Thanks for your suggestions, you almost seem like friends. I am actually at the tail end of a very mild depression (which I'm being treated for) which may have warped my perceptions a little, but that doesn't necessarily mean I'm wrong, psychologists often point out "normal" people see things through rose tinted glasses, they are slightly high and accordingly slightly unrealistic. i'm curious which psychologists pointed this out?

I've seen this on TV twice in discussions of bipolar but don't recall names sorry, experiments have found people think they are smarter, less likely to get cancer etc than other people therefore it was inferred normal people are slightly manic. I think it explains a lot about us, able to fight impossible odds for instance when everything suggests there is no hope (and rightly so), it may also explain why we hear we are destroying the planet and think "isn't that terrible" then forget it and go on doing all the things that are destroying it.

I think the book "Kluge. The Haphazard Construction of the Human Mind" by G. Marcus talks about this but can't guarantee it. It's along those lines anyway, how irrational we are, or can be.

HMMM, maybe friendship isn't always about seeking yourself in others, I hope so, I think it is much to often, at least in western industrialized societies, I don't know that it has to be that way.

I appreciate your comments, got back with an old friend as a result, feels pretty good actually.