The riddle of the shooting

 Alan Place - The Puzzle solver

For the last month, I had been trying to find out some information on a murder in the USA. 

At the time, the murder was headline news in the papers; I could recall a man walking to a table, and shooting another man three times in front of about 100 people, but other than that I was shooting in the dark.

The information, as I recalled was flawed; I thought the killing was in the 1920's - it was in 1908 - I thought it was at a rooftop party, it was at a revue for a show.

The killer was Harry Kendall Thaw, the person he shot was Stanford White - I can't say White was a victim - with Shaw's reputation for raping young ladies the incident was "on the cards." The victim in this story is actress Evelyn Nesbit, who became Mrs. Thaw.

White took her to a secret room, plied her with alcohol which was doped, and when she fell asleep, he raped her. 

Thaw got off the murder charge, partially because his family had influence, but also he had a rep for violence going back to his youth; in this case, he thought White was barring his way into high society.

I solved another puzzle too, for days I was looking for a pair of my spectacles, I turned my room upside down but to no luck; then, when I stopped looking for them, I found them in a pile of clothes I was going to wash.

The third puzzle is one I created with no solution.

I had been searching for some DVDs of shows on Netflix I thought I had copied. I am now convinced I put the files on a USB external drive, not DVDs.

Links without Draft2Digital

 An experiment in Writing

I found using Draft2Digital is waste of time, and energy when trying to sell an eBook, so I am going back to the old ways' I am going to add some of my eBook stock to some sites without using their site. Hopefully this may gain some sales, I have nothing to lose, and possibly something to gain. Among the stories will be some previously unseen fantasy, horror, and romance 

Natural History on Twitter

 Non-related posts

Should you view my Twitter pages, you will find many posts not related to this blog, and wonder what is their point?

Their point is nothing suspicious, I like to post nice posts about nature if I can; I have been a nature lover for as long as I can recall, some of my best times are watching the waves crashing and the boats entering the harbour with the catch.

Was I naive or crazy?

 A writing community?

When I began writing, I knew it would be hard, and I would have more chance to fail than succeed, but I considered as an Indie Writer among other Indies if one did well the glory showed us all in a good light. 

What a jerk I was!

In only a few months, I learned, the hard way, there is NO writing community, it is dog eat dog for any scrap - and putting it politely, as Walter Winchell would say; "Be sure to step on as many fingers going up, because they'll be sure to kick your butt if you fall!"

That is the polite version, to transfer to common terminology, "Anybody will shit on you, if they feel they can gain by putting you down."

By the end of my tird year as a writer, promoter, I cut promoting other writers as nobody did me a favour. Several writers who gained from my help, didn't have the decency to even send a thank you note, or email.

One got a book contract for a series, another got a magazine contract from me writing good blurbs, and the man in Australia had his sales go from 20 a month to voer 200, what did I get? A feeling of ash in my mouth.

A comparison in size

The growth of my Jewish readers 

The thing to realise in this comparative study is not the number of readers for my blog, but the sizes of the countries involved.

Yesterday, Israel had 50% more readers for my blog, than China, 100% more than Canada, and over 200% more than the USA.

The fall in my US popularity could be down to two things, not writing much about the USA, or my support for Israel; my support for Israel will not change.

I didn't include the UK because my blog has never had many readers here; half of the few readers I get is me checking to see how things are going.

Israel is now challenging for the lead

 Other than Hong Kong

My growing Jewish audience on the blog has grown so quickly this week, yesterday they were third behind Hong Kong, and the UK.

Putting this in real terms, I discount Hong Kong, as I doubt anyone can overtake them; I have yet to find a reason for my popularity there, perhaps I never will know.

I tend to cut my UK viewers by half, this accounts for me checking to see what is happening. So 37 yesterday is only 18, and Israel had 17.

Alan Place - Bollywood collector

 Golden Oldies

Amassing any collection of films will entail some problems. In my case - collecting old Bollywood films - the main issue is subtitles. Before the 1960's there was no need for subtitles, most films made in India were for the audience in India who could speak Hindi - the major dialect - several areas had their own cinema, but for general release the language was HIndi.

During the 60's, a new breed of Indian surfaced, children born in the UK, who were Indian, but spoke English more often, at this time, subtitles had to be readily available, yet you needed the technology to add them; this didn't happen until much later.

If you are intrigued to know, though I have a growing selection of films from the 40's and 50's, there are some actors, and actresses I don't like to watch from the era.

Why select film from this time, when Bollywood has a booming industry of modern films with subtitles?

The answer to that question is I am not a fan of modern Bollywood - in general - there are some films I like, but the tendency of basing films around the singing, and dancing of Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, and Aamir Khan I find boring.

Also, I find the sexist attitude in Bollywood annoying; it smacks of 1920's Hollywood. In my view, many of the actresses who get thrid billing on the films, are the equal, and in many cases better than their male leads, but they are women, and as such treated little better than cattle.

Hebrew films and TV

The Virtual Tourist 

I have written many posts on the subject of Israel, you may ask, do I have any Hebrew films?

The answer is not many, they are hard to find, but a few. I did have one called Free Zone about three ladies travelling back to Israel from Palestine.

Though it has one of my favourite actresses in, Hana Laszlo, I found I couldn't watch the film, why?

The style of photography, shooting from one lady to another, and showing their reflection in the windscreen gave me a bad headache.

Israel is moving ahead

My appeal to the Jewish reader 

I hoped for this day, and it has arrived; in the last 24 hours my blog had more readers in Israel than the USA, Canada, and China.

I am not surprised, few of my posts are on religion, many are about the state of the country, and how the media shows Israel in a bad light when it is Hamas, and Palestine who should take the blame.

Long before Caitlin Jenner

Mae West 

Years before Caitlin Jenner made her name with a gender change, there was a film about the subject. The film, Myra Beckinbridge, features Mae West, and Raquel Welch.

Ms. Welch played the title role of a man who has a sex change to try to get a family fortune.

Director John Houston, said it was one of the worst films he directed, and the clash between two ladies who were considered sex icons almost ruined the film.

From my view, the contest is a no-brainer. Despite being in her mid-70's at the time, as the image shows Mae was still a real beauty.