On 25 Nov 2002, David Dyer-Bennet wrote: >Jeremy Michel <jjm57 at cornell.edu> writes: > >> So i got 84 messages about youth fantasy today (and i will admit that >> i've contributed a bit myself in days past) but this is getting >> rediculous, i'm sorry i can't keep up anymore I prepose we start a >> new conversation. > >Oh, that'll help, *another* topic to add to the message cascade! :-) > >But seriously, the way to start a discussion is to *say* something; >asking somebody else to do the work is far less likely to work. Yes. In other words, yammering on about how everybody else is yammering on isn't going to *stop* people from yammering on; they're just going to yammer on about how you're yammering on about *their* yammering on. Which is counterproductive, unless that's the sort of thing you like to do. Uh. Anyway, to change the subject, here's a question for Steve, about something he wrote in his weblog: "Listening to music while reading is like putting ketchup on steak." What does that *mean*? I'm a vegetarian, so I don't really understand how ketchup affects steak. To the left, I do sometimes listen to music while reading, and I find that sometimes what I'm reading is so interesting that I start ignoring the music, and sometimes the music is so compelling that I no longer give the text my full attention. Some people have spoken of a particular piece of music being a good "soundtrack" for a particular written work, but I have not yet found such an example that works for me.