ex-mancave upgrade

[Bo Bo Olson]

3 hours ago, Anne-Sophie said:

At the time, I believe, all Catholic services were in Latin.

 

Protestant ones were/are in everyday languages.

True.

 

And if I was perfect I'd be telling Billy Gates what time he has to show up for work.

I had wondered in I'd not heard of Albuquerque Cathedral., but I could only go a few years, to match the pictures. 

............

 

I may have taken real folks out 20 years on the census to see if I could put a beer flag on their breaths or not. Or such, how much get up and go did they have....in Keeping Up with the Jones was even more Major than today; back then in the west. Where did they live....same place = not keeping the wife happy with new house,  debts and furniture.

A wee bit of OCD....in mostly I never used it....but it did kill time so I'd not have to write. Her bootmaker had a beer in the morning.....never did move to a newer neighborhood. Have the name of the bookstore next door to her bootmaker, name of owner and the bookstore clerk..... who had those infamous French under the counter books, no one reads any more. Ooh la la la

 

I was lucky to find lots of fashion, including the exact Spring Fashion of 1882....hopefully enough to satisfy the women readers.

Have various Denver master seamstresses who worked in the 'ultra modern'  Department Stores or couple dress shops.

For the men, horses, guns ....cocktails....odd poker hands.....1881 baseball...men's fashion also.  Most men, including Presidents were rumpled.....

In Colorado, a man had to wear a soup strainer mustache to prove he was an old timer from the Gold Rush of 1859/60.

 

 

[Anne-Sophie]

I love that you are so precise about the context of your plot.

 

I usually don't expect that in fiction. It is wonderful!

 

When seeing pictures of Lincoln, he looks kind of rumpled, to me, so I am happy that you are confirming that, and also a bit miffed by the society double standard, which, at the time forced women to wear what was in effect furniture fabric.

 

So Carol Burnett sketch  about wearing curtains is not so far fetched, after all.

 

 

 

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

5 hours ago, Anne-Sophie said:

at the time forced women to wear what was in effect furniture fabric.

Oh, no....such great fabrics.

In some cases better than what is in common use today.

True the woman had too many layers...and corsets.

A well to do woman was supposed to get back to 21 inches or less after birth. 18" was rather plump for a well to do unmarried girl.

 

Such expensive cloth...fine cloth. When heavy for a reason of fashion,...ie winter.... but brocade was not all that used.....at least around 1880-82.

 

I had to look up so many fabrics mentioned in fashion write ups of the era.....this or that applications....nightmares of scarecrows dressed in Dior dresses. (which are rather simple and labor saving.)

 

Charles Frederick Worth an Englishman invented fashion. His cuffs are still something a woman could use to upgrade what she has.

One of his mail order dresses....made to measure on a mannequin or live mannequin.....cost a fortune.....$250--350...gold dollars.

 

A normal middle class woman might have a $75 dollar dress....$125 was an up grade...upper middle class $150.....one or two dresses per year....and the year befores dress would be stripped of the applications and this years fashion applications would be put on it.....no one changed last years dress; which was still in everyone's memory.

Someone rich paid $250-300 the same price as in Paris from the cities best seamstress shop often a department store.....or the Night Ladies needing to be one up on their compatriots, would have such hand made dresses.....on credit of course....So keeping up with the Jones girl kept them poor. The middle/lower Parlor houses discouraged that behavior by making the girls wear white dresses.

 

I spent a lot of time learning about fabrics, applications, how things were sewn.....and a seamstress shop had a rack of Irons around a iron stove and spent half their time ironing what they were sewing.

 

I had a 1912 Singer Sewing machine with it's 35-40? (forgot) oiling points. It was indeed more mechanically complicated than what most men used in that era. (since gotten rid of, but I had it to play with for some 15 years....play, not sew.)

[Anne-Sophie]

The brocades went with the style that is more like a straight silhouette with an upturned bun shelf.

I forgot the date.

 

Velvet is the best fabric for winter, but layers of cotton and satin in summer, no thanks.

 

I saw that women had what looked like cotton pants with bow ornaments to wear under the skirts. 

 

The 21 inches waist after birth was obtained by Sissi Imperatrice, who was always exercising.

[Bo Bo Olson]

The beautiful....Princess Alexandria, of Denmark, married to Eddie of England, in the very late '70's early '80's had brought in the Slim Line fashion that held on for some five years (an ice age in fashion).....would look good today. It lacked the bustle.

So I have my murderous heroine wearing Slim Line.....in she too is slim built.

 

Diana was a piker compared to the beautiful  Princess Alexandria.....a social motivated woman considering her position and the time.

She did hate the Germans for stealing Schleswig-Holstein, from her country in Bismark's 1866 war.

 

What ever that little band around the neck is called, she wore one to hide a small neck scar....so all wore one. Later when she had rheumatic fever and developed a limp.......All of society limped after her.

Of her husbands 6 mistresses, she got along grandly with the first 5, hating the last one. She use to walk in the castle parks with her husbands mistresses.

Ah....she wore bangs, so Everyone wore bangs. The well to do, had artificial bangs, the poor women just cut their hair to have permanent bangs. But every-woman wore bangs.

 

[inkstainedruth]

@Bo Bo Olsonand @Anne-Sophie-- Are the Sanborn maps the plot plans made by some insurance company?  I got to see one in the Heinz History Center library a number of years ago, after learning about them at The Old House Fair (a home show specifically geared to people who owned older houses -- of which there are a vast number in the Pittsburgh area).  If Sanborn is the same company I'm thinking of, they were done for each town, and the one for 1926 for my town shows that our house (originally built around 1885) was once L-shaped, with a bump out corner in the crook of the "L" (guessing it was a porch over the well, which is now in the basement -- we're not sure how far under the driveway it goes).  Sometime after that, the corner was filled in (you can tell because it's not stone for the foundation in that corner) and that's where the den behind the living room is, and then there's a room above it which I tried to turn into a mini-greenhouse for rooting cuttings and such), and also goes up to the attic along the side of the stairs.  So the addition was done sometime between 1926 and when we bought the place in 1997 (I'm guessing by the guy who lived there in the 20s and 30s, and NOT by the people who lived there after that before we bought it).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Bo Bo Olson]

Yes Ruth the Sandborn maps were from an Insurance company.

And I can believe many changes a house might have happen to it in 70-100 years.

 

Of course I over did it....but some day, comes the cutting.

 

The maps told me how big the interior was of certain buildings; how high the roofs, like the Windsor Hotel right across from the Alford House.....that building  too. It too had a high three story lobby and both buildings had corridors like all hotels so there was some light from the end of each corridor and an outside window.

Along with light in each room on either side of the corridor.

 

The lobby of the Windsor Hotel (a skyscraper) went 5 stories up to a glass skylight. It had a sixth story observation deck.

There were very few buildings in the US  taller at that time.

When the Windor was built an elevator needed to be as deep as it was high. The next year elevators no longer needed to be deeper than the first story cellar.

 

Sanborn maps showed me where the kitchens were; dining room...second floor, wouldn't want the peasants sticking their nose on the glass to see what fine dining was.....

 

(By the way German Black Forest Cake hadn't been invented yet...Comet Years meant something good with wine still.

 

Buffalo, elk and antelope were on the menu and Caviar was cheap; in America dominated the world caviar market between Hudson in NY and or the West Coast rivers.

A portion of caviar cost a nickle, the same as a beer.

 

Before the Italian immigrants lowered the status, Italian cooking was high classed. Original Spaghetti Bolognese had nothing to do with ground meat nor tomatoes.

 

(Well with a book covering 1795-1840' and another 1880's. I do get to mention most of the great cook books. 1840's the measuring cup and spoons were just coming in. And Baking powder and baking soda....before three woman beat the dough  for 3 hours to make a light cake.)

 

I was able to find out what the buildings were made of, what it was roofed with. How many stories. So and so was on the second floor, in he moved to a better building later........no one was on the third floor....even in walking days no one wanted to walk up three flights of stairs.....unless one was after a real cheap deal (roll-by-night in they didn't have flying yet)....or cheap lawyer.

 

It wasn't easy to get all my Sandborn map info together. Santa Fe is partial, as was Albuquerque (due to lack of buildings...scattered around the town....not having a real main street).  Pueblo, Denver and Leadville were relatively good for 1880/81.

[Anne-Sophie]

Thank you for sharing the history of your house Ruth!

 

It is so wonderful to be able to match primary source documents to make stories alive, real ones like yours or fictional ones, like Bo Bo is writing.

 

Thank you for such a great thread Bo Bo!

[Bo Bo Olson]

10 hours ago, Anne-Sophie said:

Thank you for such a great thread Bo Bo!

I'm glad you enjoyed it....

 

I hope the books will be good....could be bad, or cut to unrecognizable by a person with a blue pencil.

I would prefer it be edited raw by both a man and a woman, so the man don't cut the cloths, and the woman don't cut the guns.

 

Of course they have to like Opera; how can you have a Western with out Opera? Every 4 horse town had an Opera House.

Opera was sang in English and in 1880  four of the top ten Opera singers in the world were American women. Squeezed three into the saga.

 

[Anne-Sophie]

I think it will be a matter of rhythm, that is what I felt when you wrote your previous post. Steward Copeland was in my ears.

 

I am a motion picture fan and I feel your book would make a great picture, most probably for tv, because this way, it has more of a chance to be produced thus, seen.

 

It would not be wise to cut the clothes part, because it has never been properly described and given the place it had to have, in films that described areas when there was no entertainment and women tried to keep in touch, with the city's trends, without the amenities.

 

The guns of course, were part of the landscape but not in town, if I am not mistaken.

 

There has never really been a great description of the parallel world women lived in, they brought nice things to those frontier towns, not for the men, but the other women.

 

I never knew about the difference between hotels with their $1 meals and room and houses at $3 to be able to cater to a richer clientele, which was few, so will get more services.

 

I need to point out that the $3 room men, were no less of a danger for the teens, as the might have come to that money by swindling it.

 

And, we all know that swindlers also like to target women.

 

I am really, really, really glad that I came to that post, just before you were about to delete it.

 

It gives my mind a great way to think and be exited about history.

 

The state where I live in, has a very high incidence of transmission of the delta variant, and, in some areas, people who finally realize that the vaccine is the way out, have to hide when they go get it because they are afraid of being shunned, bullied or worse.

 

So I am always, doing laundry, because the need of a daily clean cloth mask, the strategic separation of cloth used a day ago versus, the same day, the endless hand washing because I fear touching my face, after handling a garment that has not spend enough time, left to shed the particles.

 

I live in a nice, but not that large a space, the laundry room is basically a square for washer on one side and dryer on the other with the length of the door as a space in between. I am delighted to have it but I don't want to pile stuff directly from the outside there. 

 

I the beginning of the pandemic a doc said to have staged surfaces, one for dedicated to items that come from the outside items so, could be contaminated and one for just inside items like my art supplies, journaling related things, and other items that never go outside. 

 

I have kept that system up, because the respite we should all have had, after the family was vaccinated, never really materialized itself, for me, because many refuse to vaccinate or wear mask, thus, putting everyone else in danger.

 

So indeed, thank you for your post.

 

I love digging into archives as I studied history and learned to write in cursive and still write this way.

 

I was also very much made fun of, in my teens, when my hobbies were needlework, dip pens, books and romantism. I have kept those hobbies plus the fountain pens and found a way to find space in my little abode.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

Anne Sophie, you are one of those I read when ever I find a post of yours.

 

I am rather flattered.

 

We have anti-vax idiots over here too.

 

I have the freedom to kill you and not even be charged with your murder.  And or the crippling of you.

That is ever so down played. Some are never going to really be fully cured. There was a jogging type woman, who now needs an hour to walk 1/2 a mile. Took her two years to get up to 1/2 a mile. There are many like her.

 

'The Govment' sticking little ever so expensive nanno bugs in the serum...so it can know what mall you are at.

All that paranoia, yet no one turns off the TV in the living room, which is easily from a distance be turned into a bugging apparatus.  No BS. The speakers act as headphones.

 

The Dark secret 'Govment'***.....isn't.

It's just the normal, in the US bribe the Politician directly through campaign funds, or in Germany bribe the political party.

It's just the basic buy a law....that is not taught in civics class.

 

***Why waste the effort, when normal above board bribery still works like a charm.....the smoke filled back rooms, are still there, just not smoke filled. It was always an invite only gathering in the back rooms. Folks with less than $17 to spare are not invited.

 

It's All Their Fault!!!

What lie is new today...........none!!!

It's their fault we have an 8 hour day, their fault we have paid vacations, their fault we once had health care.........the part about sex crazy liberals deleted in that is too political.

 

 

One needs at least 3 political parties to have freedom. IMO.

 

By German standards the American Democratic party is center right.

 

It has always been the Government of the Rich, by the Rich, for the Rich; paid for by the poor.

For the American Revolution, the Indians paid.

 

We don't want Them voting. How soon till you are one of Them?

 

 

[Anne-Sophie]

I am French born, so it is also prevalent there where I have family. Luckily, everyone is vaccinated, except the very small chidren and the family is talking about their electronic vaccine code and the booster.

 

Because of their prudence and the fact that  I check up on them, I feel less stressed than right at the beginning.

 

But, I have no understanding of people, who must have realized, that it was a vaccine, that got us away from polio.

 

And those new ones, work the same way, it is also wonderful that research scientists, have been working on understanding similar strains of viruses, for a very long time, so they were able to develop a working vaccine, rather quickly.

 

I am not good at math but, I understand exponential growth, the more people infected, the more chances the virus has to mutate. 

 

We already know that it has a good potential for mutating because it jumped from bats to pangolins to humans, I even saw the case of a gorilla infected at a zoo.

 

 

I really like your posts because you are smart and I always lean something new from you.

 

Ah! The ever present pay to play from the money class to the political class and their expert ways of finding scapegoats.

 

Which, as you pointed out, is all fine and dandy until one is the scapegoat.

 

As a writer, how do you divide your time and your space for writing?

Do you use fountain pens, pencils, your computer or all of the above?

Do you color code by character, plot, etc...

 

I have no plan to write fiction but I am interested in my family and region's history.

 

 

 

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

9 hours ago, Anne-Sophie said:

As a writer, how do you divide your time and your space for writing?

Do you use fountain pens, pencils, your computer or all of the above?

Do you color code by character, plot, etc...

 

I have no plan to write fiction but I am interested in my family and region's history.

 

Thank you, I am more widely read....not even well read than smart.

 

Some first draft by hand....or when editing and the back page gets use is by fountain pen. Don't use pencil, if I did it would be the 450 Pelikan MP.....which shocked me. By accident I tried it and put it down six weeks later when it ran out of lead....and I hated MP's all my life.

Mostly computer in I've got to put it back on computer as is.

 

I tried color coding. Too much trouble and no advantage.

 

My problem is I don't use my own writers notebook enough. All writers copy advice.....as they see it into their own what they hope works for them.

There are basic writing tricks I've got to put in, when I go to cut....I'd not put them in in the second or third draft. ( It helped to make the print of my Notebook  larger so it is easier to read.)

 

It takes a tool box of some 50 books to make a couple of writer's notebooks.  One goes through, underlining and marking 10* or 7* or only 5* importance........transfer and put in some sort of order.

 

I have three writer's notebooks. Plot, scenes, body language are all in those old large green government cloth binders. I've got to use them more. (Only got space on my desk for one.)

 

I am here on the Com way too much....and am not disciplined to exact hours of when to write....which I'm supposed to be doing right now.

 

A character has to over come the villain due to his own perhaps single character strength that matches the villain's weakness.

 

Superman the super seal is boring............the Army veteran supply clerk has some tools.............his brother the night manager at a local McDonalds....has possibilities. ....

His expertise with gaming can be the key to him shooting instead of dithering. A Klutz on the Run!

 

Civilized Villains don't really think themselves villains. Show working up from intimidation, legal or violent, and arson. Killing becomes a cheaper way than paying expensive lawyers....and that was not an easy step to his villainy. The killing becomes easier.............efficient. One don't want him to be a serial killer.

Sometimes even the best lawyer don't have a leg to stand on.........and having killed or hired a killer before, It wasn't his fault the AHole won't negotiate.

It might be more fun to do the villain, and  how does the Klutz find out the villain killed his brother the supply clerk? 

Obviously it must be a piece of land needed for the counties newest mall, that makes the Klutz the next target.

What would make him a real villain is his use of disposable henchmen. Crocodile tears...or have him remember doing that when he was young.

 

It is important to make the reader care for the character.

 

A plot is just that short blurb you read on your TV guide. There are some 27 of them. Themes are limited. Man vs Man. Man vs self. Man vs society and so on.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Anne-Sophie, oddly, I get into everyone's past but my own.

 

To understand the past, get a 1902 replica Sears catalog.**

If you cook, there are a hundred good tools you can find only in the antique market. Everything a household needed.

Electric blender and hand blenders are the only improvement since the Dover Eggbeater of 1880.

 

**I also have the 1894-95 Montgomery Ward replica catalog. One needs both in too many pages were deleted. I also have various forgotten craft books I used.

 

I am much too much detailed driven. I'll cry when the sadist with the blue pencil amputates extraneous hard fought details.

 

One head has to go in most folks only have one, and the book isn't Indian, so four arms and a leg have got to be removed. Along with that neat scene of 6 swords flashing in a wall of steel.

 

Oh well, off to the 'new' book...where the Persians won at Marathon, so with out the Greeks, the Romans lost to the Carthaginians.  But history will return to it's bed. First got to kick Bredin Arthur who was never King around, before getting back to Queen Jane's England. 

Maybe later tonight I'll get back to work on the last chapter of that western saga........so when bored I write other books........which is no way to run a rail road.

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

Anne-Sophie.

I was six in '54 when the Polio shots came in....and the kid before in the Dr.s office me was screaming. I stood there brave and tensed up....tensed up enough the needle bent.

So the nurse said look out the window there is an airplane, and I knew she was lying but looked anyway.

At six I knew then polio crippled or killed, it was in the Magazines. We were so far out in the Texas sticks we didn't have the money to put up a 25 foot antenna for the single TV channel it would get. So we listened to the radio and read. My mother pointed out pictures to me, so I understood why I was lucky to get a shot.

 

Every year a shot to the drops came in, every year a drop.

 

So you got to think how old folks must be to remember kids in school with them with a useless arm or a leg in a brace of the 'lucky ones.

The unlucky ones finally died  after years in a iron lung.

 

Some Australian nurse worked wonders but was ignored in she was a nurse, not a doctor. SOP. So so many thousands stayed crippled that didn't need too. Immediate massage, stretching and such cured.

 

Constant Polio reminders in the covers of Life, Newsweek and other big time magazines. ...of course that was back in the dark ages when folks did believe the Government....outside of those Commies in front of McCarthy.

 

The vacuum tubes were a bit too big to inject and the IBM punch cards weren't fast enough....and that was of course pre-mall. So the Government didn't need to know to which Woolworth you went too.

 

There were  back then, not so many folks that considered themselves as enemies of the state...yet some hating folks want to go back to that time.

 

In the '50-60's I lived in the north, and in the south. The once or twice I looked around; but I was young so didn't do that often.... I could understand then why folks moved north....even as AC was coming in.

I understand now, why women are moving north.

 

Polio was also a 'new' virus....

From wiki""Although major polio epidemics were unknown before the 20th century,^[1] the disease has caused paralysis and death for much of human history. Over millennia, polio survived quietly as an endemic pathogen until the 1900s when major epidemics began to occur in Europe.^[1] Soon after, widespread epidemics appeared in the United States. By 1910, frequent epidemics became regular events throughout the developed world primarily in cities during the summer months. At its peak in the 1940s and 1950s, polio would paralyze or kill over half a million people worldwide every year.""

 

vvvvvvvvvvvvv

The will to believe..........this virus has nothing to do with polio is said....yet the crippled of it are ignored....they don't wear braces...those not still in wheelchairs.

 

My immune system is great.... I don't need an update.

My minister says  "Come to church, I need the donations in the collection plate.

One channel leads/led  the die and murder for freedom propaganda.

 

Some of the anti-vax blog and radio show hosts have died....saying way too late Whooops....I was wrong.....get a shot.

That is ignored of course.....

 

I don't know how the American Insurance is paying for this......but I suspect the worse. Is Corona covered by 39 hour part time workers....or 25 hour folks.

What about the workers so crippled they will never work again?

 

That sort of US info don't show up here on our German TV, in next to everyone is covered, even the registered unemployed.  So the reporters don't think to ask.

 

[ParramattaPaul]

5 hours ago, Bo Bo Olson said:

Anne-Sophie.

I was six in '54 when the Polio shots came in....and the kid before in the Dr.s office me was screaming. I stood there brave and tensed up....tensed up enough the needle bent.

So the nurse said look out the window there is an airplane, and I knew she was lying but looked anyway.

At six I knew then polio crippled or killed, it was in the Magazines. We were so far out in the Texas sticks we didn't have the money to put up a 25 foot antenna for the single TV channel it would get. So we listened to the radio and read. My mother pointed out pictures to me, so I understood why I was lucky to get a shot.

 

Every year a shot to the drops came in, every year a drop.

 

So you got to think how old folks must be to remember kids in school with them with a useless arm or a leg in a brace of the 'lucky ones.

The unlucky ones finally died  after years in a iron lung.

 

Some Australian nurse worked wonders but was ignored in she was a nurse, not a doctor. SOP. So so many thousands stayed crippled that didn't need too. Immediate massage, stretching and such cured.

 

Constant Polio reminders in the covers of Life, Newsweek and other big time magazines. ...of course that was back in the dark ages when folks did believe the Government....outside of those Commies in front of McCarthy.

 

The vacuum tubes were a bit too big to inject and the IBM punch cards weren't fast enough....and that was of course pre-mall. So the Government didn't need to know to which Woolworth you went too.

 

There were  back then, not so many folks that considered themselves as enemies of the state...yet some hating folks want to go back to that time.

 

In the '50-60's I lived in the north, and in the south. The once or twice I looked around; but I was young so didn't do that often.... I could understand then why folks moved north....even as AC was coming in.

I understand now, why women are moving north.

 

Polio was also a 'new' virus....

From wiki""Although major polio epidemics were unknown before the 20th century,^[1] the disease has caused paralysis and death for much of human history. Over millennia, polio survived quietly as an endemic pathogen until the 1900s when major epidemics began to occur in Europe.^[1] Soon after, widespread epidemics appeared in the United States. By 1910, frequent epidemics became regular events throughout the developed world primarily in cities during the summer months. At its peak in the 1940s and 1950s, polio would paralyze or kill over half a million people worldwide every year.""

 

vvvvvvvvvvvvv

The will to believe..........this virus has nothing to do with polio is said....yet the crippled of it are ignored....they don't wear braces...those not still in wheelchairs.

 

My immune system is great.... I don't need an update.

My minister says  "Come to church, I need the donations in the collection plate.

One channel leads/led  the die and murder for freedom propaganda.

 

Some of the anti-vax blog and radio show hosts have died....saying way too late Whooops....I was wrong.....get a shot.

That is ignored of course.....

 

I don't know how the American Insurance is paying for this......but I suspect the worse. Is Corona covered by 39 hour part time workers....or 25 hour folks.

What about the workers so crippled they will never work again?

 

That sort of US info don't show up here on our German TV, in next to everyone is covered, even the registered unemployed.  So the reporters don't think to ask.

 

 

My late wife and I both had Polio. She at age 5, and me, 2 years earlier, at age 3. I was lucky and suffered no noticeable affects, and only some very minor weakness in one leg.  She had Bulbar Polio* (the worst strain).  She spent 6 months in an iron lung, and another 6 month in rehab.  Her childhood, adolescence, and teen years unlike mine, filled with repeated fittings, braces, and orthopaedic surgeries.  Post-Polio Syndrome, now called 'Latent Effects of Polio' robbed her of her mobility, effectively a 'Polio-quad', in middle age, and eventually caused her premature death.

 

I was also a guinea pig for the Salk vaccine. 

 

Do I see parallels between the Polio epidemics of my childhood and the pandemic?  In that both are rampant, and scourge, yes,  The 'anti-vax' mentality was not something that occurred when the Salk and the later Sabin vaccines were first available.  Our parents were eager to have us vaccinated even when the vaccines were still experimental and unproven.  The hope of preventing what my late wife went through was enough.  Now -- trust me here,  society has changed.  People seemingly are driven by misinformation and a misguided fear.  They are more afraid of an unproven and barely (I'm being generous) realistic fear of a potential risk from the vaccine (Micro-chipping?????) than they are of the disease and the risk to life and disability.

 

What if, just what if, we find out 20 or 30 years from now that COVID, like Polio carries with it latent affects such has a failing respiratory system?  Will the risk anti-Vaxxers take now prove to be their worst nightmare?

 

 

*Polio has various strains.  Some are worse than others.  'Wild Polio' -- infections caused by the virus still existing in the world is now only common in Asia, Africa, and some parts of Latin America where populations resist vaccination programmes.  It is also possible for some immune-compromised people to contract polio from vaccinations, but this is extremely, extremely rare.

[Detman101]

2 hours ago, ParramattaPaul said:

 

My late wife and I both had Polio. She at age 5, and me, 2 years earlier, at age 3. I was lucky and suffered no noticeable affects, and only some very minor weakness in one leg.  She had Bulbar Polio* (the worst strain).  She spent 6 months in an iron lung, and another 6 month in rehab.  Her childhood, adolescence, and teen years unlike mine, filled with repeated fittings, braces, and orthopaedic surgeries.  Post-Polio Syndrome, now called 'Latent Effects of Polio' robbed her of her mobility, effectively a 'Polio-quad', in middle age, and eventually caused her premature death.

 

I was also a guinea pig for the Salk vaccine. 

 

Do I see parallels between the Polio epidemics of my childhood and the pandemic?  In that both are rampant, and scourge, yes,  The 'anti-vax' mentality was not something that occurred when the Salk and the later Sabin vaccines were first available.  Our parents were eager to have us vaccinated even when the vaccines were still experimental and unproven.  The hope of preventing what my late wife went through was enough.  Now -- trust me here,  society has changed.  People seemingly are driven by misinformation and a misguided fear.  They are more afraid of an unproven and barely (I'm being generous) realistic fear of a potential risk from the vaccine (Micro-chipping?????) than they are of the disease and the risk to life and disability.

 

What if, just what if, we find out 20 or 30 years from now that COVID, like Polio carries with it latent affects such has a failing respiratory system?  Will the risk anti-Vaxxers take now prove to be their worst nightmare?

 

 

*Polio has various strains.  Some are worse than others.  'Wild Polio' -- infections caused by the virus still existing in the world is now only common in Asia, Africa, and some parts of Latin America where populations resist vaccination programs.  It is also possible for some immune-compromised people to contract polio from vaccinations, but this is extremely, extremely rare.

The population was also much smarter and wise back then. The anti-vaxxers of today will be the examples of tomorrow...and the see-saw of Darwinism continues.
The "Lowest-Common-Denominator" mentality of today will lose 45% of the population before it realized the error of it's ways.
(Note: I do not count myself among the deficient masses, our household is vaccinated.👍)

[Anne-Sophie]

It really is reassuring to read from people who cared enough to get the shot(s) and are getting the seriousness of the illness.

 

7 hours ago, ParramattaPaul said:

 

My late wife and I both had Polio. She at age 5, and me, 2 years earlier, at age 3. I was lucky and suffered no noticeable affects, and only some very minor weakness in one leg.  She had Bulbar Polio* (the worst strain).  She spent 6 months in an iron lung, and another 6 month in rehab.  Her childhood, adolescence, and teen years unlike mine, filled with repeated fittings, braces, and orthopaedic surgeries.  Post-Polio Syndrome, now called 'Latent Effects of Polio' robbed her of her mobility, effectively a 'Polio-quad', in middle age, and eventually caused her premature death.

 

I was also a guinea pig for the Salk vaccine. 

 

Do I see parallels between the Polio epidemics of my childhood and the pandemic?  In that both are rampant, and scourge, yes,  The 'anti-vax' mentality was not something that occurred when the Salk and the later Sabin vaccines were first available.  Our parents were eager to have us vaccinated even when the vaccines were still experimental and unproven.  The hope of preventing what my late wife went through was enough.  Now -- trust me here,  society has changed.  People seemingly are driven by misinformation and a misguided fear.  They are more afraid of an unproven and barely (I'm being generous) realistic fear of a potential risk from the vaccine (Micro-chipping?????) than they are of the disease and the risk to life and disability.

 

What if, just what if, we find out 20 or 30 years from now that COVID, like Polio carries with it latent affects such has a failing respiratory system?  Will the risk anti-Vaxxers take now prove to be their worst nightmare?

 

 

*Polio has various strains.  Some are worse than others.  'Wild Polio' -- infections caused by the virus still existing in the world is now only common in Asia, Africa, and some parts of Latin America where populations resist vaccination programmes.  It is also possible for some immune-compromised people to contract polio from vaccinations, but this is extremely, extremely rare.

 

I am so sorry about your wife, I dread the development of more and more serious strains of covid, as well. People who survived it, are already mentioning how life changing the sequels are. I saw a picture of a little girl, who is now wheelchair bound, as she had meningitis after contracting covid. 

 

 

Unfortunately, the lowest common denominator, did not improve with the arrival of reality tv, which is the lowest of the low and revolting, as in, bad food taste.

 

I also don't get the excuse for being uneducated and "bored", the public library is free to access, there are now, prestigious universities lectures, available on the internet, even a simple search engine is a treasure trove of information.

 

From bird species to landscapes to railroad history to fountain pen and other writing instruments invention, evolution, and persistence, even after the typewriter and the keyboard era. 

 

I don't know about any of you, but I avoid most tv news, as they seem to be bound to show the worst of tragedies happening in the world, in rapid succession before commercials between them.

 

Yet, the anchors seem to be completely unable to analyse any event with a modicum of depth. Some even ramble the same point, two or three times, until a commercial comes, then after change subject, only to do the same thing, until the next commercial.

 

I understood you, the first time, it is the news, not "I love Lucy".

 

Besides the entertainment pundits, some news anchor are really not very bright but, think, that delivering talking points, in an authoritative sounding voice, is going to give them the Walter Cronkite tone, well... A trained parrot, can sound, like this most worldwide respected newsman.  

 

The quality of in depth analysis makes a news person.

 

When I wrote that, I was thinking of the most delightful screwball comedy with Rosalind Russel, Cary Grant and Ralph Bellamy.

[Bo Bo Olson]

Once movies were made only for adults not 12 year olds.

5 hours ago, Anne-Sophie said:

I was thinking of the most delightful screwball comedy with Rosalind Russel, Cary Grant and Ralph Bellamy.

 

I remember Walter Cronkite and every so often his temporary replacement would say seriously, "Tonight Walter Cronkite is on assignment." .................it wasn't till years later that it was found out Assignment was the name of his boat.

 

Paul, I am so sorry about your wife and her tribulations.

I only knew the 'lucky' withered arm or leg brace not the iron lung survivors.

 

For Corona I put the blame on the 25 years of Neo-nazi propaganda that has no solution but tax the poor not the rich as it was and is funded by the rich Koch (sp?) brothers from Texas...............all the fault of the wishy washy liberals................not enough jack boot marching....as advocated from draft dodgers.

They are better and better paid than Joseph Goebbels. Adolph proved right, tell the big lie long enough and enough will believe it. 

 

I remember when 'The Great Liberal' Kurt Vonnegut died...... 

I remember the one of the head jerks of that entertainment channel, dancing....the Great Liberal is Dead.......he was 80 and hadn't written anything since he was 60.....and he'd been in a nut house.............must have said that 15 times ....as he danced around jumping for joy.

Such a small man.

Do you know, I was so ignorant, I didn't know Kurt was The Great Liberal.

How far the Liberals have fallen, when Kurt is The Great One. I just thought he was a run of the mill wishy washy liberal.....

 

Kurt Vonnegut was in Dresden as POW and wrote Slaughterhouse 5. Dresden had a horrible on purpose fire bombing....that killed @ 25,000. That was the only book of his I liked.

I had read the rest......all the collage girls walked around with one of his books showing to show they were 'intellectual'....I was a little snide even then. Had read them or many of them before going off to collage....soup cans would be read. It did give me an ice breaker.

 

I was what would be considered a wishy washy conservative back then.   I'd once been a Goldwater Boy, which could be expected of an Army brat...............I had liked and admired Hubert Horatio Humphrey....but thought we needed Tricky Dickie Nixon. but back then the Republicans were still a law biding political party. 

 

I'm now more liberal than Saunders, in I live in Germany and even our right wing Republicans/CDU are as liberal as he is...........our Nazi's aren't. 

 

 

Well I'd forgotten about Chicago....the political riot.....and the later gagged show trial. But one riot*** was in the streets, the other in the halls of government to topple it. There is a difference.

 

*** My opinion then was it was more a anti-draft riot..........in the upper lower class and lower upper class knew the rich didn't go....except to manage an officer's club.

The only poor that showed up for the riot were from Chicago.

The lower class did believe their government back then.....unfortunately. (Well surviving the draft was the only way out of poverty with the GI Bill....collage and house.)

 

 

Being over here, I don't know if the old fashioned monetary class system has much to do with today's belief system.

 

The question is....though there are some who have had Corona, who still are anti-government, will enough survive or survive economically to be able to vote for tyranny the next election or not. Or has gerrymandering done it's job, live or die. 

[Anne-Sophie]

Bo Bo, I am French born, so I get everything you say.

 

A very good civil rights organization said that we can involved, in our state redistricting process.

 

I expect that both my fountain pens, mechanical pencils and lead holders, will get a workout.

 

I have been writing with a 2mm lead holder since I discovered them, in high school. I wrote with the same one and from the same box of HB lead refills, from high school to way past university.

 

Because I love bold lines, I write with a round lead, with all my lead holders.

 

I lost the one I bought, in the U.S, when there was a sale for the pencil, a box of lead and a lead pointer. To add insult to injury, I lost it at the dentist office, which pretended they never found it. 

 

So I bought 3 replacements, one didn't work and is my portable lead pointer, some papers make using a round leads, disagreeable.

The other has a plain cap, with no lead pointer, and the third has a lead indicator, which prompted me to buy luscious B leads.

 

Doing genealogy research, I found out I liked using my Lamy mechanical pencil better. So many details to fit in an A5 page, a format I find easier to deal with, and store, than an A4.

 

Unfortunately, I bought the wrong lead size, which was remedied, at the time, I also bough, one, non Lamy mechanical pencil, not on sale.

 

Then, its other lead size cousin, when my local brick and mortar store had an online sale, as they have shut down, the physical store for customers, transforming it, into outside pick up and shipping HQ.

 

Thank you Bo Bo, I tried to tighten the writing style of my posts.

Nevertheless, I still write long French styled phrases in English.

 

 

 

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

I'm quite wordy....and I hijack posts** and actually write more than five lines.

Your English style is just fine.

**One drifts, hopscotches, but there is always a comet's tail if one looks hard enough; as one follows the currents of the thread.

 

You know much more about MP's than I do. I only know round points.

What other types of 'point's are there?

What is a lead holder?...Ah ha, looked them up, and they were 'after my time.'.

Interesting...never thought of fat lead....

 

I hated MP's all my life, then a couple years ago, a Pelikan 450 MP that didn't get sold like planned when I won it and a '1950's 455...and I do mean 1950's...with all the teething problems of that era's ball points. The type as a third grader you hauled out your jack knife in 3rd grade to shave the shaft to make it work.....yep, once one had one's pocket knife (more than one blade) or jack knife with you .... if one lived out in Rattlesnake Flats of Texas...and the teachers didn't freak.

 

Neighborhood women use to call up, "Can you send your 7/8 year old son out with his .22 rifle to shoot rattlesnakes so I can take in the wash or let the kids out to play." 

There was no more disappointed kid in the world as me, when I got to NY state mountains, and wasn't allowed to finally go shoot squirrels. What was wrong with those people....I was from Texas....and it didn't count.

 

Anyway, do try a 450 it is so well balanced....better than a Jotter MP. I grabbed it in I was too lazy to fill a pen or something....and 6 weeks later I put it down to figure out how to reload it.

Six weeks with out using a fountain pen even once.

 

The longest French sentence consists of 823 words & is found in the novel of Victor Hugo «Outcast».

The Guinness Book of Records lists the longest proper sentence as one from William Faulkner's novel 'Absalom, Absalom!' (1,287 words)

There's another Faulkner sentence of some only 130+ words I read and counted it once when I was 12/13.

None of those sentences would be published today.

Those are Generic sentences**....carefully constructed and punctuated  'run one sentence. I use a semi-colon for the word 'and'.

Usually at and, the sentence can be split with no terrible loss.

**I still got an old '30's English book that explains that.

 

The one with the 27 different kinds of simple sentences I accidentally gave to some German kid needing an English book. The most another book shows is @12.....there is more to simple sentences than most know. Often simple sentences are not simple at all.

And no where on the net do they have a book with near that many simple sentences.

 

For someone that once had so many English books, I sure butcher the language.

But writing fiction luckily one only needs past tense and past perfect.