent city state), except for the years that the family spent in the country during World War II to try to safeguard everyone as best they could. When the war ended, she found herself in the newly created communist East Germany where she was required to take Russian in school, which is why I know a few words of Russian. She left East Germany to return her sister's baby to her , so she was a young illegal immigrant in West Germany when she met my father at a party. She spoke extremely proper High German. His American accent plus the fact that he mostly learned German from farmers, meant she couldn't understand a word he spoke and she asked someone what language he was speaking. My older sister was born in Germany. Her first language was actually German and she translated for my parents while she was a toddler. So I grew up in a bilingua...
Read more

Medical care in the US

This is a thought I've had a long time: If you served in the US military and were honorably discharged , you should get medical benefits for the rest of your life . That would drastically reduce the need for Obamacare which is a lousy solution to what's wrong with American healthcare. We have some of the best medical stuff in the world -- IF you're rich. In fact, people travel here to get it -- IF they're rich. Meanwhile, most of our people are left out in the cold and living with stupid levels of stress about the COST of medical care, etc. We should not be putting the health of wealthy foreigners above that of the American people. I mean unless you WANT the world to invade, take us over and etc. The people who raised their right hand and swore to give their life for their country and were honorably discharged should be told by actions, not words, "You are the kind of people America values." Obamacare just plays into this bullshit medical system where money ...
Read more

I'm a blogger

1. I'm socially observant and interested in figuring out how social stuff works. 2. I'm an ordinary person, not one of the upper crust, who knows how it works if you are a big fat nobody. 3. I'm interested in parsing how someone can get their own needs met without stepping on anyone else's toes. AKA "ethics" or good boundaries. 4. I'm not interested in controlling anyone. I just want to TALK about what I know so other people can look at that and go "Oh, x and y are useful to me, z is irrelevant to my life. I can make some adjustments here and be less miserable/have less friction with other people."
Read more