Stupid is as stupid does and I've done plenty of stupid

A few of the comments here and at that LinuxToday post have questioned my competence and made fun of my selling an ebook on Linux and Unix troubleshooting. Here's a typical sample:

I found it highly amusing that at the top of these articles you are trying to sell "ebooks" about "how to solve the tough problems on Linux and Unix systems." A person who doesn't know you (and I don't) might be forgiven for thinking he would be paying for help from a newbie.

I have to smile a little myself. I've said more than a few times that I don't consider myself "expert" on anything, that at best I'm willing to call myself "competent" and I've also frequently noted that I (like most of us) can be bone numbingly stupid every now and then.

Oh, I can point at some bona-fides. For example, I took the Solaris Enterprise Certification exams back when they included a nasty section on kernel internals. It took me two tries to pass that section of the tests, but apparently that was more than most of my peers could manage: right after I passed all the tests Sun dropped that one a requirement, explaining that too many people were unable to pass it. I felt pretty brilliant then, I'll tell you!

The SCO certs that I took around the same time were a breeze compared to the Sun exams. But SCO is (deservedly) just about belly up now, so who cares?

Besides, I've had so many opportunities since then to show that my brain can misconstrue, befuddle and just stubbornly refuse to comprehend a lot of things that later turned out to be pretty trivial. If I weren't such a thick skinned, arrogant ass that alleged brain of mine could really embarrass me sometimes..

Even before Forrest Gump, it's always been my feeling that stupid is as stupid does, and I've done plenty of it. Haven't we all? I mean everybody else, of course - not YOU.

But that's why I write this stuff. I write it for all the "stupid" people whose brains sometimes refuse to cooperate or are busy concentrating on other things. I write to be helpful, and that's also why I wrote that ebook - and in my opinion, it really will help "solve tough problems on Linux and Unix systems".

So.. so what? I don't know - I just felt that I had to respond and defend myself - sort of, anyway.