Sanity - NO - a descision made

We have an expression: I'm not crazy Gerrit... my friend might ask what that means. As he says himself, he's not good with proverbs and sayings. That doesn't matter, though, because he is intelligent. After all, it's a sign of intelligence to be curious and to investigate the meaning of a word or a saying, or in this case, simply to ask what it means. Asking questions is not a sign of weakness or stupidity, by the way. As my father always said: There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers—and by this, he generally meant the lazy teachers who refused to explain anything, and indeed, back then there was no internet. You memorised the dictionary as punishment, and the encyclopedia, and proverbs and sayings were simply hammered into us, just like songs and all the places, rivers, and mountains in Geography, and of course the books of the Bible.

Coming back to "crazy Gerrit"—that person is not me, but it's starting to look like it lately, and this in relation to Steemit. I did some calculating, and in 2025 alone, I spent over €5000 just on Steemians who knocked on my door for help, not to mention the many upvotes I gave, the comments I left, the things I researched or had researched. Interestingly, of those who asked me for help, all of them vanished into thin air as soon as they got what they wanted. If there's one thing I can't stand, it's people who can't even be bothered to keep their promise (you're lucky you don't live near me). Besides helping others out of a fix (something I've been doing for years as if I'm Santa Claus), I myself am regularly stabbed in the back, and there are people who think they can throw mud at me. Are you one of those people? If so, conside yourself warned. I won't be treated like dirt. If you're too stupid to think, to research something yourself, that says more about your incompetence than mine. I'm not a toddler, not a schoolchild, and in all likelihood older than you. So tuck that away in your back pocket before you shoot your mouth off again. By the way, there's nothing patronising about quoting what's in the dictionary, and anyone who makes a little effort can look it up. I would do that immediately myself if I used a word incorrectly, instead of being condescending.

Coming back to common sense and "crazy Gerrit" and Saint Nicholas: communities are meant to be carried by the community. It's impossible for me to run everything alone, to provide everyone with comments and an upvote. A number of people get an automatic upvote from me, simply because I know they write well. Now it turns out there are recipients of upvotes who aren't satisfied when they don't get personal comments. To start 2026 off right, I've removed a large number of names from my fanbase. From now on, you won't get an automatic upvote anymore, nor any other upvotes allocated through me, unless I've read you and I also have time to leave a response. From now on, I'm going to think more about myself. I also couldn't care less whether my CSI is high or low or whether self-votes are cast, as many do. Have a good 2026, and maybe see you around.

P.S. I'm also stopping with sponsoring contests effective immediately.

_{31.12.25
Prompt: sanity
cc @gertu @olivia08}