eggheads over easy

Someone called me "book-smart" a few weeks ago.
"You're book-smart. !"
It's amazing, the opinions I am treated to, without even having to ask.
One of those -- it's a compliment that sounds like an insult.
Or is it the other way around?

Egghead. That used to be an expression some people applied to anyone they thought was "intellectual." And maybe, the person was thought to -- know the concepts and answers in a classroom, or on a page, but they might not in real life. That was an "egghead." (I think they meant that the same as 'book-smart.')
When John F. Kennedy was president-elect, and was putting together his advisors and cabinet members, in late 1960, a lot of his picked names were Harvard-types: one commentator remarked that the new Administration would "have all its eggheads in one basket" ... : )

[excerpt, Grace And Power: The Private World of the Kennedy White House]:
------------ During the campaign, Kennedy took impish pleasure when his academic allies were thrown in with hard-bitten political veterans, described by TIME correspondent Hugh Sidey as "brawling Irishmen." During a rally in Boston, Kennedy spotted Schlesinger and Galbraith in the crowd. Later, on the campaign plane, Kennedy asked Sidey, "Did you see Arthur and Ken trapped in the middle inhaling all the cigar smoke?" Said Sidey, "He enjoyed and respected them and their brains, but he understood the limits of intellectuals. He needed the stimulus but he needed the down to earth O'Donnells and O'Briens as well." [end excerpt]

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Different people's perspectives are amazing -- what's unsatisfactory, or uncomfortable for one person, would be a Heavenly Career Option for someone else --
[from Grace / Power]: -------------- [Arthur] Schlesinger's wife, Marian, believed that her husband "would have loved to have had Mac Bundy's job," but settled for a more nebulous designation as "special assistant," what Galbraith described as "a good address but no clear function." The notion of an adviser with no definable responsibility initially disquieted Schlesinger. "I am not sure what I would be doing as Special Assistant," he said. "Well," cracked Kennedy, "I am not sure what I will be doing as President either." ------------ [end Excerpt]

I read that and think, You're "disquieted" to be an "adviser with no definable responsibility" -- DISQUIETED??? If it were me, I'd be, like, "WHERE DO I SIGN UP??!"
Lack of definition means lack of limits -- YAY! You would get to See The Big Picture and make connections and find better ways to make things work better -- or help other people do that. And other than that, stay out of the way. Be in the background.
See, to me having a non-specific, not-definable, whatever-it-was would be a terrific opportunity. But to some people, if they are looking around them & see other people with specific titles and lists of what's their turf, and they think they themselves are not having a title or a turf-list, it can bother the ego, and the person might worry about being on the bottom rung of ladder.

(If I had been there, I would have told him, "If you're getting paid, don't worry about rungs and ladders -- you're in the best position there is.")

[excerpt / Grace]: ------------ Schlesinger's most burdensome task, one that originated early in the presidential campaign and continued in the White House, was as the middleman between Kennedy and Adlai Stevenson. "Adlai was not in the inner circle," said Schlesinger, "but Jack Kennedy always wanted to know what Adlai thought." Schlesinger never tired of insisting how compatible Kennedy and Stevenson should have been.... [end excerpt]

Their incompatibility resulted mostly from their competition during the presidential primary; some people can put that in the past more easily than others. -- So --

...so Schlesinger was "resigned to his fate as intermediary for the next three years: 'on the phone between the two of them, trying to translate one to the other.'"
Being a liaison between the U.S. Pres. John F. Kennedy and Adlai Stevenson: would have to be Best Job In World -- Hell-oh?!?!

one simple sentence: People see things differently.
another simple sentence: People see things differently, partly due to history and expectations.

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