Game: Ask the Person Below You

id guess an ideal sleeping temperature would be somewhere in the 50s, low 60s at most.

I would say a 3-4 week bike trip around Ireland but that's just me and im only half the equation.

clopin---I loved that scene where lieutenant dan came back for forrest's wedding and was walking and he had a fiancé!

that's consistent with my favorite thing about the movie, how forrest's enduring love for the people in his life, redeemed them. this was especially true for jenny. in fact, I think the movie was as much, if not more, about her than forrest.

im reading (very slowwwwwwwwwwwly) a Charles dickens biography and it struck me recently, I don't know anyone whose last name is dickens. and then I started thinking, I don't know any hemingways, poes, hawthornes, austens, brontes or bucks either. I do know however some Clemens, hardys, irvings and a few others.

do you know some people who share any famous authors' last names?

I share Joel Chandler Harris' last name.

Do you think the Br'er Rabbit stories are racist?

No, although some have used them to try to humiliate others. Those idiots are to blame, and not the stories.

Do you think the chef on the Muppets was a slur on Swedes?

i suspect there are liberals here and in Sweden who would think so, but for my part no. I just saw him as an exaggerative (and very funny) caricature in the same way the musicians, scientists and statler and waldorf were.

who is the funniest muppet?

Haha Miss Piggy, but I'm not well versed in the muppets. Also if any group deserve to be slurred it's the Swedes.

Was taking out Colonal Gadaffi the right move?

It was a dirty job but someone had to do it I guess. Not sure Libya is any better off.

Why does every ruler the US backs become an enemy? The US backed, for example, Ho Chi Man, Fidel Castro, etc.

Because the U.S. becomes too much of an overbearing parent and they feel the need to rebel.

I am totally drawing a blank for a question so same question

How come women statistically read quite a bit more than men do but this literature forum only has a couple female posters?

Good question. It's weird, too, because according to the site stats (I think), the ratio is fairly even. Come back Ms. Reading!

What is the least appealing city you have ever visited?

Delhi, nothing else is even in the running... Oh, least appealing? Well I found Delhi appealing for it's foreignness, so to me personally it might be Port Coquitlam... or Surray... or Burnaby.

And I know right? I think the stats for hobbyist readers who read fiction strongly favour women over men.

Same question about horrible cities.

My least favorite city is L.A. Most the time the sky is litterally bown. And I don't jive with the people there.

What is the best city you have been to?

The least appealing city I have visited in Wuhan, the over-populated and over-heated capital of China's Hubei province, which discharges its abundant sewage into the otherwise lovely Yangtze River. My lingering memory of Wuhan is eating. at a greasy restaurant (although cosmopolitan enough to have a polyglot menu: "roast vegetarian," "boiled crap," etc.), and watching a father remove the pants of his toddler-age son, then hold him up for a pee into a potted plant next to my table. Oklahoma City is nothing to write home about, either.

The "best" city I've seen, in terms of beauty and atmosphere, is Venice.

What is the most insipid book you have ever read?

I have to say All the King's Men by Robert Penn Waren. There were a couple of interesting passages but the majority of the book I found to be insufferably boring. I saw the movie before reading the book and was disappointed in it but as soon as I read the book i knew why the movie was so uninteresing.

Most laugh out loud funny book you have read?

There some laugh out loud moments in Straight Man by Richard Russo (also Nobody's Fool by the same author) and, more recently, We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler. None of those are primarily comedies (except maybe Straight Man, which is academic farce), but the funny parts are better for that.

What is the scariest scene that you have ever read (and obviously from what book)?

this might be sacrilege to some, but I am a vociferous opponent of a catcher in the rye, and moby dick, and id add an accidental tourist to the insipid list too.

I so wanted moby dick to be a high seas adventure, a drama, not a treatise on whaling for goodness sake.

Patrick McManus books make me laugh out loud. I recommend anyone who likes the outdoors to read him.

I read a fair deal of murder mysteries and sometimes the situations the psychopaths put their victims in are "scary" but none of them have really impacted me in that regard. Winston, in 1984, with a caged rat on his head comes to mind...but I think the scariest for me and im probably going off in a direction different than the intent of the question, was Sydney Carton (spoiler alert for a tale of two cities) willingly being hauled off in the cart on his way to the guillotine at the end of the book. I found myself strongly identifying with dickens' writing, and the situation to the point where I remember being affected by it---not quite like I was living it, but along those lines.

what movie ending would you like to change?

Any forced happy ending. Eliza Dolittle ought to leave Henry Higgins like she does in Shaw's play, the Little Mermaid should dissolve into sea foam like she does in the Hans Christian Andersen story, etc. Does Quasimodo survive the Disney version of Hunchback? Whack him, too.

Who is the best minor Dickens character?

Miss Wade in Little Dorrit


What is is the best show on TV right now?

VEEP - very sharp writing, alot of ironic dry humour(especially considering it's American), love it.

What is your favourite television show not produced in the country of your residency?

Orphan Black


What is your favorite News Network?

Al Jazeera America... similar in look and feel to the BBC, except with more energy.

If you could own any car, what would you be driving?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pompey Bum

Any forced happy ending. Eliza Dolittle ought to leave Henry Higgins like she does in Shaw's play, the Little Mermaid should dissolve into sea foam like she does in the Hans Christian Andersen story, etc. Does Quasimodo survive the Disney version of Hunchback? Whack him, too.

Who is the best minor Dickens character?

---

They're movies for kids! Yes, Quasimodo, Pheobus and Esmeralda all survive and Pheobus is recast as a great guy who wins Esmeralda's reluctant heart through his charm and friendliness (and looks obviously). It's honestly not the best Disney adaptation.

I don't give any kind of a crap about cars but give me the most hideous, ostentatious Lamborghini or whatever so I can impress really stupid girls into sleeping with me.

What is the worst show on TV which is also quite popular?

Virtually any reality TV show

What would be your ideal type of lodging ( mansion, log cabin, house boat etc.)?

If I'm self sufficient i'll take the pastoral idyll, on the ocean preferably.

Would you physically fight someone who was obnoxiously hitting on your significant other and being very rude to you?

In a heartbeat

Do you have grandchildren?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dark Muse

Miss Wade in Little Dorrit

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Interesting character. The odd thing is that, if the book were written today, Miss Wade would likely be the heroine and Amy Dorrit the "self-torturer." Whether that's a good thing or not is another discussion.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Clopin

They're movies for kids! Yes, Quasimodo, Pheobus and Esmeralda all survive and Pheobus is recast as a great guy who wins Esmeralda's reluctant heart through his charm and friendliness (and looks obviously). It's honestly not the best Disney adaptation.

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And Quasi was their special ed buddy? Hee hee. I may have to break down and see that one.

No grandchildren, Pen.

Should Andrew Jackson's face on the 20 dollar bill be replaced with that of a woman (there is a current effort to that effect), if so, by whom, or if not a woman, by what man?

I don't think it need be replaced by anyone. I think that would be a waste of expense. What does it really matter whose face is on the bill?


Same question

I couldn't agree more.

Should convicted felons be allowed to vote?

That is a tough one I do have mixed feelings about it, but I think I lean more towrds no they shouldn't.

Do you think an immigrant who has legally become a U.S. citizen should be allowed to run for president?

Yes, of course. Those who don't want a first generation immigrant to become president can vote for someone else.

Should free people have a right to die?

If by that you mean should a person be able to take their own life or if they cannot do it themselves have another assist them than yes

A person should be able to do with their own life what they want, including end it.

Same question

I agree.

Has your favourite dish changed from when you were say 20?- and what is it?

Same answer, DM.

My favorite meal is a Chinese dumpling fest. At 20 I think it was beer (20 year olds could drink beer in those happy days).

Should education use more or less (or no) standardized testing?

hhm, without knowing the regional or national issue in which your question may be framed: yes, in some form or fashion. (I am a realist about issues such as this).

Do you gain news information from the internet more than television at this point? (And as the two blur together anyway)

I get almost all my real news from the Reuters website.

Should people from the United States call themselves something other than Americans, since there are so many other countries in North or South America?

Nah, it's sort of like calling people specifically from England 'Brits', and I mean who really cares?

What's the last thing which made you laugh?

Your recent punctuation, sexist. :)

I agree about the "Americans" thing. You'd be surprised how often I get it, though. PC loves intimidation.

Is the artificial insemination of a chimp in a zoo a kind of rape?

That punctuation was fine! That comma had to be used to phrase it for aye or nay! And there's a question mark after sexist.

Speaking as a Canadian I always refer to the U.S.A as America and it doesn't bother me or anyone else as far as I can tell.

And I mean, a kind of rape? Of chimps? Perhaps but I've got bigger fish to fry.

Is it?

Probably. I mean, chimps have minds. But they are endangered so what are you going to do?

Is it wrong to hit a dog for peeing on a chair?

It's wrong to really try and hurt the dog, but not wrong to give it a discilinary swipe or something. I personally don't like hitting anything but 'wrong' is a bit much.

What's the best way to learn a language while living outside of a region where it is spoken?

Rosetta Stone CDs

Which language do you wish you spoke?