A Time For Everything

 

The myth is that the forbidden fruit was an apple...

The Bible merely says fruit, but for hundreds of years, it seems that society at large has just accepted that the forbidden fruit was a bright shiny apple.

But how and when did that happen? Why did it happen?

I recently listened to a pod cast (are you surprised?) that tackled that very subject. Here's the link and I strongly encourage you to listen for yourself... The pod cast guest, Professor Azzan Yadin-Isreal, shares his journey of finding the answer, which is super interesting. So, as I said, you should go listen for yourself.

But the answers are as follows...

Professor Yadin-Israel posits that the forbidden fruit became an apple by the morphing of vernacular. Much as we see today, meanings of words morph and change over time. So sometime back in the 16th century, the general French word for fruit became the French word for apple and wha-la.

Interestingly, it took a bit longer for Italy to catch on. They still referenced figs in their art for a time.

And there you have it. The Professor makes a compelling argument, I think. I guess we'll never know what type of fruit was really the forbidden fruit. And maybe that's for the best.

Have a great weekend!

 

Image courtesy iStock Photos.

Sooo...my writers group recently disaffiliated from its parent organization. As a result, we've had to change our name. And that meant a new domain name. Which lead to the decision to also revamp the website.

Now I've loved messing around with website for years, decades maybe.

It all started with a fan site for the TV show The Guardian. I didn't create the site, but I took it over from the person who did and I fell in love with the coding. I learned HTML and CSS in order to manage the elements.

Then I became a fan of the TV show JAG and joined the fansite band wagon yet again, going from creating the original incarnation of my site called JAGNikJen's JAG Archive to The JAG Archive's final design as I honed my skills. There was a version in between, but I can't seem to find it in the Wayback Machine.

Fast forward twenty years and I still dabble. Mostly as the website director for the above mentioned writers group for years because I'm one of the few people who seems to understand how websites work on the back end or is brave enough to learn it/dumb enough to take it on.

But let me tell you--I hate WordPress with a passion. I was hoping to walk away from it, but DH convinced me it was easier than I found it (which I disagree with) and now I'm frustrated to the point of tears again.

Unfortunately, the platform I'd prefer to use isn't as inexpensive--we've got trim our budget as well--so I've been researching other alternatives, but mostly to no avail.

In the meantime, I'll keep fiddling with it to see if I can't make nice with the world's largest website builder...keep trying to make sense of it, but it's not as intuitive to me as maybe it should be.

On the other hand, the theme we've decided on--diversity, basically--is fun. Which isn't a theme really, but a mindset. The term "theme" come more from the whole series of vector images I found to use on the site. A series that includes people all shapes/sizes/colors/ages, and all created by the same artist so they "match." As soon as I saw them, I got soo excited and knew that theme and those images were the way to go.

The fact that there are so many images is a double edged sword. While we have a lot to choose from. it's going to be hard to narrow down our choices to just a few. And by a few I mean at least ten, max twenty-four. When you have approximately 600+ images to choose from, 10 to 24 is definitely going to be a challenge.

Image courtesy iStock Photos.

There are so many people--diverse groups of people: young, older; thin & curvy & in between, varieties of skin tones and ethnicity. Just the type of writers group we want, so we need to show those interested that we welcome all kinds of folks, and this image set will show that but also give off a fun welcoming vibe.

Have a great week and wish me luck with WordPress...

You know I do. :0)

My favorite podcast, for which I will drop everything else to listen to the new episode when it drops, is...


Mostly I listen to podcasts of the hockey variety, but I've branched out of late and have found some interesting podcasts in the subject of history. I've always loved history and it was good place to start.

It actually started with a commercial for a podcast called Hope Through History, which was nothing more than a five or six episode series that offered a bit of insight and hope as we Americans faced a new large-scale crisis by looking back at large crises we've faced in the past, such as the Great Depression and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

I checked it out and found it interesting, though not all that hopeful. (But that's probably just me.)

I also listen to History This Week which is just what it sounds like--a story from some point in history of whatever week it is. I mentioned this just over a month ago, but I learned that our building codes came about as a result of the Great Molasses Flood of 1919 and that Beethoven wrote his finest piece of work, Ode to Joy, while completely deaf.

I used to get an email with the Ted Talk of the Day linked to it, but these days, I just get the podcast instead. I curate those and only listen to the ones that sound interesting.

The latest addition to my podcast play list is The Last Archive and it's current series, Who Killed Truth?, which has also been instructive.

They're good for those road trips, short or long, but also for sitting and cross stitching. That's about as multi-tasky as I can get these days.

Do you listen to podcasts? Any recommendations?

Today, I'm at workshop to learn how to make money by investing in the Stock Market. Things like when to buy, when to sell, and hopefully how to choose which ones to watch and ultimately buy.

I've had an account with Robinhood--a commission-free brokerage platform for trading stocks, options, and crypto-currency--but haven't done anything with it because I didn't really know what to do or how to work the system.

Then they started sending out newsletters called Robinhood Snacks that talked about what stocks were up, what were down, and other interesting things about the stockmarket and my interest was piqued again.

Now, DH and I were supposed to attend this workshop last fall, but we had that family medical emergency and had to wait until this traveling workshop came back to DFW. Gotta say, it's not great timing now, but we've got $900 tied up in this venture and I want to make it work for me instead of letting it work for them, so it's going to be a long couple of days--all day today and probably all day tomorrow.

I'll tell you all about it next week.

In the mean time--have a great weekend.

I've toyed with the idea of going back to college, but if the homework from a single month-long online class about writing is kicking my butt, I can't imagine actual course work.

>>picture me grimacing<<

So this homework / instructor is frustrating me. I'm not doubting it's a good thing to be challenged. I'm trying to work through it, to ask for clarification as needed, but youch. It's still tough. And while I'm competitive, I'm also lazy and part of me just wants to quit.

It's hard...

There are some parts that really are a challenge for me, not just because I'm lazy, but because that's just now how my brain works. I don't think I'll be able to find the nuances on my own if I use this method to work on another book down the road. But I do have critique partners and fellow writers who could maybe help. But argh. Still. And I'll still have all the lessons and my worksheets. But argh.

Part of the initial struggle was that this method takes some standard plotting methods and tweaks them just slightly, starting with a different take on the meaning of certain terminology. That wasn't so bad. But then I'm doing my homework and going along with the knowledge I've had all these years and bam!

Now, she doesn't include this slightly tweaked way of looking at things in her lesson posts... Then you get your homework back with her responses and suggestions and corrections--don't get me wrong, she's very nice and respectful--but boom, you're like WHUT?? Well, I am, anyway. And I'm scratching my head. And I'm thinking, "That's not the way GMC and every other plotting method tells you to do it." Not exactly. She's slightly left of center.

**sigh**

She did encourage us to read everyone's work/lessons, but that's a lot of data for me to parse on top of the lessons themselves, so I haven't. Just been following along with the movie example she's using and asked us to watch prior to class, which I did.

It all makes perfect sense until I try to do it and then, I'm taking a left turn in Albuquerque and she's in Omaha or something. :0)

But I'm really trying this time. I haven't given up even though I'm having to redo lessons. And all her explanations make sense. I understand the shift in thinking and the why of it. Now if I can just figure out how to do this without training wheels, I might could make some progress on more books.

Anyway...back to my homework.