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I appreciate the Dewey Decimal system as much as the next person, but I wouldn't put it in the same category as "The Theory of Relativity" or Newton inventing calculus. I'd put the brain power needed to figure out how to number books at about the same as it took to number each page. "Let's see, should we do even on one page, then odd on the next, or maybe try two consecutive odd numbers? Hmmm...
Read this link
First of all, I didn't re-read the article, but I remember it stating that the DD system is easy to think of as no big deal and rather obvious, but when you look at how it was before that, he was quite the pioneer.
That being said, allow me to tell you this little anecdote:
I had a super bowl party last year, and while I was engaged at the time, there still was this really hot girl who showed up and everyone was drooling over. Turns out she's a librarian. Talk about fantasy time. Well, while everyone else was making the typical librarian jokes about whips and leather and shit like that, I was able to have a real conversation with her. I brought up how I recently read about the DD system and how genious the guy was. She told me she knew a lot about him and his system and was impressed that I knew his first name. What she didnt' know and I was able to tell her was about the stuff in the article about his own shorthand techniques and his obsession with efficiency because he thought he was going to die soon or something like that and whole slew of other stupid things. That article may seem like a waste of time, but let me tell you, I was the only one who was able to keep her interest piqued. and had I not been engaged, I would have been bedding the girl that night.
good ol' cecil never lets ya down. I should write him and let him know this story. I bet he'd get a kick out of it.
