Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2013 August 30

= August 30 =

Who is R. M. Grenon?
If you google the name you'll find tons of websites with quotes from this person ("Solitude has long since turned brown and withered, sitting bitter in my mouth and heavy in my veins"). But I can't find anything real about them. Who actually wrote this? 68.0.135.117 (talk) 02:19, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * My searches have come up empty... interesting.. – Connormah (talk) 20:24, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * That quote is also attributed to Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:30, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * There's a Mr Schieder, or Schneider, who makes up stuffy quotes on public websites, then uses those as refs to support another entry under his name at wikiquotes. μηδείς (talk) 19:50, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Where is this phone number number from this website located?
link Is this phone number in South America? Abadás COTTON CANDY: TEL: 71.9991-2037 Venustar84 (talk) 03:32, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Given that the TLD on the web links is .br and the original site language is Portugese, my SWAG is Brazil. --  Gadget850talk 10:41, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * For more detail see List of dialling codes in Brazil. For the numbers shown on the blog, area codes 71 is for Salvador and 11 is for Sao Paulo. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 11:32, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

What does this Symbol mean?
I once saw this symbol on a temple in Kerala. Where is it from?/What does it mean? Closest to an answer yet: it seems related to Raelism, but it is still different. I saw it only once in India and could not take a picture. Any help or info where I can find help related to discovering symbols is truly appreciated! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.209.71.44 (talk) 09:53, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * The six-pointed star in Hinuism is called a Shatkona. Our Hexagram article also has some information about the symbol in Buddhism, however, I couldn't find an exact match for the symbol that you linked. Alansplodge (talk) 18:16, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

The Economist on Australia
Has The Economist made an endorsement in the forthcoming Australian federal election? 86.7.120.15 (talk) 11:40, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * The choice, BTW, is between Dumb and Dumber. Whichever you think is which, will be the correct answer. --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  11:50, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * No personal opinions, please. We don't want another debate .. or do we? 163.202.48.126 (talk) 12:33, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Yep - 163.202.48.126 (talk) 12:33, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Thank you so much! 86.7.120.15 (talk) 12:39, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Nervous before performing in front of people
Is there any way to prevent getting nervous before you're going to perform in fornt of a lot of people. Tomorrow I'll have my first official gig (I performed 3 years ago in front of 2000 people), but it always makes me feel weird at first, I need to sing 3 songs before I feel comfortable. Is there any way to prevent this? I don't think this is a question for medical advice, but if you consider that way, please remove the question :D  Miss Bono  [zootalk]  17:43, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Hello there! You could try the old Roy Orbison trick and wear sunglasses - he had a lot of problems with stage fright and found that they helped - they "hid" him from the audience in a psychological sense. Hope that helps miss! Quintessential British Gentleman (talk) 18:35, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks British Gentleman, I am always wearing sunglasses, but your advice is great. Thank you so much.   Miss Bono  [zootalk]  18:44, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Well, there's the classic advice to picture the audience in their underpants so they don't seem as intimidating, but personally I suggest you perform first in front of a smaller group to build your confidence. StuRat (talk) 19:25, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Oh, it is a small group, 100, I think. I will picture them in heart boxers lol  Miss Bono  [zootalk]  19:28, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Well, find an even smaller group to practice on, then, like your family. StuRat (talk) 20:45, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
 * We have a (rather bad) article: Stage fright. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 20:54, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Towards the end of his career, Laurence Olivier, despite all his many decades of experience, suffered such crippling stage fright that he had to cancel some performances on the pretext of being ill. He did ultimately get beyond it, though.  You'll never be judged on the same standards Olivier was, Miss Bono, so your bar is much lower.  I don't know if this anecdote is of immense comfort to you or immensely off-putting, but I proffer it in the hope of the former.  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  21:39, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * It's not necessarily bad to be uncomfortable at the start. Just make sure you begin with something simple and energetic -- don't start with something that requires perfect performance to come across.  Looie496 (talk) 22:56, 30 August 2013 (UTC)


 * A few anecdotes which may or may not help. (1) CBS newsman Charles Osgood, in his book on speaking, said that the underwear idea doesn't really work. What works for him is to pretend it's the audience that's nervous, and it's his job to comfort them. (2) Ed McMahon said that he was always nervous before going onstage. He said he used the butterflies in his stomach as "energy" for the task at hand. (3) Joe DiMaggio, who was notoriously averse to public speaking, was asked how he could perform in front of 67,000 fans at Yankee Stadium. He said it was no problem, because "I knew what I was doing." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 00:21, 31 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Former UFC Light Heavyweight champion Forrest Griffin popped some Xanax to help his nerves the night before his impending doom at UFC 101 against Anderson Silva. It may have helped his nerves, but his performance probably couldn't have been worse (though it's hard to pin that on just one thing).


 * The same "skill vs confidence" dilemma comes up with other drugs, as well, primarily alcohol. It can be effective, but there's a fine line between "not minding" and "not caring". A beer or two probably wouldn't hurt you. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:30, 31 August 2013 (UTC)


 * In addition to sedative benzodiazepines, there are beta-blockers which lower the appearance of anxiety, like sweating. These are matters to discuss with a physician. μηδείς (talk) 20:14, 31 August 2013 (UTC)


 * There's also non-prescription powder, which doesn't exactly stop sweat, but has made the brightest stars less shiny for as long as any of us remember. Too late for any of that, though. How'd it go, Miss Bono? InedibleHulk (talk) 06:19, 2 September 2013 (UTC)


 * We arrived early in the morning and after an hour we were informed that one of the judges (an old man) had die... so the contest was moved to next Sat... so that give us more time, I guess, to deal with nerves. We were thinking about a name for the band Sat. 31 lol... Our first cancelled gig.   Miss Bono  [zootalk]  15:31, 2 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Aha! I've been waiting for years for someone who needed a name for a band to come here and ask a question!! Here is my handy tool for automatically generating band names (I wrote it for my son who actually used "The Magical Velvet Gnomes of Rock" for his band):


 * http://www.sjbaker.org/cgi-bin/rock_band.cgi


 * ...enjoy! SteveBaker (talk) 18:58, 3 September 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm now dying to be able to follow that link... how does it work?? Can someone find a name for me?  Miss Bono  [zootalk]  12:33, 4 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I replied on my talk page with some examples and a description of how it works: User_talk:SteveBaker SteveBaker (talk) 15:38, 4 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Technicolour Mauve Velvet Geeks Paradox. Rock on!!! :) Honourable mentions: The secret green plastic swamp tomato, The rockin' walrus 3000 and The exploding swingin' frizbee of Rock. I wonder what the code looks like for this one... does it have a word bank it gets these from? Either way, awesome gadget. -- .Yellow1996. (ЬMИED¡) 18:12, 4 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry to hear about the judge, but every cloud has a silver lining, I guess. Maybe considering his problem can remind you of how minor a problem stage fright is, in the big picture. Might take some pressure off, by making a molehill out of a mountain. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:03, 4 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes, Hulk... Life is too short and very complicated.   Miss Bono  [zootalk]  12:33, 4 September 2013 (UTC)