iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

My crop of strawberry. Talk about season of mellow fruitfulness.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

Horses getting in to their Ram, Assateague Island.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

Maybe the traffic signs should be in horse?

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 12/03/2026

JSTOR calls it unusual traffic. I call it research.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

I’m teaching in 15 minutes. Frantically working on an updated lesson plan.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 04/02/2026

Apparently the answer to more artificial intelligence is less natural intelligence.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 29/01/2026

Campus map now with interactive live weather updates!

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

I like how AI is totally ambivalent about being right. Here we go from the right answer directly to spectacularly wrong answers.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 25/11/2025

Want to get a PhD in Yiddish or Hebrew? Or Yiddish AND Hebrew? We are accepting applications for the PhD in Jewish Languages & Literatures! Please help me get the word out! @jhuartssciences.bsky.social

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

If you’re in the area and like cool books… featuring Dr. Mack Zalin of @jhulibraries.bsky.social and yours truly. events.jhu.edu/form/hopkins...

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 12/10/2025

“Have mercy. Don’t be a nudnik.” Ordering these immediately.

https://il.bidspirit.com/ui/lotPage/kedmatdena/source/catalog/auction/65766/lot/137665/share?lang=en

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 05/10/2025

These post-it notes are perfect for when you need a reminder that you’ve already forgotten the thing you wanted to remember.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 07/08/2025

Migraine and other Headaches in the... Of course I clicked. I needed to find out what headaches have to do with Sonderkommando testimonies. ...in the Mesopotamian Incantation Bowls. doi.org/10.1515/tc-2...

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 05/08/2025

We all know about computers and data mining. But did you know about humans and doodoo mining?

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 29/07/2025

“The Case of Mordecai vs. Haman: A struggle for an independent judiciary Before the Bar of Universal Justice Based on a Unique Interpretation of the Book of Esther,” by Rabbi Dr. Solomon M. Neches, 1951.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 28/07/2025

Turns out you can get books and Pokémon at the Yiddish Book Center. I got a few of each.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 28/07/2025

I spent an amazing few days last week @yiddishbookcenter.bsky.social talking to a group of middle and high school teachers from all kinds of schools around the country about Yiddish Holocaust poetry and how they can incorporate it into their teaching about the Holocaust.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 10/07/2025

Great topic! Speaking of, check out ch 9 of Sven-Erik Rose’s new book. And the rest of it too…

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

If you want to get the inside dope on the Tour de France, can’t beat this show:

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 26/06/2025

Museum rules: - Do not take pictures of pictures. - Do not sit on chairs.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 26/06/2025

Yes definitely self help books (more and more of which are being translated and adapted into Yiddish). But also everything:

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Hi Playmobil, Who is we? I am a Maple Leafs fan from Hamilton, Ontario. You are a German toy company with American headquarters in New Jersey. I am not happy about the Florida Panthers winning the Stanley Cup. Why are you?

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

P'tcha or galareta (also known as "calves' foot jelly") is a traditional Ashkenazi Jewish dish. It is a kind of aspic prepared from calves' feet. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%27tcha

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 13/06/2025

Newsweek insists on the archaic singular to refer to Lisa Murkowski.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 13/06/2025

The @nytimes.com style guide recommends using the plural in reference to Lisa Murkowski.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 10/06/2025

The Universal Yiddish Library has launched: www.universalyiddishlibrary.org. It's going to be a long afternoon.

Universal Yiddish Library search interface

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 16/05/2025

SO: Why not just make them at home? Me: Then they wouldn’t be heimish.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 14/05/2025

Two poetry books from New York: one by Ida, one for Ada. “In halb-shotn,” (In semi-shadow), Ida (Edith) Glasser-Andrews, 1922. “Adas liderbukh,” (Ada’s book of poems), Ephraim Auerbach, 1934.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 14/05/2025

Fresh in, Yiddish books from early-1970s Montreal. A veritable potpourri, rtl: 1) “In mayn gefalnkeyt,” M. M. Shaffir, 1975. Poems. 2) “Di mishpokhe in Kanada un Dos hoyzgezind fun Profesor Sidney Goldstein,” Sh. Shtern, 1975. Novellas. 3) “Midrash Rabbah Shir Hashirim” trans. Sh. Dunsky, 1973.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 22/04/2025

The Life Cycle of Leaven. Stage 1: moments after Passover.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 04/04/2025

I have four questions about this talking Haggadah: - Why? - Why? - Why? - Why?

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

Vol. 1: Brush your teeth Vol. 2: Go to sleep

Sefer Halichos Shana
https://v2.shopeichlers.com/products/halichos-shanah-2-volume-set-yiddish/32456

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 20/03/2025

Speaking of Chaim Grade, here’s something cool: his book length poem “Musernikes,” inscribed to scholar and critic Meir Wiener in March 1941 in Vilna. Note the Soviet spelling Grade used for his first name. A few months later Grade fled east; his wife & his mother stayed & were murdered.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

I found it: the blank-of-blank book of blank-of-blank books.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 13/02/2025

Looks like I’m collecting “____ of ____” books. What should I get next?

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 07/02/2025

Hillel Zeitlin, “Dos problem fun guts un shlekhts bay yidn un bay andere felker,” 1911. (The problem of good and evil in the thought of Jews and other peoples). Yiddish translation of Zeitlin’s Hebrew original, first published in book form also in 1911 in Warsaw.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 03/02/2025

Follow Shakespeare? Talk about anxiety of influence.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 30/01/2025

"Anne Frank, German diarist." Google has to do some work on the "intelligence" part of AI.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

And what’s the impact factor of your hobby?

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 19/01/2025

The evil-kitty-cat-diving-suit made its first appearance in this 15th century Yiddish guide to underwater Irish stepdance. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Cod.hebr. 235 www.digitale-sammlungen.de/view/bsb0003...

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 17/01/2025

If you want to make a catapult-thingy with a tail but you only know Old Yiddish, I’ve got the book for you! Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Cod.hebr. 235 www.digitale-sammlungen.de/view/bsb0003...

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 13/01/2025

I visited the beautiful rink at Johns Hopkins University and was stunned to find that the crisis has reached even here: students are now using Chat GPT to ice skate.

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Sam Spinner @samspinner.bsky.social · 12/01/2025

Mine is: spitting on the ground is forbidden.

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