The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 12:35 PM

Someone I know, who wishes to be known as His Brother's Brother, has also commenced a life's work.

Poem #1 The Meaning of Poetry

With my pen keeping time,
in a desperate attempt to
preserve a beautiful rhyme,
Wouldn't you?

#2 A Diet to End All Diets

Raisins, prunes and mandarins,
All are nice,
But so is plain boiled rice,
Best in humans, not so in mice.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 09:27 AM

Yeah man.....WE KNOW its your life's work......and more's the pity!

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 10 Oct 08 - 07:13 AM

Little Hawk - whilst at least trying to maintain a sense of humour through the barrage, walkaboutsverse.741.com is indeed my genuine life's work.
And thanks Don.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 05:35 PM

LOL! Well, yes, I get your point about the chimpanzees. It's so easy to slip over the border and verge into rank specism. I must be more careful about how I word things.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Don Firth
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 05:04 PM

Poetry? He wants poetry?

Okay, how about this?

Algie saw the bear.
The bear saw Algie.
The bear was bulgie.
The bulge was Algie!
          —Red Skelton

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: KB in Iowa
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 03:48 PM

LH, I hope for your sake Chongo doesn't read this.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 02:57 PM

Exactly.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: s&r
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 02:53 PM

COme one Little Hawk: what self respecting chimpanzee......


Stu

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 01:52 PM

Whereas I think he is maintaining the illusion...

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 01:37 PM

Yes, but then he opens his mouth, er, I mean, types something, shattering the illusion.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 01:29 PM

Have you people considered the possibility that WAV may simply be a bored chimpanzee in Brighton with a word processor who likes making up stories and provoking neo-liberal folkies, and he's entertaining himself daily here by waving the red flag before the bull, as it were, and then observing with wry amusement as the bull snorts, paws, and charges?

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 01:13 PM

...I'm not sure where he's from and whether it's an issue for him, Catspaw, but I thought the great Amos might have made a visit for our National Poetry Day...anyone else want to venture some verse?...

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 06:40 AM

Have you considerd that everything might go a lot better if you'd show some ambition and a bit of humility? Combine that with not acting like such an asshole and you might realize that all these issues for you ain't diddly-shit to others.

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 09 Oct 08 - 06:31 AM

I hate imperialism, Don - be it Nazi, Victorian or any other.
When it comes to performing (rather than just appreciating, AS I DO) other cultures, instead of their own, modern English are among the world's worst - or best, depending on your stance. You know I see this as a problem, a negative thing, for society, and you know I'm at least trying to do something about it.
At interviews, I do keep my political mouth shut, but still sometimes have to cope with: "Why ON EARTH did you come back"; "You must be mad"; "Most people go the other way"; etc. So, as well as my concern for society, of course it would be better for me personally if attitudes toward economic/capitalist immigration changed, and my repatriation was questioned less.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: s&r
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 06:20 PM

Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? There is more hope of a fool than him (Ecclesiastes)

Was it Zuleika " I don't know anything about music but I
know what I like"

WAV I don't blame you for the state of the world nor do I believe that there is any similarity in any of your postulated solutions and those proposed by skilled politicians and men of high intellect faced with a global crisis.

I do believe that your need to prove your strange outlook on life has just reached its most risible and distasteful in the latest of your YAH Boo Sucks arguments.

Pride, the never failing vice of fools (Pope)

The refuge of poor thought is the cliche. Yhere's a few above for you just in case you feel the need to vary the rather boring liberty thing (get another book of quotations for the after-dinner speaker)

Seriously WAV you don't understand trade, finance, economics as well as the other examples of matters that are beyond you such as music, tradition, verse/poetry. How do I know this? Because you tell us repeatedly in your banal and infantile posts.

Read, edit, think inany order.

Stu

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Don Firth
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 03:21 PM

Well, on the face of it, it looks to me like Ruth, an immigrant from America (shudder shudder), is doing far more in the way of active, tangible things to promote appreciation of English folk music that David is. In fact, David's approach, which involves putting singers into a cultural straitjacket and dictating to them what songs they are allowed and not allowed to sing, strikes me as consistent with his other nazionalistic pronouncements.

Considering that a significant portion of folk song springs from peoples' resistance to oppression by those in power—protest songs, in fact, and often antinationalistic—attempting to cast folk music into some sort of nationalistic mold eradicates much of its very character. If he wants to ban songs, how long will it be before he wants to ban books? Movies? Television shows? What people should be allowed to say?

So despite all your degrees and certificates, David, you still haven't been able to find a job. Blaming this on immigrants makes for a very easy excuse (one which I've heard before).

But perhaps there are other reasons you haven't been able to find a job.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 03:17 PM

In case you haven't had chance to catch the news these last few weeks, Stu, the "World" has in fact moved at least a bit closer to my way - "Global Regulationism" (Poem 105), etc...Who's "been so wrong all this time"? But if you just can't listen to me, Stu: "Liberty, as surfeit, is the father of much fast" (William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure).<\i>

Be specific, Wav. No more vagueness. Tell us who in the world, when and what events, etc.

Something I forgot to mention about polymers is that it is frequently CHANGING. A certificate which is a few years old and NO practical experience is NOT impressive. Not to me, not to prospective employers neither does it add up to highly skilled.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 03:03 PM

Why, I would hang myself from the old oak tree in the backyard, what do you think? ;-)

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 03:00 PM

Little Hawk, the answer is simple. I wouldn't argue with him, I have other ways to fill my time, but when he makes these ridiculous pronouncements I'm not going to let him get away with it. Pure and simple.
What would YOU silly F-er do if we weren't here to berate from your pedestal?

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 02:54 PM

What would you few silly fuckers who are arguing with WAV all the time on this thread do if he went away and you didn't have him to argue with anymore? ;-)

Worse yet...what if this entire Mudcat website collapsed and you couldn't argue with anyone here anymore? Then what???????

There ARE more dire threats than World War III or a global depression. Does it keep you awake at night worrying that these things might happen? I know it does me. Imagine it! Not having the chance to pick on WAV any longer. Wowee. Pretty scary. OOOOO-wee!

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 02:43 PM

In case you haven't had chance to catch the news these last few weeks, Stu, the "World" has in fact moved at least a bit closer to my way - "Global Regulationism" (Poem 105), etc...Who's "been so wrong all this time"? But if you just can't listen to me, Stu: "Liberty, as surfeit, is the father of much fast" (William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure).

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 02:34 PM

I am well aware of how and when E-ceilidh (not the Scottish or Irish forms) came into the English folk dance revival, and am happy to support and programme it as an accessible form of traditionally-based dance. I'm not having that stupid semantic argument with you again - it's just a name.

Why do you think i'm getting those opportunities, Waveydavey? Maybe because I work for them? Maybe even because I'm good at what I do? Do you think a native-born English person has a greater entitlement to the opportunities I have had because they were born here, regardless of whether they were more able to do the job?

I've told you to go home only once - and let's face it, you've made no secret of the fact that you'd prefer it if people like me had never come here, so it's tit-for-tat, really. But you are a racist, a xenophobe, a segregationist - call it what you will, it ain't nice.

I do the work I do because I love it, and because I passionately believe in its intrinsic value - not to satisfy some warped political agenda. I have also managed projects around Ghanaian drumming, Yoruban singing and dancing, African diasporan music and singing, Caribbean music and culture...oh, the list goes on. It's all part of the cultural mix of this beautiful country, which I love with all my heart. And it belongs to me, and all of the people of many races and cultures whom I've had the honour and pleasure to work with over the years, as much as it belongs to you.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: s&r
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 02:21 PM

Please ask yourself what it is in your pronouncements that repeatedly causes such vitriolic responses from nice people.

Please consider that you are the one soldier out of step.

Please read what you write, then edit it, then think of its effect on the rest of us normal kindly sincere people.

Then edit it again to read 'Sorry World, I've been so wrong all this time.

Pretty please?

Stu

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 01:43 PM

Firstly, IB - you have again confused the questioning of immigration with racism; secondly, I have given examples of how conquest and mass-immigration have had negative affects on culture and, thus, society - and you, of course, went on to say those problems have nothing to do with the loss of culture, people no longer going to church, etc (remember now?).
My PP Cert. was 1 year, Volgadon; and I'd agree that is not one of the most highly skilled trades in terms of dexterity, but there IS a lot of knowledge comes into the moulding process - all the different polymers, the temp's required, the different moulds to fill without getting flashes or short shots...see poems 86, 92, 147, 200, if you wish.
I know that you are getting plenty of opportunities here, Ruth/Joan, and that you have repeatedly called me a "racist", told me to "go home", and made other defamatory marks that would certainly not help me get back into employment - rather than spunge off your's and other tax payers' money, as you have also accused of me of; not to mention repeatedly calling me "Crocodile Dundee"!. However, I admit, and am pleased, that there is indeed plenty of good English culture on the list you just gave; but why not "English country dancing" instead of (Scottish) "ceilidh"? My late Godmother told me of doing plenty of English country dancing at her English school - but I swear to God she didn't know what a ceilidh was.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 07:16 AM

Also Ruth you have an error in this sentence:"....or indeed to learn top-line melodies on my English nose flute......"

He plays English Skin Flute, not nose flute. Just trying to help out...........

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 07:03 AM

I forgot to say: I can't drive a forklift truck.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 06:58 AM

"Ruth - if you were using your posts to promote ENGLISH culture (rather than Americanisation), if you weren't constantly attacking my character and telling me to "go home", and if you came across as a more reasonable competent person, I WOULDN'T mind you having gained such opportunity."

That's one of the funniest posts I have ever read in my life, and awfully magnanimous of you, Wavey. I'd be very interested to know how I'm promoting Americanisation, apart from being American. Unlike you, I don't really like to blow my own trumpet about my achievements, but if you want to question my "competence", here are some excerpts from my recent CV:

Programme and Marketing Manager at a venue where I developed a strong programme of folk music (with an emphasis on English music), supported a composition project and showcase of new music by English traditional musicians, started a ceilidh series and ran a folk festival with a whole strand exclusively dedicated to English traditional music. Started an outreach project with local schools where kids learned traditional dance incuding rapper, longsword, morris and clog.

Currently the Artisitc Director of one of England's most prominent folk festivals, as well as the outreach officer for a project which develops and carries on the work we started at my venue with young people and traditional dance.

I am on the National Council for EFDSS, and as their representative was responsible for creating and delivering Saturday's Vaughan Williams celebration at Cecil Sharp House (you'll find details above the line).

Worked on other festivals and events as part of a wider career in Arts Management. I started running music sessions and one-off folk events about 20 years ago, as well as volunteerring at all sorts of events.

Admittedly, I've been a bit busy in the past few years to catch every single BBC folk programme or indeed to learn top-line melodies on my English nose flute, but the idea that, by challenging your dubious Nationalistic and racist tendencies I am not promoting English culture, is one I feel compelled to dispute. I love English culture, but abhor the way that you and your ilk twist it to suit your own deeply flawed political agenda.

Of course, I've probably only managed to do all this stuff because I'm a foreigner, and the government hands us everything on a plate. Once upon a time every foreigner got handed a corner shop on arrival, eh, Crocodile Dundee? Now they just give us a folk festival.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 06:42 AM

Wav, you'll find she uses her TIME and TALENTS to promote ENGLISH culture, or did you think that the RVW celebrations at C# House just spontaneously fell into place?

A certificate in polymer processing is decidedly UNIMPRESSIVE. It's usually a 6 month course and all it means is that the plastics factory can put you right to work looking after one of the machines without having to start from simple worker, the ones that put the stuff into boxes and stack them. It is nothing special and quite often people work their way into the same position without having to take a course. I don't know how it is in the UK, but here in Israel if you plan to make a carreer in maufacturing, you get a fork-lift license. Why? The factory has to give you slightly better wages and deference.

After 3 months in a cannery I am reasonably well skilled, without any courses or certificates. Really isn't difficult at all.

I'll repeat an earlier post, hope you reply instead of evading, as is your wont.

"But you yourself are an immigrant! Repats are a category of immigrants. And just so you know, there are people like the Kalmyks who question the act of repatriation, which is a hotter issue there than immigration. They oppose repatriation on the same grounds as you immigration- take our jobs, dilute our own good culture with their foreign ways they bring back, and so on..."

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 06:27 AM

You don't like people questioning immigration or it's effects on our culture and, therefor, society

You have never explained just what effects on our culture (and, therefore, society) immigration has had. When asked, you either duck the question or refer us back to your racist rhetoric. Now please, WAV - take this opportunity to show us precisely the effects immigration have had on our culture that might justify the racist tirade of (say) English culture is taking a hammering. Also, show us how people are suffering as a result.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 08 Oct 08 - 06:12 AM

Ruth - if you were using your posts to promote ENGLISH culture (rather than Americanisation), if you weren't constantly attacking my character and telling me to "go home", and if you came across as a more reasonable competent person, I WOULDN'T mind you having gained such opportunity. You don't like people questioning immigration or it's effects on our culture and, therefor, society - and you use nasty unprofessional tactics to try and stop them (have a look back of some of your posts - of the other kind).
Stu - level 1 IT Certificate (a bit of level 2, also - in order to self-publish), Fork-Lift Licence, Certificate in Polymer Processing, Advanced Certificate in Manufacturing Technology, BA degree in Humanities - majoring in anthropology, with distinctions for many of my essays; and, with all that, I have tried for work well beyond the field of manufacturing - despite what Ruth has ASSUMED, above.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 11:26 PM

He's also got an A-1 rating certification as a wanker.........

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: s&r
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 06:58 PM

I forgot grade A Junior football.

Stu

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: s&r
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 06:44 PM

So you've got a degree, a certificate in manufacturing, a fork lift truck certificate, a level 2 desktop publishing, a level 1 web design certificate, you have photocopied and bound some A4 sheets, and read a recent book on operations management.

Is that it then?

Stu

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 03:24 PM

"...during the Blair years there was a record amount of immigration and a lot of pro-immigrationism here that was great for the likes of you Ruth, and difficult for a repat, who has questioned economic/capitalist immmigration, like me..."

See, now we're finally getting to the crux of it. Great for the likes of me, was it? You think I've had my career handed to me on a platter, just because I'm an immigrant?

I have done my share of shitty jobs. When I first arrived in London I sometimes worked 60 hours a week in pubs - it's an expensive city, and there was no minimum wage at the time. Until my daughter was 4 I was a full-time mum all day who then worked evenings and weekends in pubs and restaurants. Tell me, instead of bleating about how you can't find manufacturing work, have you got up off your arse to find some - ANY - work that would mean you didn't have to be a burden to the English taxpayer? Or is that beneath you?

I re-trained specifically to work in my current profession - I took a specialist degree, and was working three part-time jobs at one point in addition to full time study and looking after my family. I came away with a 1st class degree and a shedload of practical experience, and haven't really looked back.

So there you go, Crocodile Dundee - if I'm one of Blair's babes (actually, I came to this country when there was a conservative government, while you were still singing Waltzing Matilda round the barbie) I've worked pretty bloody hard for the privilege. And yeah, I have a pretty nice life.

You resent people like me because we have what you don't. You would like to see laws that would keep us out, because you're a jealous, spiteful little man. But regardless of when or where you were born, you are no more entitled to a career or success than anyone else. At the end of the day, I've got a strong suspicion that it's your own social inadequacy that is far more responsible than all the immigrants in Britain for your current sorry state. Why not do yourself and everyone else a favour? Go home.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 02:59 PM

LMAOLMAOLMAOROTFLMAO...........


Who gives a shit about the day you were born or Alf Ramsey or what either has to do with whether you deserve gainful employment. I really would love to have a tape of your next job interview......if you ever get another. I am reasonably sure you come off to them the same as you do here.


ALf molested Cocker Spaniels and I'm sure they were English Cockers............

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 02:57 PM

But you yourself are an immigrant! Repats are a category of immigrants. And just so you know, there are people like the Kalmyks who question the act of repatriation, which is a hotter issue there than immigration. They oppose repatriation on the same grounds as you immigration- take our jobs, dilute our own good culture with their foreign ways they bring back, and so on...

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 02:11 PM

...during the Blair years there was a record amount of immigration and a lot of pro-immigrationism here that was great for the likes of you Ruth, and difficult for a repat, who has questioned economic/capitalist immmigration, like me...but, in case you haven't noticed, things are just beginning to turn around...
Believe it or not Stu, I am quite a dedicated person and have allowed for that - e.g., purchasing an up-to-date Operations Management book, that shows things have not changed that much since my equivalent of a HNC.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 02:05 PM

Graduating from school and getting a degree or certificate of some kind is only the beginning of education. In school, the most important thing one should learn is how to learn.

Lots of people never get that.

I knew a woman who considered herself highly educated. Yet, she bragged that she had not "cracked a book" since she graduated from college.

Her education didn't seem to do her much good.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: s&r
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 01:41 PM

a degree is not highly trained = a few certificates are not highly trained. It adds up to a reasonable level of education but not out of the ordinary among members of this forum. Probably much of the content has been superceded since you took them.

Stu

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 01:15 PM

"And, yes, Ruth, whether or not you deserve it, it seems you are indeed being given a lot more opportunity from English people than I, a highly-trained English repatriate born here the day Alf Ramsey's English team won the World Cup of football, at the moment..."

The sort of opportunities you should be MORE entitled to because of an accident of birth, WAV? I've always known that one of the biggest chips you carry on your rather overburdened shoulders stems from a resentment that foreigners - "capitalist immigrants" - are in work (work you're somehow more entitled to?) when you aren't.

Well, love, maybe I get work because I'm good at what I do. Maybe you don't cause you're not (despite your BA and your tennis trophies). Harsh, but true.

Where either of us was born is irrelevant - and what football matches might have been taking place as my poor mum was squeezing me out, I have no idea.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 01:06 PM

HIGHLY trained?

Have you written on your resume that you were born on the day that Alf Ramsey on the world cup? Might help....

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 12:49 PM

"some level of editorial process and criticism would be invoved" (Ruth)...yes, I did that, and virtually everything myself - but, as you just IGNORED, these other publications do have an editor who does suchlike. And, yes, Ruth, whether or not you deserve it, it seems you are indeed being given a lot more opportunity from English people than I, a highly-trained English repatriate born here the day Alf Ramsey's English team won the World Cup of football, at the moment...

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: catspaw49
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 10:03 AM

Ya' know Wavytinyballs, you are such a humongous asshole and your "Life's Work" is such a tiny and fetid piece of crap-laden claptrap that you should have no problem shoving it up your ass. LOL.....The very idea that the world could be better served by following your teachings is both laughable and grotesque.

Once again please look in the mirror at your racist and bigoted self and say, "I am a totally worthless excuse for a human being." Of course you could pass on that and just go around the world again.......with your mother. I hear she goes around the world quite well and quite often.

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 08:11 AM

My work in manufacturing paid for the travel and the self-publication of my life's work, Stu; and I did so as I'm sure it contains good ways forward for humanity, Stu and Ralphie

Always worth a laugh or two, reading that. I'll tell you what is a good way forward for humanity, it's not the UN, it's not dense poetry which doesn't really say anything, but it is popular movements like my friend Max Goryachev's 'Revolution of Goodwill' (or kindness), helping people to get out and DO something, not merely walkabout with their pen.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 05:43 AM

The difference between that and vanity publishing is quite simple.
Vanity is easier, cheaper and less time-consuming than printing a large amount of your own books. The quality of the binding is often (but not always) better.

That said, not all vanity publishing is onanistic. I know some genuinely good writers who used vanity publishing because their work was turned down by numerous printhouses because their topic wasn't quite what the market wanted at the time. Some of the books have been subsequently picked up by proper houses.

The biggest problem with vanity press is that there are absolutely no quality checks.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 05:17 AM

you published it yourself. This is quite different from being a "published author", where some level of editorial process and criticism would be invoved. How is this different from vanity publishing? Both are equally onanistic. The point is, you believe this manifesto to represent some "way forward for humanity". God knows you keep shoving it under people's noses. If there were any ideas worthy of real consideration, surely some editor of political or social polemic would snap it up and publish it more widely?

I am indeed off to visit America soon - but first I had an event to organise in London, celebrating the folk song legacy of Vaughan Williams. Tell me, what did you do with your weekend? Chew on your plastic recorder some more?

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 04:53 AM

...seems you've also been learning from Catspaw, Ruth...and weren't you off to visit American after having your paws done?
My life's work was self- NOT vanity-published, Don: I did level 2 desktop publishing to come up with a sturdy folky A4 paperback; and level 1 web design to come up with walkaboutsverse.741.com
And, since then, some have been published in newspapers and journals, with editors who DON'T publish everything (use DF link from the above link for details, if you wish); and, yes, paperbacks have been gifted to 10s of libraries.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 07 Oct 08 - 02:56 AM

In 9th grade I had a frightful teacher, who taught literature, grammar and Old Testament. She always had it in for me for reasons unknown, but would brag about what a great poet she was, putting herself on a par with the current greats, and she even had a volume published and a copy in the local library. Well, I was by the poetry section once and noticed it sticking out conspicously, but closer examination revealed that it had been checked out a grand total of 3 times in 15 years. Twice by her, once by her husband.
The poetry was dire, unsurprisingly.

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Oct 08 - 08:12 PM

Oh, yeah. Forgot about those. My wife (who works at the Seattle Public Library) says that, in general, fifteen seconds after the author who contributes the books walks out of the library, there is a loud THUNK in a nearby waste basket.   (Shhhh!).

By the way, the books are pretty good for lobbing out the bedroom window at alley cats yowling on the back fence in the middle of the night. Much preferable to the traditional shoe, because you don't have to go outside the following morning, muttering and cursing, to retrieve the shoe.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Weekly Walkabout (part 2.)
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 06 Oct 08 - 08:01 PM

what about the ones foisted on bewildered local librarians? That must account for another 20 or 30...