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Well, Terry, you started the week on Tuesday, and I'm starting mine on Friday by only reading this post now! I clearly need help.... or a better calendar.

You beat me with your puzzle, but that's not an unusual state of affairs, so fair enough! I maintain that my Marx Brothers' Gambit had been a good opener, although you might have been more impressed had I counted the siblings more accurately in the first place.

I too was interested to read about the blogging boom. Do you feel that microblogging had overtaken blogging the first time around? Now that [insert this week's platform name here] has gone all hatstand is this the moment for a rise of a new blogging generation? 🤔

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Yes, yr Marx Bros thing was very good, marred only y the fact that it was wrong. But thank you for trying. Interesting comment about blogging and microblogging. You might be right, although I never saw any conflict myself. I'[ve noticed that every few years people start saying blogging is dead, now it's Twitter, or Tumbler, or FB, or TikTok, but it's never really gone away. And substack is a cross between maintaining a blog and having a newsletter, so as far as I'm concerned we've been blogging all this time anyway!

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Heads up: the craft of blogging is alive and well and being taught by expert tutor Terry Freedman at City Lit college in an online course in November.

https://www.citylit.ac.uk/courses/writing-for-blogs

Oh, and I'll be adopting the Marx Brothers' Gambit for any and all future Eclecticism puzzles, Terry. One day I'll be right...

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Oh thank you so much, Rebecca 😁 You will! 😃

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Sep 26, 2023Liked by Terry Freedman

Loved the music and the excerpts and reflections on kissing, Terry. My head has been highjacked into the kissing zone, lately, which is totally weird for a single woman of my particular age. I have vowed not to write another thing until I can get out of this romantic capture. What's come over me?

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LOL. It's probably the weather!

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Sep 27, 2023Liked by Terry Freedman

You think?

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Take my word for it, Sharron. Not that I speak from experience 🤣

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You have no experience of weather, Terry? Given that you reside in the United Kingdom I find this VERY hard to believe! ☔️💧🌧️

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Sharron: "My head has been highjacked into the kissing zone, lately, which is totally weird for a single woman of my particular age. I have vowed not to write another thing until I can get out of this romantic capture. What's come over me?" I suggested it was the weather, which I have experience of. I have not had the experience of feeling romantic because of the weather. I hope that clarifies matters!

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🤣

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That line from Year of the Cat has always stood out to me as one of those "I wish I had written that" kind of lines. It was nice to hear the song again.

Clue #3 should have been all I needed to solve your puzzle but Nope!

Many thanks for the mention, Sir Terry.

I am anxious to learn how to make a proper cup of tea tomorrow when I read your reply to Rebecca.

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Thanks, Jim. I think the lyrics are very ethereal, and although of their time (the 70s) somehow timeless.

Hope you found my tea-making instructions educational 🤣

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Well done with all the 13s. I certainly didn’t pick all those up. And the Sudoku article - I’m a numbers person rather than a words person, so I’ll stick to my current daily practice. Thanks Terry. All the best.

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Thanks, Beth. I'm a words person, so I think the words version night remove a psychological barrier for me.

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Sep 26, 2023Liked by Terry Freedman

Love that opening piano on The Year Of The Cat. Marvellous.

Thanks for the shoutout. I'm glad it didn't elicit any cringe. Renn's many attempts at that moment remain on the literary equivalent of the cutting room floor 😅

13. Lucky! Well, I had an inkling, but certainly didn't work out all of those! Most impressive getting all that in there.

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Apparently, it was the pianist messing about on the piano and coming up with that riff which led to the song being composed.

Your kissing scene was totally uncringeworthy. " literary equivalent of the cutting room floor": great expression!

Thanks re 13 puzzle :-)

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Sep 27, 2023Liked by Terry Freedman

Ah how lovely. That's a great bit of info.

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https://youtu.be/zL_MJlnpHRU?si=jkw99N2FXtRWQ_y9

He starts talking about year of the cat 2:47. It's interesting, though it removes the mystique in a way

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Thank you Terry.

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You're welcome, Marple 😁

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Thanks for kind words, Mitch. "I will claim psychic victory, which is not as bad as a pyrrhic one.": Brilliant line!

Perhaps Substack is bringing blogging to a new and non-tech audience. Even I found the open-source version of Wordpress too involved for me to want to bother with very much, whereas with substack you can be up and running in 5 minutes. Like Blogger, but more functional IMO.

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Exactly! I loved the fact that you could install widgets and mess about with code, but when all said and done what I really want to do 8s write and be 8n a good community

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