Shangas

Chinese history, myth, legend and culture is chock-full of good luck, bad luck and superstition. Here are a few... BAD LUCK - NEVER hand something to someone behind you, sight unseen. In case it's the devil. - Going out at night? Walk straight. Never look back. Never turn your head when you breathe or sneeze. The gods place a pair of candles on your shoulders to ward off evil spirits and guide you home safely. Turning your head and sneezing will blow them out and bring bad luck. - NEVER EVER EVER...stick your chopsticks upright in a bowl of rice. EVER. It is extremely rude, and offensive. And very bad luck. This is because it mirrors the practice of inserting sticks of incense into an altar at a cemetery to give prayers for the dead. - NEVER place a bed in a room such that the foot of the bed directly faces the door. A bed is only ever oriented this way to carry out a corpse. Ever heard of the expression "to be carried out feet first"? That's where it comes from. - NEVER buy sets of four ANYTHING. 4 in Chinese is an extremely unlucky number, just like 13 in Western society. - NEVER clean the house for two weeks after Chinese New Year. This will remove any good luck for the following year. - NEVER give someone a clock as a present. It suggests that their time is running out. - This is a big one...NEVER buy anything second-hand, or inherited. Along with the item, will come all the bad luck of the previous owner. Or even worse, the previous owner's ghost, wondering what the hell you're doing with his stuff! GOOD LUCK - At big Chinese celebrations (weddings, birthday-parties, CNY, etc), wear red, and make lots of noise. Red and loud noises drives away demons and evil spirits. It is the same reason why Chinese people light red firecrackers. - If a coconut falls on your head, consider it good luck. As recompense for any injury, you will be granted ten years' extra life ----- My late, beloved grandmother was a particular adherent to this superstition.

They're all on the Public Domain now. You can download them from various websites. www.otrfan.com is one.

From 1939, up to about 1963, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson came to people all over the world via way of the wireless radio. Starting with Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce in 1939, for about twenty years, people could listen to "The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes". i have nearly the entire collection of surviving episodes on my computer. Only a handful of the episodes from the War (1939-1945) survive. A couple from 1939, and one or two from the 1943-1944 season. But almost every other episode from 1946 onwards remains. Originally, the producers used the original Canon stories, and adapted them as radio-plays. When they ran out of original material, radio scriptwriter Edith Miser wrote nearly all the other episodes as original, non-canonical short stories, taking her influence from incidents mentioned in original canon stories, or completely new story-ideas. Her works were so ingenious that the Doyle family made their feelings known to Miser, and went on the record as saying how impressed they were with her work. The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes was sponsered at various times, by Groves Bromo Quinine Tablets, the Petri Wine Co., Kreml Hair Products for Men., and Klipper Craft Men's Clothing. At various times, Holmes & Co. were portrayed on radio by... Mary Gordon (Mrs. Hudson). Dennis Hoey (Inspector Lestrade). Basil Rathbone, Tom Conway, John Stanley, (Sherlock Holmes). Nigel Bruce, Alfred Shirley, (Dr. John Watson).

My grandmother comes from a line of very long livers. According to my dad, my great-grandmother didn't die until she was 101, or something like that. Gran might have lived to 100 if not for the cereal. That said, though. Gran was suffering terribly from advanced Alzheimer's disease. So going at 97 was probably a relief.

"I hear of Sherlock everywhere, since you became his biographer!" - Mycroft Holmes. To me, the biggest Holmes-alike in today's world is Patrick Jane, of "The Mentalist". To me, the comparison is obvious. That, and Dr. House, although he deals with medicine instead of crime.

"There are always some lunatics about. It would be a dull world without them". - Sherlock Holmes.

I just had loads of them. I dunno why. But that was the most common one.

My main issue was that i was terrified that they'd turn Sherlock Holmes in to 00-1887. Some sort of Victorian secret agent. Which is not what it was at all. He was a private detective! I could just imagine Mycroft. "Now Sherlock, this pipe. Don't smoke it. You fill it with gunpowder, pack it down with tobacco, then light the fuse hidden in the mouthpiece. It's now your personal grenade. Wait three seconds and then throw it at the enemy". "This walking-stick. It's got a concealed Lee-Enfield rifle inside, and the handle holds a half-dozen rounds." "Your top hat has a morse-code transmitter hidden inside it. Simply remove the lining and it'll pop out, ready for use!" "Your carriage comes with smoke-screens, oil-slicks, bulletproof glass, silk-and-steel bulletproof sides, wheel-spikes and flame-projecting tail-lamps. Caltrops are hidden under the suspension-leaves. The trunk on the roof houses a Gatling machine-gun with 2,000 rounds of ammunition, accessed from inside the cab by a hatch in the roof". "Anything else?" "Yes. If you don't return this equipment in pristine order, brother, you will be struck off my will and disinherited!"

The stupid white rabbit stole my pocketwatch, and I had to chase him down a hole. Fortunately, I got the watch back. It's on my desk now. I found this place after extensive...extensive...web-searching. I was a member of another Sherlock Holmes forum for a few years. Until it went belly-up about six or eight months ago. I was overcome with a desire to be a part of another Holmes forum. But I couldn't find one that was as much like the one I knew, until I found this one. If I'm completely honest, this isn't exactly what I was after, but given the alternatives that I've seen, it's the best of a bad situation.

"Shangas" was one of my many nicknames in school.

In case you guys think I made that birthday thing up, here's some more information: http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/australian-kids-banned-birthday-tradition-school-181900033.html

My rant for today: Cotton-wool kiddies. In the news this afternoon on the radio, kindergarten teachers are making kids bring their own personal and private cuppycakes to school. This is because it is extremely dangerous to bring a birthday cake to school to share with your friends. This is because when you blow out the candles on the cake, the poisonous miasma of spores and goolies will kill everyone in the room when they eat a slice of the infected anthrax cake. GIVE ME A BREAK. Why on earth do we live in such a stupid age? It's a CAKE for the love of god. What do you think happens when you blow out candles on a birthday cake? You breathe. What happens when you talk to someone face-to-face? You breathe. What happens when you accidentally sneeze at someone? You BREATHE. BREATHING in someone's face is NOT GOING TO KILL THEM. Stupid people...

I watched the RDJ & RL SH movies just so that I would have an informed view on what it was I didn't like. A shield against the logicians who go: "How do you know you don't like it, if you haven't even seen it?". Having seen the films, I have to say...they're INTERESTING...but...I dunno. There's too many departures from character, and other things, which just niggle me too much to really REALLY enjoy them. I just couldn't get into them. Not even Stephen Fry as Mycroft helped to make things interesting. And I'm a big Stephen Fry fan.

How derogatory they are depends on how derogatory the receiving party believes it to be, or allows it to be. I don't think that such terms as are the subject of this thread, to be derogatory, or at least not as what they once were. I think to a certain extent, words which are "offensive" become so because of denial. You would find the word 'nerd' offensive if you were trying to hide the fact that you were such. And so it would seem like an accusation. if that makes any sense. On the other hand, there are those who accept, or admit, or even embrace that they are a *whatever*, and so are unlikely, or are less likely, to find offense in such terms.

I've seen this video before. I believe it's actually from 1930. In 1927, talkie-films were just becoming practical. And the guy who filmed it was incredibly lucky. Doyle died just months later. It was the first, last, and ONLY sound-sync'ed film interview that he ever gave.

In hot weather, I like listening to gypsy jazz. Mostly Django Reinhardt. It makes me think of Paris and Brussels in summertime. And the European countryside.

I have played the piano on-and-off since the age of seven. After watching the musical in London, and the recent film, I'm learning the soundtrack to "Les Miserables". So far, I have learnt... "Master of the House" (my favourite song in the musical). "The Bishop of Digne" (my other favourite song). "Valjean's Arrest" (which follows directly after the above). I'm currently learning "Do You Hear the People Sing?", and "Look Down", from the same musical. I would love to be able to play "At the End of the Day", but the number of sharps is making my fingers fall down flat! Outside of that, I generally play jazz and classic pop. Anything from the Edwardian era up to about the 1950s.

Dying in your sleep. Not choking on breakfast cereal like my grandmother did. Honestly, what stupid hospital nurse tries to feed a 97-year-old lady Weetbix an hour after she has a stroke? The official verdict is that grandmother died of a stroke on the 28th of November, 2011. I reckon it was death by cereal.

Thanks, Carol. I'm a history nerd, through-and-through. Almost anything concerned with the history of the era of the Holmes canon (the Victorian & Edwardian eras), I've read about. And could probably answer questions on. But I'll answer questions about Australia, too.

Thanks for the welcome, folks.

Thanks for the welcome, Medic. It's a lovely forum. I think I will find a home here, somewhere.

Hello. See? I told you I'd say 'hello'. I have been a fan of Sherlock Holmes since I was 13, and I read my first book, 'The Hound of the Baskervilles', in about 2001. I was a member of another Sherlock Holmes forum. Several months ago, it went belly-up, and by the looks of things, it's gone for good. We were a small community of about a dozen or two, active members. We were a happy, close-knit group of Holmesheads. But then the forum went down and yeah...I found myself floating around with nothing to do. I'm not a strict fan of the TV series "Sherlock", although I will admit to finding it fresh, gripping, fascinating, inventive and at times, very funny. I am not here to see the Queen. And I am wearing pants. The ash-tray is on my desk, behind me. I have come here mostly to discuss the original stories, and Victorian history. If I've come to the wrong place for that, I apologise. But I honestly couldn't find another half-decent forum online. They're all horribly specific and have god-awful layouts. This was the only one that jumped out at me and looked good enough for me to want to join it. As I said, my old Holmes haunt died several months ago. For those wondering, it was a forum called "Holmesian.net" (don't bother going there, doesn't exist anymore). It was a wonderful place to hang around in, but is sadly no-more. A bit about myself. I live in Australia. I am in my 20s. I am a blogger of history (http://scheong.wordpress.com - "Not Yet Published") I collect antiques and vintage nicknacks. I'm a fan of Sherlock Holmes. I'm a writer looking for work (as yet, this has proven elusive). I meddle in photography. I meddle with stuff. So far, I've fixed about a half-dozen vintage sewing-machines. Cleaned one typewriter. And fixed dozens of vintage fountain pens. That's about all for now. Feel free to ask questions. Don't be shy. I'll answer anything you want to know. That's it from me. Shangas.