A lot of people are offended by the ".... For Dummies" books, but I bought the very first one ever produced ("Automobile Repair for Dummies"). I didn't grow up tinkering with car engines (my parents were schoolteachers, I grew up reading books) and when I tried to teach myself, I found that all books on automotive mechanics were written with the assumption that anyone reading it would know what a carburetor looked like, or how to identify a manifold, etc. AR For Dummies was written by a woman, in the days when a female mechanic was considered not just a curiosity, but an abnormality. <img src="images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" /> She had had to learn everything about her car engine from scratch, so when she wrote a book about it, she didn't worry about "talking down" to the reader.

Technical writing is a real challenge; it's incredibly difficult for most experts to put themselves in the position of someone who knows absolutely nothing about the subject.

Fortunately for me, I have a "scientific" mind - I'm generally not satisfied to know how something works, I want to know *why* it works that way.

Chemically treated "Instant" firelogs probably contribute to a generation of people who don't realise that a single large log won't continue to burn by itself, no matter how hot you get it.

By the way, I just signed up for a 7-day course with Mors Kochanski in Wildwood, Alberta, in July. Hopefully, I'll know how to build a decent campfire before I head up there; but if not, I'm certain I'll know how to build one when I head back <img src="images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />