Podcasts about Mark Twain

Mark Twain – How I Edited an Agricultural Newspaper plus The Next Peacelands Mark Twain's “How I Edited an Agricultural Newspaper” brings a touch of mischief to today's episode of Kitty Reads Literature for Peace. Kitty offers a short, good-natured excerpt that captures Twain's humor and his fondness for human overconfidence, all delivered in her warm, steady voice. Each day's reading continues to serve as Kitty's gentle warm-up for CTRL–AI–DISARM, the upcoming Peace Is Here series exploring truth, power, and the systems shaping our shared future. The episode closes with The Next Peacelands, where Avis Kalfsbeek reads a real-time list of global warzones and major arms suppliers—an honest grounding in the world as it is, and an invitation to practice peace with intention. Get the books: www.AvisKalfsbeek.com Contact Avis to say hello or let her know how to say “Peace is Here” in your language: Contact Me Here The Next Peacelands source: Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) and the Stockholm Internation Peace Research Institute's Arms Transfers Database [as updated on Wikipedia. Music: "Dalai Llama Riding a Bike" by Javier "Peke" Rodriguez Bandcamp: https://javierpekerodriguez.bandcamp.com Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3QuyqfXEKzrpUl6b12I3KW?si=uszJs37sTFyPbXK4AeQvow Peace is Here podcast series Coming Soon!: CTRL-AI-DISARM

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for December 1, 2025 is: pseudonym • SOO-duh-nim • noun A pseudonym is a name that someone (such as a writer) uses instead of their real name. // bell hooks is the pseudonym of the American writer Gloria Jean Watkins. See the entry > Examples: “Edgar Wright, the filmmaker and genre specialist who has given the world modern gems like Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and Baby Driver, estimates he was around 13 years old when he read ‘the Bachman Books,' a collection of four novels that Stephen King published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman during the early years of his career.” — Don Kaye, Den of Geek, 9 Oct. 2025 Did you know? Pseudonym has its origins in the Greek adjective pseudōnymos, which means “bearing a false name.” French speakers adopted the Greek word as the noun pseudonyme, and English speakers later modified the French word into pseudonym. Many celebrated authors have used pseudonyms. Samuel Clemens wrote under the pseudonym “Mark Twain,” Charles Lutwidge Dodgson assumed the pseudonym “Lewis Carroll,” and Mary Ann Evans used “George Eliot” as her pseudonym.

Jon Herold kicks off the December 1 Daily Herold with post-Thanksgiving catch-up before diving straight into the drip-drip chaos surrounding Emerald Robinson's ongoing claims about election interference and the Three Musketeers story. He walks through the logical gaps, the lack of sourcing, the contradictions about 2016, and why he believes the narrative ultimately works to delegitimize Trump rather than expose wrongdoing. From there Jon broadens the lens to the wider information war, calling out media hit pieces like the New York Times' attempted takedown of David Sacks, the parallels to attacks against Badlands, and how irregular warfare operates by generating false conflicts and weaponized narratives. He checks in on the lack of new federal documents, DoD updates, Doge's missing Friday posts, and Trump's latest Truth Social messages about Syria, the Sedition 6, and Mark Twain. Later he examines peace-deal rumors around Ukraine, the legal battle over Alina Habba's appointment, and key geopolitical shifts including Venezuelan tensions and Biden-era foreign policy failures. Jon closes with reflections on Bitcoin as energy-based currency, the Flynn debate, and even college-football coaching chaos, all tied back to the larger fight over information, legitimacy, and narrative control.

This episode we look at many of the natural events and talk about those observing and writing things down, and why they may have wanted to do so. For more, check out our podcast blogpage:  https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-139   Rough Transcript: Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is episode 139: Observing the "Natural" World. Members of the Onmyou-ryou, dressed in the official robes of their office, sat around in their observation tower, measuring the location of the stars.  They kept their light to a minimum, just enough so that they could write down their observations, but not so much that it would destroy their vision.  As they looked up, suddenly they saw a strange movement: a streak through the sky.  They waited, and observed, and then there was another, and another after that.  It was as if the stars themselves were falling from the heavens.  They watched as it seemed that the constellations themselves were melting and falling apart.  Quickly they scribbled down notes.  Tomorrow, with the light of day, they would consult various sources to see just what it could mean.  For now, their role was simply to observe and record.   Welcome back, everyone.  It is the height of holiday season in the US as I record this, and in our narrative we are in the middle of the reign of Ohoama, aka Temmu Tennou, who came to power in 672 and who has been shoring up the Ritsuryo state instigated by his late brother, Naka no Oe, aka Tenji Tennou.  We have talked in recent episodes about how Ohoama put a lot of the state under the control of members of the royal family, or at least those with claims to royal blood, and how he had also begun work on the Chronicles—the very works that we have been using to try and understand the history of this and earlier periods.   It seems clear that Ohoama and his cohorts were doing their best to solidify their control and, in the process, create what they felt was a modern state, leveraging the continental model, but not without their own local flavor.  After all, they were also investing in the kami based rituals of state and specifically in Ise shrine, which they claimed as an ancestral shrine for their lineage. This episode, let's dig into another thing that was getting reported around this time.  And that is… science!  Or at least observations of the world and indications of how people were interacting with it. Before going into the subject, I want to acknowledge that "science", or "Kagaku" in modern Japanese, may not look like what we think of as "science" today.  The word "Kagaku" itself appears to come about in the late Edo period, and became associated with the western idea of "Science" in the Meiji period.  Today we think of it as observations, yes, but also testing via the scientific method. I think it might be more appropriate to categorize a lot of earlier science under a term like "learning" or "study", and it seems to have encompassed a wide range of topics of study, some of which we would include as "science" and some which we might refer to more as "arts".  There is also a very fine line with religion and philosophy as well. From a modern perspective, I think one could fairly argue that "science"—particularly the so-called "hard" sciences—refers to something that can be empirically tested via the scientific method.  So you can see something, form a hypothesis, create a test, and then that test should produce the same results no matter who conducts it, assuming you account for the variables. And please don't @ me about this… I know I am simplifying things.  This isn't a podcast about science unless we are talking about the social sciences of history and archaeology. In contrast to our modern concept of science, much of what we see in the Asuka era is built around using our reasoning to arrive at the truth of something.  In cases where we are dealing with clearly physical phenomena that have observable causes and effects, this can lead to remarkably reliable results.  One example of this is calendrical science—it isn't that hard to observe the passing of days and seasons.  Even the rotation of the earth and the movements of stars and even something with as large a period as comets could be observed and tracked, especially if you had centuries of data to comb through.  In fact, they often would predict things that it turns out they couldn't, themselves, see.  They could predict that an eclipse would occur, for example, even when that eclipse was only visible somewhere else.  And they didn't have to calculate gravitational pull, mass, or distances between different heavenly bodies for that to occur. Similarly, in the agricultural sphere: you had so many people who observed the seasons and would figure out new ways of doing things.  It doesn't take an understanding of chlorophyl to know that plants generally do better when exposed to sunlight. I believe the leap happens when you get to things that go beyond purely observable means.  Sickness, for example—how do you explain viruses or germs without equipment like microscopes to see what our eyes alone cannot?  And if such "invisible" things could cause so much damage, then why could there not be other "invisible" elements, such as kami and boddhisatvas?  And as humans we are driven to make connections.  It is one of the things that has driven our technological innovation and rise, but it is also something that can easily go awry.  Like when you are sitting in a dark house, alone, and you hear a noise.  Rationally, you might know that houses settle and creak, but that doesn't necessarily stop your brain from connecting it with thoughts that someone must be in the house making that noise. Or even how we make judgments based on nothing more than how someone talks or what they look like, because our brains have made connections with those things, for good or ill. A large part of the rationalization that was accomplished in Asian thought had to do with concepts of Yin and Yang, the negative and the positive, the dark and the light.  This was thought of as a kind of energy—qi or ki—that was embedded in things.  We discussed this somewhat back in episode 127, because yin yang theory, along with the five element theory, known as Wuxing or Gogyou in Japanese, became embedded in the idea of the calendar.  Why was summer hot, except that it was connected with an excess of fire energy?  And the cold, dark days of winter would be associated with an excess of water, naturally. I should note that while this is one of the more comprehensive philosophical systems in use, it was not the only means by which various phenomena and effects were rationalized.  After all, it had to be imposed on a framework of how the world otherwise worked, and descriptions of the world came from a variety of places.  There was, for example, the Classic of Mountains and Seas, or Sanhaijing, which detailed the world as envisioned in the period before the Qin dynasty, although there were occasional updates.  The Sanhaijing  described regular plants and animals in the same breath as gods and monsters.  There were also various buddhist sutras, which brought their own cosmological view of the universe that had to be squared with other visions, including those passed down locally describing the archipelago as the "Reed Plain" and giving particular importance to eight of the islands—though which eight depends on which variant of the creation myth you are referencing. To categorize the study of the natural—and what we would consider the supernatural—world around them, the Ritsuryou set up specific bureaus.  One of these was the Onmyou-ryou, the Bureau of Yin-yang, also known as the Onyo no Tsukasa.  This Bureau oversaw divination, astronomy, time, and calendars.  At its head was the Onmyou-no-kami.  Below them were the various scholars studying the core subjects, as well as technical practitioners to carry out the rites and divination. On the continent, priority was generally given to astronomical and calendrical studies, and many of the more magical practices or rituals would fade away, likely because there were local Taoist institutions who could take up much of that work.  In Japan, however, it seems that the calendrical studies tended to ossify, instead, while onmyoji came to fill a role not just for the state but also among the population for divination and other such practices.  Even into the Edo period one could find private onmyoji, and the Bureau itself lasted until the very beginning of the Meiji period. Another important institution of the Ritsuryo government for learning was the Daigakuryou, the Bureau of Great Learning.  Students of Japanese may recognize the term "Daigaku" referring, today, to universities. The original concept for the Daigaku-ryou, or Daigaku no Tsukasa, was focused on the study of those things that were considered perhaps a bit more practical and necessary to anyone who might want a political career.  Since this was founded on concepts of Confucian government, it is little wonder that it was originally designed to focus on Confucian studies, among other things.  This fits into the idea of a supposed meritocracy, where one's education was part of the examination.  You may recall from Episode 115 we talked about the National University in Chang'an, which is likely something that the Daigaku Ryou could only ever dream of becoming. Early arts taught at the Daigaku Ryou included the Confucian classics, mathematics, writing, and Chinese pronunciation.  These were all things that you would need to know to become a part of the bureaucracy The idea of a school may have been born along with the early institution of the government, with mention as early as 671, in the last year of Naka no Oe's reign, but we don't have it clearly established in the code until later.  Full operations may have been somewhat delayed due to the tumultuous events of Ohoama's accession to power in 672, but we do see it explicitly mentioned in the year 675.  On the first day of the year we are told that Students from the Daigaku Ryou, along with students from the Onmyou-Ryou and from the Gaiyaku Ryou, the Bureau of External Medicine; along with the Woman of S'ravasti, the Woman of Tara, Prince Syeonkwang of Baekje, and Silla labourers offered presents of drugs and various rarities. We talked about the first two, the Daigaku-ryou and the Onmyou-ryou, but the Gaiyaku Ryou doesn't seem to have a lot of information out there beyond this mention.  Later there would a "Ten'yaku Ryou", or Bureau of Medicine, established in the code.  Since we don't have any extant codes from this period beyond what was written down in the Nihon Shoki, we don't know for certain what the Gaiyaku-ryou was , and it is possible that the Gaiyaku-Ryou was a precursor to the Ten'yaku Ryou.  "GAI" means "outside" or "external", leading me to wonder if this referred to external medicine in contrast to internal medicine, or if it meant medicine or drugs from outside teh archipeloago. I would point out that these students are found with the Woman of S'ravasti, or Shae; the Woman of Tara; a Baekje prince and Silla labourers.  In other words, they were all people from outside of the archipelago.  This is not entirely surprising as it was from outside that much of the learning was coming into the country. "Yaku" or "Kusuri", which can be translated as either "Drugs" or "medicine", could refer to a number of things.  How effective they were is somewhat questionable. Almost certainly some of them had confirmed medicinal efficacy, but others may have been thought to have been effective due to things like their connection to the five elements, or wuxing, theory. For example, something red might be assumed to have a warming effect because of the presumed presence of the fire element.  And the power of the placebo effect no doubt made them seem at least partially effective.  Consider, for example, how many people will swear by certain remedies for the common cold when all it really does is distract you, or perhaps make you a bit more comfortable, until the symptoms pass on their own. A more certain science was probably that of Astronomy, which we've mentioned a few times.  The passage of the stars through the sky was something that could be easily observed.  There is a theory that some of the first lines in the Yijing, or book of changes, may actually be a description of the changing of seasons as different aspects of a given constellation rise over the horizon, and the placement of certain stars would help in the adjustment of the lunar calendar, since the moon's orbit does not match up exactly with the solar year, and year the solar year was quite important to things like agriculture and even sailing to the mainland. This all makes 675 a seemingly banner year for science, as four days after the presentation of medicine to the throne, the government erected a platform by which to observe the stars.  This wouldn't need to be much—it could have been an earthen mound, or just a tower, from which one could get above the ground, presumably see over any buildings, to the horizon.  Granted, Asuka might not be the best place for such observations, with the nearby mountains meaning that the true horizon is often obstructed.  Nonetheless, it may have been enough to make calculations. Astronomy platforms, or Tenmondai, would continue to be used up until at least the Meiji period.  Without a telescope, observations were somewhat limited—though they also didn't have the same level of light pollution that we have today.  Remember, many woke just before dawn and went to sleep not too long after the sun went down, which only makes sense when you are living in a place where creating light, while doable, also ran the risk of burning your entire house to the ground. It is worth noting that the sky for the ancient Japanese was likely quite different than what most of us see when we look up, unless you are fortunate enough to live in a place with very little light pollution.  For many of those living today in the cities and suburban landscape, go outside at night and you might see the moon and some of the brightest stars, but for most of the ancient Japanese, they would look up and see the heavenly river, the Amakawa, or Milky Way.  They would have looked up at a sky glittering with myriad dots of light, as well as planets and more.  It was both familiar and strange—something one saw regularly and yet something that was also extremely inaccessible. Astronomical observations would have been important for several reasons, as I've mentioned.  They would have been used to keep the calendar in check, but they would also have likely been used to help calibrate the water clock, which helped to tell time.  Of course, going back to the five elements and yin yang theory, it is also believed that the energy, the qi or ki, changed with the seasons and the movements of the stars and planets—planets were not known as such, of course, but their seemingly erratic movements compared to bright lights in the sky meant they were noticed and assigned values within the elemental system. One of the things that came with the changing seasons, the heavenly movements, and the flow of ki was a concept of "kata-imi", literally directional taboos.  There were times when certain directions might be considered favorable or unfavorable for various actions.  This could be something as simple as traveling in a given direction.  In the centuries to come this would spawn an entire practice of kata-tagae, or changing direction.  Is the north blocked, but you need to travel there, anyway?  Well just go northwest to say hello to a friend or visit your local sake brewery, and then travel due east.  Ta-da!  You avoided going directly north!  There were also mantra-like incantations that one might say if they had to travel in an inauspicious direction to counteract the concept of bad influences. This also influenced various other things, and even today you will often see dates where a year and month might be followed by simply the character for "auspicious day" rather than an actual day of the month. So observing the heavens was important, and it was also important that they tostudy the works of those on the continent, whose records could help predict various astronomical phenomena.  Except that there was one tiny problem:  I don't know if you've noticed, but Japan and China are in two different locations.  Not all astronomical phenomena can be observed from all points of the globe.  The Northern Lights, for example, are rarely seen in more southerly latitudes, and while eclipses are not too rare, a total eclipse only impacts certain areas of the earth, along relatively narrow paths. I mention this because it isn't always clear if the records we get in the Nihon Shoki are about phenomena they directly observed or if they are taking reports from elsewhere and incorporating them into the narrative.  One such event is the comet of 676. The entry in the Nihon Shoki tells us that in the 7th lunar month of the 5th year of Temmu Tennou, aka 676 CE, a star appeared in the east that was 7 or 8 shaku in length.  It disappeared two months later. We've mentioned some of this before, but the sky was divided up into "shaku", or "feet", though how exactly it was measured I'm not entirely sure.  It appears to be that one foot was roughly 1.5 degrees of the sky, give or take about a quarter of a degree, with 180 degrees from horizon to horizon.  So it would have been about 10 to 12 degrees in the sky.  Another way to picture it is if you hold out your arm towards the object, and spread your index and little finger, it would probably fit between those two points.  This comet hung around for some time, and a great part about a comet like this is that it was viewable from multiple locations.  After all, as the earth turned, different areas were exposed to the comet as it passed through our part of the solar system.  Thus we have records of it from not just the Nihon Shoki:  We also find it in the Anglo-Saxon chronicles, where it was thought to have foretold the end of Bishop Wilfred's control of Northumbria.  We also see it in Tang, Silla, and Syrian sources. These sources aren't always in complete agreement.  For one thing, they noted when they first saw it, which might have been impacted by local conditions.  And then conversion between lunar and solar calendars can also sometimes get in the way.  Roughtly speaking, we have the Nihon Shoki providing dates of somewhere from about August or September of 676, on the Western calendar, to October or November. Tang sources put it from 4 September to 1 November.  Silla Chronicles claim that it first appeared in the 7th lunar month, so between August and September.  A Syrian Chronicle notes a comet from about 28 August to 26 October in the following year, 677, but this is thought to have been a mistake.  European sources generally seem to claim it was seen in August and lasted for three months.  All of these sightings put it at roughly the same time. Working with that and with known comets, we think we actually know which comet this is:  The Comet de Cheseaux also known as the Comet Klinkenberg-Cheseaux.  And I should mention this is all thanks to a research paper by M. Meyer and G. W. Kronk.  In that paper they propose that this is the comet with the designation of C/1743 X1, or the common names I just mentioned.  If so, based on its trajectory, this comet would have been visible in 336, 676, 1032, 1402, 1744, and is next predicted to show up in 2097.  And no, those aren't all exactly the same amount of time.  It is roughly every 350 years or so, but with the movements of the solar system, the planets, and various gravitational forces that likely slow or speed up its movement, it doesn't show up on exactly regular intervals.  Still, it is pretty incredible to think that we have a record of a comet that was seen the world over at this time, by people looking up from some very different places. Comets were something interesting for early astronomers.  They may have originally been seen as particularly ominous—after all, in the early eras, they were hardly predictable, and it would take years to get enough data to see that they were actually a somewhat regular occurrence.  In fact, it is likely that early astronomers were able to figure out eclipse schedules before comets.  Still, they seem to have come to the realization that comets were in fact another type of natural and reoccurring phenomenon.  That isn't to say that they didn't have any oracular meaning, but it did mean they were less of an obvious disturbance of the heavenly order. We have another comet mentioned in the 10th lunar month of 681, but that one seems to have had less attention focused on it, and we don't have the same details.  Then in the 8th lunar month of 682 we have an entry about a Great Star passing from East to West—which was probably a shooting star, rather than a comet.  Comets, for all that they appear to be streaking across the sky thanks to their long tails, are often relatively stable from an earthbound perspective, taking months to appear and then disappear again. Then, on the 23rd day of the 7th month of 684 we get another comet in the northwest.  This one was more than 10 shaku in length—about 15 degrees, total, give or take.  Given the date, we can be fairly confident about this one, as well: it was the famous Halley's comet.  Halley's comet is fascinating for several reasons.  For one, it has a relatively short period of about 72 to 80 years, though mostly closer to 75 to 77 years in between sightings.  The last time it visited the earth was in 1986, and it is expected back in 2061.  Halley's comet has been recorded since the 3rd century BCE, and, likely because of its short period, it was the first periodic comet to be recognized as such.  There are other periodic comets with short periods, but many of them are not visible with the naked eye.  Halley's comet is perhaps the most studied comet, given its regular and relatively short periodicity.  It is also connected to the famous writer, humorist, and essayist, Samuel Langhorne Clemens, aka Mark Twain.  He was born only a few days after the comet reached perihelion in 1835 and died a day after it reached the same point again in 1910, and while he may not have visited Japan in his lifetime, it was a period of great change both in his home country of America and in Japan.  America, of course, would undergo a Civil War over the issue of slavery in the early 1860s, and shortly after that Japan would have its own civil war in the form of the Meiji Revolution.  And while he never visited—and translation could only do so much to capture the art of his prose—Mark Twain's works were apparently quite influential in Japan in the early 20th century. Of course, comets were just one of the celestial phenomena to be observed.  The astronomers were interested in just about anything happening in the sky.  We have accounts of both solar and lunar eclipses, and not necessarily full eclipses either.  We even have notice of the movement of some planets, such as in 681, when they noted that the planet mars "entered" the moon. Obviously the astronomers weren't recording every raincloud that came through—at least not in the main chronicles—but they did capture a fair number of events.  They did record particularly memorable storms.  For instances, in the 8th lunar month of 675 there was a storm that is said to have caused sand to fly and which then damaged houses.  This sounds like a wind storm without rain—after all, if there was rain, you would expect that the sand would have been wet and tamped down.  It is possible to have hurricane level winds without the rain.  While typhoons typically bring rain, especially as they usually build up their strength at sea, it is possible to have the winds alone, as I've experienced, myself, in Tokyo.  This most likely happens in an isolated area—there is water and rain somewhere, but the typhoon can be large, so parts of it may only get the wind and little or no rain.  I wonder if something like that happened in this instance.  It is also possible that this record refers to actual sand being brought across from the continent.  In some instances, sand can be lifted up from as far away as Mongolia and carried all the way to Japan, though it is pretty rare. And it wasn't just wind and sand.  We get accounts of hail coming down as large as peaches, torrential rainstorms, and even ash, likely from a volcanic eruption that was otherwise unrecorded.  There are also accounts of snow, though typically recorded in times where you wouldn't expect to see it, such as the third lunar month, which would mean snow in late April or early May. Mostly these storms are mentioned in terms of how they affected the immediate fortunes of the living, but sometimes storms did even more damage.  In 682, for example, a hoar-frost was reported in both Shinano and Kibi in the 7th lunar month.  On its own, this probably wouldn't have been worth mentioning, but the chroniclers add that because of storms the "five grains had not formed".  So storms had diminished the crops and the hoar-frost was apparently the killing blow.  The harvest that year would be lean, and it would not be a happy time for many that winter. And then, just as important as what was happening was what was not.  There are several mentions of droughts, particularly towards the end of Spring, early Summer.  This is traditionally a drier period, and if it is too dry it could harm the harvest.  And so the government was expected to find a way to bring the rain—a tall order, the general resolution to which seems to be prayers and rituals designed to bring rain.  In a place like Japan, I suspect that it was usually just a matter of time before the prayers were "successful", thus reinforcing their presumed efficacy. Some of the things that they recorded were a bit more mysterious.  For example, in the second lunar month of 680 we are told that a sound like drums was heard from the East.  There are many things this could theoretically be, from rumbles of thunder to some other phenomenon, though the following year we have a note about thunder in the West, so theoretically they knew the difference between thunder and drums.  Later that same year, 680, we are told that there was a "brightness" in the East from the hour of the dog to the hour of the rat—about 8pm to midnight.  Was this some kind of aurora?  But wouldn't that have been in the north, rather than the east?    Could it have been some kind of lightning?  But that is a long time for a lightning storm to hang around.  And there are other strange things, some of which seem impossible and we have to doubt.  For example, in 684 they said that, at dusk, the seven stars of the Big Dipper drifted together to the northeast and sank.  Unless they are just recording the natural setting of the stars of the big dipper.  Certainly, over time the constellation appears to rotate around the north star, and it dips down to or below the horizon in the autumn months.  So were they just talking about the natural, yearly setting of the stars, or something else? There may be some clues in that the 11th lunar month, when that was recorded, we see several other heavenly phenomena recorded.  Two days after the Big Dipper set, at sunset, a star fell in the eastern quarter of the sky that we are told was as large as a jar.  Later, the constellations were wholly disordered and stars fell like rain.  That same month, a star shot up in the zenith and proceeded along with the Pleiades until the end of the month.  While this sounds like shooting stars and a possible meteor shower, a later commenter suggested that this was all a heavenly omen for the state of the court, showing the "disordered" state of the nobility at this time.  Of course, this was also a year and change before the sovereign's eventual passing, so there is also the possibility that the Chroniclers were looking at events later and ascribing meaning and importance after the fact. In another account of something seemingly wonderous: in 682 we are told that something shaped like a Buddhist flag, colored like flame, was seen by all of the provinces and then sank into the Japan sea north of Koshi.  A white mist is also said to have risen up from the Eastern mountains. There are various things that could be going on here.  It strikes me that the white mist could be a cloud, but could also be something volcanic.  And the flame colored prayer flag makes me think about how a high cloud can catch the light of the rising or setting sun.  That could look like a flag, and can seem extremely odd depending on the other conditions in the sky. Or maybe it was aliens. Okay, it is unlikely that it was aliens, but I think that these do give an idea of the kinds of records that were being made about the observed phenomena.  Obviously the Nihon Shoki is recording those things that were considered particularly significant for whatever reason.  This could just be because it was something odd and unexplained, or perhaps it was more well known but rare.  It may have even had religious connotations based on some aspect, like evoking the image of Buddhist flags.  And it is possible that it was thought to have had significant impact on events—perhaps even an impact that isn't clear to us today, many centuries removed from the events. Some things were clear, however.  Lightning strikes are often mentioned specifically when they strike something of note.  In 678, we are told that a pillar of the Western Hall of the New Palace was struck by lightning, though apparently the building itself survived.  Then, in 686, Lighting appeared in the southern sky with a large roar of thunder.  A fire broke out and caught the tax cloth storehouse of the Ministry of Popular affairs, which immediately exploded in flames.  After all, a thatched roofed, wooden building filled with kindling in the form of cloth—and likely a  fair amount of paper and writing supplies to keep track of it all—sounds like a bonfire waiting to happen.  There were reports that the fire had actually started in Prince Osakabe's palace and then spread to the Ministry of Popular Affairs from there. It is also worth noting that recording of such events was still somewhat new to the archipelago as a whole. They were learning from the continent, but also defining their own traditions. Observations of natural phenomena weren't just relegated to celestial occurrences or weather.  After all, there was something else that one could observe in the sky:  birds.  Now this wasn't your average bird-watching—though I'm not saying that there weren't casual birders in ancient Japan, and if we ever find someone's birding diary from that era I think that would be so cool.  But there were some things that were significant enough to be mentioned. For example, in 678 we get a report of "atori", or bramblings.  Bramblings are small songbirds which are found across Eurasia.  Notably they are migratory, and are known to migrate in huge flocks especially in the winter time, and sure enough on the 27th day of the 12th month we are told that the bramblings flew from the southwest to the northeast, covering the entire sky.  This makes me think about some of the other mass migrations that used to occur that have largely been reduced significantly due to habitat loss, disruption to traditional migratory routes, and other population pressures on various bird species.  Still, having so many birds that it blocked out the sky certainly seems a significant event to report on.  We later see a similar account in 680, with the flock moving from southeast to northwest.  Given the location of Asuka it sounds like they were flocking in the mountains and heading out over the Nara Basin, perhaps seeking food in another mountainous area. In 682, the birders were at it again.  This time, around midday on the 11th day of the 9th lunar month, several hundreds of cranes appeared around the Palace and soared up into the sky.  They were there for about two hours before they dispersed.  Once again, cranes are migratory and known to flock.  Cranes are also known as a symbol of long life and joy—and I can understand it.  Have you ever seen a flock of cranes?  They are not small birds, and they can be really an incredible sight.  Flocks of cranes themselves were probably not that rare, and it was no doubt more about so many gathering around the palace which made it particularly special. It wasn't just birds in the sky that were considered important symbols, though.  Birds often are noted as auspicious omens.  Usually strange birds, plants, or other such things are found in various provinces and presented to the throne.    So in 675, Yamato presented auspicious "barn-door fowl", likely meaning a fancy chicken.  Meanwhile, the Eastern provinces presented a white falcon and the province of Afumi presented a white kite.  Chickens are associated with the sun and thus with the sun goddess, Amaterasu, and albino versions of animals were always considered auspicious, often being mentioned in Buddhist sources.  Later, in 680, we see a small songbird, a "Shitodo", also described as white, and probably albino, sent to the court from nearby Settsu. Then, in 681 there is mention of a red sparrow.  Red coloration is not quite the same as albinism, though it is something that does occur at times, when the brownish coloration comes out more red than brown, and I suspect this is what we are talking about.  This is most likely just a recessed gene or genetic mutation, similar to causes for albinism, but just in a different place in the DNA.  As for why it was important:  I'd first and foremost note that anything out of the ordinary (and even some ordinary things) could be considered a sign.   Red was also seen as an auspicious color, so that may have had something to do with it as well.  And then there is the concept of Suzaku, the red bird of the south.  Suzaku is usually depicted as an exotic bird species of some kind, like how we might depict a phoenix.  But it was also just a "red bird", so there is that, and perhaps that was enough.  Not that this red sparrow was "Suzaku", but evoked the idea of the southern guardian animal.  A year prior, in 680, a red bird—we aren't told what kind—had perched on a southern gate, which even more clearly screams of the Suzaku aesthetic. It is probably worth noting here that in 686, towards the end of the reign, not that anyone knew it at the time, Ohoama decided to institute a new nengo, or regnal period.  It was called Shuuchou—red or vermillion bird—and it likely referred to Suzaku.  This nengo was cut short, however, with Ohoama's death that same year.  Nengo were often chosen with auspicious names as a kind of hope for the nation, so clearly "red bird" was considered a good thing. A month after the red sparrow, Ise sent a white owl, and then a month after that, the province of Suwou sent a red turtle, which they let loose in the pond at the Shima palace.  Again, these were probably just examples of animals seen as auspicious, though they would have likely been recorded by the Onmyou-ryou, who would have likely combed through various sources and precedents to determine what kind of meaning might be attached to them. Color wasn't the only thing that was important.  In 682, the Viceroy of Tsukushi reported that they had found a sparrow with three legs.  There are numerous reasons why this could be, but there is particular significance in Japan and Asia more generally.  A three legged bird is often associated with the sun Andusually depicted as a black outline of a three legged bird inside of a red sun.  In Japan this was often conflated with the Yata-garasu, the Great Crow, which is said to have led the first mythical sovereign, Iware Biko, to victory in his conquest of Yamato.  Thus we often see a three legged crow depicted in the sun, which was an object of particular veneration for the Wa people from centuries before.  And I suspect that the little three-legged sparrow from Tsukushi  I suspect that this had particular significance because of that image. Animals were not the only auspicious things presented to the throne.  In 678, Oshinomi no Miyatsuko no Yoshimaro presented the sovereign with five auspicious stalks of rice.  Each stalk, itself, had other branches.  Rice, of course, was extremely important in Japan, both from a ritual and economic sense, so presenting rice seems appropriate.  Five stalks recalls things like the five elemental theory—and in general five was consider a good number.  Three and five are both good, prime numbers, while four, pronounced "Shi", sounds like death and is considered inauspicious.  Three, or "San" is sometimes associated with life, and five is associated with the five elements, but also just the fact that it is half of ten, and we have five fingers on one hand and in so many other ways, five is regarded as a good number in much of Asia. That the stalks had multiple branches likely referred to them bearing more than the usual amount of rice on them, which seems particularly hopeful.  Certainly the court thought so.  In light of the auspicious gift, all sentences of penal servitude and lower were remitted.  In 680, Officials of the Department of Law gave tribute of auspicious stalks of grain, themselves.  I'm not sure, in this case, that it was all that they hoped, however, as that began three days straight of rain and flooding. A year earlier, in 679, we are told that the district of Ito, in Kii, immediately south of Yamato, sent as tribute the "herb of long life".  We are told that it "resembled" a mushroom—probably meaning it was a mushroom, or maybe something formed into a mushroom shape.  But the stem was about a foot long and the crown was two spans, about 6 feet in diameter.  This is pretty incredible, and I have to wonder if there is a bit of exaggeration going on here. Another tribute was a horn found on Mt. Katsuraki.  It branched into two at the base, was united at the end, and had some flesh and hair still attached, about an inch in length.  They claimed it must be horn or a Lin, or Kirin, sometimes referred to as an Asian unicorn—a mythical creature considered to be quite auspicious and benevolent.  This was on the 26th day in the 2nd lunar month of the year 680, probably around March or April.  I highly suspect that what they found was an oddly shaped bit of antler from  a buck whose antlers had begun to come in and which might have been taken out by wolves or bears or something else altogether.  The fact that the ends were said to be fused together could just be referring to some kind of malformation of the antlers.  The fur and flesh could mean that the antlers were still growing—antlers would probably just be coming in around early spring time.  Still, there is no telling how long it was there, so it could have been from the previous year as well.  Attributing it to a kirin seems a bit of a stretch, but it was clearly something unusual. Animals and plants were recorded in tribute, but also when something odd happened.  Fruiting out of season was one such occurrence, which we've seen elsewhere in the chronicles as well.  There was even a record when the famous Tsuki tree outside of Asukadera had a branch fall down.  Presumably it was a large and noticeable branch, and by now this appears to have been a tree with a bit of age to it that had seen a lot, so it makes sense it got a mention. Finally, we go from the heavens to the earth.    Perhaps the most numerous observations in the Chronicles were the earthquakes.  We've noted in the past that Japan is extremely active, volcanically speaking, so it makes sense that there are multiple accounts of earthquakes each year, especially if they were compiling reports from around the country.  Most of these are little more than just a note that there was an earthquake, but a few stand out. The first is the 12th lunar month of 678.  We are told that there was a large earthquake in Tsukushi—modern Kyushu. The ground split open to the width of about 20 feet for more than 30,000 feet.  Many of the commoners' houses in the area were torn down.  In one place there was a house atop a hill, and though the hill crumbled down the house somehow remained intact.  The inhabitants had apparently been home and must have been oblivious, as they didn't realize anything had happened until they woke up the next morning. Again, probably a bit of hyperbole in here, but if we think back to things like the 2016 Kumamoto earthquake, where large areas of land shifted noticeably along the fault lines, it is likely that this was a similar or even more catastrophic event.  And here I'll give a quick plug for Kumamoto, which is still working to rebuild from the earthquake, and if you ever get a chance, I recommend a visit to the Kumamoto Earthquake Memorial Museum or Kioku, where you can see for yourself just how powerful mother nature can be. Another powerful earthquake was mentioned in the 10th lunar month of 684.  If the earthquake in Tsukushi had hit mostly agricultural areas, based on the description, this seems to have hit more populated regions.  We are told that it started in the dark of night, the hour of the boar, so about 10pm, give or take an hour.  The shaking was so bad that throughout the country men and women cried out and were disoriented—they could not tell east from west, a condition no doubt further hindered by the dark night sky.  There were mountain slides and rivers changed course, breaking their banks and flooding nearby areas.  Official buildings of the provinces and districts, the barns and houses of the common people, and the temples, pagodas, and shrines were all destroyed in huge numbers.  Many people and domestic animals were killed or injured.  The hot springs of Iyo were dried up and ceased to flow.  In the province of Tosa, more than 500,000 shiro of cultivated land sank below sea level.  Old men said that they had never seen such an earthquake.  On that night there was a rumbling noise like that of drums heard in the east—possibly similar to what we had mentioned earlier.  Some say that the island of Idzu, aka Vries Island, the volcanic island at the entrance of Edo Bay, increased on the north side by more than 3,000 feet and that a new island had been formed.  The noise of the drums was attributed to the gods creating that island. So here we have a catastrophic quake that impacted from Iyo, on the western end of Shikoku, all the way to the head of Edo Bay, modern Tokyo.  This appears to be what seismologists have labelled a "Nankai Trough Megathrust Earthquake".  Similar quakes have occurred and are predicted to occur in the future., along a region of Japan from the east coast of Kyushu, through the Seto Inland Sea, including Shikoku, through the Kii peninsula and all the way to Mt. Fuji.  The Nankai Trough, or Southern Sea Trough, is the area where the continental shelf drops down, and where the Philippine tectonic plate slips underneath the Eurasian—or more specifically the Amuric—plate.  As these plates move it can cause multiple events all along the trough at the same time.  Since being regularly recorded, these quakes have been noted every 100 to 150 years, with the last one being the Showa Nankai quakes of 1944 and 1946. For all of the destruction that it brought, however, apparently it didn't stop the court.  Two days after this devastating quake we are told that Presents were made to the Princes and Ministers.  Either they weren't so affected in the capital, or perhaps the date given for one of the two records is not quite reliable.  Personally, I find it hard to believe that there would be presents given out two days later unless they were some form of financial aid.  But what do I know?  It is possible that the court itself was not as affected as other areas, and they may not have fully even grasped the epic scale of the destruction that would later be described in the Chronicles, given the length of time it took to communicate messages across the country. Which brings us back to the "science" of the time, or at least the observation, hoping to learn from precedence or piece out what messages the world might have for the sovereign and those who could read the signs.  While many of the court's and Chronicler's conclusions may give us pause, today, we should nonetheless be thankful that they at least decided to keep notes and jot down their observations.  That record keeping means that we don't have to only rely on modern records to see patterns that could take centuries to reveal themselves.  Sure, at this time, those records were  still a bit spotty, but it was the start of something that would be remarkably important, and even though these Chronicles may have been focused on propaganda, the fact that they include so many other references are an incalculable boon to us, today, if we can just see to make the connections.  And with that, I think I've rambled enough for this episode.  We still have a couple more to fully cover this period. Until then, if you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website,  SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast. And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  

Infinite Plane Radio open phones 11/22/25 “The Meta Script: Hoaxes and Worldview Control” Infinite Plane Radio open phones 11/22/25 “The Meta Script: Hoaxes and Worldview Control” November 22nd, 2025The discussion centers on the "Very significant hoax-aversary" of the killing of JFK, framing it and subsequent significant public events as manufactured myths or staged simulated events (psyops) that are recycled and planned far in advance.The assassination of JFK on November 22nd is presented as a myth, not a real event, which is accepted as real because it is part of the "state religion" and its myths are considered "real". It is suggested that the event fits the template of a psyop and was directed by figures like Stanley Kubrick and John Frankenheimer.The concept of the "lone wolf assassin" has been recycled, evolving into the "lone furry" to describe recent shooters like Thomas Crooks and Tyler Robinson, suggesting nothing has fundamentally changed and that "History definitely rhymes". John Frankenheimer, director of The Manchurian Candidate (a template for the lone wolf assassin), is noted for driving RFK to the Ambassador Hotel where he was killed by a "mind controlled assassin".High-profile figures like Candace Owens are critiqued as "alt-mainstream" or "controlled opposition," disseminating predictable conspiracy theories (such as Israeli-trained assassins taking out Charlie Kirk) that are designed to be discredited, thereby tarnishing the reputation of genuine skepticism toward mainstream media. This behavior is seen as embodying the negative archetype of the "conspiracy theorist" created in the wake of the JFK assassination.Large-scale events are considered part of a long-term "meta script" where historically significant occurrences are proactively created and planned, sometimes decades in advance, to curate the collective worldview and maintain a monopoly on media. The Charlie Kirk assassination, for instance, is suggested to have been scheduled at least 27 years in advance.These simulated events follow a systemic formula involving predictive programming (foreshadowing in media), concurrent programming (related content appearing simultaneously), and reinforcement programming (the post-event echo chamber), often paralleled by concurrent drills in the exact location of the event.Quotes from the Source:"The killing of JFK is actually a myth, not a real event"."Mark Twain said, history doesn't repeat, but it rhymes. It's kind of doing both. There's a lot of recycling going on"."No, the reason why Candace Owens is the number one podcast is because this is slop. This is conspiracy slop for the masses"."The truth is they don't kill people in psyops. But they need you to believe that the person's dead"."The meta script, would be the program. It would be all of the fake events that are going to be inserted onto the real timeline".Insight Analogy:Thinking of historically significant events as elements of a "meta script" is like viewing the nightly news as episodes of a long-running, reality-bending television series. The main producers (governments, media controllers) don't just report on accidents or spontaneous events; they plan major plot twists—like assassinations or terror attacks—years in advance, ensuring that movies, sports, and popular culture (predictive/concurrent programming) have already subtly laid the foundation in the audience's mind, making the "event" feel inevitable, believable, and historically important when it finally airs.

In this episode of Peace Love Moto, we explore the idea that a motorcycle is more than just a machine—it's a passport to human connection. We look beyond the technical aspects of riding to discuss how being on two wheels makes us vulnerable, approachable, and open to the world in ways a car never could.Join me as we weave together the wisdom of travel legends Pico Iyer, Mark Twain, and Maya Angelou to understand why we ride. We discuss how travel acts as the ultimate antidote to prejudice, how to "rescue the humanity of places," and why a simple "hello" at a gas station can be the most important part of your trip.Whether you're a long-distance tourer or a weekend rider, this episode is a reminder that we are all "carrier pigeons" of culture, transporting stories and kindness wherever the road takes us. Tags: Mindfulness, Motorcycle riding, mindful motorcycling, motorcycle therapy, nature connection, peace on two wheels, Rocky Mountain tours, rider self-discovery, spiritual journey, motorcycle community, open road philosophy.

On Mother’s Day 2020, Susan Morphew vanished from her Colorado home, leaving behind a community full of questions and loved ones searching for answers. In this episode of Zone 7, Sheryl McCollum sits down with retired NYPD Sergeant and cold case expert Joe Giacalone to revisit the investigation, the early red flags, and the clues that continue to raise quesions, from the discovery of Susan’s bicycle to the inconsistencies that complicated the case. Highlights: • (0:00) Sheryl opens with the timeline of Susan Morphew’s disappearance and introduces guest Joe Giacalone • (1:30) The early facts of the case and first warning signs: missing bicycle, disabled surveillance cameras, and a Mother’s Day that went unnoticed • (2:00) The 911 call from a neighbor and Barry Morphew's arrival at the scene • (5:45) Inconsistencies in Barry's statements and the odor of chlorine in his hotel room • (9:30) Digital breadcrumbs: truck data, phone records, and deleted text messages • (10:30) The tranquilizer dart, the “chipmunk” story, and the forensic evidence found in the Morphew’s dryer • (16:45) The recovery of Susan's remains and what investigators believe it reveals• (19:00) Barry's behavior raises more questions: his calm demeanor, the sale of Susan's truck, and the discovery of the spy pen that exposed her affair • (26:00) How public pressure, social media, and speculation can influence a case • (28:00) Joe closes with a Mark Twain quote that captures what Barry Morphew failed to grasp: “It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.” Guest Bio: Joe Giacalone is a retired NYPD Sergeant and former Commanding Officer of the Bronx Cold Case Squad. He serves as an adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and is the author of The Criminal Investigative Function: A Guide for New Investigators and The Cold Case Handbook. Giacalone also hosts True Crime with the Sarge and is a frequent media commentator on criminal investigations. Enjoying Zone 7? Leave a rating and review where you listen to podcasts. Your feedback helps others find the show and supports the mission to educate, engage, and inspire. Preorder Sheryl’s upcoming book, Swans Don’t Swim in a Sewer: Lessons in Life, Justice, and Joy from a Forensic Scientist, releasing May 2026 from Simon and Schuster. https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Swans-Dont-Swim-in-a-Sewer/Sheryl-Mac-McCollum/9798895652824 Sheryl “Mac” McCollum is an active crime scene investigator for a Metro Atlanta Police Department and the director of the Cold Case Investigative Research Institute, which partners with colleges and universities nationwide. With more than 4 decades of experience, she has worked on thousands of cold cases using her investigative system, The Last 24/361, which integrates evidence, media, and advanced forensic testing. Her work on high-profile cases, including The Boston Strangler, Natalie Holloway, Tupac Shakur and the Moore’s Ford Bridge lynching, earned her an Emmy Award for CSI: Atlanta and induction into the National Law Enforcement Hall of Fame in 2023. Social Links: Email: coldcase2004@gmail.com Twitter: @ColdCaseTips• Facebook: @sheryl.mccollum Instagram: @officialzone7podcast See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Host Joy reflects on a Mark Twain–style insight: good decisions come from experience, and experience comes from mistakes. She encourages listeners not to spiral over imperfect homes or unmet goals, but to find gratitude in the lessons and the life they have. Through a short, heartfelt message before Thanksgiving, Joy invites you to slow down, savor messy real moments, and celebrate the growth, community, and small joys that make life meaningful. Connect with Me! Community: https://bit.ly/joylovinghomecommunity Membership: https://joylovinghome.com/membership Email: joy@joylovinghome.com IG: https://instagram.com/joylovinghome Website: https://joylovinghome.com  

It's not quite accurate to say that Hester Kaplan's father Justin Kaplan was a man of few words because Justin Kaplan was a man of many. His first book, a biography of Mark Twain published in 1966, won both the Pulitzer and the National Book Award, a debut that ensured Kaplan would enjoy a long and prestigious career as an author and editor. It was an idyllic life in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that he shared with his wife Anne Bernays, also a novelist, and their three daughters.But Hester doesn't remember her father ever looking her in the eyes or letting any of his three kids call him ‘Dad,' not out of any cruelty or neglect, but more of a mysterious inability to go there. Hester remembers the steady clickety clack of his typing behind the study door as a child as he wrote, his quiet retreat in a household filled with estrogen, and craved the connection over his own memories of growing up that were never revealed.Even after Hester became an author herself, she had never read any of her father's work - nor had he read hers. But after his death in 2014, Hester embarked on a new book, TWICE BORN: Finding My Father in the Margins of Biography (available now), wherein she biographs the biographer, unearthing not only the parallels between Joe/Justin's interior life and those of the literary giants he memorialized, but also finds intimacy in her memories of a surprisingly tender man who eschewed sentimentality but nevertheless always had a chestnut for the people he loved. Here's more of my conversation with Hester Kaplan. Get full access to Tell Me About Your Father at tellmeaboutyourfather.substack.com/subscribe

Why do boys love adventure?Mark Twain said, “There comes a time in every rightly constructed boy's life that he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure.”The search for adventure drives some boys to video games, where they can conquer kingdoms and gain virtual accolades.  Others find their adventures in sports.But deep down, the call of the woods, the wild, the mountains and the seashore live deep in all young boys.You can feed that desire and strengthen the bond with your son at the same time.  Take him on a wilderness adventure, or hike to a waterfall, or camp in the woods by a crackling fire amidst the lightning bugs.  Lead him on his adventure!For information about raising your son into a godly man, visit Trail Life USA or RaisingGodlyBoys.com.

Send us a textJoin us starting November 25, 2025 for a Christmas Holidays Special 16th Season as we venture into new territory. Over the end of November and through out December we will spend 16 episodes looking at the Great American Authors, From F. Scott Fitzgerald to Stephen King and all points in between. We hope you will join us as we take a little break from American Political History and take a deep dive into American Literature, its history, and learn some writing tips from some of the greatest authors our country has ever produced. This sixteen episode season will feature F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edgar Allan Poe, Dr. Suess, John Steinbeck, Thomas Wolfe, Mark Twain, Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Harper Lee, J. D. Salinger, Margaret Mitchell, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, William Faulkner, Ian Fleming, J. K Rowling, Pat Conroy, Gene Hackman, Kurt Vonnegut, Walter Mosley, Lee Child, Stephen King, John Grisham, Joyce Carol Oats, Sinclair Lewis, Tennessee Williams, Ernest Hemingway, Jimmy Carter, Marilyn Quayle,  Newt Gingrich, Bill Clinton, James Patterson, and the announcement about our hosts own three books, a history companion book to this podcast, and two novels by Randal Wallace. We hope you will join us starting November 25 for The Great American Authors Special Season and Bob Dole will return in "Bob Dole The Life That Brought Him There" in January, 2026. Questions or comments at , Randalrgw1@aol.com , https://twitter.com/randal_wallace , and http://www.randalwallace.com/Please Leave us a review at wherever you get your podcastsThanks for listening!!

Deutsch lernen mit einem schrecklich übertriebenen Aufsatz von Mark Twain. Humorvoll durch und durch. Ich lese dir den extrem vereinfachten Text vor, erkläre ihn, sage dir "Mark Twains" RICHTIGEN Namen und wir machen eine Wiederholungslektion der wichtigsten Wörter und Phrasen. PDF und Wörterliste verfügbar. Das PDF gibt es hier: PDF 3 Ways to Support Us: 1. Join us, reach levels A1 + A2 and get hooked on learning German 2. Get ad-free episodes on Apple Podcasts 3. Buy us a cup of coffee via PayPal

Diesmal geht's nach St. Petersburg, einem kleinen Städtchen am Mississippi, wo Tom Sawyer, Becky Thatcher und Huckleberry Finn ihre Streiche treiben. Für das Familienstück zur Weihnachtszeit nach Mark Twains berühmten Roman verwandelt sich die frisch sanierte Bühne des Kleinen Hauses in ein riesiges Wimmelbild. Wie zaubern Theatermaler*innen und Plastiker*innen ein ganzes Dorf auf die Bühne? Wie viele Töne Blau, Gelb oder Rot können sie in ihrer „Farbküche“ mixen? Und warum begeistern die Abenteuer von Tom Sawyer Klein und Groß? Fragen an Schauspieler Stefan Schuster, Ramona Greifenstein, Leiterin des Malsaals am Staatstheater Darmstadt und Intendant Karsten Wiegand. Podcast-Host Mariela Milkowa wollte auch von ihnen wissen, wie es sich anfühlt, endlich wieder im Kleinen Haus zu spielen. Infos & Tickets Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today, we explore the world through phrases. Not just any phrases, but aphorisms – those short sentences with the power to stop us in our tracks, cause us to rethink how we see things, and even make better decisions. I'm joined by James Geary, author of the newly re-released book, The World in a Phrase: A Brief History of the Aphorism. James is a lecturer at Harvard's Kennedy School. James is also a self-confessed 'aphorism addict', and he studied the history of what he calls the world's oldest written art form. As you will hear, aphorisms transcend culture and historical periods. And James's work and this conversation refer to the likes of Lao Tzu, the ancient Greeks, through to Mark Twain, and modern figures like Wynton Marsalis and Brian Eno. From a decision-making lens, aphorisms have potency as heuristics. When we think about modern challenges, James explains that they can help us so very much, particularly as AI is taking over the written word and threatening to reduce our cognitive load to zero. Show notes: James' website The World in a Phrase: A Brief History of the Aphorism James on Instagram James on Blue Sky Stanisław Lec Yogi Berra The I Ching G.K Chesteron Cyril Connolly Brian Eno Wynton Marsalis Clet Abraham Steven Wright Brian Wilson Josh Billings Eric Jarosinski Joseph Joubert _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Like what you heard? Check out: The Decision-Making Studio: https://thedecisionmaking.studio/ The Decision-Making Studio Podcast: https://thedecisionmaking.studio/podcast

Hello to you listening in Victoria, Texas!Coming to you from Whidbey Island, Washington this is Stories From Women Who Walk with 60 Seconds for Story Prompt Friday on Whidbey and your host, Diane Wyzga.Maybe like me you're familiar with the line, “Everything old is new again.” Some attribute the saying to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, to Jonathan Swift in the 1700s, or to Churchill, Mark Twain, or even a Chinese proverb.  Genesis aside, what does the saying mean?  In brief, old patterns, music, items, ideas, and so on come around again to inspire new forms. Like this example from Ben Tuna, the Glass Cowboy, a second-generation stained glass artist. His most recent creation involves a vintage Porsche (scorched by the fires in Los Angeles) and windows salvaged from decommissioned churches.To quote from the Glass Cowboy website: “By merging sacred architecture with the burned-out shell of an icon of speed and design, Ben explores the tension between ruin and reverence. These windows, once still in chapels and cathedrals, now move - reframed in steel, placed in motion, and carried forward by a new purpose.This body of work asks: What survives disaster. What beauty do we carry with us. And how can broken things be reborn, not as what they were—but as something entirely new.”Click HERE to learn more  Click HERE to contact Ben Tuna at Glass Vision StudioClick HERE to follow Glass Cowboy on InstagramStory Prompt: What in your life has survived disaster? What beauty still remains? How might you imagine what's broken being reborn as something entirely new?  Write that story and tell it out loud!You're always welcome: "Come for the stories - Stay for the magic!" Speaking of magic, I hope you'll subscribe, share a 5-star rating and nice review on your social media or podcast channel of choice, bring your friends and rellies, and join us! You will have wonderful company as we continue to walk our lives together. Be sure to stop by my Quarter Moon Story Arts website, check out the Communication Services, arrange a no-obligation Discovery Call, and stay current with me as "Wyzga on Words" on Substack.Stories From Women Who Walk Production TeamPodcaster: Diane F Wyzga & Quarter Moon Story ArtsMusic: Mer's Waltz from Crossing the Waters by Steve Schuch & Night Heron MusicALL content and image © 2019 to Present Quarter Moon Story Arts. All rights reserved.  If you found this podcast episode helpful, please consider sharing and attributing it to Diane Wyzga of Stories From Women Who Walk podcast with a link back to the original source.

A major political player faces charges of public corruption. Breaking down the drama around the Stockton City Council. Famed actor Richard Thomas plays Mark Twain in Modesto. Finally, a long-lost Ukrainian symphony makes its U.S. debut.

Premillennial vs postmillennial, why your end‑times Interpretation shapes policy, protest, and faith. Alan Smith and Jeff Rowland walk through Revelation 20, Daniel 9, and key Old Testament patterns, then make the case for a dispensational, Pretribulation Rapture. They contrast amillennial and postmillennial readings, discuss Israel, the two‑state policy debate, Mark Twain's report on a barren Jerusalem, Ezekiel's future temple, and the abomination of desolation. Clear, Bible‑first reasoning, plain language, no fluff. Watch to learn:  * How starting points in Scripture change your view of the millennium  * Why a literal reading leads to a premillennial timeline  * How end‑times doctrine influences modern foreign policy  * Why Israel and the church are distinct in this Interpretation Subscribe for the next episodes on the rapture, tribulation, and the millennial reign. Website: kingdompropheticsociety.org Daily podcast: smithandrowlandshow.podbean.com Also on Amazon, Apple, and Spotify #Premillennialism #Pretribulation #Rapture #Eschatology #Israel

We explore how Mark Twain's writing, not his public persona, teaches a demanding civic balance: democratic equality joined to a living culture of excellence. Through Huck Finn and Connecticut Yankee, we trace how humor, empathy, and imagination form judgment without sliding into cynicism.• distinguishing Twain the persona from the unified teaching in the work• equality, liberty and the cultivation of greatness in tension• Connecticut Yankee as a parable of science, soul and trade-offs• Huck and Jim's shared fate and moral growth• literature as civic education and imagination-building• satire that critiques pretension while honoring the noble• teaching Twain in class through short forms and humor• America 250 as a moment to reread Twain• patriotism as rededication, not reflex; moderation over hubris• warnings against technocratic certainty and the loss of the humanListeners, I will be putting a ton of links into the show notes to make sure that everything that we've talked about is available, as well as Dr. Dobski's books.  The Arizona Constitution ProjectCheck Out Our Free Lessons on Arizona History and Government!Follow us on:TwitterLinked InInstagramFacebookYouTubeWebsiteInterested in a Master's Degree? Check out the School of Civic and Economic Leadership's Master's in Classical Liberal Education and Leadership

It is very hard for me to believe it but the 2025 edition of WestEdge is almost here. This will be the 10th edition of the show and I am so excited to share the slate of talks taking place this year in the WestEdge Theater Presented By Pacific Sales! But, I'm not going to do it here because our time here is limited. But I have an idea. I am going to link all of the programs and the times in the show notes. So, you can make your plans accordingly. Today on the show, you are going to hear from Megan Reilly, co-founder of WestEdge and my dear friend, Kim Gordon of Kim Gordon Designs. Kim is joined by Julia Demarco, who together designed the WestEdge Theater Presented by Pacific Sales. We talk about the inspiration that went into the theater design, the how and they why. You are going to love this. Designer Resources Pacific Sales Kitchen and Home. Where excellence meets expertise. Design Hardware - A stunning and vast collection of jewelry for the home! TimberTech - Real wood beauty without the upkeep LOME-AI.com, simple, inexpensive, text to video harnessing the power of AI to grow your firm, beautifully. Before we get into it, I have something really special to share with you. Something special with a WestEdge connection. My friend, and longtime friend of the show Anthony Laney of Laney LA sent me a copy of the new monograph, Poetics of Home; Essays and Spaces by Laney LA. And so, I want to share a special installment of BOOKLOOK. BookLook - Anthony Laney, Laney LA: Poetics of Home Avialable from Oscar Riera Ojeda Publishers: Order Here.  “ Laney LA's work embodies a distinctly Southern California spirit - the blur between indoors and out, the layering of experiences, the quiet merger of minimalism and sensuality. - Sam Lubell . This is from the foreword of Laney LA's book, Poetics of Home. The book is available through Oscar Riera Ojeda Publishers. Before I tell you about the book, let me tell you about my friend Anthony Laney. Laney and I first bonded on the show over a project of his in Manhattan Beach, home for me. This project had a disappearing pool, which was very cool, but it was't the cool factor of a pool that disappeared below a functional outdoor space. It was the “why” behind its installment. The South Bay in Los Angeles is known for very expensive homes on very small lots. The underground pool is very cool but more than that, it represents something very special about Anthony and his namesake firm. This was a solution to a challenge. The client wanted this space and the home designed for the site. But they also wanted a yard for the family to enjoy the very unique exterior environment. Mark Twain said it best, “Buy land, they're not making It anymore”. It takes a very special mind to craft something that literally makes more functional space on the same site. If you want to understand the thought process and the ethos of this unique firm, Poetics of Home shows you what's behind the walls, and under the deck. But Laney LA has another challenge. This was their debut monograph and just like a smash hit record, it will be very difficult to match or exceed. So, let's focus on this one. “Craft is where intention becomes tangible” - Anthony Laney My favorite quote from the book because it is so simple and true. 6 words that succinctly define the motive. If you are anything like me, with regard to design and architecture, the story behind the design is equally important to form and function. Because the industry still speaks about architecture in terms of form and function. Yeah, it' important. However, when you minimize something to simply how it looks and why it does, you can't fully explore the intangibles. The way a space makes you feel. If you've never been to LA's South Bay, you don't know what Manhattan Beach smells like in August. Sunscreen and salt air, the scent of grilled meat and citrus. Or, what it sounds like during the Charlie Saikley 6-Man Beach Volleyball Tourn...

To borrow from Mark Twain, “bad news can travel halfway around the world, while good news is still putting on its shoes.” When an influential believer falls into sin, it seems like we hear about it at the speed of light. But how do we reach out to someone who’s helped us, when they’re the ones who need help? Pastor Greg Laurie answers that question today on A NEW BEGINNING. We’re considering a story about Noah in the book of Genesis. This godly man sinned. But we can learn from this biblical account. Looking for hope or know someone who is? Join Greg Laurie at the Harvest Crusade: Hope for America on November 16! Get event information here. — Become a Harvest Partner today and join us in knowing God and making Him known through media and large-scale evangelism, our mission of over 30 years. Explore more resources from Pastor Greg Laurie, including daily devotionals and blogs, designed to answer your spiritual questions and equip you to walk closely with Christ.Support the show: https://bit.ly/anbsupportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

To borrow from Mark Twain, “bad news can travel halfway around the world, while good news is still putting on its shoes.” When an influential believer falls into sin, it seems like we hear about it at the speed of light. But how do we reach out to someone who’s helped us, when they’re the ones who need help? Pastor Greg Laurie answers that question today on A NEW BEGINNING. We’re considering a story about Noah in the book of Genesis. This godly man sinned. But we can learn from this biblical account. Looking for hope or know someone who is? Join Greg Laurie at the Harvest Crusade: Hope for America on November 16! Get event information here. — Become a Harvest Partner today and join us in knowing God and making Him known through media and large-scale evangelism, our mission of over 30 years. Explore more resources from Pastor Greg Laurie, including daily devotionals and blogs, designed to answer your spiritual questions and equip you to walk closely with Christ.Support the show: https://bit.ly/anbsupportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On Lit with Charles, we usually dive into novels, short stories, and poetry - but in this episode, we're doing something a little radical. From the longest literary forms to one of the shortest: the aphorism.An aphorism is a short, striking statement - often just a line or two - that captures a deep universal truth. It's a form beloved by some of history's greatest minds: Oscar Wilde, Mark Twain, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Friedrich Nietzsche, to name a few.Today's guest, James Geary, is an American writer and lifelong devotee of this deceptively simple art. From his early fascination with language to his career as an editor at Time magazine and later as a lecturer at Harvard, James has explored the timeless power of the aphorism - those brief sentences that linger far longer than they last. His works include The World in a Phrase: A Brief History of the Aphorism and Wit's End: What Wit Is, How It Works, and Why We Need It.We talk about what makes an aphorism work, why brevity can sometimes reveal more than verbosity, and how these tiny truths continue to shape how we think and write.I loved this conversation - it's a thoughtful, witty, and illuminating dive into the distilled essence of language. I hope you enjoy it too.If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a review — it really helps others discover the podcast. You can also follow me on Instagram @litwithcharles for more book recommendations and literary discussions.Let's get more people listening — and reading!James Geary's four books were:Reader's DigestWalden, Henry David Thoreau (1854)I Ching (c. 1000 – 750 BCE)Ulysses, James Joyce (1920)

In this episode, Michael Shermer explores anomalous experiences through personal anecdotes and historical examples. He reflects on how to balance healthy skepticism with open-mindedness, and how to reckon with the very real emotional significance of such experiences—regardless of the scientific explanations behind them.

The conversation around herd rebuilding has been brewing all year — but is it actually happening? Senior Beef Industry Analyst Lance Zimmerman with Rabo Research (Rabobank) joins me to break down what the data really says about heifer retention and the pace of this rebuild. We'll look at how recent market disruptions and global trade chatter have shaped producer confidence, what the numbers reveal about the strength of the cow herd, and how long this upcycle could last. Then, we'll wrap with a bit of Mark Twain wisdom that reminds us to stay humble and intentional as we plan for the future — in both our markets and our ranches. #workingranchmagazine #ranchlife #ranching #dayweather #weather #agweather #beef #cows #livestock #cattle #Allflex #Neogen #IngentyBeef #TankToad #WorkingRanchRadio #BeefCattle #CowCalf #CattleManagement #Cattlemen #Livestock #BeefProduction #RanchProfitability #RanchEconomics #CattleHealth #Ranchers #AgPodcast #RuralAmerica #HeiferRetention #HerdRebuilding #BeefMarkets #CowHerdExpansion #LanceZimmerman #RaboResearch

Who is Andrea?Andrea Stenberg is a social media whiz who really knows her stuff when it comes to video marketing. She loves helping business owners figure out how to use video to get noticed online and turn viewers into customers. Andrea's all about sharing simple, practical tips that actually work, no jargon or tech headaches. As a guest on “It's Not Rocket Science: Five Questions Over Coffee,” Andrea brings her friendly vibe and tons of helpful advice for anyone looking to grow their business with video.Key Takeaways00:00 “Aligning Video with Brand Strategy”04:45 Building Trust Through Videos07:39 Authentic Video Marketing with AI11:25 Authentic Video Outperforms Polished Content17:21 “Start Marketing with Video”21:23 Instagram & LinkedIn Content Strategies22:29 Challenges of Creating Short Videos25:53 Improving Videos Through Feedback_________________________________________________________________________________________________Subscribe to our newsletter and get details of when we are doing these interviews live at www.systemise.me/subscribeFind out more about being a guest at : link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/beaguestSubscribe to the podcast at https://link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/podcastHelp us get this podcast in front of as many people as possible. Leave a nice five-star review at apple podcasts : https://link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/apple-podcasts and on YouTube : https://link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/Itsnotrocketscienceatyt!Do You Need a P.A.T.H. to Scale?We help established business owners with small but growing teams:go from feeling stuck, sceptical, and tired of wasting time and money on false promises,to running a confident, purpose-driven business where their team delivers results, customers are happy, and they can finally enjoy more time with their family -with a results-based refund guarantee: if you follow the process and it doesn't work, we refund what you paid.This is THE P.A.T.H. to scale your business.————————————————————————————————————————————-TranscriptNote, this was transcribed using a transcription software and may not reflect the exact words used in the podcast)SUMMARY KEYWORDSvideo marketing, social media video, lead generation, customer conversions, coaches, course creators, healers, expertise marketing, personal branding, seat of your pants marketing, marketing strategy, brand consistency, going viral, target audience, client journey, personalized videos, AI in video, video editing tools, video content repurposing, audience trust, showing up on camera, authentic video, video length, LinkedIn Live, Instagram Reels, closed captions, video accessibility, video engagement, video production quality, content funnel, repurposing contentSPEAKERSAndrea Stenberg, Stuart WebbStuart Webb [00:00:00]:Hi, and welcome back to It's Not Rocket Science. Five questions over coffee. The important thing here is the coffee. And I want to really welcome Andrea, Andrea Stenberg, who's going to talk to us about the importance of doing a video in your social media and helping us to increase our lead generation and help us to increase our customer conversions by using effective video in, in lead generation. So, Andrea, welcome to It's Not Rocket Science. Five questions over coffee. And I hope you're ready to give us some pearls of wisdom.Andrea Stenberg [00:01:08]:Oh, thank you, Stuart. Thanks for having me.Stuart Webb [00:01:11]:So let's start by trying to understand exactly who, who, who the who, who the people are that you help with understanding how to use video better. And how do you, how, how you understand what their needs are?Stuart Webb [00:01:25]:Well, I, I work with coaches, course creators, healers, anyone who's selling sort of what's up here, their expertise and their knowledge. And they're usually people who are really good at what they do and they're really passionate about helping people. In fact, they're almost more passionate about helping people than they are about growing their business. But they're also serious about growing their business. And one of the things that that happens is, you know, they've learned along the way that video is becoming really important and they understand that video is important. So they've started using video, but they don't really know what they're doing. So what happens is like, so they've got over here, their website, their social media, their emails, all their marketing is kind of professional and branded. And then they put their video and it's over here and it almost looks like they're not even coming from the same business because they've just kind of added it on.Stuart Webb [00:02:22]:And they're doing what I call seat of your pants marketing, where they're just, when they, you know, on the rare occasions they have a few spare minutes, they do a video because, and they model it on somebody else's. But they don't really figure, haven't really figured out where it fits in their marketing and really is, I want your marketing and your video to like work together seamlessly like this so that they all support each other, they all work together, they all look like they're from the same business and they're all sharing a similar message. And so that's, you know, that's, that's who I work with. And that's my, my end goal for everybody is to have their video and their, the rest of their marketing all working seamlessly together.Stuart Webb [00:03:05]:You've kind of already Excuse me, you've already sort of answered the second part of my question which is, you know, we, you're right, we're all, we're all very aware of the fact that video is really important in, in marketing nowadays because it starts to help to sort of demonstrate who you are as a person. And you know, we have to remember at the end of the day even big businesses buy people. So, so what is it you've seen people do that perhaps doesn't quite gel? You've sort of talked about the website not looking the same as the video or the video somehow not looking as if it's coming from. What are some of those things that people have done that you've sort of spotted potential problems for them?Stuart Webb [00:03:42]:Well, I mean some of the problems is like, so everybody gets focused on the idea of going viral and I want to go viral and get discovered. And yes, part of video is getting discovered. But for most coaches, course creators, consultants, healers, going viral is actually not good for your business. For example, I had a video that went viral like it didn't get millions of people but it was like easily 10 times my normal viewership of videos. And the interesting thing was the vast majority of this new audience were 18 to 24 year old boys. And they're not my target audience, they're not going to be a customer of mine. Like I don't know why they liked this video but you know, like it was not really of any business value to me that these 18 year old boys were liking this video. So, so going viral, like yes, it's nice to be discovered but it's if you're being discovered by the wrong people, that doesn't help you.Stuart Webb [00:04:45]:The other thing about that is when people come into your world like they don't just hear of you today and become a customer today. I mean sometimes that happens but usually there's a process and there's a journey where people have to get to know like and trust you and, and that's where video becomes really powerful because not just from being discovered, but as people are getting closer and closer to making that decision, to becoming your client, you can build that trust. You can let them see that you have some expertise. They can, you can get them to experience what it might be like to work with you in a completely non threatening way. So if you're posting a video on LinkedIn or YouTube, somebody doesn't even have to give you their email address to watch your video. So it's a very low risk on their part to get a taste of what it's like to work with you. And then, of course, you know, once people get closer to becoming a client. For example, one of my favorite strategies is you can do personalized videos that you create one video for one person and you can say, hey, Stuart, I really enjoyed talking with you.Stuart Webb [00:05:52]:I just wanted to remind you about A, B and C and send a video to them and that, you know, really creates that. Wow, that's. This person really heard me. This person is really interested in me. And look, they sent me a video just for me. So there's lots of different places where you can use video, not just at the top of the funnel of just getting discovered by new people. And I think that's. That's the biggest change that people can make is start incorporating it into all the stages of your marketing, not just at the beginning.Stuart Webb [00:06:27]:I think that's a very, very, very, very interesting way of doing things because I've. I've seen and done similar things where. And that personalization, even if that video that you create for that one person is, you know, it's just their name and everything else is exactly the same to something you sent to somebody else, they feel it's theirs, don't they? Because you can't create a video easily without putting some effort in and making it very personal to them. We ought to just sort of COVID off the AI thing because is that something that you think AI generated videos are helping or hindering in these respects?Stuart Webb [00:07:08]:Well, I mean, for people who I work with. So, like, for example, if you're a coach or a healer, like, say you're a healer and you're going to help me make my child healthier or do better at school or whatever that you do. I need to trust you a lot, Especially if it's about my child. Like, if it's about me, I might be willing to take some risk. But if it's my child, I want to trust you a lot. And having an AI video like that doesn't build any connection to me. Whereas. But AI is useful.Stuart Webb [00:07:39]:But I really think if you're an expert and you're sharing your expertise and you work closely with your clients and they need to trust you, I think there's real power in getting your face on camera, getting your voice, letting people hear your enthusiasm, your passion for your industry, and getting a taste of what it's like to work with you. So having an AI avatar do the talking for you, I think is not going to help you grow your business. That being said, there are lots of ways you can Use AI as part of your video marketing. For example, I have a video editing tool that I use that creates a transcript so that instead of editing video, you actually edit the transcript. And when you delete a sentence in the transcript, it deletes it from the video. That's AI but it's like, it's still me, I'm just editing what I said. Or the same AI, you can go in and say, put in a 15 minute video and say, pull out five 30 second clips that I can share on social media. It's still my words.Stuart Webb [00:08:46]:It's just doing it for me. So it's kind of like having an assistant rather than, than, you know, AI creating everything. So I, I am very, very passionate about the idea of people showing up on camera, showing their faces. And you know, I, I sometimes get pushback from people saying they don't want to. And it's like, you know what? I, I don't like being on camera either. I'm, you know, I'm pushing 60, I'm not as thin. I have, you know, gray hair and wrinkles like everybody else. But you know what, my ideal clients don't care about that.Stuart Webb [00:09:17]:What they care about is how I can help them. And that's the same with anybody watching this. Your ideal clients ultimately don't really care that much about what you look like. It's like, how can you help them and do they trust you enough that you can actually do the things you say and video is really the thing that's going to help you?Stuart Webb [00:09:33]:I think you've got a valid point actually, Andrew. And you know, to an extent, I can remember talking to one consultant who actually said, at long last, I've got the gray hairs. Because now it looks like I've got the experience to help you rather than just having the experience to help you. So sometimes those gray hairs and wrinkles are really helpful and useful. Andrea, let's, let's move on to your, the way that you can help people. You've given us an offer that we've put into our vault at Systemize Me Free Stuff. What, what's the offer that you've got available for people if they go there and they, they read about this?Stuart Webb [00:10:09]:Well, the number one question I get from people is, okay, I get video is important, but what do I say? And it goes back to what, you know, what I said earlier about having that, that kind of funnel is you want to have videos for each stage. And so I have, I have a free guide that's called this seven Essential Videos for Explosive Growth. And it is, it's seven videos that are for different stages of a client, of the client journey. And if you follow that, you will create seven videos that speak to people in different stages of that journey. And then, you know, if you do one video a week, that's two months worth of videos you've created following this guide.Stuart Webb [00:10:53]:One video a week is so easy to do as well, isn't it? Let's face it, I mean I've, I've had a, I've had a look myself and they are not, these are not, these are not very difficult videos to create, are they? You're not, you're not telling people they need to book a studio or go and spend time learning how to be a professional presenter. This is how normal people, I'd like to consider myself normal. Normal people can just do these things in a very simple way just to get themselves started, even if they don't, even if they don't have all of the necessary professional equipment.Stuart Webb [00:11:25]:Well, and what's really interesting is there's actually lots of data now that shows that if your video is too polished and too well edited and too slick looking, they actually perform worse than somebody taking their cell phone and holding it up and, and talking and walking and it's jiggly and it's not perfect. And I think the reason is we're all used to, you know, commercials. As soon as a commercial comes up on television, what do you do? You get up and you go get a snack or you go and, and go use the, the, the facilities or you do any commercial. So when you're on, on social media, if you see something that feels like a commercial, your blinders go up and you go, no, I'm not going to listen to that. But if you get on camera and it's not perfect and you make a mistake or you stumble over a word, people go, this is a real person.Stuart Webb [00:12:20]:Do you know we've had a comment in from Derek. Derek's another video person I know, and he said, he's just said AI videos are great and can be personalized. What love said. But it's still easy to insert. Some of you, it's the dynamic captions that annoy the heck out of me. And I think Derek's got a point there. You're talking about the fact that we need to be us on those videos, don't you? You're saying that having the jiggliness sometimes just shows that you're a human being and you're still relatable. And that's the really key thing to making your video hit home with people.Stuart Webb [00:12:53]:And I've even seen, like, you know, Tony Robbins was doing video back when we were still using VHS to watch video. And I've seen him now online doing videos where he's clearly holding the cell phone and speaking to the cell phone. So even, you know, somebody who has been doing video for decades is recognizing that sometimes this off the cuff, just speaking to your audience, speaking from your heart, sharing a message resonates better than a really polished professional done in a studio. And all the flashy bells and whistles, sometimes those, those convert better.Stuart Webb [00:13:30]:So, Andrea, tell us how you, how you got to who you are. Was there a book or a course or something which sort of, which you used as a way to sort of help you to understand how video marketing was going to help your business grow?Stuart Webb [00:13:45]:Well, it's kind of. I felt really long and hard about this question because there's lots of things that got me to where I am and when I started learning video, because as a marketing professional, I knew my. I had to learn it for me so that I could help my clients figure it out. And there, there wasn't a lot available, but I came across, I think it was about 20, 20, 19. Somebody had an ad online for a course and it was going to be like, learn how to do video. And I was like, oh, yay, I'm going to get support, I'm going to get coaching, I'm going to get accountability. And I swear, I think my credit card was smoking. I pulled it out of my wal about to pay for this course.Stuart Webb [00:14:27]:And then imagine my crushing defeat when I opened up the course and the course was a PDF with 30 topics to do. When I went live every day for 30 days and the hashtag to you to post with my videos, I was like, this wasn't what I was looking for. But I went live every day for 30 days, including one day I was at my sister visiting my sisters. And the only place in the house that was quiet enough was. Was the bathroom. And I sounded like I was at the bottom of the toilet because it was all echoey. It was terrible. And so at the end of that, I thought, well, okay, if I can do that.Stuart Webb [00:15:05]:Okay, so I'm not scared of being on video because, like, that was bad. And I did it. I didn't die of embarrassment. Nobody threw virtual tomatoes at me. Like, it was fine. But I still didn't have a strategy. So I had to spend. I spent the next year being very UN Canadian.Stuart Webb [00:15:22]:I started like If I saw people doing interesting things with video, I would like message them. Can we get on zoom? Can we get on the phone? I'd like to pick your brain and what you're doing. And I just like, sort of, I just spent time talking to people and looking at people and just trial and error and learning from people because there wasn't really good guidance back then for how to use video as marketing. And so it kind of. But then the other thing, other side about it is video marketing. While it. It is different, it's actually still the same principles as offline marketing. And, you know, a lot of times I have older entrepreneurs come to me and say, well, I don't know if I can do video because I'm not a digital native.Stuart Webb [00:16:05]:I didn't grow up with this stuff. And I was just, you know, what? If you have the knowledge and the skills to talk to people and talk to customers and. And find out what their pain points are and talk to them about how you can help them, all you have to do is learn which buttons to push on video, because it's the same skill set because you're still talking to human beings. And that's. That's really the most important part.Stuart Webb [00:16:31]:Yeah, absolutely, Andrea. That there's a. There's a sense in which I'm sure that you've sort of got a question at the moment which you're wondering why I haven't asked yet. And I'm sure that that question is the one that you sort of really will help us to sort of to nail what the next step is or something. So I don't have that question because I've got to admit, I haven't thought that deeply about it. But you have got a question that you think I should ask. So what's the question that I should have asked you by now? And therefore, once you've asked it, you can have to answer it for us.Stuart Webb [00:17:05]:Well, earlier when I said you want to take your. Your marketing and your videos and make them work together, like, you know, a handshake. It's like, well, how do you do that when you're busy and, you know, busy entrepreneurship?Stuart Webb [00:17:19]:I like the question very much.Stuart Webb [00:17:21]:And so my answer is what I like, you know, people to do is turn their marketing on its head and start with video. So if you start with one video that has your message, has your voice, has your face, you start with the video and then repurpose that video. So you take your video and then you're repurposing it into a bunch of other Content. And you can do it quickly, you can do it easily, AI can help you, but it still sounds like you because you started with your words, your ideas, your voice. So, for example, you take a transcript of your video that you created and turn it into an email or a blog post, or do some LinkedIn posts based on content that you've created. And, and that does a number of things. I mean, first of all, it saves you time because you're starting with your words and then you're just recreating it. The second thing is one of the fundamental marketing principles is people need to hear the same message over and over again.Stuart Webb [00:18:27]:That's why, like, if you're watching commercial television, the advertisers don't make a commercial play at once and they never play it again. They play it over and over until we're sick of it because it takes that long for us to remember it. So if you take a video and then maybe you do an email or a blog post, then you do a LinkedIn post and maybe a LinkedIn carousel post, that's all on the same messaging. People start recognize it, remembering it. And sometimes they may even think, oh, I've heard that before. That Stuart must be really smart because I've heard that before, even though they heard it from you. So it's the repetition and the different formats that help. So that's, that's for me, is if you start with the video and then build from there, but using, you know, the same basic messaging, you can speed up your marketing.Stuart Webb [00:19:15]:You can make your, make it easier for you and more effective.Stuart Webb [00:19:21]:Brilliant. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. I love it. Andrea. I mean, you've left us with what can only be described as the action for the rest of the day. We. Which is to do that, start with video and take that first step and go, go live.Stuart Webb [00:19:37]:I mean, you're right. It didn't kill you to go live 30 times in 30 days. Nobody is yet violently objected to me going live on video. Although personally I have. But that's another story. Andrea, thank you so much for encouraging us to sort of go and do these things and really make it happen. I think it's brilliant that you're pushing this message. I wish more people were taking it on board.Stuart Webb [00:20:00]:And I'm just going to ask people if they would value, like Derek was earlier, being alive and listening to us live, talking. If you can go to www.systemize.me, subscribe, that takes you to a simple form which allows you to actually just ask for my email once a week where I Send you who's coming up so that you can do like Derek, join and listen to the comments that are being made. We've got, we've got other people here talking as well and I'm just going to share these you Andrea, so that you can answer them. Derek, what is the sweet spot regarding video length?Stuart Webb [00:20:38]:That is a fabulous question. It's one of my most common questions and my answer is a terrible answer. And it's terrible because the answer truly is. It depends and it depends on a number of things. One, it depends on what your audience is expecting and what they're used to. Two, it depends on your skill as a presenter. You know, if you're really skilled and engaging and interesting and speak and sound bites, you can go longer. The other thing, the third thing it depends on is the actual content of the video because you need to give be long enough to give all the information that you promised at the beginning, but not so long that people are dropping off.Stuart Webb [00:21:23]:For example, I know I, I have two clients, one who is doing massively good reach with seven second Instagram reels. People are commenting, people are DMing her. They're, you know, you know, they're not just top of the funnel. These are people reaching out and taking the next step from 7 second reels. And then I also know somebody who does. This is also an Instagram example, but hour long live videos on Instagram five days a week and has hundreds of people showing up live, have people commenting, people are staying all the way through and engaging. So I know it's a terrible answer but it really is true. But if you're just starting out and you know, for example, If Derek's on LinkedIn, if you're doing a LinkedIn Live, often 10 to 15 minutes is a good place to start because there's that, you know, that quota that's been attributed to Mark Twain and a few other people is I apologize, my letter is so long I didn't have time to make it shorter.Stuart Webb [00:22:29]:So making a really short video that has a complete message and is really succinct is actually challenging. Where it's talking for 10 to 15 minutes, you know, if you have an intro that's one to two minutes, you maybe you have three talking points and you have an example or a story for each one of those, that's probably two to three minutes each. And then you have your, your closing statement which is probably at least a minute. There you go. You're already over 10 minutes. So, so that's a good place to start. And then you can sort of adjust up or down as you figure out what your audience expects from you and wants from you, and also what you're. Your skill as a presenter and how much work you want to put into making them shorter or making them longer.Stuart Webb [00:23:14]:Love it. We've got one question from Nicholas. Closed captions are on nearly every video now. They're always wrong somewhere. Do you have a comment on that, Andrea? As closed captions, I've always thought the closed captions were useful because, you know, we do have people who don't necessarily understand all of our accents. We do have people who are not able to hear everything we're saying. Sometimes they're in a busy office and they've got to have the sound off. There are a whole range of reasons why closed captions might be useful.Stuart Webb [00:23:40]:Are you a fan?Stuart Webb [00:23:42]:Yeah, absolutely. I actually have a client who is hearing impaired, so even when we're in person, she's got an app that will do closed captioning. So, yes, I think it's important for all sorts of reasons. There's also lots of data that show a lot of people watch videos with the sound off. So if you want to engage your audience having captions and really it's. The problem with closed captions is most of them are done with AI and the AI is mostly trained with American accents. So if you don't have an American accent, that's problematic. I speak quickly, and some.Stuart Webb [00:24:21]:Some of the AI has trouble with the way I speak. And then if you have, you know, particular terminology for your industry, they may not understand them. Now, depending on what you're like in a live stream, if there's closed captionings, there's not really anything you can do while you're live. If you're editing videos, people, you know, it just depends how much of a perfectionist you are, whether you go in and edit the closed captioning that the AI created or whether you just go, you know what? This is close enough. I'll just. I've got more important things to do in my business and. But closed captioning has gotten better. A year ago, I just about always edited, even on Instagram, the AI closed captioning because they were so wrong.Stuart Webb [00:25:09]:Now a lot of times I'll just leave them because they're close enough and they may get better as time goes on.Stuart Webb [00:25:19]:Andrea, thank you for answering those questions. I really appreciate you spending a bit of time doing that. I think that's great advice there. So just to repeat, go to Systemize me Free stuff. Pick up Andrea's excellent course on how to get your seven messages across and go to the Systemize me. Subscribe and be like Nicholas and Derek. Get your questions answered live by real experts like Andrea, rather than having experts like me tell you something wrong. So Andrea, thank you so much for spending a few minutes with us.Stuart Webb [00:25:53]:I really appreciate what you've been able to do teach us today and I look forward to getting my videos better because of the advice you've given.Stuart Webb [00:26:01]:Thanks for having me, Stuart, that. Get full access to It's Not Rocket Science! at thecompleteapproach.substack.com/subscribe

“The Mississippi River will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise,” said Mark Twain. In this, our final episode marking the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we consider how efforts to control the Mighty Mississippi – a river engineered from its Minnesota headwaters to its Gulf Coast outlet – have responded to the devastating storm, and how New Orleans' relationship to the river has changed. Can the city keep up with the pressure that climate change is putting on this engineered system, or is retreat the only viable response? Plus, a wetland recovery project that aims to bolster protection from hurricanes and flooding in the Lower Ninth Ward. Guests: Boyce Upholt – Journalist and author of “The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi River”  Nathaniel Rich – Author of “Second Nature: Scenes From a World Remade” and the New York Times Op-Ed, “New Orleans' Striking Advantage in the Age of Climate Change”  Harriet Swift – New Orleans resident Andrew Horowitz – Historian, University of Connecticut, author of "Katrina: A History, 1915-2015" Rashida Ferdinand – Founder and Executive Director of Sankofa Community Development Corporation, overseeing the Sankofa Wetland Park and Nature Trail in New Orleans Jason Day – Biologist, wetland Scientist, Comite Resources in Louisiana Descripción en español Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support! Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

December 27, 1980 - January 2, 1981   This week Ken welcomes author, screenwriter, movie maker Eric Miller (ericmillerwrites.com) to the show. Ken and Eric discuss satellites, the creepy paying with your palm technology at Whole Foods, when Sci-Fi actually predicts the future, Dawn of the Dead, The Running Man, Hell House, The Haunting of Hell House vs The Haunting, story prompts, Shirly Jackson, Richard Matheson, Magnum PI, how prevalent Vietnam vets were in 80s pop culture, PTSDT, the importance of character, dark sense of humor, dealing with serious topics, how you need rules to kick against, why having no problems to solve actually makes worse art, how amazing it is that anything produced in Hollywood is ever good, Full Moon Pictures, Crash and Burn, Bill Mosley, life long friends, directing Orson Wells, working with legends, Phantasm, being an intern, cigarettes, Umph in Triumph, being from Indiana, David Letterman, Breaking Away, learning there is a TV series based on your favorite movie, how everything is more or less streaming for free if you know where to look, Schlitz vs Bud in the Great American Beer Switch, Mark Twain, Hal Holbrook, Grace Kelly, variety shows, the M*A*S*H finale, gallows humor, how sometimes an awful toxic workplace can still produce a good end product, Real People, That's Incredible!, The White Shadow, Mud Wrestling, New Year's Eve, Bonanza, cop shows, setting the tone, The Muppet Movie, the NBA, basketball, Meet the Feebles, Peter Jackson, how nobody can really attain the levels of fame people had in the second half of the 20th century, Bob Cousy, Secret Agent Man, Branded, Larry Cohen, Dexter and how being a fan of television often leads us to reverse engineer story telling and interact with people (not kill them).  ALSO Ken is giving away a pair of tickets to the 945 Arts at the Armory show on November 13th where Ken will be opening for Janeane Garofalo. If you can tell Ken the reason Loren Michaels gave Janeane for why she couldn't quit SNL, email it to tvguidancecounselor@gmail.com and you will get a pair of tickets for the show.  

A look at mankind's deep and enduring connection to dogs through the eyes of two literary masters: American humorist Mark Twain in “A Dog's Tale” and “The Power of the Dog,” by the great British poet Rudyard Kipling. Including the “Waltz of the Puppy” (Valse du petit Chien), by Polish composer and virtuoso, Frédéric Chopin.

“The Mississippi River will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise,” said Mark Twain. In this, our final episode marking the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we consider how efforts to control the Mighty Mississippi – a river engineered from its Minnesota headwaters to its Gulf Coast outlet – have responded to the devastating storm, and how New Orleans' relationship to the river has changed. Can the city keep up with the pressure that climate change is putting on this engineered system, or is retreat the only viable response? Plus, a wetland recovery project that aims to bolster protection from hurricanes and flooding in the Lower Ninth Ward. Guests: Boyce Upholt – Journalist and author of “The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi River”  Nathaniel Rich – Author of “Second Nature: Scenes From a World Remade” and the New York Times Op-Ed, “New Orleans' Striking Advantage in the Age of Climate Change”  Harriet Swift – New Orleans resident Andrew Horowitz – Historian, University of Connecticut, author of "Katrina: A History, 1915-2015" Rashida Ferdinand – Founder and Executive Director of Sankofa Community Development Corporation, overseeing the Sankofa Wetland Park and Nature Trail in New Orleans Jason Day – Biologist, wetland Scientist, Comite Resources in Louisiana Descripción en español Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support! Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

BITS AND BYTES. A couple of episodes jam-packed with comedy bits greets Bryan and Katie (Geekscape's Christian Cringe and Napping Through Happy Hour podcasts) in this month's animated spotlight on Lower Decks. Does Captain Freeman's IT work rise to the level of expert? Can Tendi overcome family traditions? Do Boimler & Rutherford realize they've lost the thread on their Mark Twain impressions and have become caricatures of southern gentlemen? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

These stories are too disturbing to be random. From Brittany Murphy's mysterious death to John Lennon, Princess Diana, and Mark Twain all predicting their own deaths! Plus, the actor who called wolf! Here's how to plan your Halloween evening based on the sunset. How do you handle a spider in the house? Psychopaths have different brains - duh. Most people who think they can't tolerate gluten might be wrong. The Louvre robbers have been 1-upped. A monkey got loose in a Spirit Halloween - is it a bit?

What horror movie should you watch based on your zodiac sign? Rocky Horror Picture Show? Friday the 13th? Find out! Jesse Eisenberg plans to altruistically donate his kidney. Hopefully he doesn't expect to be invited to the recipient's wedding. Dictionary.com adds the gen alpha phenomenon 67 as the world of the year… we have questions. Can GLP-1 help with long COVID? Would a 6lb iPhone keep you from using it too much? This Kickstarter plans to find out. It's time for another installment of Bridge The Gap! Sarah and Vinnie are joined today by two very special guests from Alice's sister stations. Whose generation will prevail? Don't wait to eat your caramel apples - OR ELSE! Vinnie's telling us how much we truly spend on Halloween. Worth every penny. These stories are too disturbing to be random. From Brittany Murphy's mysterious death to John Lennon, Princess Diana, and Mark Twain all predicting their own deaths! Plus, the actor who called wolf! Here's how to plan your Halloween evening based on the sunset. How do you handle a spider in the house? Psychopaths have different brains - duh. Most people who think they can't tolerate gluten might be wrong. The Louvre robbers have been 1-upped. A monkey got loose in a Spirit Halloween - is it a bit? Sarah is pumped for her Halloween jam session tonight. Still looking for spooky content? Here is the best horror movie from each year for the last 20 years. The scariest thing in Bob's house is the number of remotes she has to use. The internet is divulging their favorite secret meals. The theme seems to be spaghetti and sardines. Plus, when did that happen: Halloween Edition!

Romantická kamenná věž Hamelika je dominantou stejnojmenného vrchu nad Mariánskými Lázněmi v Karlovarském kraji. Nachází se v nadmořské výšce 723 metrů a už téměř 150 let na ní za výhledy míří lázeňští hosté. Navštívili ji třeba i Johann Wolfgang Goethe nebo Mark Twain. Nabízí výhled na město, Slavkovský les i vzdálené Krušné hory. K rozhledně se dostanete příjemnou procházkou z centra města.

Romantická kamenná věž Hamelika je dominantou stejnojmenného vrchu nad Mariánskými Lázněmi v Karlovarském kraji. Nachází se v nadmořské výšce 723 metrů a už téměř 150 let na ní za výhledy míří lázeňští hosté. Navštívili ji třeba i Johann Wolfgang Goethe nebo Mark Twain. Nabízí výhled na město, Slavkovský les i vzdálené Krušné hory. K rozhledně se dostanete příjemnou procházkou z centra města.

In Day 100 of the Mussar Mondays series, Rabbi Wolbe begins the Gate of Remembrance in Orchos Tzaddikim, emphasizing its foundational role in society, ethics, and spirituality. He explains that remembrance enables business, loyalty, and gratitude, preventing harm and fostering trust. Stories like Colin Powell's pro-Jewish stance (due to a Jewish family's kindness) and Mark Twain's truth quote illustrate the trait's power. Key themes include:Essential for Existence: Without remembrance, society collapses, as lending, business, and relationships fail (Deuteronomy 8:11) (0:33–2:30).Loyalty and Prevention of Harm: Recalling benefits curbs ingratitude and harm, as in the Chofetz Chaim's story of vivid childhood memories (2:30–4:44).Practical Applications: Remember pledges, confidences, debts, and Hashem constantly (Psalms 16:8). Daily blessings maintain divine awareness, even in secular settings (6:08–23:46).Truth and Memory: Truth simplifies remembrance; falsehoods lead to inconsistencies, as in Rabbi Moshe Feinstein's case (8:06–10:55).Recorded at TORCH Centre in the Levin Family Studios (B) to a live audience on March 24, 2025, in Houston, Texas.Released as Podcast on October 29, 2025_____________This series on Orchos Tzadikim/Ways of the Righteous is produced in partnership with Hachzek.Join the revolution of daily Mussar study at hachzek.com.We are using the Treasure of Life edition of the Orchos Tzadikkim (Published by Feldheim)_____________Listen, Subscribe & Share: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jewish-inspiration-podcast-rabbi-aryeh-wolbe/id1476610783Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4r0KfjMzmCNQbiNaZBCSU7) to stay inspired! Share your questions at aw@torchweb.org or visit torchweb.org for more Torah content.  _____________About the Host:Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe, Director of TORCH in Houston, brings decades of Torah scholarship to guide listeners in applying Jewish wisdom to daily life.  To directly send your questions, comments, and feedback, please email: awolbe@torchweb.org_____________Support Our Mission:Our Mission is Connecting Jews & Judaism. Help us spread Judaism globally by sponsoring an episode at torchweb.org.Your support makes a HUGE difference!_____________Listen MoreOther podcasts by Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe: NEW!! Prayer Podcast: https://prayerpodcast.transistor.fm/episodesJewish Inspiration Podcast: https://inspiration.transistor.fm/episodesParsha Review Podcast: https://parsha.transistor.fm/episodesLiving Jewishly Podcast: https://jewishly.transistor.fm/episodesThinking Talmudist Podcast: https://talmud.transistor.fm/episodesUnboxing Judaism Podcast: https://unboxing.transistor.fm/episodesRabbi Aryeh Wolbe Podcast Collection: https://collection.transistor.fm/episodesFor a full listing of podcasts available by TORCH at http://podcast.torchweb.org_____________Keywords:#JewishInspiration, #Mussar, #MasterClass, #Remembrance, #Gratitude, #Memory, #Loyalty, #Trust, #Truthfulness, #Integrity, #Honesty, #Kindness, #Responsibility, #Hashem, #Faith ★ Support this podcast ★

Nitwit Nero cans the panel that advises on monuments in DC. Because of course. MAGAT scum goes before the Court and gets a reading of the Riot Act: Rope-->Self-->Hang. MAGATS prove that Mark Twain will always be relevant. MAGAT NJ Congresscreep thumbs his nose at Mullah Moses Mike, not that he's paying attention, nudge-nudge, wink-wink. WV's pill-rolling governor asks already hungry West Virginians to contribute to his food bank scam. We're in the deepest funding hole ever, and I more than understand. If you can help, though, this is the time: https://HeadOn.Live

In Day 100 of the Mussar Mondays series, Rabbi Wolbe begins the Gate of Remembrance in Orchos Tzaddikim, emphasizing its foundational role in society, ethics, and spirituality. He explains that remembrance enables business, loyalty, and gratitude, preventing harm and fostering trust. Stories like Colin Powell's pro-Jewish stance (due to a Jewish family's kindness) and Mark Twain's truth quote illustrate the trait's power. Key themes include:Essential for Existence: Without remembrance, society collapses, as lending, business, and relationships fail (Deuteronomy 8:11) (0:33–2:30).Loyalty and Prevention of Harm: Recalling benefits curbs ingratitude and harm, as in the Chofetz Chaim's story of vivid childhood memories (2:30–4:44).Practical Applications: Remember pledges, confidences, debts, and Hashem constantly (Psalms 16:8). Daily blessings maintain divine awareness, even in secular settings (6:08–23:46).Truth and Memory: Truth simplifies remembrance; falsehoods lead to inconsistencies, as in Rabbi Moshe Feinstein's case (8:06–10:55).Recorded at TORCH Centre in the Levin Family Studios (B) to a live audience on March 24, 2025, in Houston, Texas.Released as Podcast on October 29, 2025_____________This series on Orchos Tzadikim/Ways of the Righteous is produced in partnership with Hachzek.Join the revolution of daily Mussar study at hachzek.com.We are using the Treasure of Life edition of the Orchos Tzadikkim (Published by Feldheim)_____________Listen, Subscribe & Share: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jewish-inspiration-podcast-rabbi-aryeh-wolbe/id1476610783Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4r0KfjMzmCNQbiNaZBCSU7) to stay inspired! Share your questions at aw@torchweb.org or visit torchweb.org for more Torah content.  _____________About the Host:Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe, Director of TORCH in Houston, brings decades of Torah scholarship to guide listeners in applying Jewish wisdom to daily life.  To directly send your questions, comments, and feedback, please email: awolbe@torchweb.org_____________Support Our Mission:Our Mission is Connecting Jews & Judaism. Help us spread Judaism globally by sponsoring an episode at torchweb.org.Your support makes a HUGE difference!_____________Listen MoreOther podcasts by Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe: NEW!! Prayer Podcast: https://prayerpodcast.transistor.fm/episodesJewish Inspiration Podcast: https://inspiration.transistor.fm/episodesParsha Review Podcast: https://parsha.transistor.fm/episodesLiving Jewishly Podcast: https://jewishly.transistor.fm/episodesThinking Talmudist Podcast: https://talmud.transistor.fm/episodesUnboxing Judaism Podcast: https://unboxing.transistor.fm/episodesRabbi Aryeh Wolbe Podcast Collection: https://collection.transistor.fm/episodesFor a full listing of podcasts available by TORCH at http://podcast.torchweb.org_____________Keywords:#JewishInspiration, #Mussar, #MasterClass, #Remembrance, #Gratitude, #Memory, #Loyalty, #Trust, #Truthfulness, #Integrity, #Honesty, #Kindness, #Responsibility, #Hashem, #Faith ★ Support this podcast ★

Deadpan's unfettered comical sensibility is a vivid testament to Mark Twain's dictum “against the assault of laughter nothing can stand.” Set during the world-wide oil crises of the 1970s, the narrative alternates between locations in West Virginia, Las Vegas, Washington, Tehran, and Sinai, featuring characters as diverse as Sarah Palin, Mel Brooks, and the Shah of Iran. Walter's phantasmagorical tour-de-force is not only a satirical takedown of antisemitism (and bigotry in general) but also a dazzling celebration ofhuman dignity, resilience, and humor.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/arroe-collins-like-it-s-live--4113802/support.

Think frustration is just anger? Think again. In this episode, Andrew Oxley breaks down the Four Faces of Frustration (Red, Yellow, Green, Blue) and hands you a simple filter for leading when emotions get loud. You'll discover why self-diagnosing under stress rarely works, how to run the people vs. task and speed up vs. slow down tests, and the one question every leader needs to ask: "What's it like to be on the other side of you?" We also tackle the difference between problems to solve and tensions to manage, the First Law of Problem-Solving, and a practical path to influence: serve the people you already have. Clear. Actionable. Memorable. 00:00 – Cold open & setup 03:07 – "The least frustrating interview" (ironic hook) 03:48 – Why frustration? Making complex ideas simple (Mark Twain shout-out) 05:55 – Are these literal faces? Not all frustration = anger 08:20 – The tour: Red (intense), Yellow (optimistic), Green (quiet), Blue (worried) 10:50 – How to know your face; why self-diagnosis fails 11:10 – Two quick axes: People vs. Task; Speed Up vs. Slow Down 17:40 – The question: "What's it like to be on the other side of you?" 18:44 – Why the book is a fable (story vs. lecture) 22:27 – How long it is and how to use it 25:56 – Can we eliminate frustration? Problems vs. Tensions 27:41 – First Law of Problem-Solving: long-running issues = you're managing, not solving 30:00 – Mission over paycheck: engaging younger teams without the doom loop 31:14 – Litmus test: "Is it effective?" and why leaders change first 33:35 – Where to get it: Amazon + free copy via live workshop (transformingresults.com) 34:16 – "Serve, serve, serve" and the real measure of influence Website: https://www.transformingresults.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-oxley-tog Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/andrew.oxley.758 Twitter/X: https://x.com/AndrewOxley YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@andrewoxley-theoxleygroup

Live from the Comixology booth at New York Comic Con, Jace chats with writer Neil Kleid about his upcoming Comixology Originals series Medieval. Blending the timeless love of baseball with the mythic world of Camelot, Kleid describes the book as "a New York baseball fan in King Arthur's Court." Inspired by Mark Twain's classic tale, Medieval follows Danny Landau, a blue-collar fan who finds himself transported back to the sixth century, armed with little more than his modern sensibilities and a love of the game. Neil shares how the story evolved from his lifelong passion for baseball, what it was like collaborating with artist Alex Cormack, and why this bloody, emotional, and often hilarious adventure marks a fun departure from his more grounded previous work like The Panic and Nice Jewish Boys. The first issue of Medieval launches November 11 on Comixology, and Neil gives listeners all the details on how to preorder and follow the series' five-issue run.

Mark Twain is generally credited with the quip, “Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it.” The same can’t be said about climate change, which has become one of our most contentious and complicated public policy controversies. It’s also divisive. According to a recent Gallup Poll, sixty-two percent of those polled worry about climate change a great Read More ›

This episode explores the journey of discovering your purpose; the “why” behind your existence. Inspired by Mark Twain's timeless quote, it's a reflection on the difference between simply living and truly being alive. Through storytelling and perspective, this message invites you to look inward, to chase curiosity, and to trust that your calling isn't found in one moment, but uncovered through every step you take toward what sets your soul on fire.More from Eddie Pinero:Wear the Mindset: www.agns.lifestyleMonday Motivation Newsletter: https://www.eddiepinero.com/newsletterYour World Within Podcast: https://yourworldwithin.libsyn.com/Stream these tracks on Spotify - https://spoti.fi/2BLf6pBInstagram - @your_world_within and @IamEddiePineroTikTok - your_world_withinFacebook - https://www.facebook.com/YourworldwithinTwitter - https://www.twitter.com/IamEddiePineroBusiness Inquiries - http://www.yourworldwithin.com/contact#liveinspired #yourworldwithin #motivation

Join Kosta and his guest: Dr. Troy Smith, Author, Historian and Professor of History at Tennessee Tech University.In this episode: In 2021 you started writing an opinion column in the Sparta Expositor called “A Liberal Dose”. This column began at the request of the Expositor's Editor looking to add more progressive commentary after the events of January 6th and the insurrection on our nation's capital. After writing your column for more than 4 years you've been asked to take a step back from the publication citing security concerns and threatening messages directed at you specifically. My first question starts here: who do you think is actually being protected by this column getting ending? Freedom of speech in America is a hot topic. Not to make light of the situation, but it has been for about 250 years. When you think about the moment we're in: the tragic assination of Charlie Kirk, the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel, the cancellation of Stephen Colbert and contributors like you across the country, what does this mean for the freedom of speech and what can we do to protect it? As Mark Twain famously said, “History doesn't repeat itself but it often rhymes.” You know a lot more about history than me, and I want to take this opportunity to ask you, what comes next? What comes next in the United States? What comes next in Cookeville?Read Dr. Troy Smith's Blog:  https://tnwordsmith.blogspot.com Shop Dr. Troy Smith's Published Works on Amazon: https://us.amazon.com/stores/author/B004G7QU7A?ccs_id=b910bd69-aade-430a-b2a9-220a051d438eBetter Together with Kosta Yepifantsev is a product of Morgan Franklin Media and recorded in Cookeville, TN.Join us with Plenty Downtown Bookshop at A Novel Affair: A Jane Austen Gala for Literacy on November 8, 2025 at Putnam County Convention Center. Find out more about A Novel Affair: A Jane Austen Gala for Literacy and buy tickets here:https://plentybookshop.com/gala

Ever wonder why Bob Hope still lands with new audiences today? I sit down with Bill Johnson, a gifted Bob Hope tribute artist who grew up in Wichita and found his way from dinner theater to USO stages around the world. We talk about radio roots, World War II entertainment, and how “history with humor” keeps veterans' stories alive. You'll hear how Bill built a respectful tribute, the line between tribute and impersonation, and why audience connection—timing, tone, and true care—matters more than perfect mimicry. I believe you'll enjoy this one; it's funny, warm, and full of the kind of details that make memories stick.   Highlights: 00:10 - Hear how a Bob Hope tribute artist frames humor to build instant rapport. 01:41 - Learn how Wichita roots, a theater scholarship, and early TV/radio love shaped a performer. 10:37 - See why acting in Los Angeles led to dinner theater, directing, and meeting his future wife. 15:39 - Discover the Vegas break that sparked a Bob Hope character and a first World War II reunion show. 18:27 - Catch how a custom character (the Stradivarius) evolved into a Hope-style stage persona. 21:16 - Understand the “retirement home test” and how honest rooms sharpen a tribute act. 25:42 - Learn how younger audiences still laugh at classic material when context is set well. 30:18 - Hear the “history with humor” method and why dates, places, and accuracy earn trust. 31:59 - Explore Hope's USO tradition and how Bill carries it forward for veterans and families. 36:27 - Get the difference between a tribute and an impersonation and what makes audiences accept it. 41:40 - Pick up joke-craft insights on setup, economy of words, and fast recoveries when lines miss. 46:53 - Hear travel stories from Tokyo to Fort Hood and why small moments backstage matter. 50:01 - Learn the basics of using Hope's material within IP and public domain boundaries. 51:28 - See the ethical close: making sure a “reasonable person” knows they saw a tribute.   About the Guest:   With a career spanning over thirty years, Bill has forged his niche on stage, screen, and television as a dependable character actor.   Bill's tribute to the late, great Bob Hope was showcased in New Orleans, LA at Experience the Victory, the grand opening of the National WWII Museum's first expansion project. In the ceremony, Bill introduced broadcaster Tom Brokaw, and performed a brief moment of comedy with Academy Award winning actor, Tom Hanks. Bill continues to appear regularly at the WWII Museum, most recently in On the Road with Bob Hope and Friends, which was under-written by the Bob & Dolores Hope Foundation.   Highlights from over the years has included the 70th Anniversary of the End of WWII Celebration aboard the USS Midway in San Diego, and the Welcome Home Vietnam Parade in Tennessee. Additionally, Bill has been honored to appear around the world as Mr. Hope for the USO in locations such as the Bob Hope USO centers in Southern California, the USO Cincinnati Tribute to Veterans (appearing with Miss America 2016-Betty Cantrell),  USO Ft. Hood (appearing with the legendary Wayne Newton), USO of Central and Southern Ohio, USO Puget Sound Area in Seattle, USO Guam, USO Tokyo, USO Holiday Shows in Virginia Beach for US Tours, and a Tribute to the USO on the island of  Maui with country music superstar Lee Greenwood.   Other notable appearances include Tribute Shows for Honor Flight chapters in Alabama, South Carolina, and Ohio, the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association, the US Army Ball, the annual 1940's Ball in Boulder, CO, “USO Cuties Show” at the Tropicana in Atlantic City, the Les Brown Jazz Festival in Tower City, PA, and Hosting “So Many Laughs: A Night of Comedy” at the National Veterans Memorial and Museum in Columbus, OH.   Through the years, Bill has been “murdered” on CSI, portrayed Michael Imperioli's banker in High Roller: The Stu Unger Story, as well as, roles in films such as Ocean's 11, Three Days to Vegas, TV's Scare Tactics, Trick Shot, an award winning short film for Canon cameras, and the series finale of Dice, where Bill appeared as John Quincy Adams opposite Andrew Dice Clay.     Bill is currently based out of Las Vegas, NV where he lives with his wife, author Rosemary Willhide, and rescue dog, Brownie.   Ways to connect with Bill:   http://www.billjohnsonentertainment.com http://www.GigSalad.com/williampatrickjohnson     About the Host:   Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening!   Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast   If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset .   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review   Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.       Transcription Notes:   Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson ** 01:23 This is your host, Mike hingson, and you are listening to unstoppable mindset. You know, we have a saying here, unstoppable mindset, where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet, and we're going to definitely have unexpected today. This is also going to be a very fun episode. By the time you hear this, you will have heard a couple of conversations that I had with Walden Hughes, who is the president of the radio enthusiast of Puget Sound. And he's also on the on other boards dealing with old radio show. And he introduced me to Bill Johnson, who is a person that is well known for taking on the role of Bob Hope, and I'm sure that we're going to hear a bunch about that as we go forward here. But Bill is our guest today, and I just played a little segment of something for Bill with Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, two characters by any standard. Well, anyway, we'll get to all that. Bill, I want to welcome you to unstoppable mindset, and I'm really honored that you're here with us today.   Bill Johnson ** 02:31 Oh, thanks a million. Michael, it's such a pleasure to be here. Well, this is going to be a fun discussion.   Michael Hingson ** 02:38 Oh, I think so. I think absolutely by any standard, it'll be fun. Well, why don't we start before it gets too fun with some of the early stories about Bill growing up and all that. Tell us about the early bill.   Bill Johnson ** 02:52 Okay, well, I was born and raised in Wichita, Kansas, of all places. And I used to say, I used to Marvel watching Hope's Christmas specials with my family that sort of spurred my interest. But grew up in Midwest, went to Wichita State University, and then after graduation, I had a job with an independent film company and a move to Los Angeles seeking my fortune. Well, the film company pulled it in three months, as those things do, and so I was left with my, I guess, my pursuit of the entertainment career from there.   Michael Hingson ** 03:42 So did you what you went to school and high school and all that stuff?   Bill Johnson ** 03:46 Yes, oh yes, I went to Wichita East High I didn't graduate with honors, but I graduated with a B,   Michael Hingson ** 03:56 that's fair B for Bob Hope, right? Yeah.   Bill Johnson ** 04:01 And then I actually went to college under a theater scholarship, wow. And so that, in those days, that would pay for everything, books, class, which delighted my parents, because we were a family of simple means. So that was the only way I was going to go to college was having a scholarship and but as it turns out, it was for the best years of my humble life, because I got a lot of hands on experience in a Wichita State medium sized College, yeah, but back then it was Much smaller, so I had a lot of opportunity.   Michael Hingson ** 04:43 I've actually been to Wichita State. I've been to Wichita and, oh, great, did some speaking back there. And we're probably going to be doing more in the future. But it's an it's a nice town. It's a great town to to be a part of. I think,   Bill Johnson ** 04:56 yes, people are so nice there. And what I. I've noticed living in other places and then going home to visit Wichitas are cleaned. Just something you noticed, the streets are usually pretty clean and foliage is well manicured. So hats off to the city for keeping the place up to date or keeping it clean   Michael Hingson ** 05:22 anyway. Well, yeah, you got to do what you got to do, and that's amazing. And in the winter, everything gets covered up by the snow.   Bill Johnson ** 05:30 Yes, you do get all four seasons in Wichita, whether you like it or not. See there, yeah, it's one of those places where they have that saying, If you don't like the weather, wait 10 minutes and it'll change.   Michael Hingson ** 05:43 Yeah. So, so, so there. So you majored in theater in college?   Bill Johnson ** 05:49 Yes, I did. Actually, the official designation at Wichita State was speech communication, ah, so that's what I got my Bachelor of Arts   Michael Hingson ** 06:02 degree in so what years? What years were you there?   Bill Johnson ** 06:05 I was there in the fall of 75 and graduated a semester late. So I graduated in December of 79 Okay,   Michael Hingson ** 06:17 yeah, but that was after basically the traditional golden days and golden age of radio, wasn't   Bill Johnson ** 06:24 it? Yes, it was still in the days of black and white television.   Michael Hingson ** 06:29 But yeah, there was a lot of black and white television, and there were some resurgence of radio, radio mystery theater CBS was on, and I think that was before, well, no, maybe later in 7879 I don't know when it was, but NPR did Star Wars. And so there were some radio, radio things, which was pretty good.   Bill Johnson ** 06:53 And I think our friends in Lake will be gone began.   Michael Hingson ** 06:56 Oh yeah, they were in, I think 71 garrison. Keillor, okay, it'll be quiet week in Lake will be gone my hometown. I know I listened every week. Oh, I   Bill Johnson ** 07:06 did too. So my interest in radio was, I think, started back then.   Michael Hingson ** 07:12 Yeah, I enjoyed him every week. As I love to describe him, he clearly was the modern Mark Twain of the United States and radio for that matter. Is that right?   Bill Johnson ** 07:26 Oh, gosh, well, I, I'm, I'm, I'm glad to agree with you. And a lot of that wasn't it improvised to his weekly monolog. He'd have, oh, sure, yeah,   Michael Hingson ** 07:39 he, had ideas. He may have had a couple notes, but primarily it was improvised. He just did it. He just did it.   Bill Johnson ** 07:47 I let some of the episodes you take a lot of find a lot of humor in the fact he's kind of pleased with himself. And he goes, Well, look what we just said, or something. He'll do.   Michael Hingson ** 07:57 Yeah, it was, it was fun. So what did you do after college? Well,   Bill Johnson ** 08:03 after college, when I had moved to Los Angeles, after that, did not work out. I pursued my living as a as an actor, which didn't last long. So I of course, had to get a secondary job, I guess. Let me back up. It did last long, although I didn't have enough to pay my bills. Oh, well, there you go. I had a secondary job as whatever I could find, bartending. Usually, I did a lot of work as a bartender and but you get at least doing something like that. You get the people watch, yeah, oh.   Michael Hingson ** 08:47 And, that's always entertaining, isn't   Bill Johnson ** 08:49 it? Well, it can be, yeah, that's true. Back in my that's where I kind of develop your little stick you do for customers to get them to laugh and maybe tip you. My big thing was that you'd always see a couple, say, making out at the bar because it was kind of dark in there. And I would always say, Hey fellas, you want to meet my wife, Carol? Oh, that's her boss. Don't worry about it. They're having a good time or something like that, just to try to get a few laughs.   Michael Hingson ** 09:23 I've done similar things at airports. I know that the TSA agents have a such a thankless job. And one of the things I decided fairly early on, after September 11, and you know, we got out, and most people, and most of the TSA people don't know it. But anyway, whenever I go through the airport, I love to try to make them laugh. So, you know, they'll say things like, oh, I need to see your ID, please. And, and I'll say things like, Well, why did you lose yours? Or, you know, or you why? I didn't want to see it. It's just a piece of paper, right? You know? But, and I get them to laugh. Mostly, there are few that don't, but mostly they they do. And then the other thing is, of course, going through with my guide dog. And we go through the portal. They have to search the dog because he's got the metal harness on that always sets off the detector. Oh my, yeah. And, and so they say, Well, we're going to have to pet your dog. I said, Well, just wait a minute. There's something you need to know. And I really sound very serious when I do this. You got to understand this before you do that. They go, oh yeah. And they back up, and I go, he only likes long searches. If you don't take a half hour, he's not happy because his tail is going 500 miles a second, you know? Oh, great coming. But it is fun, and we get him to laugh, which is, I think, important to do. We don't laugh at enough in life anyway.   Bill Johnson ** 10:57 Amen to that. It's That's my philosophy as well, my friend. And there's not a lot to laugh about these days. And hopefully we can find the humor, even if we create it ourselves.   Michael Hingson ** 11:11 Yeah, I think there's a lot to laugh at if we find it. You know, there are a lot of things that are not going very well right now, and there are way too many things that make it hard to laugh, but we can find things if we work at it. I wish more people would do that than than some of the things that they do. But what do you do?   Bill Johnson ** 11:31 Yes, yeah, from from your mouth to God's ears, that's a great plan for the future.   Michael Hingson ** 11:39 Well, we try so you you did some acting, and you had all sorts of other jobs. And then what happened?   Bill Johnson ** 11:47 Well, I finally got fed up with the whole bartending thing and the rat race of trying to make it in Los Angeles. I did some commercials. I had a couple of small roles in some independent movies, as they say. But on my first love being theater, I hit the road again doing some regional theater shows to where I finally ended up back in Kansas, once again, that the there was a dinner theater in my hometown of Wichita, and I got hired to do shows there. Oh, so eventually becoming a resident director so and my my family was going through some challenges at the time, so it was good to be home, so I hadn't really abandoned the dream. I just refocused it, and I got a lot of great experience in directing plays, appearing in plays, and I met my white wife there. So so that was a win win on all counts.   Michael Hingson ** 13:00 I first got exposed to dinner theater after college. I was in Iowa, in Des Moines, and the person who was reading the national magazine for the National Federation of the Blind, the magazine called the Braille monitor guy was Larry McKeever was, I think, owner of and very involved in a dinner theater called Charlie's show place, and I don't remember the history, but I went to several of the performances. And then he actually tried to create a serial to go on radio. And it didn't get very far, but it would have been fun if he had been able to do more with it, but he, he did do and there were people there who did the dinner theater, and that was a lot of fun.   Bill Johnson ** 13:45 Oh, gosh, yeah, although I must say that I was sort of the black sheep of the family being in the arts. My My mom and dad came from rural communities, and so they didn't really understand this entertainment business, so that was always a challenge. But there's one footnote that I'm kind of proud of. My grandfather, who was a farmer all his life. He lived on a farm. He was raised on a farm. Every year at the Fourth of July Co Op picnic. The Co Op was a place where they would take the crops and get paid and get supplies and so forth. They would have a picnic for all the people that were their customers every year he would supposedly play the unscrupulous egg buyer or the egg salesman. And so he'd go to the routine, was an old vaudeville routine. He'd go to this poor farmer and say, Here, let me pay you for those eggs. That's here. There's one two. Say, how many kids do you guys have now? For the No, five. 678, say, How long have you and your wife been married? What is it? Seven years, eight, they get the guy go, no, 1011, 12, so that was the bit, and he would do it every year, because I guess he did it   Michael Hingson ** 15:15 really well. Drove the farmers crazy.   Bill Johnson ** 15:18 Yeah, so, so humble beginnings in the lineage,   Michael Hingson ** 15:23 but on the other hand, once you started doing that, at least being in the theater was enough to pay the bills. Yes.   Bill Johnson ** 15:30 So my parents really couldn't complain about that.   Michael Hingson ** 15:34 Well, see, it worked   Bill Johnson ** 15:36 out, yes indeed. And I met my wife, so I'm not complaining   Michael Hingson ** 15:41 about any of it. Now, was she in the theater? Yes, she was a performer.   Bill Johnson ** 15:46 We met in a show called lend me a tenor, and she was the lead, and I was at this point doing my stage management duties. But suffice to say we have gone on and done many shows together since then, and even had been able to play opposite each other a couple of times. So that cool, yeah, that's, that's a you can't ask for better memories than   Michael Hingson ** 16:13 that. No, and you guys certainly knew each other and know each other well. So that works out really well.   Bill Johnson ** 16:20 Yeah, that works out pretty good, except, you know, you sometimes you have to have a conversation and say, Okay, we're just going to leave the theater on the stage and at home. We're at home. Yeah?   Michael Hingson ** 16:32 Well, yeah, there is that, but it's okay. So how did you get into the whole process of of portraying Bob Hope, for example, and did you do anything before Bob of the same sort of thing?   Bill Johnson ** 16:51 Well, interestingly enough, to complete the whole circle of my experience, when I was performing in Wichita, I got a job opportunity here in Lacher. I'm living in Las Vegas now, to move out here and audition, or come out and audition for a new dinner show that was opening at Caesar's Palace. It was called Caesar's magical Empire, and it was, it was in 1996 and during that time, there was this big magic craze in Las Vegas. Everybody was doing magic   Michael Hingson ** 17:27 shows. You had Siegfried and Roy and yeah.   Bill Johnson ** 17:30 So I came out, I auditioned and got hired. And so then it was like, Well, now you got to move. So we moved on a just on hope and a prayer. And luckily, they eventually hired my wife, and so we got to work together there, and I eventually went on to become the, what they called the show director. I didn't do the original show direction, but it was my job to maintain the integrity of the attraction. So during those years it was that was kind of difficult, because you have to listen to being on the administrative team. You've got to listen to all the conflict that's going on, as well as and try to keep the waters calm, keep peace. Yes. So anyway, doing my show and being interactive, you talk back and forth to the audience, and after it was over, you take them out to a next the next experience in their night, when they would go see magic in a big showroom. And a lady came up to me and and she said, say, I've got this world war two reunion coming up next month. I'd like you to come and be, pretend to be Bob Hope. Do you know who that is? And I was like, yes, he's one of my heroes. And so that was the first opportunity, suffice to say, I guess I did. Should have prefaced it by saying, when the magical Empire first opened, we were all playing these mystical wizards and dark characters. Well, that didn't fly. That wasn't any fun. So then the directors, the producers said, well, everybody, come up with your own character, and we'll go from there. And so I created this character named the Stradivarius, because I like to fiddle the room. I get it and   Michael Hingson ** 19:37 but I played it like Bobby and you like to stream people along. But anyway, hey, I wish I would have   Bill Johnson ** 19:42 thought of that. My approach was like Bob Hope in one of the road pictures. So the show would be sort of a fish out of water type thing. Come on, folks. You know, I laughed when you came in that type of thing. Yeah. So when this lady saw the show that. How she got that inspiration?   Michael Hingson ** 20:04 Well, your voice is close enough to his that I could, I could see that anyway.   Bill Johnson ** 20:09 Oh, well, thank you. Sometimes I'd say it drives my wife nuts, because I'll come across an old archival material and say, Hey, honey, how about this one? So she's got to be the first audience, yeah.   Michael Hingson ** 20:23 Well, I'm prejudiced, so you could tell her, I said, so okay,   Bill Johnson ** 20:27 that you would, you'd love to hear it, right? Yeah.   Michael Hingson ** 20:31 Well, absolutely. Well, so you went off and you did the the World War Two event.   Bill Johnson ** 20:38 Did the World War Two event shortly after that, the met this, well, I should tell you another story, that shortly after that, a young man came to my show, and during the show, he stopped me and said, say, You remind me of someone very dear to me. Have you ever heard of Bob Hope? And I said, yeah, he's again. I said, one of my heroes. The guy said, Well, you kind of remind me of him. Went on his merry way, and I didn't think much of it. Well, it just so happens. The next day, I was watching the biography documentary of Bob Hope, and all of a sudden this talking head comes up, and it's the same guy I was just talking to in my show the day, the day before, it turns out that was, that was Bob's adopted son, Tony Tony hope. So I took that as a positive sign that maybe I was doing something similar to Mr. Hope, anyway. But then, as I said, The show closed very soon after that, sadly, Mr. Hope passed away. And 2003 right, and so there was, there was no real demand for anything like that. But I didn't let the idea go. I wanted something to do creatively. I continued to work for the same company, but I went over and ran the 3d movie at Eminem's world in Las Vegas 20 years. So I had plenty of time to think about doing   Michael Hingson ** 22:26 something creative, and you got some Eminem's along the way.   Bill Johnson ** 22:30 They keep them in the break room for the employees. So it's like, here's all the different brand I mean, here's all the different flavors and styles. So to have a way and you can tell guests, oh yeah, that's delicious. It tastes like, just like almonds or   22:45 something. Yeah.   Bill Johnson ** 22:47 So based on that, I decided to pursue this, this tribute, and it, I'll tell you, it's difficult getting started at first, you got to practically pay people to let you come and do a show. I'd go to retirement homes and say, Hey, you want to show today. Sometimes they'd let me, sometimes they wouldn't. But the thing about doing a show at a retirement community is they will be very honest with you. If you ain't any good, they'll say, man, no, thanks. Oh, nice try. So know where my trouble spots were,   Michael Hingson ** 23:29 but, but audiences don't treat you as the enemy, and I know that one of the things I hear regularly is, well, how do you speak so much and so well. You know the one of the greatest fears that we all have as a public speaking, and one of the things that I constantly tell people is, think about the audiences. They want you to succeed. They came because they want to hear you succeed, and you need to learn how to relate to them. But they're not out to get you. They want you to be successful and and they love it when you are and I learned that very early on and speaking has never been something that I've been afraid of. And I think it's so important that people recognize that the audiences want you to succeed anyway.   Bill Johnson ** 24:17 That's so true. And you kind of touched on a quote I remember one of the books from Bob hopes. He said how he approaches it. He said, I consider the audience as my best friends, and who doesn't want to spend time with your best friend, right?   Michael Hingson ** 24:34 And I and I believe that when I speak, I don't talk to an audience. I talk with the audience, and I will try to do some things to get them to react, and a lot of it is when I'm telling a story. I've learned to know how well I'm connecting by how the audience reacts, whether there's intakes of breath or or they're just very silent or whatever. And I think that's so important, but he's. Absolutely right. Who wouldn't want to spend time with your best friend? Yes, amen. Did you ever get to meet Bob? Hope   Bill Johnson ** 25:07 you know I never did, although I at one point in my when I was living in Los Angeles, a friend of mine and I, we were in the over the San Fernando Valley, and they said, Hey, I think there's some stars homes near here. Let's see if we can find them. And we said, I think Bob Hope lives on this street. So we went down Moor Park Avenue in Toluca Lake, and we finally saw this home with a giant H on the gate. And it's like, Oh, I wonder. This has got to be it. Well, all of a sudden these gates began to open. And we, kind of, my friend and I were like, and here, here, Hope came driving home. He was, he arrived home in a very nicely appointed Chrysler Cordoba, remember those? And he had one, he just was just scowling at us, like, what are you doing in my life? You know, and they drove it. So that's as close as I got to the real guy. But I wish I could have had the pleasure of seeing him in person, but never, never was fortunate enough.   Michael Hingson ** 26:18 Well, one of the things that's interesting is like with the World Trade Center, and I've realized over the past few years, we're in a world with a whole generation that has absolutely no direct Memory of the World Trade Center because they weren't born or they were too young to remember. And that goes even further back for Bob Hope. How does that work? Do you find that you're able to connect with younger audiences? Do they talk with you know? Do they do they react? Do they love it? How   Bill Johnson ** 26:52 does that go? Well, interestingly enough, a lot of times, if there are younger people at shows, they're usually dragged there by their parents and I have found that they will start chuckling and giggling and laughing in spite of themselves, because that old humor of hopes that, granted, it is corny, but there's some great material there, if presented in the proper context. Yeah. I was funny story. I was doing a show at the National World War Two Museum in New Orleans. They were dedicating a new theater or something, and the color guard was a group of local leaf Marines that were serving in a local base, and they were standing there right before they went on, and this young man kept looking at me, and finally he said, very respectfully, says, I'm sorry, sir, but who are you? So I said, luckily, there was a picture of Bob Hope on the wall. And I said, Well, I'm trying to be that guy. And I said, Hang around a little bit. You'll hear some of the material so, but that's the thing I that you did bring up. An interesting point is how to keep your audience, I guess, interested, even though the humor is 4056, 70 years old, I call it like all my approach history with humor. The first time I did the Bob Hope, as in the national natural progression of things, I went to an open call, eventually here in Vegas to do they were looking for impersonators for an afternoon show at the Riviera in a place called Penny town. It was just a place for Penny slots. And they had, and they hired me. They said you can do your Bob Hope impression there. And so they had a stage that was on a one foot riser. You had a microphone and a speaker and a sound man, and you had to do a 10 Minute monolog six times a day every Yeah, do 10 minutes. You'd have about a 40 minute break. Do 10 more. And I didn't do it every day, but you would be scheduled. Maybe they'd have, you know, have a Reba McEntire one day. They'd have an Elvis one day. Well, so I would it was a great place to try your ad, because, and that's what turned me on to the whole idea of history with humor. Because when I started, I was just doing some of his material I'd found in a hope joke book that I thought were funny. Well, once in a while, people would be playing the slots. Granted, they were looking at the machines. Nobody was looking at me. And once, when I'd have somebody who. Ah, you know, crank the arm, one arm banded against and then, or I make the sound man laugh. And that was my goal. Well, there was a snack bar right in front of us with a rail that people. They weren't tables, but you could go, lean against the rail and eat your I think it was called Moon doggies hot dog stand so you could eat your hot dog and watch Bob. Hope so if I could make the moon doggy people hot dog folks choke on their hot dog while they were laughing. That was like a home run. Yeah. But to keep them interested, tell them something that they will know. For instance, Hope's first show for the troops was May 6, 1941 down in March field in Riverside California. And you start giving dates and specifics that i i can see the people in the audience go, oh yeah, in their mind's eye, they if they were around, then they will go back to that day. What was I doing then? Okay, and so you kind of make the world relevant for them. So that's how I approach World War Two, Korea and Vietnam. Is give dates and places, which you got to be accurate, because the veterans   Michael Hingson ** 31:27 will set you straight. Oh yeah, because they do remember. Oh yes, they were there.   Bill Johnson ** 31:33 So some of them and but it's, it's amazing, as you say, you can tell if the audience is engaged by if they inhale or if they make some complimentary noises during the show. Sometimes I'll get fellas who will sit there and ponder just looking at me, and then they'll come up afterwards and say, Man, I hadn't thought about that in years.   Michael Hingson ** 32:04 Yeah, thank you. And you know you're connecting, yeah, yeah.   Bill Johnson ** 32:09 And because hope represented, I think, a good memory in a kind of a rough time for a   Michael Hingson ** 32:16 lot of folks. Well, he did. He did so much for the troops with the military. And as you said, May 6, 1941, and it went from there. And of course, during the whole war, he was all over and entertaining people and and he was also very active in radio as part of all that.   Bill Johnson ** 32:38 Oh my goodness, I don't know how the man found time to sleep, because if he were alive today, he would love social media and podcasts and things, because he was always trying to get his name in the paper or get some publicity, but he never forgot about his audience. He would want to do a show for the troops, no matter where they were stationed or he said I couldn't look at myself in the mirror if I didn't try.   Michael Hingson ** 33:10 Yeah, well, you do a lot with veterans and so on. So you've kind of kept up that tradition, haven't you?   Bill Johnson ** 33:19 Yes, I have been fortunate enough to play a lot of reunions and some, maybe some uso themed shows, because that first show he did, hope did, in May of 1941 was they just was a radio show that his, one of his writers had a brother stationed it in Riverside, California, and the war hadn't started, so they had nothing to do, right? These guys were bored, and so he said, Let's take our show down there and hope. So hope didn't want to leave the comfort of his NBC studio. It's like, you know, what's the idea? And they said, how big is the crowd? And they said, Well, I don't know, maybe 1000 and of course, you know 1000 people. And you know, in Hope's mind, he says, I'd give my arm and a leg to hear 10 people laugh. 100 people is like a symphony, but 1000 people, yeah, sheer fantasy. So he said, Oh, wait a minute, are you 1000 people? Are you sure? And this guy, Al capstaff, said, Well, maybe two. So that was it. And they went down. And when the audience, of course, they were just hungry for anything, the response was just so great that hope said, well, where has this been? And he said, shortly after that, we teamed up with the USO and been going steady. Ever since, yeah,   Michael Hingson ** 35:02 and that's so cool. And again, you've, you've kept a lot of that going to now, we've talked on this show with Walden about reps and the showcase and so on. Are you going to be up at the recreation in Washington in September?   Bill Johnson ** 35:18 Yes, I am. I'll be there, and we're, I believe we're doing a one of the cavalcade of America shows that sort of incorporates a lot of his initial, well, one of his initial tours over in World War Two. But it's because a cavalcade is a recreation. A lot of it's drama, dramatized, but it's, it's and it's encapsulated you go bang, bang, bang across a big section of World War Two and Hope's experience in Europe. But it's, to me, as a fan of that genre, it's fascinating, so I just looking forward to it. I think it's going to be a lot of fun.   Michael Hingson ** 36:04 Well, we ought to, one of these days, we need to just do a Bob Hope radio show or something like that, and get you to come on and get an audience and and, and just do a show.   Bill Johnson ** 36:15 Oh, that would be great. I would love. That would be fun. That would be great, you know. And if there's any naysayers, you just say they said, Why do you want to do radio? Say, well, as hope would say, radio is just TV without the eye strain,   Michael Hingson ** 36:30 yeah, and the reality, you know, I'm one of my favorite characters, and one of my favorite shows is Richard diamond private detective, and I was originally going to actually be at the showcase doing Richard diamond, but I've got a speaking engagement, so I won't be able to be there this time, so we'll do it another time. But I remember, you know, at the beginning of every show, the first thing that would happen is that the phone would ring and he would answer it and say something cute, and it was usually his girlfriend, Helen Asher, who is played by Virginia, or who is, yeah, played by Virginia. Greg and one of his shows started. The phone rang. He picked it up. Diamond detective agency, we can solve any crime except television. That's great. I love that one. I love to use that.   Bill Johnson ** 37:20 I gotta remember that that's a great line, yeah,   Michael Hingson ** 37:24 but it's really fun. Well, so you classify yourself as a tribute artist. How do you really get started in doing that, and how do you keep that going?   Bill Johnson ** 37:38 Well, that's, that's a, that's the million dollar question. Basically, I I found all the archival material I could find, and there's a ton of information on Bob Hope on YouTube nowadays, and you need to decide, are you a tribute, or are you an impersonator? Because there is a slight difference.   Michael Hingson ** 38:04 What difference a tribute?   Bill Johnson ** 38:08 Well, first off, an impersonator is someone who resembles someone famous and dresses up in a manner as to portray them, and that can include a tribute artist who may not look identical to the person, but can capture a mannerism or a vocal vocal rhythm to suggest enough that the audience will accept it. I I do it. I am, I feel like I can capture a little bit of his face with some, you know, some of the expressions people have told me my eyes resemble his, as well as wear a hat or something from try to copy a costume from a picture that is very you feel like is iconic of this character. So if you can come out and present that, that's the battle hope would always he began his radio shows, as you recall, by saying where he was and like, how do you do ladies and gentlemen, this is Bob live from Santa Ana Air Base, hope and and then do a two, two line rhyme about his sponsor, usually Pepsodent, just to get on to start the show with a laugh like Pepsodent on your brush and use plenty of traction and none of Your teeth. They'll be missing in action.   39:39 Yeah.   Bill Johnson ** 39:42 Huge, but, but you to to pursue it. As I said, you've just got to, you've got to kind of forage out in the real world and see if see somebody's looking for a show, and hopefully get someone to take a chance. Okay? Give you an opportunity. That's why I went to that open call to do that show at the Riviera. It is difficult to tell jokes at people that are chewing at you, but it's a good learning ground, plus doing the shows at the retirement homes made you prepared for anything because, but I found that I got the strongest response from veteran mentioned some of those history moments, historical moments. And so I thought maybe I'll just focus on this, not to put together the other comedy. And the other experiences are very important too. But the things I have found people remember the most were those shows for the troops. Yeah, and basically, in a nutshell, and they don't remember what did he What did he say? Do you remember a joke? Sometimes they'll tell me a joke, but most, most times, they don't remember what he said, but they remember how he made them feel,   Michael Hingson ** 41:06 yeah, and the fact that he said it, yes, yeah,   Bill Johnson ** 41:10 there's a there's a common joke I'd heard for years, and a friend of mine told me he was a 10 year old kid at Fort Levin fort, Leonard Wood, Missouri. And hope came out and told the joke. The guy goes into a bar. Oh, no, excuse me. Let me back up. A grasshopper goes into a bar. The bartender says, Hey, we got a drink named after you. The grasshopper says, you got a drink named Irving cute. And I'd heard that. Yeah, I guess hope told it and so you never know what what inspires your comedy, but there's a lot of common things I heard growing up that I will find hope said. Hope said it at one point or another in his either his radio show or on one of his specials. So   Michael Hingson ** 41:58 do you think that a lot of what he did was ad lib, or do you think that it was mostly all written, and he just went from a script?   Bill Johnson ** 42:07 That's a good point. He was one of the first performers to use cue cards, okay? And a lot of it was was written, but from what I've read is that he was also very fast on his feet. That's what I thought. Because if something happened, he would come in with a bang, with with another line to top it, yeah. Well, you know, like we were talking about that command performance, where with Lana Turner that he said, she said, Well, they've been looking at ham all night, and you're still here. Ah, big laugh. Haha, yeah. And he said, Now I'm bacon with the double entendre, you know, like, yeah, you burn me, whatever. But that was, I thought that was   Michael Hingson ** 42:51 cute, yeah, and he, and he is, clearly there had to be a whole lot more to him than than writing. And so I absolutely am convinced that there was a lot of bad living. And there was just, he was fast, he was good at it and them, and the more he got comfortable, because of those big crowds that they got him started, the better he became   Bill Johnson ** 43:16 absolutely you can there's a great book by, I know, do you know Bob mills? He was one, was one of Bob Hope's writers wrote a right and he explains the formula behind a lot of their jokes situation, and then it would have a payoff, you know, like, I don't know what happened, but now that you know this is set up in a setup and then the joke. Hope supposedly liked an economy of dialog. He didn't like a lot of language going from point A to point B to tell his joke. That's why the rapid fire delivery. And he had a lot of jokes in his shows. The radio shows had, at least, was it something like 10 jokes a minute?   Michael Hingson ** 44:08 Well, they were, they were very fast. And there were, we've got a few rehearsals of Bob Hope shows. And clearly some of the things that he did, because at first he wasn't getting the reaction that he thought he was going to get, but he pulled it out. And again, it's all because he was fast. He was good.   Bill Johnson ** 44:29 Yeah, I've got some blooper reels from some of the Christmas specials, and he'll try and try and try. And then finally, he'll say, take that card and tear it up, throw it away. And that's funnier than the joke itself.   Michael Hingson ** 44:44 Yeah, than the joke itself. It's really cute. So you obviously like performing. Does that run in your family?   Bill Johnson ** 44:55 Well, not necessarily, as I said, I'm kind of the black sheep of the. Family, because I was in the arts, they would rather have a more what do I want to say? A more safe career, a career choice as a you know, because entertaining, you're always wondering, well, where's my next job? Yeah, as opposed to something else, where you might have a better idea of what are your next paychecks coming? But I do have always had a day job, and this is sort of like my way to flex those creative muscles.   Michael Hingson ** 45:33 So what's your day job today? My   Bill Johnson ** 45:35 day job is I still do technical support for the good folks at Eminem's world on the script. Only they after covid happened, they closed the 3d movie that I was overseeing. And another fellow, when I do tech support, we just basically make sure the lights come on. And as well as I have a job at the College of Southern Nevada, on the support staff, trying to help folks who have English as a Second Language get a job. So I find those are both rewarding challenges.   Michael Hingson ** 46:15 It's a good thing I don't go to Eminem's world because I don't really care if the lights are on or not.   Bill Johnson ** 46:20 Oh, well, there you go. We need somebody here doing rim shots.   Michael Hingson ** 46:26 Yeah, you like dependent people are all alike. You know, you got to have all those lights. Yes, I don't know that I've been to Eminem's world. I've been to the Eminem store in New York City, but I don't think I've been to the one in Las Vegas.   Bill Johnson ** 46:40 I was actually at the opening of that Eminem store in New York City. Funny story, they know they have people that put on the character suits, right? And when I was there to help them kind of get their get acclimated to wearing those suits and then peering in front of people. Well, the kids were doing around, say, two in the afternoon. Well, the New York Times showed up at noon, one pick they wanted a picture of and so I had to put on the I was yellow, the peanut, and this other person that was there put on the red suit, and we walked down on 46th Street and started walking on the street, wave and and carrying on. I thought, Here I am. I finally made it to Broadway. Yeah, and I'm and I'm dressed as a nut so,   Michael Hingson ** 47:30 and you had Hershey right across the street,   Bill Johnson ** 47:32 right across the street, so I don't know. I imagine her, she's still there, probably still going head to head, to this   Michael Hingson ** 47:40 day, the last time I heard they were so well, I don't know, I don't know whether anything really changed with covid, but the last I heard they were   Bill Johnson ** 47:49 well, more powerful, Yeah, funny story.   Michael Hingson ** 47:56 Well, so you will, you travel basically anywhere to do a show? Are there any limits?   Bill Johnson ** 48:03 Or no, I'll go anywhere. My this tribute has taken me as far as Tokyo, Japan for the USO there. I've done shows in the Pacific and Guam I'm not too sure I want to travel internationally these days, but if somebody has an opportunity, I'll think about it. Funny thing happened at that, that show I did in Tokyo, I was, it was, it was a gala for the local uso honor the the troops who were serving in that area. So they had that representative from each branch that was serving our Navy, Marines and the Japan, nation of Japan now has what they call, this, the Civil Defense Group. I believe that's what they call because after World War Two, they signed that document saying they would not have an organized military. But right, they have their civil defense, and so we were honoring them, that there was a group, an Andrew sisters trio, performing, singing and dancing and and I was standing off off stage, just waiting to go on and finish the show. And this, this has been 20 years ago. Let me preface that this older Japanese gentleman came up to me, and he said, I would like to make a toast. And there was a lady in charge who, you know this was. There was some, some admirals there, and leaders of the Seventh Fleet were, were there. So everything had to be approved. Everything went according to schedule. The military events are just boom, boom, boom. And so I said, Well, okay, I need to ask Judy, when this Judy was in charge, when we can do this? And he just said, I want to make a tow. Toast. And I said, okay, but I have to clear it with Judy. Well, I finally got Judy and said that older Japanese man would like to make a toast. And she said, Yes, let him do whatever he wants. Turns out, he was an admiral in the Japanese Navy during during World War Two, and he was attending the event here, although these many years later, just as you know, everyone else was sure. So to bail myself out of it, I went back on said stage and said, And now, ladies and gentlemen, our honored guest would like to make a toast. And he, of course, I can't remember the toast, but as I at the time, I thought that was very sweet and very eloquent. So it's just these incredible little snippets of life you you go through. It's like, how could I ever know, when I was a five year old kid in Kansas, that Monday I'd be chatting with a world war two Admiral from the Japanese Navy, right? Just, it's just mind boggling.   Michael Hingson ** 51:06 So I'm curious. Bob Hope copyrighted a lot of his jokes. Are you able to still use them? Well, that's a   Bill Johnson ** 51:13 good question. Yes, he did. He copyrighted his jokes and everything, however, and I have spoken to the lawyer for the hope estate. There are the, what do you call that? It just flew out of my head that the the laws surrounding   Michael Hingson ** 51:32 intellectual property, copyright laws and intellectual property and public domain, yeah, yeah.   Bill Johnson ** 51:38 The song, thanks for the memory is in public domain, and hope would always change the lyrics to where he went because he hated the song. Supposedly he had, how did I get hung with that old dog of a song?   Michael Hingson ** 51:52 Yeah, well, he kept using it every week, so I can't believe it was too anti song. Yeah,   Bill Johnson ** 51:57 that's true, but the hope is they did copyright his jokes, but as long as I don't write a book and try to sell them as my jokes, I should be fine as well as I am. Allow you the those laws allow you to present impersonate someone, no matter who it is. You could impersonate your next door neighbor, even though he's not famous, as long as you do not do something to harm them, yeah, or represent it in an unflattering way   Michael Hingson ** 52:28 well, and clearly, what you're doing is pretty obvious to anyone who knows at all that it's Bob Hope and that you're trying to do a tribute to him. So I would think it would make sense that that would work   Bill Johnson ** 52:39 well it should and but the final caveat is that a reasonable person must come away from the show knowing full well they did not see the original. You must tell them. And Bob Hope's been gone for   Michael Hingson ** 52:55 many years. Yeah, 22 years now.   Bill Johnson ** 52:59 So that's usually not a problem, but that's how I finished my tribute as vice is, I usually wear a hat to complete the illusion, with the bill flecked up. I'll take the hat off and say, now if I could break character and tell about how hope was named an honorary veteran, and at the age of 94 it was an amendment passed by Congress designated him as an honorary veteran, and it was received unanimous bipartisan support   Michael Hingson ** 53:30 as it should yes and   Bill Johnson ** 53:33 Hope went on to say, sort of all the awards I've received in my lifetime being now being listed among the men and women I admire the most. This is my greatest honor, so that's a good way for me to wrap up my tributes whenever possible.   Michael Hingson ** 53:54 Do you have, oh, go ahead, no,   Bill Johnson ** 53:56 I was gonna say there's another funny story. You know, hope lived to be 100 Yeah, and George Burns.   Michael Hingson ** 54:03 George Burns, lived to be 100   Bill Johnson ** 54:05 lived to be 100 Supposedly, the two of them had a bet as to who would live the longest. Now, the thing is, what were the stakes and how do you collect? Yeah, because some guy, you're not going to be there. But in any event, George Burns was born in the 1890s and so he was older than hope. Hope was born in 1903 George Burns lived to be 100 years and 10 days old. Bob Hope lived to be 100 years and 59 days   54:41 Oh,   Bill Johnson ** 54:42 so hope. Well, the story goes that in his final, final months, he was just he was pretty much bedridden and slept and slept a lot. His wife, Dolores went to his bedside. He had that 100 years 10 day mark, and she said. Well, Bob, you won the bet. You have now lived longer than George Burns. And supposedly, even though he was fat, he was like they thought he was asleep, this huge smile just curled up his lips so he heard, that's great.   Michael Hingson ** 55:18 That's great. Well, if, if you have, do you have something that you could do for us, or do you have something that you could play or something that would give us just a little flavor?   Bill Johnson ** 55:28 Um, yeah, I Well, if you, I would tell your listeners that they want to catch a little bit more. They can go to my website, Bill Johnson entertainment.com, and there's some video clips there, but I like to do is that hope would always, he would always joke about traveling to the event, and that's how I like to begin my shows with him arriving. Since I just flew in on a wing of prayer. I was on the wing because as a soldier, I wouldn't have a prayer nicely. My flight was very nice, but the plane was rather old. In fact, the pilot sat behind me wearing goggles and a scarf. This plane was so old that Lindbergh's lunch was still on the seat. The fasten seat belt sign was in Latin. To get to the washroom, you had to crawl out on the wing. But I come on, folks, I said, to get to the washroom, you had to crawl out of the wing. But hey, I don't know about you, but I have a fear of flying that dates back to my childhood. See, when I was a baby being delivered by the stork, that blasted bird dropped me from 400 feet. Yeah, he did that to stay out of the range my father's shotgun. See, Dad already had my brothers, Eenie, Meenie and Miney. When I came along, he didn't want   56:55 no moat. I get it just   Bill Johnson ** 57:00 it goes along in those words. Well, we are,   Michael Hingson ** 57:05 we are definitely going to have to just work out doing a radio show and getting you to to do a whole show, and we'll have to get some other people to go along with it. We'll figure it out. Oh, that sounds great. I would buy a lot of fun to do. Count me in. Well, I want to thank you for being here. This has been absolutely wonderful to be able to talk about Bob Hope and to talk about you. Even more important, I'm sure that Bob Hope is monitoring from somewhere, but by the same token, you're here and we're here, so we do get to talk about you, which is important to do as   Bill Johnson ** 57:41 well. Well, that's very kind, Michael. I was hopeful that you would be at the rips.   Michael Hingson ** 57:47 I was planning on it because I wanted to, I want to really do the Richard diamond show. I'll, I told you I'd send you the command performance that we talked about Dick Tracy and B flat, or, for goodness sakes, is he ever going to marry Tess true heart? Oh yes. And I'll also send you the Richard diamond that we're going to do the next time I'm able to be at the rep show. It's, it's   Bill Johnson ** 58:06 really hilarious. Oh, that sounds great.   Michael Hingson ** 58:09 But I want to thank you for being here once again. Tell us your website.   Bill Johnson ** 58:14 My website is, it's my name and followed by entertain Bill Johnson, entertainment.com there's there's some video clips there, and some great pictures of some of the folks I've had the pleasure of meeting and performing with. I don't want to name drop, but just to give the the act a little more credence, pictures with Les Brown Jr. Rest his soul. I did it floored. I was able to do a show with Lee Greenwood on the island of Maui Wow, as well as perform with Wayne Newton at Fort Hood, Texas. Wayne Newton actually took over for Bob Hope with the USO when Bob just got too old to travel. Yeah, so, so that's just for a humble, humble guy. It's some incredible stories   Michael Hingson ** 59:19 well, and you're keeping some wonderful memories alive, and we'll definitely have to do something with that. But I want to thank you for for being here and again. Bill Johnson, entertainment.com, so go check it out, folks and and there's a lot of old radio out there online. We've talked about yesterday usa.com or yesterday usa.net they're the same. You can listen. You can go to reps online, R, E, P, S online, and listen to a lot of radio programs there. There are a number of people we've had Carl Amari on who several years ago, did come. Complete redos of all of the Twilight zones, and he made them scripts for radio, which was a lot of fun. Have you ever heard any of those?   Bill Johnson ** 1:00:07 I've never heard. I was a big fan of the show when it was on TV, but I never heard any of the   Michael Hingson ** 1:00:12 radio. Stacy Keach Jr is is the Rod Serling character, but, oh yeah, Twilight radio,   Bill Johnson ** 1:00:19 that's great. I will check it out,   Michael Hingson ** 1:00:22 or we'll send you some that's even better. But I want to thank you for being here, and thank you all for being here with us. I hope you had fun today. It's a little bit different than some of the things that we've done on the podcast, but I think it makes it all the more fun. So thanks for being here. Please let us know what you think. Email me. I'd love to hear from you. Michael, H, I m, I C, H, A, E, L, H, I at accessibe, A, C, C, E, S, S, i, b, e.com, love to get your thoughts wherever you're listening. Please give us a five star review. We appreciate those a lot. Tell other people about the podcast. We really would like to get as many people listening as we can, and we want to be sure to do the kinds of things you want on the podcast. So if you know anyone else who ought to be on the podcast, Bill, that goes for you as well, please introduce us. We're always looking for more people to come on unstoppable mindset that we get a chance to chat with. So hope that you'll all do that and again. Bill, I want to thank you one more time for being here. This has been fun.   Bill Johnson ** 1:01:21 This has been a blast. Michael, thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed it.   Michael Hingson ** 1:01:32 You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com . AccessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for Listening. 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When a podcast asks Unspookable to collaborate, especially if it is one of our all time favorite podcasts with one of the coolest hosts in the business, we will jump at the opportunity. We are thrilled to present this special Halloween Edition of The Past and The Curious featuring Unspookable creator Nate DuFort. Give it a listen and if you want more cool, quirky, and surprising stories from history (with the best musical accompaniment), go subscribe to The Past and The Curious wherever you listen to podcasts. Did a no-longer-living Mark Twain send a novel from the great beyond with a Ouija Board? Find out about the real story with help from our pal Nate DuFort of the podcast, Unspookable. Looking for merch from Unspookable and your favorite Soundsington Media shows? Head on over to our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Dashery store ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠for t-shirts, hoodies, mugs, stickers, hats and more. ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://soundsington-media.dashery.com Advertise on Unspookable: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠advertising@airwavemedia.com

Welcome to Book Club Day at the Professional Left, where we're spoiling a 141-year-old novel that remains the undisputed champ of American literature—and revealing why it's more relevant than ever.What does Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn teach us about the struggle for America's soul in the age of Trump? Huck faces an agonizing choice: turn in his friend Jim and save his soul, or commit what he believes is a mortal sin and "go to hell." What happens when a sound heart collides with a deformed conscience?Why are the Duke and the King—usually portrayed as "lovable scamps" in film adaptations—actually dangerous grifters who sell Jim back into slavery for "forty dirty dollars"? How does Huck transform from a passive, undecided observer into an activist with a plan? And what can we learn from his refusal to accept the "Both Sides" lie of his era?We're fighting the same battle Twain declared war on: a culture that wraps monstrous lies in scripture and protects them with passive, silent complicity.All right, then—we'll go to hell.More at proleftpod.com.Not safe for work. Recorded live from the Cornfield Resistance.Stay in Touch! Email: proleftpodcast@gmail.comWebsite: proleftpod.comSupport via Patreon: patreon.com/proleftpodMail: The Professional Left, PO Box 9133, Springfield, Illinois, 62791Support the show

Tonight, for our monthly Snoozecast+ Deluxe bonus sleep story, we'll read the opening to Mark Twain's “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court” published in 1889. While we at Snoozecast adore ALL our listeners equally, our monthly bonus episodes like this one are specifically made for our Snoozecast+ Deluxe premium subscribers. If you are not a Deluxe subscriber, you will here a trimmed version of the story. To learn more about our 2 premium subscription options, go to snoozecast.com/plus. As a non-Deluxe listener, Tonight's satirical novel tells the story of Hank Morgan, a 19th-century engineer from Hartford, Connecticut, who, after a blow to the head, finds himself transported back in time to the England of King Arthur. The book was one of the earliest major works of time-travel fiction, predating H. G. Wells' The Time Machine by six years. At the same time, it sat firmly in Twain's style: humorous, biting, and rooted in American sensibilities. Though filled with fantastical elements like knights, castles, and magic, the story is just as much a sharp social commentary as it is an adventure. When first published, the novel stirred controversy for its irreverent treatment of Arthurian legend, but over time it has come to be recognized as a clever and influential blend of satire, science fiction, and historical fantasy. — read by 'V' — Sign up for Snoozecast+ to get expanded, ad-free access by going to snoozecast.com/plus! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices