Did you ever have one of those moments where someone way older than you says one sentence and it just sticks in your head forever? Same thing happened to me with an old welder down in Amarillo, he watched me fight a joint for twenty minutes and finally just said "quit rushing the puddle." I was so mad in the moment but he was right and I still hear it every time I strike an arc. It's funny how the guys who've been doing this forever don't need fancy words, they just cut straight to it. That farrier in Laramie sounds like he'd seen a hundred young guys like you walk through and make the same mistake.

I did the same thing with my books a few years ago. Kept buying them faster than I could read and one day the stacks were just everywhere, so I made myself finish five before buying one new. Turns out I mostly liked having them more than reading them, which was a strange thing to admit.