Those who live in England will surely know of Delia Smith, who has pleased us with her cooking tips and books for thousands of years. Speaking not so recently, she wisely claimed :

If the entire planet became vegan, we’d die. It’s not practical. We wouldn’t be able to feed ourselves; you can’t grow vegetables in hilly country. My relatives come from Wales and you struggle to grow vegetables there, but the lamb is wonderful.

Our dear Delia obviously has no knowledge of land requirements, or indeed land structure outside Wales, for a vegan against a meat-eating diet. She would, presumably, prefer the “alleged” cutting down of rain forests for our ever growing need to satiate “protein” intake.

I have no problem with points of view. What annoys me is someone who professes to be knowledgeable in an area shows how stupid that person is. Another example, taken from her site :

On Junk Food : I’m one of those people who don’t believe there’s any such thing as unhealthy food. No recipes on their own can be unhealthy, if the rest of the diet is balanced.

Well, take a look in a dictionary once and a while and you’ll see junk food described as having little or no nutritional value, but with high sugar content.

Delia, you are a fool.

N.B. I do actually understand the point that Delia made about junk food, and agree with her. I just got a bit bothered by her first quote and wanted to continue a good old-fashioned defamation. Needed pedantry to do it, though.

I’ve taken the time to properly read yesterday’s personality-test result, and one thing struck me. I didn’t pay too much notice to it at first, though when I read the sentence again, I realised how easy it is to read what one wants to hear, while ignoring the obvious error in the whole. At the end of the summary it says that:

Idealists are rare, making up between 20 and 25 percent of the population.

I, like many people, like to think I’m a bit special, having an individuality about me that others do not. While it is impossible to gain any sense of real individualism in a test that classifies (into 4 groups, essentially), it still gave me a warm glow to see I was “rare”. I gleaned over the rest of the sentence, but on second glance it clearly states that I shares traits that 20-25% of the population do.

Since when has it ever, ever been “rare” to to be among 25%? If British Airways came out with a statement that if I were to travel to England on one of their flights, the chances are “rare” that I’d crash (mumbling “just don’t do it three more times or you’ll more than likely die in flames”).

No, rare to me (and many dictionaries) means uncommon, and I’d be surprised if, whilst playing football, the striker and the substitute (and two players on the opposing team) turned to me and said gleefully in perfect synchrony “Well, what are the chances of that?”

Jo told me this evening about a well-known personality-test, one which seems to be used by professionals (whatever that means), universities and the like. Being rather curious to find out just how decent the test is, I took it, and the result is a fairly good representation of who I am.

I am an Idealist:

Idealists, as a temperament, are passionately concerned with personal growth and development. Idealists strive to discover who they are and how they can become their best possible self — always this quest for self-knowledge and self-improvement drives their imagination. And they want to help others make the journey. Idealists are naturally drawn to working with people, and whether in education or counseling, in social services or personnel work, in journalism or the ministry, they are gifted at helping others find their way in life, often inspiring them to grow as individuals and to fulfill their potentials.

Idealists are sure that friendly cooperation is the best way for people to achieve their goals. Conflict and confrontation upset them because they seem to put up angry barriers between people. Idealists dream of creating harmonious, even caring personal relations, and they have a unique talent for helping people get along with each other and work together for the good of all. Such interpersonal harmony might be a romantic ideal, but then Idealists are incurable romantics who prefer to focus on what might be, rather than what is. The real, practical world is only a starting place for Idealists; they believe that life is filled with possibilities waiting to be realized, rich with meanings calling out to be understood. This idea of a mystical or spiritual dimension to life, the “not visible” or the “not yet” that can only be known through intuition or by a leap of faith, is far more important to Idealists than the world of material things.

Highly ethical in their actions, Idealists hold themselves to a strict standard of personal integrity. They must be true to themselves and to others, and they can be quite hard on themselves when they are dishonest, or when they are false or insincere. More often, however, Idealists are the very soul of kindness. Particularly in their personal relationships, Idealists are without question filled with love and good will. They believe in giving of themselves to help others; they cherish a few warm, sensitive friendships; they strive for a special rapport with their children; and in marriage they wish to find a “soulmate,” someone with whom they can bond emotionally and spiritually, sharing their deepest feelings and their complex inner worlds.

Idealists are rare, making up between 20 and 25 percent of the population. But their ability to inspire people with their enthusiasm and their idealism has given them influence far beyond their numbers.

It’s a bit crap, really. Using this test you get to be one of four temperaments (Guardian, Artisan, Rational or Idealist, albeit with four subcategories in each), whereas a Horoscope gives you twelve, and you can be far more interesting things, like a lion, fish or set of scales.

It’d still be interesting to take the test again, only this time lying throughout, and see how near to my perceived personality it is. I could just go and read the summaries on the site, but this is not an option at the moment, since it’s nearly bedtime.

I’m waiting to see what Jo’s (and Leigh’s) is, to see how much of their personality summaries fit (or could fit) what I think is Jon.