Currently, I am listening to "The Stars, Like Dust" by Asimov (of
course). I do this while I am doing various chores and yard work around
the house and don't need to give full attention to the chore. It is interesting enough, but not great, IMHO. In fact, Wikipedia says that he
said it was "his least favorite novel". I had not read it before and I
found this surprising. But I love the title. The first time I saw the
Milky Way whilst camping at Lassen National Part, I was reminded of this title. When you are up at 8000+ feet and the air is calm and clear, the
stars ARE like dust.

I am currently rereading Glen Cook's "She is the Darkness". I am
enjoying it more than I did the first time.

--
----------------
Dave Scruggs
Senior Software Engineer - Lockheed Martin, et. al (mostly Retired)
Captain - Boulder Creek Fire (Retired)

--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

BCFD 36 wrote:

Currently, I am listening to "The Stars, Like Dust" by Asimov (of
course). I do this while I am doing various chores and yard work around
the house and don't need to give full attention to the chore. It is interesting enough, but not great, IMHO. In fact, Wikipedia says that he
said it was "his least favorite novel". I had not read it before and I
found this surprising. But I love the title. The first time I saw the
Milky Way whilst camping at Lassen National Part, I was reminded of this title. When you are up at 8000+ feet and the air is calm and clear, the
stars ARE like dust.

I am currently rereading Glen Cook's "She is the Darkness". I am
enjoying it more than I did the first time.

Did you ever hear the story about Saul Alinsky's influence on Hillary
Clinton and Barack Obama? If not you can giggle it.
Saul supposedly said something along the lines of "The very first
radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did
it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom -- Lucifer."
Although the modern words may belong to Saul, the sentiment
doesn't. It dates back millennia to the start of Gnosticism.

_The Hidden Life is Best! - Francis Bacon and the Gnostic English Empire_
talks about such topics (but not Clinton and Obama specifically). There's
free audio available at <https://thehiddenlifeisbest.com/episodes>

Long story short, all of the free episodic excerpts were recently heard
by me.

Danke,

--
Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.


--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

Don <g@crcomp.net> wrote:

BCFD 36 wrote:

Currently, I am listening to "The Stars, Like Dust" by Asimov (of
course). I do this while I am doing various chores and yard work around
the house and don't need to give full attention to the chore. It is
interesting enough, but not great, IMHO. In fact, Wikipedia says that he
said it was "his least favorite novel". I had not read it before and I
found this surprising. But I love the title. The first time I saw the
Milky Way whilst camping at Lassen National Part, I was reminded of this
title. When you are up at 8000+ feet and the air is calm and clear, the
stars ARE like dust.

I am currently rereading Glen Cook's "She is the Darkness". I am
enjoying it more than I did the first time.

Did you ever hear the story about Saul Alinsky's influence on Hillary
Clinton and Barack Obama? If not you can giggle it.
Saul supposedly said something along the lines of "The very first
radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did
it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom -- Lucifer."
Although the modern words may belong to Saul, the sentiment
doesn't. It dates back millennia to the start of Gnosticism.

_The Hidden Life is Best! - Francis Bacon and the Gnostic English Empire_ talks about such topics (but not Clinton and Obama specifically). There's free audio available at <https://thehiddenlifeisbest.com/episodes>

Long story short, all of the free episodic excerpts were recently heard
by me.

One more thing...

Bacon was a brilliant phrase maker. Below is but a few of the hundreds
of phrases coined by Bacon. _The Hidden Life is Best_ host speculates
how Western audiences may unknowingly parrot Bacon far more than
they themselves realize.

Forwarded from another Shakespeare scholar, Kelly Albertine:

Original mind control ..

William Shakespeare's influence on the English language is
immense, with many phrases he coined still in common use
today. Here are 25 popular phrases that originate from
Shakespeare's plays:

1. "Break the ice" (The Taming of the Shrew) - to commence
a project or initiate a friendship.
2. "The be all and end all" (Macbeth) - the central or most
important element.
3. "Fair play" (The Tempest) - adherence to rules or
standards of fairness.
4. "In a pickle" (The Tempest) - to be in a difficult situation.
5. "Love is blind" (The Merchant of Venice) - love does not
see imperfections.
6. "Wild-goose chase" (Romeo and Juliet) - a futile search
or pursuit.
7. "Heart of gold" (Henry V) - a very kind or generous nature.
8. "Such stuff as dreams are made on" (The Tempest) - the
ephemeral nature of human life and pursuits.
9. "Wear my heart on my sleeve" (Othello) - to openly
display one's emotions.
10. "Dead as a doornail" (Henry VI) - absolutely dead
or unusable.
11. "Green-eyed monster" (Othello) - jealousy.
12. "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet" (Romeo and
Juliet) - what matters is what something is, not what it
is called.
13. "All that glitters is not gold" (The Merchant of Venice) -
appearances can be deceptive.
14. "Bated breath" (The Merchant of Venice) - in great
suspense; very anxiously.
15. "Brave new world" (The Tempest) - a new and hopeful period
in history.
16. "Full circle" (King Lear) - returning to the original
position or state of affairs.
17. "Good riddance" (Troilus and Cressida) - an expression of
relief at being free of a troublesome or unwanted person
or thing.
18. "It was Greek to me" (Julius Caesar) - something that
cannot be understood; incomprehensible.
19. "Kill with kindness" (The Taming of the Shrew) - to
overwhelm or harm someone by excessive kindness.
20. "Knock knock! Who’s there?" (Macbeth) - the phrase used
in the famous knock-knock jokes originated from this play.
21. "Laughing stock" (The Merry Wives of Windsor) - a person
subjected to general mockery or ridicule.
22. "Naked truth" (Love’s Labour's Lost) - the plain or
unembellished truth.
23. "Set your teeth on edge" (Henry IV) - to cause someone to
feel intense irritation or discomfort.
24. "Star-crossed lovers" (Romeo and Juliet) - lovers whose
relationship is doomed to fail.
25. "There’s the rub" (Hamlet) - a phrase indicating a problem
or obstacle.

These phrases show Shakespeare's lasting impact on the way we
express ideas and emotions in English.

Danke,

--
Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.


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* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

On Tue, 23 Apr 2024 16:02:13 +0000, Don wrote:

These phrases show Shakespeare's lasting impact on the way we
express ideas and emotions in English.

My favorite one that's /not/ made it into the lexicon:
Fall into the unclean fishpond [of someone's] displeasure.
(spoken by the clown before exiting)

https://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php? WorkID=allswell&Act=5&Scene=2&Scope=scene

Shortened: https://tinyurl.com/4dhaj4v4


--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

On 2024-04-23, Don <g@crcomp.net> wrote:

William Shakespeare's influence on the English language is
immense, with many phrases he coined still in common use
today. Here are 25 popular phrases that originate from
Shakespeare's plays:

15. "Brave new world" (The Tempest) - a new and hopeful period
in history.

Aldous Huxley has changed that. When I now see that phrase it
popular usage, it refers to dystopic developments.

18. "It was Greek to me" (Julius Caesar) - something that
cannot be understood; incomprehensible.

That's some literary license. The phrase is spoken by Servilius
Casca, who was one of the Roman senators that assassinated Caesar,
and as a member of the Roman upper class surely would have been
competent in Greek.

"Et tu, Brute?" from the same play is famously an invention by
Shakespeare. Apocryphally, Caesar's dying words have been reported
as the Greek(!) phrase "kai su, teknon" ("you too, child").

--
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber naddy@mips.inka.de

--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: ---:- FTN<->UseNet Gate -:--- (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

Charles Packer wrote:

Don wrote:

These phrases show Shakespeare's lasting impact on the way we
express ideas and emotions in English.

My favorite one that's /not/ made it into the lexicon:
Fall into the unclean fishpond [of someone's] displeasure.
(spoken by the clown before exiting)

https://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php? WorkID=allswell&Act=5&Scene=2&Scope=scene

Shortened: https://tinyurl.com/4dhaj4v4

Thank you for the link. Allow me to note how the Clown character
conceivably serves as an analog for Bacon himself.
It proves rather futile for trolls to try to disguise themselves
behind multiple usenet pseudonyms. For a creature's core characteristics
always emerge fully formed from its words - at least to discerning
readers.
There's no disguising Bacon's wit regardless of the nom de plume
he hides behind. Can ChatGPT change this playing field?

# # #

As an ngram maven, you may find this interesting:

Is ChatGPT Transforming Academics' Writing Style?

Based on one million arXiv papers submitted from May 2018
to January 2024, we assess the textual density of ChatGPT's
writing style in their abstracts by means of a statistical
analysis of word frequency changes. Our model is calibrated
and validated on a mixture of real abstracts and ChatGPT-
modified abstracts (simulated data) after a careful noise
analysis. We find that ChatGPT is having an increasing impact
on arXiv abstracts, especially in the field of computer
science, where the fraction of ChatGPT-revised abstracts is
estimated to be approximately 35%, if we take the output of
one of the simplest prompts, "revise the following sentences",
as a baseline. We conclude with an analysis of both positive
and negative aspects of the penetration of ChatGPT into
academics' writing style.

<https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.08627>

Danke,

--
Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.


--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

Christian Weisgerber wrote:

Don wrote:

William Shakespeare's influence on the English language is
immense, with many phrases he coined still in common use
today. Here are 25 popular phrases that originate from
Shakespeare's plays:

15. "Brave new world" (The Tempest) - a new and hopeful period
in history.

Aldous Huxley has changed that. When I now see that phrase it
popular usage, it refers to dystopic developments.

18. "It was Greek to me" (Julius Caesar) - something that
cannot be understood; incomprehensible.

That's some literary license. The phrase is spoken by Servilius
Casca, who was one of the Roman senators that assassinated Caesar,
and as a member of the Roman upper class surely would have been
competent in Greek.

"Et tu, Brute?" from the same play is famously an invention by
Shakespeare. Apocryphally, Caesar's dying words have been reported
as the Greek(!) phrase "kai su, teknon" ("you too, child").

Allow me to note how my post refers to two separate Shakespeare
scholars, related only by their mutual field of interest. AFAIK, neither
knows the other. The second scholar, Kelly Albertine, takes the literary license you mention.
The primary scholar, Robert Frederick, devotes an episode to "The Shakespeare Effect, the Tragedy of Julius Caesar, the New Atlantis, and
the Great Instauration." An episodic excerpt's available at:

<https://thehiddenlifeisbest.com/post/episode-12/episodes>

"Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; I come to bury Caesar,
not to praise him." Actually Antony aspires to bury the Conspirators.
Can Antony help it if the Republic also gets buried along the way?
Others describe Antony's speech as "a famous example of the use of emotionally charged rhetoric." Does excessive emotionally charged
rhetoric fill today's political discourse?
A long time ago my dad took a rhetoric class at UC Boulder. "The
Hidden Life is Best" host wonders aloud whether rhetoric's still taught
at public schools? Or did rhetoric simply fall by the wayside after it
became as unpopular as subliminal?

Danke,

--
Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.


--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

On 4/23/24 06:29, Don wrote:

BCFD 36 wrote:

Currently, I am listening to "The Stars, Like Dust" by Asimov (of
course). I do this while I am doing various chores and yard work around
the house and don't need to give full attention to the chore. It is
interesting enough, but not great, IMHO. In fact, Wikipedia says that he
said it was "his least favorite novel". I had not read it before and I
found this surprising. But I love the title. The first time I saw the
Milky Way whilst camping at Lassen National Part, I was reminded of this
title. When you are up at 8000+ feet and the air is calm and clear, the
stars ARE like dust.

I am currently rereading Glen Cook's "She is the Darkness". I am
enjoying it more than I did the first time.

Did you ever hear the story about Saul Alinsky's influence on Hillary
Clinton and Barack Obama? If not you can giggle it.
Saul supposedly said something along the lines of "The very first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did
it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom -- Lucifer."
Although the modern words may belong to Saul, the sentiment
doesn't. It dates back millennia to the start of Gnosticism.

_The Hidden Life is Best! - Francis Bacon and the Gnostic English Empire_ talks about such topics (but not Clinton and Obama specifically). There's free audio available at <https://thehiddenlifeisbest.com/episodes>

Long story short, all of the free episodic excerpts were recently heard
by me.

Danke,

Why is this mess a reply to my post? It has nothing to do with my post,
unless "She is the Darkness" is some kind of reference to Hillary
Clinton. In which case it is still not welcome since I try to keep my
stuff non political.
--
----------------
Dave Scruggs
Senior Software Engineer - Lockheed Martin, et. al (mostly Retired)
Captain - Boulder Creek Fire (Retired)


--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)

BCFD 36 wrote:

Don wrote:

BCFD 36 wrote:

Currently, I am listening to "The Stars, Like Dust" by Asimov (of
course). I do this while I am doing various chores and yard work around
the house and don't need to give full attention to the chore. It is
interesting enough, but not great, IMHO. In fact, Wikipedia says that he >>> said it was "his least favorite novel". I had not read it before and I
found this surprising. But I love the title. The first time I saw the
Milky Way whilst camping at Lassen National Part, I was reminded of this >>> title. When you are up at 8000+ feet and the air is calm and clear, the
stars ARE like dust.

I am currently rereading Glen Cook's "She is the Darkness". I am
enjoying it more than I did the first time.

Did you ever hear the story about Saul Alinsky's influence on Hillary
Clinton and Barack Obama? If not you can giggle it.
Saul supposedly said something along the lines of "The very first
radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did
it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom -- Lucifer."
Although the modern words may belong to Saul, the sentiment
doesn't. It dates back millennia to the start of Gnosticism.

_The Hidden Life is Best! - Francis Bacon and the Gnostic English Empire_
talks about such topics (but not Clinton and Obama specifically). There's
free audio available at <https://thehiddenlifeisbest.com/episodes>

Long story short, all of the free episodic excerpts were recently heard
by me.

Danke,

Why is this mess a reply to my post? It has nothing to do with my post, unless "She is the Darkness" is some kind of reference to Hillary
Clinton. In which case it is still not welcome since I try to keep my
stuff non political.

Doesn't this thread's title - "What I'm listening to" - entitle me (so
to speak) to also share my own recent audio adventures in literature
with the group?

Danke,

--
Don.......My cat's )\._.,--....,'``. https://crcomp.net/reviews.php telltale tall tail /, _.. \ _\ (`._ ,. Walk humbly with thy God.
tells tall tales.. `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.' Make 1984 fiction again.


--- MBSE BBS v1.0.8.4 (Linux-x86_64)
* Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (3:633/280.2@fidonet)