April 5, 2022

Your Morning Splash of Happiness!

I LOVED this story in today’s Washington Post.

The remarkable brain of a carpet cleaner who speaks 24 languages.

How did he get this way? And what was going on in his brain? But also: why was he cleaning carpets for a living?
To Vaughn, all of that is missing the point. He’s not interested in impressing anyone. He only counted his languages because I asked him to. He understands that he seems to remember names, numbers, dates and sounds far better than most people. Even to him, that has always been a mystery. But his reason for dedicating his life to learning so many languages has not.

He thought, at first, that there were two languages. English, like his dad spoke, and Spanish like his mom spoke. Vaughn liked visiting his family in Orizaba, Mexico, liked the way the Spanish words sounded in his mouth.
But growing up in Maryland, he often tried not to use them. He didn’t want to feel even more different than the other kids. He was already browner than them. He already didn’t understand why they laughed at certain things, or why they seemed to be able to follow instructions from the teacher that made no sense to him. Spanish was his first secret.
When some distant cousins of his dad’s came to visit from Belgium, they used words different than Vaughn had ever heard. Vaughn became more and more frustrated that once again, he couldn’t understand.
“I was like, ‘I want that power,' ” Vaughn remembers.

From then on, he was entranced by every language he encountered. His mom’s French record albums. A German dictionary he found at one of his dad’s handyman jobs. A boy from the Soviet Union who joined his junior high class. By then, one of Vaughn’s favorite places was the library. He checked out a beginner’s guide to Russian.
Soon after, he overheard a Russian woman in a grocery store.

“Здравствуйте, как поживаете?”.
Vaughn asked. Hello, how are you? He explained that he was trying to learn Russian.
He liked the look he put on that woman’s face.
“Like she was hit with a splash of happiness,” Vaughn remembers.




https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/interactive/2022/multilingual-hyperpolyglot-brain-languages/?itid=hp-more-top-stories

April 4, 2022

Romance Writer Accused of Husband's Murder

Her trial starts today in Portland, Oregon and can be streamed live on the KGW streaming app./platform.

https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2022/02/attorneys-for-romance-novelist-accused-of-murdering-husband-seek-1-year-trial-delay.html

Crampton Brophy, now 71, has spent more than three years in jail after being charged with gunning down her husband, Oregon Culinary Institute chef Daniel Brophy, in June 2018. Prosecutors claim the case has parallels to Crampton Brophy’s fiction, including an essay titled “How to Murder Your Husband.”

https://www.kgw.com/mobile/article/news/crime/nancy-brophy-trial-begins/283-74e48127-2874-4e45-8b9a-fd435894d0fe

March 28, 2022

What is it about poisoning peace negotiators

that speaks to the legitimacy of a country’s leader?

My question now about Biden’s unscripted nine word assertion that no doubt caused a run on the market for smelling salts, is what did the President know and when did he know it?

March 25, 2022

At the very least, the Ginni Thomas revelations

fail the “appearance of a conflict of interest” test. Meaning that the expectation of confidence in the opinions and judgments of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has to be in serious doubt.

March 25, 2022

Question about ending our war in Afghanistan.

Has it allowed us to be stronger in our support of Ukraine?

March 25, 2022

DU format on iPhone question.

A few days ago the DU format changed on my phone. Now there are blocks of white space making navigation more cumbersome and less aesthetic. I have reviewed my browser settings and tried tweaking things, but without fixing the problem.

Any suggestions?

March 22, 2022

A metaphor for the war in Ukraine?

https://edition.cnn.com/videos/us/2022/03/20/pigs-fight-black-bear-that-jumped-in-pen-connecticut-orig-jc.cnn


'I'm still in shock': Woman stunned by pig pen surveillance video

Rebecca Shaw was shocked when she watched a black bear enter her pig's pen. Watch as Hamlet and Mary courageously fend off the bear.Source: CNN

March 17, 2022

A canary in the coal mine for Putin's invasion?

Could it have been those magnificent Irish fishermen who forced the Russian navy to back off?

March 17, 2022

I can't get this song out of my head despite its cartoonish

and controversial depiction of a historic battle.

"The Battle of New Orleans" is a song written by Jimmy Driftwood. The song describes the Battle of New Orleans from the perspective of an American soldier; the song tells the tale of the battle with a light tone and provides a rather comical version of what actually happened at the battle. It has been recorded by many artists, but the singer most often associated with this song is Johnny Horton. His version scored number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1959 (see 1959 in music). Billboard ranked it as the No. 1 song for 1959, it was very popular with teenagers in the late 1950s/early 1960s in an era mostly dominated by rock and roll music.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Battle_of_New_Orleans

March 15, 2022

Feel free to weigh in.

Met up at a favorite restaurant with longtime close friend the other evening. While I did not have much to say about myself, having spent much of the past two years in voluntary solitary confinement, I wanted to hear all about her sudden whirlwind romance and engagement.

During a recent FaceTime happy hour, which included her fiancé, I’m not sure how the subject came up but she started talking about how great his retirement income was. It isn’t something I would have brought up, but I let the discussion topic run it’s course and said something like, “That’s great” for the sake of politeness.

However, when she again brought up the subject of his very generous retirement income at dinner l felt disturbed by it. She knows how much my retirement income is - which allows me to live comfortably and enjoy a few pleasures, and her income has been roughly the same, but way below his apparent tax bracket.

So, am I envious? No. I have what I need and have never aspired to great wealth. Again, I listened and made polite nods to her apparent good fortune, but am left with questions about the etiquette surrounding discussions of money in social situations.