Saturday, June 30, 2018

Fools Walk Where Wise Men Fear to Tread


Ben Franklin observes:
"It is ill-manners to silence a fool, and cruelty to let him go on."
Hah! You're not going to silence me that easily, Mr. Franklin! I'll talk where I want! Hell, I'll even walk where I want!

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Friday, June 29, 2018

One Thing of Free Counsel: Useless Information


Ben Franklin says:
"If you'd know the value of money, go and borrow some."
And I add, if you'd want to know how much more it's worth than that, just try stealing some.

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Thursday, June 28, 2018

Ah, you were lucky!

Lucky he didn't get himself killed!

Ben Franklin says:
"Diligence is the mother of good luck."
Gasp! You mean luck's not a super power?

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Wednesday, June 27, 2018

An idle thought


Benjamin Franklin says:
"Be always ashamed to catch thyself idle."
Nay. Be always proud that one is attentive enough to catch oneself idle!

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Tuesday, June 26, 2018

Sound Notion?


Benjamin Franklin said:
As we must account for every idle word,
so we must for every idle silence.
Hmpf! There's just no pleasing some folk! And then we go and treat them like an idol! Now that's an idle sound of silence, even if not a neon light!

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Monday, June 25, 2018

The first American soft drink?

Franklin Orders
Another Sprite

Benjamin Franklin was first to use the name of America's truly first soft drink:
A house without woman and firelight,
is like a body without soul or sprite.
He neglected to capitalize the name (and to capitalize on the name), but we see to our surprise that "Sprite" - not "Coke" - was our first soft drink!

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Sunday, June 24, 2018

Sigh . . . misheard lyrics

Linda Ronstadt

I liked Linda Ronstadt's singing, way back when, but I now find that I was an inattentive listener to "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow":
Is this a lasting treasure
Or just a moment's pleasure
Can I believe the magic of your size
Will you still love me tomorrow?
I listened to that stanza in "Will You Still Love Me Tomorow" countless times and never heard it right. But in looking up the lyrics, I find the reference was to the innocuous word "sighs" rather than to the more racy, salacious "size."
Is this a lasting treasure
Or just a moment's pleasure
Can I believe the magic of your sighs
Will you still love me tomorrow?
How tame. And how wrong of me to mishear so well.

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Saturday, June 23, 2018

Be Not Procrastinacious!


Benjamin Franklin offers some sage advice:
"Have you somewhat to do tomorrow; do it today."
I agree with the bourgeois advice from the frank Franklin, and offer my own, similar advice:
 "Have you somewhat to do today; do it yesterday."
See? I have learned from the man!

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Friday, June 22, 2018

Franklinly Speaking, You are my everything . . .

Ben in Love?
Yes, at times . . .

Benjamin Franklin offers an unusual gradient of values:
"Poverty wants some things, Luxury many things, Avarice all things."
Franklin may be using "wants" in the sense of "lacks."

Let me add a detail to Franklin's words:
"Love wants but one thing . . . because it is everything."
I've heard-tell that Franklin would agree . . .

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Thursday, June 21, 2018

Blazing a Trail of Glory!


Benjamin Franklin wrote another maxim:
"The Sun never repents of the good he does, nor does he ever demand a recompence."
Am I alone on this point, namely, that even to think of repenting for having done good suggests a moral flaw?

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Wednesday, June 20, 2018

Franklin on: Let's Forget about Tomorrow!


Benjamin Franklin wrote words that he didn't always follow:
"To-morrow, every fault is to be amended;
but that To-morrow never comes, thank God,
for there'd be no end to amending."
Actually, that is not all from the hand of Mr. Franklin,
for I added my bit, a couple of copper coins
that I also call "my two cents."

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Tuesday, June 19, 2018

Benjamin the Orator


Benjamin Franklin once orated:
"Fear to do ill, and you need fear naught else."
Okay, yeah, but there's always danger . . .

and let's not forget the 'naughty' else,

which might not rise to the status of ill,

but which might ought be avoided, anyway.

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Monday, June 18, 2018

Not Doggerel, but Caterwaul!


He beat me to it . . .

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Sunday, June 17, 2018

In Part, I am 'Write'


I meant partly, for Benjamin Franklin almost wrote:
Be neither silly, nor cunning, but wise, in the use of the comma, economize!
(And shun to exclamationize!)

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Saturday, June 16, 2018

Franklin's Name Belied His Aim

An Edge Over You

Sitting under a tall tree pine, Benjamin Franklin did once opine:
"Necessity never made a good bargain."
(Except for with the other guy, of course.)

And forget not young man Newton, too, who made the universe anew!

He felled the apple what caused the fall and re-fused heaven and earth for all!

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Friday, June 15, 2018

Shedding a Coat

Benjaminerisms:
Even Franklin
 had his
Bad Hair Days

Benjamin Franklin wrote the following "speciesist" remark:
The Wolf sheds his Coat once a Year, his Disposition never.
Which is good, albeit speciesist, because a 'disposition' would be damned hard to clean up!

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Thursday, June 14, 2018

Franklinish Irony


"He's a Fool that cannot conceal his Wisdom."

Said the man who grew rich selling this very same sort of folksy wisdom compiled in Poor Richard's Almanack, which he published annually from 1732 to 1757, a quarter of a century, all told.

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Wednesday, June 13, 2018

Undecidable Country?


The Neitherlands: Neither above sea nor below water.

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Tuesday, June 12, 2018

Franklin was very smart!

Lucky Franklin

He even wrote his own autobiography!

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Monday, June 11, 2018

Franklinly Speaking . . .


Having been poor is no shame, but having been twice poor likely is!

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Sunday, June 10, 2018

Benjamin Franklin spreads the word


Franklin: Do not do what you would not have known.

Fool: I would not have known had you not told me, but could you give an example?

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Saturday, June 09, 2018

I see, said the blind man . . .

Well-Digger Done
Cross Eyes
if
Double Image
Desired

"Well done is better than well said," said the welldigger well, his work well done.

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Friday, June 08, 2018

The Wisest American?


Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise enough to ignore this bit of clever nonsense.

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Thursday, June 07, 2018

Aspiration, Aspersion, Asp


Here's the main rebel angel, but he seems also meant for more than mere rebellion, given his grand title "Lucifer," the Light-Bearer:
(Isaiah 14:12) How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! (13) For thou hast said in thine heart, "I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: (14) I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High."
The asp aspires higher than mere serpent or mere snake, and moreover, the asp is venomous. Henceforth is that old serpent, Satan, to be called by us an asp as well as the more familiar "Satan," which means, "The Adversary," and is thus another aspersion cast upon him! Consider these lines from Milton's Paradise Lost 4.835-837:
Think not, revolted spirit, thy shape the same,
Or undiminished brightness, to be known
As when thou stood'st in heaven upright and pure.
Such is his transformed aspect (though the word is not used), from the Latin term "aspicere," meaning "to look at."

None of these speculations is scholarly, merely pre-scholarly rambling . . .

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Wednesday, June 06, 2018

Some dogmas . . .


. . . are beyond catastrophic.

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Tuesday, June 05, 2018

Lighthouse Cliché


There's a venerable old prosaicism what says a platitude's nothing more than a flat attitude with a shibbolethic bromide as its lighthouse cliché.

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Monday, June 04, 2018

He who laughs last . . .


. . . didn't get the joke.

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Sunday, June 03, 2018

Wisdom Gained from Pain?

Roses Riotously Flung
Fling them all if fling ye must, but go on them not bare of foot.

(Sigh, Nada.)

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Saturday, June 02, 2018

A Dyslexic Reading of Isaiah 2:4:

The Letter T
on
a
Shopping
Bag?

"[He] hammers words into plowshares."

(He has to spell it out for us?)

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Friday, June 01, 2018

Only if God's a monster . . .


. . . will we get our just deserts.

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