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Everything posted by Carol the Dabbler
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Hello, Alastair, and welcome to Sherlock Forum! That sounds very much like an early scene in "The Hounds of Baskerville," episode 2 of season 2 of the BBC program Sherlock. Here's the first part of it: SHERLOCK (quick fire): You came up from Devon on the first available train this morning. You had a disappointing breakfast and a cup of black coffee. The girl in the seat across the aisle fancied you. Although you were initially keen, you’ve now changed your mind. You are, however, extremely anxious to have your first cigarette of the day. Sit down, Mr Knight, and do please smoke. I’d be delighted. (Henry stares at him, then glances across to John who averts his gaze and sighs. Hesitantly, Henry walks back to the armchair and sits down, fishing in his jacket pocket.) HENRY: How on earth did you notice all that?! JOHN: It’s not important ... (But Sherlock’s already off.) SHERLOCK (looking at two small round white pieces of paper stuck to Henry’s coat): Punched-out holes where your ticket’s been checked ... JOHN: Not now, Sherlock. SHERLOCK: Oh please. I’ve been cooped up in here for ages. JOHN: You’re just showing off. SHERLOCK: Of course. I am a show-off. That’s what we do. (He turns his attention back to Henry and the napkin that he’s still holding.) SHERLOCK: The train napkin that you used to mop up the spilled coffee: the strength of the stain shows that you didn’t take milk. There are traces of ketchup on it and round your lips and on your sleeve. Cooked breakfast – or the nearest thing those trains can manage. Probably a sandwich. (Henry half-sobs, over-awed.) HENRY: How did you know it was disappointing? SHERLOCK: Is there any other type of breakfast on a train? That quote is from the transcript by the amazing Ariane Devere. The episode was based, of course, on Arthur Conan Doyle's novel The Hound of the Baskervilles, but a quick scan of the book's text turns up nothing like that scene, so either it was original with the TV show, or the writers borrowed it from some other ACD story.
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Hello, Oliverleo, and welcome to Sherlock Forum! J.P. tends to check in every few days, so you may get a response fairly soon. But the answer to your question is presumably "no." J.P. joined the forum in January of 2015, and has been active ever since.
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What's your opinion on the apparent gambling of dr. Watson?
Carol the Dabbler replied to Kat's topic in The Casebooks.
Hello, Agne1940 and welcome to Sherlock Forum! Do you think Holmes specialized in solving crimes because he found it to be a more satisfying challenge than ordinary gambling? Or because he wasn't supposed to dabble in police business (i.e., the lure of the forbidden)? Or -- ? -
Names do seem to come and go. I looked into the history of "Violet" while writing a story about a (fictitious) American woman born in the 1890s. It was a popular name here from roughly the 1880s through the 1940s (and has become popular again since the turn of the millennium). From what little data I can find, the situation seems to have been similar in England, with the name having been rarely used until the 1800s, when it gradually became relatively common (though not as common as -- for example -- Sarah, which had been fairly common since at least the 1700s). Now I'm curious about the ages of ACD's four Violets: Violet Hunter, "Copper Beeches" -- published 1892 -- Watson describes her as "a young lady" and she has at least five years' experience as a governess -- perhaps born in the late 1860s Violet Smith, "The Solitary Cyclist" -- published 1903 -- Watson refers to her as a "young woman/lady" but just offhand I see few clues to her specific age -- perhaps born in the late 1870s. Violet Westbury, "Bruce-Partington Plans" -- published 1908 -- her late fiancé was 27 years old, so I would guess her to be in her early 20s, and therefore born in the mid-1880s Violet de Merville, "Illustrious Client" -- published 1924 -- this Violet is also described as "young" and seems naive -- for lack of a better guess, perhaps born in the late 1880s. It seems a bit odd that ACD used the name so often, starting with characters apparently born when it was just gaining popularity. But perhaps a friend of his had a baby daughter named Violet, born shortly before he wrote "Copper Beeches," and he liked the name but didn't realize (or didn't care) that it would be unusual for a grown woman to have that name.
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The Cute Animal Pics/Videos Thread
Carol the Dabbler replied to Caya's topic in Miscellaneous Musings
While looking for something else, came across this on a Facebook page called (logically) I Love Cats (click on image to enlarge): -
Sherlock Holmes and Psychohistory
Carol the Dabbler replied to Brontodon's topic in General Sherlock Holmes Discussion
Agreed. There have been a few mathematical problems (or what could perhaps better be termed "mathematical questions") that have taken centuries to solve (e.g., proving Fermat's Last Theorum), but I doubt that was quite the sort of thing Reade was talking about. Yes, that's exactly the sort of thing that I half-remembered reading somewhere in the Holmes canon. Thank you! I suppose even the best fictional detectives need to do a second deduction now and then -- otherwise some stories would be too short. -
Sherlock Holmes and Psychohistory
Carol the Dabbler replied to Brontodon's topic in General Sherlock Holmes Discussion
Yes, Holmes was definitely more specific! But what he said could almost be derived from that quote -- a mathematical problem generally has a specific solution. As for the occasional Holmes slip-up, I wish I could think of an example! All I have is an impression that he said, at least once, something along the lines of "I should have realized it sooner, but I was assuming . . . . " -- at which point, of course, he proceeds to come up with what proves to be the correct deduction. I may possibly thinking of Nero Wolfe, though, who every now and then says something like "I've been a witling -- I was overlooking the possibility that . . . ." -
Sherlock Holmes and Psychohistory
Carol the Dabbler replied to Brontodon's topic in General Sherlock Holmes Discussion
As you say, Doyle (speaking as Holmes) states that he borrowed the idea from Reade. Beyond that, the idea may have been passed from one person to another, as you suggest, or alternatively it may have arisen more or less independently in various minds over the centuries (or it may have been some of each). I believe there's a similar theory regarding the movement of particles, which may have inspired the human-behavior concept in some cases. Holmes may be correct that human behavior "in the aggregate ... becomes a mathematical certainty" but that concept may not be particularly useful in practice. Even Holmes occasionally let his deductions be led astray by his preconceived notions, and most people are far more likely to do so. Even (or especially?) people considered experts in their field often have their observations clouded by assumptions. Even if a new Holmes should somehow arise among us, I suspect he would be attacked from all sides. -
Sherlock Holmes and Psychohistory
Carol the Dabbler replied to Brontodon's topic in General Sherlock Holmes Discussion
I've heard of it, but am definitely not familiar with it, so Caya has me beat. I think I started to read it years ago (though I may be thinking of War and Peace), but gave up when the characters that I'd gotten to know in Chapter 1 were all dead and gone by Chapter 2. Apparently there needs to be at least one continuing character that I care about before a story really appeals to me. (I've read many of Asimov's robot stories -- I'm fond of Daneel Olivaw -- and Nightfall is quite memorable. But it's been years since I read anything of his.) Now I'm curious as to how your thread title connects to this. -
Continuity Error in "A Scandal in Bohemia"!
Carol the Dabbler replied to Brontodon's topic in Other Versions
I had to look it up, but "uncourteous" is indeed a word, a very old word in fact, dating back at least 800 years. I too have mostly heard "discourteous," though, so perhaps "uncourteous" is a mostly British word, or perhaps it's dying out. -
I believe that was in "The Man With the Twisted Lip," which happens to be one of my favorites. I suspect that ACD made that error because A} he didn't much bother with continuity for his "potboiler" Holmes stories, and B} he rarely called the good doctor anything other than just "Watson." He may, in fact, have forgotten that Watson even had an established first name, so when his wife needed to call him something, he used his go-to first name for characters, namely James. As you may know, however, Holmes fan Dorothy L. Sayers (author of the Lord Peter Wimsey stories) pointed out that we're never told what Watson's middle initial stands for, and proposed that the "H" stands for "Hamish," which is the Scottish equivalent of "James." (Presumably Mrs. Watson was staunchly English and therefore anglicized the name.)
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Let me point out that this forum (for example) has no specific rules against referring to women as property, etc. -- yet that sort of thing hardly ever happens here, simply because most people don't consider it to be polite, and I assume that Facebook still has a rule that one should be polite. In short, just because those very specific rules no longer exist, I doubt that most people will start breaking the former rules -- except, of course, for those (mercifully) few who seem to feel obliged to offend. At which point a lot of other folks will object, and Community Notes will be posted. In short, I encourage you to give the new system a try.
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Continuity Error in "A Scandal in Bohemia"!
Carol the Dabbler replied to Brontodon's topic in Other Versions
He was in a brown dressing gown, and a mere 21 seconds later, he's wearing a black suit coat or dinner jacket. Either it's a continuity error or else he's a quick-change artist! I'm tempted to guess the latter, since they do seem to be expecting an important potential client (the King, I suppose) to call at any moment. Perhaps the scene as originally filmed gave Holmes somewhat more time to change, but then some of that time had to be left on the cutting-room floor? -
The Cute Animal Pics/Videos Thread
Carol the Dabbler replied to Caya's topic in Miscellaneous Musings
OK, that's still hot-linking. The actual image lives on Imgur and you simply provided a pathway to it. The forum used to provide an option to host images right here in the forum's webspace, but that could take a whole lotta bytes, so of course the forum imposed a limit to each person's total. That system may have eventually proved to be unmanageable -- in any case I don't know how to do it now. Well, there is one vestige of that system remaining -- the posting/editing box has a drop-down menu (in the lower right-hand corner) to access "Other Media", and one option there is "insert existing attachment," which brings up a catalog of all the images that the member has ever embedded. (If you've never embedded any images, your catalog is presumably empty.) Anyhow, here's one of the smaller images from my catalog: -
Thanks for that link. I had heard that Facebook was changing its rules, and now I'm trying to understand what that article says about the new policy. Please let me know if I'm misinterpreting the article, but apparently what Facebook did was remove a bunch of very specific former rules, and instead will create "community notes" from members' reactions to posts. That may actually turn out to be more adaptable to specific situations that arise. (And I assume they've still got the basic politeness rules that every forum has.) The new system may take a while to evolve fully, but hopefully it'll be able to detect and deal with a wider range of rudeness than the old rules could.
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The Cute Animal Pics/Videos Thread
Carol the Dabbler replied to Caya's topic in Miscellaneous Musings
OK then, HOW did you do that? Specifically -- assuming that the jpg file is living on your own computer -- how do you tell the forum software what folder it's in? Or whatever? -
Now I don't feel quite so bad -- at least I have company! That doesn't sound the least bit off-base to me, and I suspect you're right about quite a few of them. Others may be maintaining databases for search engines or doing other reasonable chores. There's a lot of non-member activity on this forum, some of which I suspect is by bots.
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The Cute Animal Pics/Videos Thread
Carol the Dabbler replied to Caya's topic in Miscellaneous Musings
Aww, cute! When I click on the top link in your post, it loads just fine. The second line thinks it's an image, but doesn't bring up anything significant. Near as I can tell, there is no longer any way to embed new images. If you had embedded an image back when that was still possible, there's a way to display it again, but at the moment that's apparently all there is. I have queried Tim about this, just to be sure, but I'm not hopeful. -
Yay, VBS! You are one brave woman! I have also written a book (and have ideas for a couple more), but *unlike* you, I have made no attempt whatsoever toward getting it published, even though it's been basically finished for years (decades, actually). And I can't even imagine writing a book in Spanish (my "second language," though I'm not nearly as good with it as you are with English). I know what you mean! I did show mine to three relatives -- *one* of whom liked it. The other two said they just don't care for that type of book, which spares my feelings a little bit -- but what if that's what they were intending to do? (Yes, I'm paranoid.) As for your "real life" reason, I think that's very logical. One of the people who read (part of) my book complained that it didn't sound like me. I suppose I should take that as a compliment, because I wasn't actually trying to sound like me, but that comment kinda threw me off balance anyhow.
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I hadn't thought of it that way, but you're right. They're just fine at first, then start acting like an idiot until you tell them to go away, then they claim to have seen the light and they behave pretty well for a while, so you take them back -- and then they go totally bonkers and keep pestering you. I'm sometimes tempted to click the "stop sending me these emails" option that's at the bottom of each message. But I'm curious to see how long they'll string it out. It's not like they're disrupting my life or anything. And it's cheap entertainment.
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The Political Thread
Carol the Dabbler replied to Carol the Dabbler's topic in Miscellaneous Musings
Many people are lazy and/or gullible, yes, and many of those are likely to remain that way. But what worries me more is the politicians and activists who take advantage of that gullibility by intentionally pitting one demographic against another. That tactic may increase their power, but it does so at the expense of the rest of us, and (if not challenged) can lead to a failed society in the long run. -
The Language (and travel) Thread
Carol the Dabbler replied to Carol the Dabbler's topic in Miscellaneous Musings
I guess I'm with VBS on this question -- cut the cake in half, put one in the freezer, and eat the other one. Or in J.P.'s analogy, save some of my money and spend the rest -- though hopefully I'd spend most of it on useful, necessary items. But the old saying apparently refers to situations where that's not possible. For example, if I were single and someone wanted to marry me, and I enjoyed his attentions but didn't like him well enough to marry him, I might string him along in hopes that he'd never realize I was taking advantage of him. In other words, he's the cake. Sooner or later, he'll probably realize what I'm doing, and might even quote that old saying when he dumps me. -
Apparently it already has, because my basic point was that I am no longer seeing those methods used. Lately there's just a screen telling me to wait a few moments while they decide whether I'm kosher or not. I looked online, and some people say the decision is now based on my pattern of use -- for example, have I been entering data far more quickly than an actual human could? Or saying -- in rapid succession -- that I am numerous different people? If so, they'll decide I'm a bot. Dunno exactly what they'd do then. So far, they've always decided I'm human.