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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 23h

Oddly reminiscent of one of MY favorite books:

"I, Libertine" by "Frederick R. Ewing", a fictional trash novelist imagined by Jean Shepherd back when he was hip & executed by Theodore Sturgeon. Endlessly quotable jacket copy: "Turbulent! Turgid! Tempestuous!" "'Gadzooks!' quoth I, 'but here's a saucy bawd!'"

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

If you wanted someone to get to know you, what horror movie would you show them?

Ernest Thesiger & Eva Moore in "The Old Dark House": "If you don't know where it is, I'll tell you. It's on the top landing on the little table. You know where the top landing is, Horace? At least you might believe there is a top landing, although you do believe in so little."

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

@davidcollard.bsky.social : "His [word aversion] paper focuses on 'moist.' What are your thoughts on that? I'm trying to think of its use in a poem and come up with nothing at all." I thought you'd never ask! www.pseudopodium.org/ht-20260626....

St. Mary of Egypt washes her hair; capital from St. Etienne Cathedral, Musee des Augustins, Toulouse

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

I'm not an academic but I did get this into one of my three academic publications:

26 At time of writing, Batman has just “died” again, as part of an unconvincingly titled “Final Crisis.” It’s expected that he’ll return more quickly than Spider-Man’s Aunt May, who earned only three years of rest after thirty-three years of graphic decrepitude.

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

A total coincidence that I pointed to "The Complete Buddy Holly" LP box set earlier today, but another thing that made it such a compelling experience was the growing sense of anticipation & experimentation, suddenly cut short.

"6-Record Set - The complete BUDDY HOLLY"

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

vinyldistractions.com/buddy-holly-...

"6-Record Set - The complete BUDDY HOLLY - Includes a 64-page souvenir scrapbook"

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

"Reminding you to hang by your thumbs."

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

Barbara Lee was a 10%-er too, leading to this immortal headline:

San Francisco Examiner front-page headline: "No war for Berkeleyites and wimps"

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Look, Mom! Longer-than-usual notes from a closer-than-usual re-reading of Flaubert's flop novel "Sentimental Education"! www.pseudopodium.org/ht-20260626....

French man with boxing gloves & ballet slippers

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

Translation studies: www.pseudopodium.org/ht-20230620....

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 21/03/2026

Which reminds me, I've been wanting to show off my recent photo of a coyote family:

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 21/03/2026

Encountered un frère de @kevinboniface.bsky.social in this morning's French lesson.

Photo of of man saying "Oui, je suis facteur. Je trouve mes idées quand je conduis ma fourgonette de livraison."

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

For example, a quick nineteenth century check in GBooks tosses up "La Mystique Divine" by M. J. Ribet:

nous avons distingué trois sortes d'extases ou trois degrés dans l'extase, selon qu'elle suspend seulement les sens externes, c'est le degré le plus imparfait; ou qu'elle enchaîne à la fois les sens du dehors et ceux du dedans, - c'est le second degré; ou enfin, qu'elle élève au-dessus des sens et de l'entendement, - c'est le troisième degré, de tous le plus parfait. / L'extase du premier degré est quelquefois accordée aux commençants ....

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 29/01/2026

"Written on the Wind"! "The Tarnished Angels"! "Warlock"!

Malone takes charge, as well she should.

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 12/01/2026

I couldn't convince anyone to give me a ride to Kansas City for Patti Smith in 1976, so I think I saw my first concert in October 1977. haver.blog/2012/11/21/t...

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 27/09/2025

From "Souvenir de la nuit du 4" by Victor Hugo:

Vous ne compreniez point, mère, la politique.
Monsieur Napoléon, c’est son nom authentique,
Est pauvre et même prince; il aime les palais;
Il lui convient d’avoir des chevaux, des valets,
De l’argent pour son jeu, sa table, son alcôve,
Ses chasses: par la même occasion, il sauve
La famille, l’égHse et la société;
Il veut avoir Saint-Cloud, plein de roses l’été,
Où viendront l’adorer les préfets et les maires;
C’est pour cela qu’il faut que les vieilles grand-mères....

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

From the truly remarkable, Isherwood-scripted "Frankenstein: The True Story":

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

"There was a depression over the Atlantic. It was travelling eastwards, towards an area of high pressure over Russia, and still showed no tendency to move northwards around it."

First paragraph of Musil's "The Man Without Qualities"

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 04/07/2025

I've cassandraed a long while now & I know there are worse things going on. But receiving partisan propaganda from the Social Security Administration actually shocked me.

"celebrating the passage of the One Big, Beautiful Bill, a landmark piece of legislation that delivers long-awaited tax relief'

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Ray Davis @pseudopodium.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

A 2010 Facebook post from Maureen Hurley points to a defunct web page with a slightly different version that adds the name "Willem Hendriksen Whenathome" & the email link "P.G. Jacobs <p.g.jacobs@12move.nl>". The disguise, I fear, is thin. web.archive.org/web/20040807...