in Julie of the Wolves the protagonist makes snowshoes in the arctic wasteland (not that i'm an enabling SOB or anything ;-)

if you want some international adventure that will test your coping mettle, launder your passport shortly before your homeward-bound travel date.

seriously, though: you function best when you have a deadline, any chance the thirst for adventure is related ? engineer some challenges for yourself, like writing a feature-length article about finding a good meal in saigon. or working in a refugee camp for a month or going on an outward bound trip.

I have a lot of the same urges and desires (and the same disappointment). I guess I haven't really given up on it, though sometimes I think I should. Mostly I avoid thinking too much about the urges, because if I do, I'll lose a major motivator for me. If I don't have this notion that one day, something dramatic might happen to me, then my life will feel more pointless and rat-raceish than it already does.

-E

I started out in a similar spot, but ended up going in a different direction. My dad was a tinkerer, but not a terribly effective one. This actually was a useful life lesson: Go ahead and try things, even if you'll probably make a mess of it. So I did. My toys disappointed too. They didn't do what I hoped they would, and they usually broke quickly. So I'd try to repair them. Then I'd try to modify them. Then I'd try to combine them into something new and interesting. These traits persisted my whole life, becoming a fondness to pick up new skills. Which is why I fix my own cars, rebuilt my house, sew, do the kind of gardening that uses a chainsaw, and design and build my own art and electronics (and, recently, electronic art projects). I, like you, don't want to be caught out missing a needed skill. One insurance is picking up lots of skills. Another, more subtle, one is the ability to just give it a try, prepared or not. That, and knowing how to fall without hurting yourself, and basic first aid.

Eh... I love learning... *laughs* I keep doing new things ALL THE TIME... and usually not to the top of a learning curve, once it gets 'easy enough' to do well, I stop and do something else.

This was profitable at one time in my life, but now I just... do it for the fun of doing it, experiencing it, and it's really useful for writing, actually...

so is THIS the big allure for people who like those on line computer games??? The ability to make a character, who has to actually DO something in an imaginary world AND has adventures to boot?? Not quite little horses running along the floor....but closer.

Yes. It's quite a bit of that.