BS: low hanging fruit

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: JennyO
Date: 20 Feb 06 - 06:41 AM

Interesting - when I looked at the "Strange Fruit" thread, I noticed that in 2001, Callie was looking for the music so her group could perform it. Well they do - I have seen them sing it a number of times. It is beautifully arranged - haunting, chilling and powerful!

Jenny

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Pied Piper
Date: 20 Feb 06 - 06:39 AM

"I have just read this paragraph in tomorrow's Independent newspaper"

You couldn't check tomorrow's newspaper's horseracing results and give me the result of the 3:30 York could you?

PP

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: GUEST,wordy
Date: 20 Feb 06 - 06:04 AM

yes "Tomorrow's Independent" was a bit of a slip. I read it at five minutes past midnight on the Net.
What worries me however is the fact that "the elephant in the room" might trample the "low hanging fruit."

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: GUEST,DB
Date: 20 Feb 06 - 04:50 AM

"If you really want to drive yourself crazy, pick up a six-sigma text."

I've always been interested in statistics and statistical matters (sad bastard that I am) so I once picked up a "six-sigma text", reckoning that it should be 'just up my street'. What a mistake! The first 12 chapters (out of about 15) were about how wise, wonderful and perceptive the author is - in fact he is probably the second most inspiring and enlightened being who ever walked the Earth - and is giving the first most inspiring and enlightened being a good run for his money!
I never did get to the statistical bits, at the back of the book, but quietly returned it to the bullsh.. - sorry, Management section of the company library.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Feb 06 - 12:27 AM

It's surprising that you don't know that song, Art. Find a copy to listen to and I am willing to bet that the vocalizations Holiday uses will bring it into sharp focus (though you may not have been paying attention to the words, you probably heard the song).

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Azizi
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 11:34 PM

Thanks. katlaughing

but sorry, GUEST,wordy.

I had no intention of hijacking this thread.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 11:31 PM

Azizi, here is an old thread (from 2001) with a lot of discussion about that song.

There is also a DT Study of it, which starts with information on Meeropol.

kat

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Azizi
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 11:00 PM

Thanks, bobad for that interesting information about "Lewis Allen".
I didn't know that.

I appreciate it.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Azizi
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 10:59 PM

Art, does "herself" know Billie Holiday music?

That song is very much associated with that tragic singer.

BTW: I may have "misspoke" in my last post for although Billie Holiday was portrayed in the movie "Lady Sings The Blues", she is primarily known as a jazz singer.

For more information on Billie Holiday {also known as Lady Day], click HERE

Here's an excerpt from that website:
"Billie Holiday's grandfather was one of 17 children of a black Virginia slave and a white Irish plantation owner. Her mother was only 13 when she was born.

The future "Lady Day" first heard the music of Louis Armstrong and Bessie Smith on a Victrola at Alice Dean's, the Baltimore "house of ill repute" where she ran errands and scrubbed floors as a young girl. She made her singing debut in obscure Harlem nightclubs (borrowing her professional name from screen star Billie Dove), then toured with Count Basie and Artie Shaw before going solo. Benny Goodman dragged the frightened singer to her first studio session. Between 1933 and 1944, she recorded over 200 "sides," but she never received royalties for any of them.

Despite a lack of technical training, Holiday's unique diction, inimitable phrasing and acute dramatic intensity made her the outstanding jazz singer of her day. White gardenias, worn in her hair, became her trademark.


In 1939, she introduced [the songs] "Strange Fruit" & "God Bless the Child." ...

Portrayed in the movie "Lady Sings the Blues."

In 1946, she gave a triumphant concert at Town Hall and appeared in the film "New Orleans."

Died on July 17,1959."

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: artbrooks
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 10:29 PM

Interesting...I'm almost 60, have lived in the US all my life, and I can't remember ever hearing "strange fruit" used in that context. On the other hand, herself has. Maybe it's an East Coast thing. Oh well, learn something new every day...

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: bobad
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 10:27 PM

Azizi

You may know this but Lewis Allen was a pseudonym for Abel Meeropol a schoolteacher from the Bronx who also, as a bit of historical trivia, adopted the children of the Rosenbergs after they were executed for espionage.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Cluin
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 10:25 PM

I loved this comic strip that was in the weekend supplement yesterday.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 10:19 PM

I visualize it as evolving from the instance of putting a hat on a stick and lifting it to see if someone shoots it down. Running something up to find out if it will be fired at, and from which direction.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Azizi
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 10:13 PM

I hate to bring seriousness to this thread, but Foolestroupe, in the United States, the phrase "strange fruits" is often associated with the lynching of African Americans. I am assuming that you may not have been aware of this. Maybe that's why your comment was ignored.

Click here to read the lyrics of Lewis Allen's song Strange Fruit

This song was poularized by Blues singer Billie Holiday.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Amos
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 10:01 PM

Well it could have been any kind of salute. Many of the men who built the sub-culture of Madison Avenue were veterans of the Second World War, and well drilled in saluting the flag when it was run up in the morning, folded at the end of a day, or most hauntingly, squared and folded during funeral services. They all called for a sharp, snap-and-pop salute (of the hand to the peak of the cap).

It was not a metaphor for institutional ritual ( such a volley of gunfire) but for seeing if a given scheme or theme or concept would inspire recognition and response (as in an individual salute).

That's my SWAG o' the day, anyway.

A

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 09:51 PM

Exactly! BWL has it, I think. The low hanging fruit is probably from a story in Aesop's Fables.

As to the flag pole, I suspect the "salute" was a volley of gunfire.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Amos
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 09:50 PM

The flagpole line was part of the subculture of "Madison Avenue ad men" in grey flannel suits who typified and represented the conformist mindset of the 1950's. "Toss it around and see if it makes a salad" was another similar cliché of the era. Most of these ad men were commuters who road the New York, New Haven and Hartford railroad from Rye, Greenwich, Stamford, Westport, Wilton and similar communities in suburban New York and Connecticut. These towns came to be known as "bed-room" communities. Huge swaths of farmland became "bed-room" houses throughout the 50's and 60's.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Auggie
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 09:29 PM

I remember that "flagpole" line from as far back as Henry Fonda's 12 Angry Men movie (1957). Hated it then. Hate it now.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 09:19 PM

Low hanging fruits are the ones that the fox walked away from because they were probably too sweet anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 09:16 PM

typo - that should have been low hanging fruit, not nnging fruit.

I think the flagpole line was used primarily by comedians, but there are a number of other cliches that are still in use. I notice that companies in California seemed to adapt these catch phrases.

In television nuts, there was one that drove me nuts. In a live newsroom situation, the director would often ask "who is playing" in the upcoming story - meaning what anchors and reporters would be on screen.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 09:13 PM

Low nnging fruit is a term often used by companies that utilize six-sigma methodology. We used it when I worked at NBC. These were projects that had easy and clearly visible fixed - we could correct these problems without waiting for data from the measurment stage of our process.

If you really want to drive yourself crazy, pick up a six-sigma text.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: GUEST,Q as guest
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 09:11 PM

I think the worst one is "Run it up the flagpole and see who salutes."

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: JennyO
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 08:56 PM

I suppose "white ants" would be another one - people who knock your ideas and undermine your self confidence.

Must admit I haven't heard the "low hanging fruit" one before.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 08:56 PM

.........However I have just read this paragraph in tomorrow's Independent newspaper;


GUEST,wordy, if you have access to tomorrow's news today, do you think you could look up Wednesday's lottery results?

I'll pay for the ticket and we can split the winnings!


DC

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 08:37 PM

Corporate business terms are great for laughs. Another great term - bluebirds.   Those are opportunities that fly-in unexpectedly.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:55 PM

You guys are ignoring me aren't you?

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Amos
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:51 PM

The phrase is a metaphor for things which are within easy reach and which return benefit quickly; as far as I know it entered business-jargon somewhere in the early 90's or thereabouts and quickly ossified into permanence as an easy-to-use phrase that sounded like it had thought behind it when it did not in fact. These paradoxical qualifications made it a perfect candidate for MBA-talk.

A

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:50 PM

'Strange Fruit' indeed!

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:48 PM

Low hanging fruit can easily be seen and can be picked without much effort.

Speeding, drink driving and seat belts are obvious targets to improve road safety and who's going to argue about measures to protect children?

Don't know where the phrase comes from – it's just my guess at the meaning.


DC

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:45 PM

So should I keep my loincloth tight?

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: michaelr
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:40 PM

"low hanging fruit" = obvious targets; easy fixes.

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:33 PM

Sounds painful to me...

I think i'll keep my fruit hanging high for now...

Subject: RE: BS: low hanging fruit
From: gnu
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:32 PM

Pas moi. I am in the dark too.

Subject: BS: low hanging fruit
From: GUEST,wordy
Date: 19 Feb 06 - 07:28 PM

As my name signifies I love language. However I have just read this paragraph in tomorrow's Independent newspaper;

"While there was no blueprint for road safety, there were some basic, "low hanging fruit" measures including, tough laws against speeding, enforcement of drink-driving legislation, compulsory use of seatbelts and use of car seats for small children".

So there you have the context, but what the hell are low hanging fruit measures? And what is the root of the phrase?
Can someone please elucidate?