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Wow, I loved this line pasted below!! Gave me such a pick me up before I sit down to write this morning!! Ty!

“The beauty of being 80 is that you realize more fully how fortunate you are. Morbid gloom belongs to the young.”

So funny. And so true!!!

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Wow! Sometimes that ChatGPI thing comes up with far better exchanges than that of which we are able. What have we got to lose. Our own submissions aren't getting the job done.

Sometimes I think your last line below a la ChatGPI says it all and it's at least as good and that's enough for me. I give it little mind anway.

We used to call it something similar: Artificial Intelligence. It may have worked at least as good as many so-called Real intelligences. Let's give the Chat a la GPI a chance.

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founding

The voice, YES! But that "don't mean a thing if it ain't got that SWING!" From the first time I accidentally tuned in to APHC on a long drive - I was coming back from doing volunteer library work at a Russian Orthodox monastery monastery (undercover female, at that!) - I've been absolutely HOOKED!

From the first, I became an "acolyte" because of the way you embrace folks from the world over in a global friendship! Then again, I am a "refugee Democrat" from a Republican party family who's head went to rallies by the likes of Richard M. Nixon. (My kids went to the Richard M. Nixon elementary school in Yorba Linda, CA.) I think, when you're in a minority, you take the distinguishing characteristics of your chose party more seriously!

Besides the politics, I Love, Love, Love your singing - in solo or duets especially! And I love going to your in-person performances, especially when you pull up a chair and sit down to begin with "It has been a quiet week in Lake Woebegon!" I think my all-time favorite was the time a fellow was on water skis with a kite on his back, and went airborne! I can remember you looking up at the "sky", as if it were blue in that theater, and imagining it in such great detail that I thought I was there myself!

It seems to me that you have a "n

natural-borne talent!" And, LONG, LONG, LONG may you continue to brighten our lives with your "Positive Thinking!

My parents were addicted to Dr. Norman Vincent Peale's radio show, "The Power of Positive Thinking" when I was growing up. However, his were lectures. You "Preach" by example! I wouldn't be surprised if you have at least 1000-times the radio audience that he commanded! Let's Hear it for

A Prairie Home Companion!!!

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Lord of the Flies on the Wall

A group of school boys stranded on a tropical island relentlessly eavesdrop on one another’s conversations.

Just running an idea up the flag pole to see if anyone salutes.

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Excellent!

Lord of the Flies in My Soup.

Same boys. Same island. Daily swimming, yet oddly stroking only on their backs. Waiter assists.

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Fascinating! I, too, heard the beeps and hum while reading that text-gathering exercise. At the time I thought I might be losing my mind. However, it did support my very early education in English, in which I learned that a poem consists of a series of four-line stanzas, in which lines 1-3 end with a comma and line 4 with a period. I used to think such instruction was lacking.

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I was at your Bellefontaine Ohio show and had a great time. I did have one question: you were wearing red socks but I seem to remember from other shows that you have a pair of red Keds. Was there a reason you weren't wearing them for this show?

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I forgot them. I have them in my suitcase now.

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founding

You talked about folks who tutor high school students having problems with English composition… When I lived in Ithaca, NY, a group of Cornellians formed the Ithaca Tutoring Society. After a few meetings with students, those in charge decided that we needed some “operational guidance.” It seems that, when many of us joined the group, we thought we would be substitute English teachers. In getting feedback from those being tutored, though, it turned out that focusing on the mechanics could lead to problems in itself. Many of those we were tutoring had low self-images. Those who were “Gung-ho” on emphasizing, for example, the use of “an” before nouns beginning with a vowel sound, might be pecking away at the limited self-confidence that some of our students had. We were advised to switch to more “creative writing” – having the students write essays about things they liked - free-form. The idea was to foster the concept that someone really wanted to listen to them, and that they could “speak” on the written page. I know, for the sophomore I was helping, it was the difference between night and day! Instead of picking apart their creations, we might talk about their enthusiasms for a while, then focus on one particular issue that they could practice for the next piece. I could see the difference right away! Before, she’d come into the meeting room - slump-shouldered, grim face, slow step and all. Once we switched to “creative writing,” she was eager to share with me whatever subject she had written about that week! That tutorial society didn’t last into the next year. It might have been asking too much of hyper-industrious college students, to take off the cap and gown and be “people.” There’s more to “teaching” than “knowing the ropes!

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