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Can someone really be ignored who like the poor will always be with us?

With a parting howl, Phil goes away for about 6 months at a time; it's like he has a hibernation schedule. The sooner he goes away the better, and maybe next time he'll come back an improved bear.

Yet the icecaps are melting at an alarming rate. Hibernia ain't what it used to be.

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Yet the icecaps are melting at an alarming rate. Hibernia ain't what it used to be.

Huh? I thought Hibernia was an archaic name for Ireland. No icecaps there. Anyway, don't worry about Phil, he can hunt beluga!

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Yet the icecaps are melting at an alarming rate. Hibernia ain't what it used to be.

Huh? I thought Hibernia was an archaic name for Ireland. No icecaps there. Anyway, don't worry about Phil, he can hunt beluga!

Way to try Polar Bear! You can see why they're worth $CDN each.

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Still no more impatient than the average bear at a frozen ice hole, waiting patiently for literary or or other Book Reading to emerge from the teeming multitudes of literate, knowledgeable OL posters. Perhaps from the ones who claim to have read? know more? have forgotten? more than I will ever know.

I guess it was all troll- bluster and I've forgotten more really good books than ND and George will ever read. or have even heard of.... :D:huh::wacko::blink:

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> Or, maybe not interested in discussing them with Phil Coates.

Little known fact: When you post, you are discussing them with everyone.

Not when people have Phil’s posts set on ignore. RC and WSS recently wrote that they avail themselves of that option; so did BG, but here we have proof that he nonetheless can’t resist a peek at Phil’s latest bit of finger wagging.

I took Phil and one other off my now empty "Ignore" list.

--Brant

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Can someone really be ignored who like the poor will always be with us?

With a parting howl, Phil goes away for about 6 months at a time; it's like he has a hibernation schedule. The sooner he goes away the better, and maybe next time he'll come back an improved bear.

Then he owes us three months on the last one.

--Brant

poke, poke--actually, he's not toooooo bad right now

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> poke, poke--actually, he's not toooooo bad right now

Never poke a sleeping bear, Brant. :smile: Right now (for some strange reason) I'm not feeling as angry or outraged** about the things that upset me about Oism, the movement, about OL, about being attacked, nobody apparently reading much or anything good.....yada, yada. I think I've just accepted a bit that's the way things are - and I'm just waiting patiently at the ice hole with my claws sheathed waiting for a steak dinner to pop up...

Or maybe I'm on tranquilizers? If rape is inevitable, just relax and enjoy it.

**of course, that could change in a heartbeat :cool:

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Phil wrote:

Or maybe I'm on tranquilizers? If rape is inevitable, just relax and enjoy it. **of course, that could change in a heartbeat

end quote

Is that YOUR fantasy? You just might be a redneck if you say the above. Goober, I am not a feminist but that is just not funny though it was briefly, snicker-worthy back in 1955. And your attempt to bring Ghs into the conversation won’t work while my saying this might. You’ re welcome.

Peter

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> poke, poke--actually, he's not toooooo bad right now

Never poke a sleeping bear, Brant. :smile: Right now (for some strange reason) I'm not feeling as angry or outraged** about the things that upset me about Oism, the movement, about OL, about being attacked, nobody apparently reading much or anything good.....yada, yada. I think I've just accepted a bit that's the way things are - and I'm just waiting patiently at the ice hole with my claws sheathed waiting for a steak dinner to pop up...

Or maybe I'm on tranquilizers? If rape is inevitable, just relax and enjoy it.

**of course, that could change in a heartbeat :cool:

The rape-type quote thing is what got a NYC weather broadcaster, Tex Antoine fired in 1976. The story he was feeding off--he only heard a small part of it apparently--concerned the violent rape of a five year-old girl. I don't remember if I actually saw the broadcast or if I made it a false memory, but the main news-reader wanted to clobber him. As for rape being inevitable, I hope she pulls a .38 sub-nose out of her purse and deals out another kind of "inevitable."

--Brant

gimme a broad who packs a gun

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Still no more impatient than the average bear at a frozen ice hole, waiting patiently for literary or or other Book Reading to emerge from the teeming multitudes of literate, knowledgeable OL posters. Perhaps from the ones who claim to have read? know more? have forgotten? more than I will ever know. I guess it was all troll- bluster and I've forgotten more really good books than ND and George will ever read. or have even heard of.... :D:huh::wacko::blink:

If you are going to bait me, you will need to come up with something that is at least in the realm of possibility.

Ghs

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I have just finished Massie's Catherine the Great. If you are a fan of Massie's other works on Russian history, this will not disappoint. Catherine was, inter alia, pen pals with Voltaire, for instance, and otherwise an ardent student of the Enlightenment. Great reading for the lay reader/fan of history in general, and the Romanov dynasty in particular.

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Still no more impatient than the average bear at a frozen ice hole, waiting patiently for literary or or other Book Reading to emerge from the teeming multitudes of literate, knowledgeable OL posters. Perhaps from the ones who claim to have read? know more? have forgotten? more than I will ever know. I guess it was all troll- bluster and I've forgotten more really good books than ND and George will ever read. or have even heard of.... :D:huh::wacko::blink:

If you are going to bait me, you will need to come up with something that is at least in the realm of possibility.

Ghs

Did Phil read the books he's forgotten?

--Brant

and if forgotten how does he know he's forgotten--or read them or not or were "really good" or not or why would someone forget a "really good" book?

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Phil wrote:

Or maybe I'm on tranquilizers? If rape is inevitable, just relax and enjoy it. **of course, that could change in a heartbeat

end quote

Is that YOUR fantasy? You just might be a redneck if you say the above. Goober, I am not a feminist but that is just not funny though it was briefly, snicker-worthy back in 1955.

Bad taste indeed, and it called to mind a bad scene from a bad movie. This captures the fumbling incompetent Phil quite well, in fact. Enjoy!

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I have just finished Massie's Catherine the Great. If you are a fan of Massie's other works on Russian history, this will not disappoint. Catherine was, inter alia, pen pals with Voltaire, for instance, and otherwise an ardent student of the Enlightenment. Great reading for the lay reader/fan of history in general, and the Romanov dynasty in particular.

I read Nicholas and Alexandra, and a bio of Peter the Great tho not sure if it was by him. He's excellent, looking forward to this one.

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I have just finished Massie's Catherine the Great. If you are a fan of Massie's other works on Russian history, this will not disappoint. Catherine was, inter alia, pen pals with Voltaire, for instance, and otherwise an ardent student of the Enlightenment. Great reading for the lay reader/fan of history in general, and the Romanov dynasty in particular.

I read Nicholas and Alexandra, and a bio of Peter the Great tho not sure if it was by him. He's excellent, looking forward to this one.

It is the same author. You will enjoy.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I just got an email from a friend who asked me what I'm reading. Here's the answer (this is an update from whatthe thread started with a month ago):

"Hi C****,

I've read two books, "A Passage to India" by E.M. Forster and "The Quiet American" by Graham Greene for this weekend's Great Books Conference in Sarasota. I decided to sign up and read them because all of the books on the agenda are by celebrated authors I hadn't yet read. I'm in the middle of the third book, "A Bend in the River" by V.S. Naipaul. That's the one I'm really enjoying the most.

I'm in the middle of a wonderfully done "biography of a continent" (from the [geological] formation of the continents through human evolution through modern tribes and countries), "Africa" by John Reader.

And I'm continuing to slowly work my way - shifting back and forth between their coverage - through three college-level intro physics textbooks. "

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I just got an email from a friend who asked me what I'm reading. Here's the answer (this is an update from whatthe thread started with a month ago):

"Hi C****,

I've read two books, "A Passage to India" by E.M. Forster and "The Quiet American" by Graham Greene for this weekend's Great Books Conference in Sarasota. I decided to sign up and read them because all of the books on the agenda are by celebrated authors I hadn't yet read. I'm in the middle of the third book, "A Bend in the River" by V.S. Naipaul. That's the one I'm really enjoying the most.

I'm in the middle of a wonderfully done "biography of a continent" (from the [geological] formation of the continents through human evolution through modern tribes and countries), "Africa" by John Reader.

And I'm continuing to slowly work my way - shifting back and forth between their coverage - through three college-level intro physics textbooks. "

I surmise that the theme of this reading series is Colonialism or Imperialism.

I am soldiering through Alongside Night. It isn't so Great.

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> I am soldiering through Alongside Night. It isn't so Great.

You are not being quizzed on it. So chuck it with decisivenss and great velocity through the nearest open window. (I have another required reading list that I will be sending you instead. Since it is traveling thru canuckistani postal express, you should have it by Easter.)

> I surmise that the theme of this reading series is Colonialism or Imperialism.

Good guess! That will turn out to be part of it, but it's a bit wider. Here's what the 'great books' conference blurb said:

SEVENTH ANNUAL TAMPA BAY GREAT BOOKS CONFERENCE WEEKEND IN LONGBOAT KEY, FLORIDA ... Welcome once again to an intellectually stimulating, mind-expanding weekend at the Hilton Longboat Key Beachfront Resort! Our theme for this year's conference will be:

"CROSS-CULTURAL CONFLICTS AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS"

The exciting program will feature three reading selections for discussion:

A PASSAGE TO INDIA, by E.M. Forster

A BEND IN THE RIVER, by V.S. Naipaul

THE QUIET AMERICAN, by Graham Greene

Our conference deals with the mystery, complexity, and risks that often emerge when different cultures collide. What happens--politically, economically, psychologically and morally--when West meets East, when colonizers interact with the colonized, and when older cultural traditions encounter more modern world views? Registration for the conference will remain the same as last year--$219 per participant....All discussions will be led by moderators trained in the Great Books method of "shared inquiry."

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David Foster Wallace:

Infinite Jest

The Broom of the System

A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again

Everything and More

Brief Interviews With Hideous Men

Oblivion

Josephine Hart:

Damage

The Stillest Day

The Reconstructist

Sin

The Truth About Love

Nietzsche: Anything by and about

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From post #3:

I hope people will give some detail on current (and recent!) reading - what value it has (or had) or why they like it. I realize I made a mistake in titling the thread current reading because often if you are in the middle or an early chapter you can't evaluate or provide feedback yet. Let me revise the thread purpose and theme: "Current or Recent Reading -- Things of Some Value and Why".

(Is there anything you've completed recently that you got benefit or entertainment from?) We had another thread on movies but, alas, people tended to not give any explanation....was more like a bunch of one-line each bullets or a laundry list.

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I am currently reading (re-reading actually) -Speakable and unspeakable in quantum mechanics- by J.S. Bell. When I first read it 20 years ago I did not have a full appreciation of just how deep and subtle Bell was. He was a genius. It is a damned shame he died as young as he did (only 62 years old (: ) Had he lived he might have rescued parts of theoretical physics from the muddle they are now in.

I am also reading QED and the Men who Made It by Silvan S. Schweber. I promised myself I would read it after having the honor of meeting Freeman Dyson when he recorded his latest book at the studios of Reading For the Blind and Dyslexic (located in Princeton NJ). Dyson who was a very good friend of Richard Feynman was one of the people covered in Schweber's book.

I am now recording the best undergraduate book in physics I have come upon in recent years:

Matter and Interactions by Chabay and Sherwood. This is the first book for undergraduates I have seen which properly discusses how electrical circuits work. I am not kidding. Many undergraduate physics book describe electrical circuits by analogizing the flow of electrons through the wires to be like water flowing through a garden hose. This is totally bogus! Physics books which teach this crappy analogy should be committed to the flames.

Ba'al Chatzaf

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I am near done reading The Creature from Jekyll Island. Very interesting. I knew pretty well how the Federal Reserve operates before reading it, but the history including central banks more generally and the collusion between politicians and financiers has been informative.

I read the book. It has some aspects of classical Conspiracy Theory. Such works are suspect.

Ba'al Chafatz

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