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CABINET OF CURIOSITIES (NEW CONCEPTS)
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Mick Harper
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Some bloke was droning on about how the Rolling Stones were rubbish because they just recycled Delta Blues. They're not big on originality on Medium.com. Hundreds of people wrote in to agree with the dude, they're very big on denouncing white appropriation of black culture on Medium.com. As someone who shared the Dartford Loop with Mick'n'Keith, and a fascist, I couldn't let this slight past, so I posted up

It is a frequent error to assume that authenticity has some innate quality. A moment's reflection will tell you that normally what comes next will be better than what went before, else we'd stick to what went before. I've been listening to black blues singers and the Rolling Stones all my life -- I got bored with 'the blues' sometime in the sixties. And the Rolling Stones sometime in the seventies.

This was greeted with complete careful ignoral until the author of the original piece replied

Good answer.

First time anyone's ever said that to me since the seventies, maybe the sixties. PS The Delta in Delta Blues does not refer to the Delta of the Mississippi but to a D-shaped bit of land made by the Mississippi and some tributary a long way up-river. Always hold this in readiness to spring on someone who is scoring a social success at your expense by droning on about a blues singer even more obscure than the one you've been droning on about.

What you do about Chad jumping in and pointing out I have already used this on the AEL is best left to his imagination.
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Mick Harper
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Spot the Odd Man Out Competition

Michael Harper - Wikipedia
Michael Harper (cricketer) (born 1945), South African cricketer. Michael Harper (priest) (1931–2010), English charismatic Anglican, later an Orthodox priest. Michael S. Harper (1938–2016), African-American poet. Mike Harper (born 1966), American racecar driver. Mike Harper (basketball) (born 1957), retired American basketball player.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Harper - Rank 15 - this is relevant | irrelevant
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Mick Harper
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But the books are doing well

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Mick Harper
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The Weekly Freedland

Is Facebook the tobacco industry of the 21st Century?
Jonathan Freedland Guardian Op-Ed

Well, it provides pleasure for billions but, as far as I know, it doesn't kill millions. What is this strange worldwide urge to scurrify electronic media? They're complained of because of their size. Doesn't anyone realise that is the whole point? You can't have a neighbourhood Facebook. You're free to use the hundreds of alternatives to Google, only you don't, do you? Everyone is outraged about all of them hoovering up our data. Fine, but would you prefer to have to pay for them instead? Yes, of course, you would but who wants to be on a tiny network limited to you and your mealy-mouthed chums? But if you insist, I'll start charging for the AEL and we too can become a tiny network of mealy-mouthed chums.

Now apparently the United Sates Congress is on Red Alert because of all the lickle girls suffering from psychotic bulimia on account of too much What's App. They never used to. Women were right as rain in my day. The odd wobble maybe. Oh, and then there's fake news -- that affects men and women and our manifest political destiny. Whoops, I'm getting confused with the tabloids, the Yellow Press and the PR industry.

Man up, citizens of the world, there's a whole new world out there and it's one hell of a lot better world than the world we used to live in. My number's in the book, Mark.
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Grant



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When summoned before Congress these tech titans need to learn from George Galloway - turn on the blowhards and defend yourself. Girls have always been horrible to other girls.

As for the footballers, I’m sure from the interviews I’ve seen that some of these morons think that any criticism they receive on Twitter is harassment. Zuckerberg should tell them to grow a pair.
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Mick Harper
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This is a good point. People in the public eye learn early on 'to grow a pair' or get out of the public eye. Politicians 'pay no attention to the polls'; actors 'never read the reviews'; footballers of course can't read but their mums always keep scrap books but only the good bits. In all cases: (a) more fool them and (b) stop lying. But all this is from professional critics. Who rely on their targets for their living. They too soon learn to grow a pair (of soft soap circumlocution antennae).

Now that everyone and his dog, Spot, old tin can, sausage roll... [we actually sang this recently on a Zoom gathering so I know all about social media] can weigh in without a care in the world and a malicious song in their heart, there has been hell to pay. How many politicians (and not always women or black or Jewish politicians either) have you heard lately saying they (well not they, but people they know) will be driven out of public life unless this tirade of filth is stopped. Call Mark Zuckerberg to the Arts, Culture and Media Committee.

As for footballers... they do little else but train for two hours and then spend the rest of the day on social media. Until it's time to tell the WAG they've got a headache from reading all the stuff they've been at the receiving end of on the internet. "Don't worry, Jermaine, I'm sure it's temporary. Why don't we look at some porn on the internet. You know you like that."
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Mick Harper
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A minor addition to the vital but neglected QWERTY principle here https://medium.com/technology-hits/the-history-of-ctrl-alt-delete-e036ae322023
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Mick Harper
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Medium.com were offering a fifty thousand dollar prize for a short (minimum five hundred words) piece on Death and since they emphasised they were looking for originality and that is not something medium.com contributors are noted for, I thought I had better stick the dosh into my inside pocket without further ado. Alas, I was pipped at the post by a long and not, I thought, very original account [though not bad otherwise, read it here https://medium.com/@randi_82744/keeper-of-the-place-f136e3c35693]. Nor was I featured among the twenty-six 'honourable mentions' but coming twenty-eighth out of probably millions is worth celebrating in its own right. And you can read it here!

---------------------------

My best friend Sam died and I wasn’t that bothered. Which bothered me. Until I looked at everyone else, who were all going to pieces, and thought, “I don’t know why I’ve suddenly become an unfeeling wretch but if it means not having to go through that little lot, I’m quite glad.” I’m sure Sam wouldn’t have minded. He didn’t actively want me to be miserable when he was alive. Unless he was trying to get his own way about something.

Why was I an unfeeling wretch? It seems, as you get older, being someone’s best mate is not in the same league as being his wife, his kids, his twin brother, his mum, his therapy patients. Even his weekly five-a-side team were missing him more than I was. They were in a right state trying to find a replacement midfielder a bit past his prime. Don’t look at me, chaps. I had a try-out for Catford primary schools but only as a goalie.

It wasn’t all plain sailing though. I had to put up with a fair bit of hands-on-hips “Well, are you missing him yet?” So it wasn’t out of pure altruism when I decided I’d better get involved in the healing process. Quite successfully as it happens, in a minor way, so I thought I’d pass along one or two lessons learned for any of you finding yourself in the same boat.

Start cracking jokes. People forget just how boring grief is and funny is funny. You won’t have a lot of competition but even so there are a few rules you should observe. Never be tasteful. It reminds ’em straight off they’re grieving and there’s no laughs in that. Start with your basic “Knock, knock” “Who’s there?” “Not Sam” and work your way up to appropriate variants on “Apart from that, Mrs Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?”

But that’s more for the kids, they’re a heartless lot. Besides, as the Catskill comic-tragedians used to say, ‘Sick is schtick.’ You need to get yourself a complete POV USP to riff from. For this, take a tip from another set of old time troupers, the spiritualists. They knew it didn’t matter whether their audience believed their loved ones were trying to communicate via some old biddy saying, “I’m getting the initial H … or possibly J…”, they just want to talk about their loved ones in a way that isn’t all doom and gloom. You can do the same.

How hard will it be when you can kick off with, “I’m getting the name Sam. Does anyone here know a Sam who passed over recently?” But remember who your audience is. Children of Dawkins. You have to box a bit cleverer than that.

I got lucky. I was spending Christmas with Sam’s grieving family — it gave me an excuse not to spend it with my own — and we’d hired a self-catering place well away from memories of Sam. Well away from anywhere, I thought but didn’t say. Anyway I’d just nipped outside for a fag, and some respite, when a bird started squawking something that for a moment sounded like ‘Mi-i-i-ck! Mi-i-ick’. A moment is all you need in this game.

I re-joined the glum non-smokers, if you’ll excuse the redundancy, and announced, “Guess what? Sam has been reincarnated as a duck and he just said to me…” Their reaction, nervous laughter, told me an act was born.

And how! For the first time in my life, I was actually in prime demand for social occasions. They weren’t parties, that would be inappropriate, just twenty or thirty bereaved folk sharing their thoughts, having a few drinks together, and could people bring along some quiche or similar, eight for eight-thirty. By nine or nine-thirty you could guarantee, “Go on, Mick, tell them your story about Sam communicating to you across the mudflats of the Essex marshes.”

“You mean the Canada goose crying “Mi-i-i-ck, ‘Mi-i-i-ck?”
“You said it was a duck last time.”
“For Chrissake, I was having an ectoplasmic experience at the time. It was some kind of waterfowl, all right? I’m sorry to be so generic when undergoing major life-changing experiences. Do you want me to go on or not?” You’ve got to be aggressive or they’ll walk all over you. Make sure to change the bird each time.

But now is when you have to start earning your fee. I don’t know how to make quiche. You need some prepared follow-ups about what Sam’s been telling you lately but it’s all standard tropes, you can put it together on the way. In fact I usually build that in. “Sorry, I had to scribble it down, but it was hard making out what he was saying on the Bakerloo.”

You always start with the widow. She’s the ranking member of the audience. “Sam was asking after you.”
“Oh yes, what was he saying?”
“You know, the usual. How you were bearing up, that sort of thing.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I was just about to when he stopped me. ‘No, I don’t want to know,’ he said. ‘If she’s gone totally to pieces, I’ll be very upset. If she hasn’t, I’ll be very upset.’

That’ll start the rest of the immediate family off. ‘Did he want to know about me, I’m really upset,’ asks Isobel, the more anxious of the two daughters.
“Sort of.”
“What do you mean, ‘sort of’?”
“Well, I asked him what he thought about this new bloke of yours.”
“I bet he didn’t approve. He never does.”
“Do you really want to know?”
“Go on, tell me.”
“All right. If you really want to know. It was quite dramatic as a matter of fact. Ornaments shaking on the mantelpiece, octarine light going in and out of phase, the works. I was getting a bit worried to be perfectly honest. I think I’d hit a raw nerve. Then finally this voice, it was Sam but in a voice I’d never heard before … sort of menacing really … then a pause as if he was gathering his thoughts and then finally he said … loud and clear, you couldn’t mistake his meaning … he said … he said, ‘Remind me, which one’s Isobel?’

That went down very well with the other sister. Divide and rule, that’s got to be your watchword. When everyone’s in floods, the dry-eyed man is king. Apart from the mother-in-law of course. The dear-departed’s mother, if present, does not stand any nonsense from anybody. “I don’t approve of any of this, it’s very disrespectful.”
“That is exactly what Sam said. You two must have been very close.”
“You tell him not so close he couldn’t tell me he was ill. Very disrespectful I call that.”

For a wrap you may need a stooge. “Has he got any advice for the five-a-side?”
“No he hasn’t. He’s really furious with you lot.”
“Why? We miss him. He must know that.”
“Yes, but nobody noticed his form was dipping, did they?”
“That’s not fair. We thought he was losing interest.”

And so on and so forth. They feed you the lines, you serve them back with a bit of top spin. Even so, everything has its term. It may be time to put this one to bed. I’m not such a sicko as to want to spend the rest of my life remembering my best mate via macabre stand-up. What d’you reckon, Sam?
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Ishmael


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This was so amazing. You should have been a novelist.
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Mick Harper
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Know Your Neighbourhood

Mick (entering sub-post office): You're closed already? It's only twelve o'clock.
Bloke behind counter: For about a year and a half now.
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Mick Harper
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More on my continuing service pointing out the difference between what is considered unusual vocabulary for a member of respectively the American and British intelligentsia. First the ones we would consider it downright weird even to mention Jink (to shift direction precipitately), Sisal (a cheap fibre).

Then the ones we would not list for fear of being considered a bit thick Contretemps, Opprobrium, Adamantine, Abstruse

Then a couple of technical terms, one familiar Chasuble (priestly garment) and one ridiculous Flehmen (a mammalian behaviour in which the animal inhales with the mouth open and upper lip curled to facilitate exposure of the vomeronasal organ to a scent or pheromone).

One that is familiar to buffs but is apparently more widely used in America: Thermidor ("No, not the appliance company that makes high-end ovens and ranges. Here it is defined by Merriam-Webster: “ a moderate counterrevolutionary stage following an extremist stage of a revolution.")

And finally something useful. Thanatosis (an animal’s ability to fake death to evade a predator or any other unwelcome intrusion). I might use that about certain groups I am a member of.
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Mick Harper
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This was so amazing. You should have been a novelist.

Except it was, save for literary flourishes, straight reportage. The background setting was even more extreme than I suggested, and still is. The bird-on-holiday origin happened exactly as described. I was asked to recount (with literary flourishes) the episode at a large get-together and I did the whole routine at a wedding of one of the daughters in the guise of giving the bride's father's speech. None of it would fit into any novel genre that I know of.
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Mick Harper
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Speaking of which
How NOT to Write a First Novel
Six Professional “Don’ts” of Taking on a Novel for the First Time

My first bit of advice would be to avoid clumsy constructions like “Don’ts”.
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Mick Harper
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After literally years (I kid you not) of having monumental difficulties getting page numbers to do something, anything, other than start at 1 on page 1, I tracked down a dude making a YouTube about how to do it. I followed everything he told me to do -- though in truth it was all the things I'd been doing unsuccessfully all those years -- except when he said remove the 'same as previous'. His hand moved too quickly for me to see what he did. So another aeon wasted. Then, ten minutes ago, I noticed a little box had popped up somewhere along the line that read Link to previous. Well, I said to myself, why not, I've never tried it before and now I will never again have the problem.

In all those years, nobody -- not Help, not Word, not all the Word advice sites, not the dude in the YouTube -- had ever told me about it. But it took only a scant few years to discover it for myself. Now I know how Robert the Bruce felt.
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Mick Harper
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When I said I solved the problem I didn't mention that having solved the problem and gazing fondly at the eight pages of un-numbered 'front matter' and the first page of actual text with its cheerful 1 at the bottom, my computer insists that page eight is followed by page ten. Not the numbers at the bottom of the page, you understand, the pages as the computer understands them. There is no explanation, despite hitting the show all button and the no, really show all button, why it is is doing this. So while the text of my book now starts on my page 1, it starts on the computer's page 10.

Why is that important, you ask, since people will be reading my book not my computer? Well, it's important to my printer's computer since it regards page ten as an even number (they've been programmed like that) whereas my page 1 is an odd number (as I learned at school) so all my left hand pages will be right hand pages and vice versa as far as it's concerned. If you've ever seen a book with its pagination reversed (I have with one of my earlier books but the printer was very nice about it) you'll never forget it.

I am allowing six months to solve this relatively piffling problem. And not full-time either, I've got a life to lead and a book to finish. The clocks just went back so I've got a head start.
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