NewsGram with Sam Youmans
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
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Top 10 NewsGram with Sam Youmans Episodes
Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best NewsGram with Sam Youmans episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to NewsGram with Sam Youmans for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite NewsGram with Sam Youmans episode by adding your comments to the episode page.
Traditional Short Stories for Children
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
03/01/22 • 5 min
Gather ‘round kids. It’s story time!
Today we have a selection of short stories for you written by a former teacher by the name of Kim Brack. Like many teachers Kim says it’s very important to emphasize reading and storytelling because they open the door to so many things. As a teacher she always encouraged her students to read and share story time with their parents or someone else.
Kim Brack – And not just go home and sit down with a tablet or smartphone or anything like that. I try to get them to understand that in their life there’s room for both of them.
It was always hard for me not to let my kids spend too much time in front of the TV. When I grew up there wasn’t all that much to watch on TV after school. Cartoons were only on on the weekends but that has all changed. Add in the computers, tablets and smartphones and it’s even harder to compete for a child’s attention. Plus as a parent it is hard to resist these devices — they make great babysitters.
When the time permits and you’re ready to crack open a book and share it with your kids Traditional Short Stories for Children by Kim Brack is a nice option. It’s for kids three to six years old and features stories about witches, wizards, elves, giants, fairies, and fantasy beings. And, the book features some fun illustrations by Windel Eborlas.
Kim Brack – I couldn’t have done anything like that myself. I’m not an artist.
Scattered throughout the book you get to see some nice, professional artwork showing the characters in action. Young kids will love them.
Kim Brack – That was one thing about the illustrations, with the young children the illustrations were there so you could talk about the very colorful illustrations.
The cover features a nice example of the illustrations. Here you get to meet Freddie the Foolish Frog and the thing about Freddie is, he is very foolish. All the other frogs avoided him because he spoiled their game with his silliness. This made him very lonely. Here is an audio sample read by Mandy Kaplan.
“The Foolish Frog” (Audio Sample by Mandy Kaplan)
What a tremendous voice. If you find it hard to compete with Mandy you can download the audio version of the book on Audible.com. It’s 24:00 long and perfect for bedtime!
She has another book out that features no pictures at all. It’s geared toward early readers in the seven to nine your old range.
Kim Brack – That’s what I wanted with that second book. I wanted it to be for all the children. I decided not to include illustrations so they could concentrate on the words in front of them and hopefully by the time they got to that book they’d be doing a lot of reading by themselves.
The second book is called The Birthday gift where it seems Jenny and Michael have a problem. When they set out to buy their father’s birthday present they found that some thugs wanted it too! This one is more of an adventure than a traditional short story. A mystery that gets young kids involved with the words and the story. It’s all part of her evil plan to get kids hooked on reading.
Kim Brack – I’ve encountered parents who don’t have any interest in reading or encouraging the children so that’s why I pay so much importance on encouraging the children. That’s important to me, and um, hopefully get some reasonable books on the shelves that you could choose from.
There are some “bad eggs” out there as well. Not the ones published by Xlibris, like this one, and thankfully this author has a very easy to spell name so if you do a search on Kim Brack you’ll find all of her books — easy peasy. And if you can’t spell Kim Brack then YOU haven’t been doing enough reading...that’s ok. There’s no time like the present to start. There’s a link for you in this show’s description.
And that will close the book on this edition of Newsgram, from Webtalkradio.com
The post Traditional Short Stories for Children appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.
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Twelve Years in Alaska
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
12/14/22 • 6 min
This episode is based on the book Twelve Years in Alaska; A Spiritual Journey by Melissa L. Farrell. It is a series of articles that grew out of her quest to find a way to live with being an open empath. A person with the ability to apprehend the mental or emotional state of another individual.
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram.
How are you feeling? It’s an appropriate question given today’s subject matter. What do you know about empathy? I want to start out today with a quick lesson because there is a difference between empathy and being an Empath. Empathy is simply the ability to understand the feelings of others. Hopefully we all have this ability. It makes you human. However being an empath would give you the ability to tap into and take on the emotions of the people around you. Think about that for a minute. Actually being able to know physically how someone feels because you can feel it too. That’s some next level stuff.
Empaths are highly sensitive people and while they probably make pretty good listeners they do need to choose their friends wisely because...well, feeling your feelings is great if you’re a happy person but what about anger, negativity and pessimism. These can be awfully draining.
Have you ever met an Empath? Today her name is Melissa.
Melissa L. Farrell – I was born an empath and I lived in San Diego county with better than 100,000 people there, and I would absorb everything of all of the people that were around me and couldn’t differentiate what was me and what was them.
That can be a real challenge. It would probably force me to seek some professional advice.
Melissa L. Farrell – It took a lot of years, counseling and one of the reasons I got into Psychology was to try to figure this stuff out.
And as you might expect, it would also force you to seek out some solitude which is all explained in her book Twelve Years in Alaska A Spiritual Journey
Melissa L. Farrell – The twelve years in Alaska were important because I am an Empath. My younger sister married a man that was stationed at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska . We went up, my mother and my son and I went up one year to visit with her and see the place. I had decided that Alaska would be a good place for me and I absolutely did. We were driving along the number two highway in Alaska, got to this one place and my heart space opened up absolutely wide and I said to my sister Terri, “Where are we?” and she said “This is Salcha Alaska” and that’s where I ended up living. There were only nine hundred people living in Salcha so I could hear me, I could feel me, I could deal with my own issues in those twelve years.
I looked it up. Salcha is about forty miles south of Fairbanks and it’s a very beautiful place. It is next to the Salcha River, a popular fishing destination but enough about that. I just wanted to give you a feeling of the serenity you could expect to see and feel and if you’re an Empath how calming this area must be. It’s no wonder she chose to stay there.
There’s something else that you need to know about Melissa. In 1964, when she was in her twenties she was driving her mothers Corvair with her brother John when she suffered a Near Death Experience.
Melissa L. Farrell – The near death experience changes everything so much. It isn’t a matter of growing through it and learning it little by little. I mean you have the experience and everything is changed and I mean physically, emotionally, spiritually, your outlook on life everything changes. Coping with that is another issue.
I was going to read you a section of the book where she talks about her experience but to be honest it is so well written that you will get the most out of it by reading it yourself. Melissa is a great storyteller. I will leave you with just the last five words in the story. “John was my first Ghost” — how’s that for an incentive?
Melissa L. Farrell – My hope for the reader
is that they will find something in one or more of the articles that help them to find their own private, personal path in life. That’s whet this whole experience in my life has been for me was to find the path that is right for me in life and I just wanted to give the opportunity to maybe find their own.
Oh yes, the articles. Before I wrap up I should let you know that there are thirty different articles on various subjects where she shares her life experiences in the hope that it will give you some perspective and help you on your own spiritual journey.
It’s probably the thing that is most fascinating about this book....
Rungs On My Ladder
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
11/02/22 • 7 min
Who is Eleanor Riley? Today on Newsgram we find out by exploring her memoir. This episode is based on the book, “Rungs On My Ladder” by Eleanor Riley
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram.
Today we ask the question, who is Eleanor Riley?
Eleanor Riley – I was born on the Island Jamaica west indies. I migrated to the United States in 1970. from the time I came to the United State with my experience, which was a little bit different-much different from Jamaica. I said I must say something in a book.
She was born in Peter’s Vale in Westmoreland Jamaica to be exact and things are different there. In her book Rungs On My Ladder, she says in her culture it is a common practice for babies to be registered not by their biological parents but by a neighbor or a distant family member who quite likely were visiting at the time of birth. This is what happened at her birth, :and later she had to correct an error made in the registration of her birth date.
Eleanor Riley – A lot of people may not think that I have what to say but everybody has a book in them so I’ve kind of, I was prepared to write.
...I’ve been saying that for years, I just can’t seem to get around writing my own memoir but Eleanor’s life and subsequent books are filled with compelling autobiographical scenes. She calls them rungs.
Eleanor Riley – Each rung is like each step that you take in life. Each day that you live, each hour that you live, you keep going by climbing a ladder and the different experiences that I have while climbing the ladder. Maybe I can see where I came from and I can maybe get a little vision of where I’m going. I’m kind of seeing things ahead of me and seeing things I left behind.
Some of those rungs include getting the strength needed to give birth or managing medications and the eventual loss of a kidney or the time she was called to be the first lady of her church.
Eleanor Riley – I got the title as first lady because my husband is the pastor for the church. I took on the title. It was given to me. I didn’t refuse, I just went along with it as a first lady of the church which comes with a big responsibility. To be the first lady of the church there’s a lot of things I have to set and standards that I have to set and I have to keep those standards. I have to be the example for the other ladies of the church. It doesn’t matter what age they are. I have to be an example and the life that I live you know has to be an example whether in the church or outside of the church.
And, one of those standards is sharing the gospel.
Eleanor Riley – If we lift Jesus up, in exhaling Him, in telling others about Him, because the scriptures also said go into the world and preach the gospel telling everybody about Jesus. If we lift him up that way he will draw others to Him all men, that’s the scripture unto Him. And I always remember that scripture. Lift Jesus up. I’ve heard many times in different sermons that if we lift up Jesus we can’t be too far off. We lift him up, we have to be right there. So I always say let me lift Jesus up because I’m right behind Him. I’m right following Him and if I lift him up I lift myself up and i will lift others up so I love that scripture
Eleanor believes that in every human being there is a void that can only be filled by God and in her book she quotes many scriptures to illustrate that point. Her overall message is one of hope, determination and faith. So as you can see, it’s more than just a memoir. She does a nice job of weaving a tapestry of stories from her life, the ups and downs, and the scriptures that help add to the stories, they all intermingle to create the experiences she shares in the book. In the end she says it was worth it.
Eleanor Riley – The many things that I have seen, the many experiences that I’ve had, you know sometimes I feel like it’s worth going any further. Sometimes I feel like I could throw in the towel, but when I think of all the rewards I have gotten from the inception of my life, from the inception of the church, it was worth it. The different experiences. The different roads that I have traveled, the different encounters, I have not regretted any of it. I thank God for the experiences that I’ve had and the experiences I have had taught me how to deal with others and how to deal with circumstances and situations and I’m able to mentor others because I’ve been down that road before.
Our life experiences make us who we are. It’s those experiences that mold us and whenever you get a chance to pass on what you’ve learned you are being of service to others. For Eleanor that’s what g...
Little Cherubs Short Stories
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
12/07/22 • 6 min
This episode is based on the series Little Cherubs Short Stories. A series of books addressing different situations from a child’s perspective, like death, fostering, disability, animal care and comradery, family situations. A learning curve and “food for thought”.
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram
Today we’re going to take a look at a series of children’s books that teaches children about a lot more than just colors, numbers and farm animals. These are socially conscious short stories that sprinkle together a bit of magic, some adventure and community involvement in a real world environment. Let me be more specific. Imagine teaching about things like blindness by taking a trip to ‘The Guide Dogs Association for the Blind’, What a great place to learn about guide dogs and blindness.
Kimberley Bachelot – Its really about teaching children to be kind, compassionate, to think of others and also to be conscious of their environment. I mean the modern day theme is the environment, climate change and endangered species so to raise them with that consciousness and teach them ordinary everyday lessons within the book as well. It touches upon issues like death, fostering friendships, teamwork, so it’s quite involved but it’s not boring and it’s not petty it’s short stories and their little things within the book.
No they’re definitely not boring and while some of those issues seem pretty heavy at first glance it’s amazing how simple it can be to teach about them if you just find the right way to do it.
Kimberley Bachelot – That’s why I say there’s three elements to it. It’s educational, inspirational and also entertaining.
Kimberly has found a terrific way to weave together these three elements.
Kimberley Bachelot – It’s not just a story to read and enjoy but it teaches you something about life and then maybe that will inspire you to delve more deeply into that area because children minds are like sponges and if you can exit that interest they might go on to look into it to do a project on it or maybe even later in life it might become a career for them, who knows.
The series is called “Little Cherub Short Stories” and they are all very different. Book 1: is about adopting a pet. It’s subtitled To be or not to be: Pet is the question.
Kimberley Bachelot – They learn about pets and that’s where Marylou comes up with the idea that she wants some cats and that’s how it all starts they go down to paws and tails and then later on discover that the cats are magical the kittens are magical and that’s where their adventures start.
Book two is where the kids visit the The Guide Dogs Association for the Blind’ but it’s also about a great deal more. In fact, she admits this one was a real challenge to write because it’s about fostering a child after an unfortunate accident.
Kimberley Bachelot – Laila lost her parents when she was four and so that was quite difficult to think about how a child would feel and how they would react and also death it can be a bit stigmatized. I can be a bit scary particularly to young children so I had to think all about that aspect and put it in a certain way but i hope I’ve shown that her feelings and the way she worked though it and the help she got eventually came across the Naylors who fostered her shows that out of real pain and hardship you can find solice and happiness again.
This one is about a lot more than death, fostering and adoption. There’s a bake sale, a set of magic pendants )A large diamond and tiger tooth) that have ancient powers — helping them on their mission to protect endangered species.
Kimberley Bachelot – I’m quite into environmental issues so endangered species and thinking about the planet those are the areas I like best. I also worked for a long time in the voluntary sector and so those areas where they go to the associate for the blind and learn about guide dogs and you know, they think about Bernardo’s that look after children they’re quite important aspects they’re my favorite bits because they do touch upon my former careers.
The third book in the Little Cherub Short Stories series is Meet Ambie and Joulsie. Book 3: Ambie and Joulsie’s East Easter Parade.
Kimberley Bachelot – Fundraising continues at the Easter Parade for the Donkey Sanctuary; Michael, Beth and Mary Lou find themselves transported to Peru, along with Glenie, Ambie and Joulsie. The Pendants, the Diamond and Tiger Tooth, help Alveros ‘appear’ and guide them to the ‘Temple of Inti’, the Inca Sun God, where the Neverending Treasures have been hidden during the 15th Century, for the protection of the Incas and environment. During a modern day excavation, the Naylors find the codeword and the Never Ending t...
Pensioned Off
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
11/02/22 • 5 min
Facing retirement, Ruth, Trudy and some other baby-boomers are drawn together by a love of music to form a traveling ukulele band. This “feel-good fiction” episode of Newsgram is based on the book Pensioned Off: Baby boomers out to pasture by Sue Dawson.
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram!
Today’s show is dedicated to anyone born between the years 1946 to 1964. The Baby Boomers. In a recent Forbes article titled Baby Boomers Are Leaving The Workforce To Live Their Best Lives In A Silver Tsunami ‘Great Retirement’ Trendstates that In the third quarter of 2020, nearly 30 million Baby Boomers left the job market and retired. The following year the numbers increased. Now that’s not to say that many of them aren’t coming back. I certainly hope they do. The world can use their wisdom — but whether they left in an attempt to reevaluate their circumstances or were forced into early retirement, there are lots of people out there looking for something to do. Start a business? Travel the sky’s and the world is your oyster as they say when you find yourself, as Sue Dawson likes to put it — Pensioned off.
Sue Dawson – Yea...
She’s the author of a fun new book called Pensioned Off: Baby boomers out to pasture. She calls it a feel-good fiction story about a year in the life of a group of newly-retired baby-boomers looking to fill up their newly found freedom.
Sue Dawson – Right well they’re just, mostly ordinary people living in Auckland New Zealand and gradually the meet each other and form this ukulele band called the Pensioners.
They are drawn together by a love of music to form a traveling ukulele band and it was that line that drew me to the book because you don’t hear that very often. I wonder what it’s like backstage with this group?
Sue Dawson – I wondered if I’d be able to make an interesting story about ukulele players because they’re not like guitar players. Guitar players, you know you can bring in substance abuse and groupie groping, all that sort of thing and make quite an exciting story whereas the ukulele singer is pretty clean but I hope I’ve managed to make it interesting.
Just pulling together these two groups is pretty exciting for me. What do you get when you combine a group of newly-retired ukulele musicians and send them on the road in Auckland? I don’t know but I kind of want to find out.
Sue Dawson – It could be partly Senior Rom-Com, haha there’s a little bit of a romantic thing happening there.
Even more exciting....
Sue Dawson – Cause there’s not really much written about that stage of life. I mean there’s a whole sub-genre of the next stage of sort of shenanigans in nursing homes. There’s quite a few novels written on those sort of things but there’s not much written about the newly-retired so I thought well there’s something and there’s not much written about Ukulele players.
There really isn’t, although there are lots of great Ukulele players out there like ka-ma-ka vi vole — God rest his soul. His rendition of “Somewhere over the rainbow” is legendary — and it’s a fun instrument for people like Eddie Veder and Taylor Swift to play. Anyway, the group in pensioned off got together with a singular focus.
Sue Dawson – They sort of want to go around nursing homes and sing to old people. They don’t think they’re old.
Haha you’re only as old as you feel, but anyway that is not what ends up happening. They form this ukulele group and it ends up transforming their lives.
Sue Dawson – There’s quite a few characters. At the beginning I didn’t intend on having so many but they just all popped out. So they’ve got their own little lives happening, all their little side streams happening so quite a bit goes on in the book but it is a gentle story. Hopefully people will find it humorous and entertaining. I mean there’s serious things running through there as well. It’s not all fun and frolics but um it’s basically a gentle story.
The story is set in Auckland, New Zealand.
Sue Dawson – I mean so many books are set in places like London or New York or whatever but I thought I would set this one in Auckland which is New Zealand’s biggest city. I thought it would give the characters more scope to develop their music journey.
Well then let the journey begin! Pensioned Off: Baby boomers out to pasture by Sue Dawson is available now at BarnesandNoble.com,
The Cosmic Romance with Existence
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
11/02/22 • 6 min
Relax your inner light and connect to God. The power is in you. This episode is based on the book, The Cosmic Romance with Existence by Murali Dharan who teaches us how to connect the inner light within us to a higher light – the light of God.
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram.
Are you ready to tap into the power of the universe? We can all do it. The power is actually within us. It is called our inner light or consciousness and today we are going to learn how to get close to it.
Do you like to meditate or have you ever done it? It has been said that honest, self-reflection can quiet the mind. Meditation combined with positive actions can remove ignorance and build knowledge. What am I talking about?? A means to an end. In the simplest of terms I’m talking about making life a little bit better today than it was yesterday — unless yesterday could not be improved upon then we’ll work on a repeat for tomorrow. To do that all you need to do is connect to the source.
Murali Dharan – God is not something that is far away. He is among us, within us and he is also influencing our daily lives. So, if we are able to build an intimate relationship with higher powers, universal powers, God; its how we say it but end of the day it’s about ensuring ourselves that if we want to move away from our life challenges, overcome our life challenges, our life suffering and then have a sense of awakening, have a higher sense of self awareness and connect to our higher self you know, enlightenment we should build an intimate relationship with higher power.
Tune in, turn on and drop out man....That is Murali Dharan and not unlike Timothy Leary he is advocating tuning into our higher consciousness but doing it by much more conventional means like meditation. In his book, The Cosmic Romance with Existence: A Personal Guide Book for Spiritual Warriors to Merge Their Light with The Cosmic Light he says when people realize and connect with their conscious divine self, they gain wisdom, clairvoyance and spiritual intelligence and the best way to do that is by building a closer relationship with God — and to do that, we need to get our inner light talking to a higher light.
Murali Dharan – In spirituality there are two lights. One, the consciousness is the light within us and there’s another light, higher light.
Connecting our consciousness or inner light to the higher light – God or the Universe is how we get what we want. There are divine forces within us and around us that we can tap into to grow as human beings and they are there to help us achieve our goals. So how do we tap into them? It can be done in many ways but it helps to know and experience the power of daily meditations.
Murali Dharan – Meditation helps us to overcome compulsive behaviors without putting too much strain onto ourselves.
Did you get that? He says meditation is also good for helping us to overcome compulsive behavior. His book emphasizes the sacred role of meditations in awakening your inner light of consciousness. It offers three guided meditations to help in various ways. For example, we might have self-control. We can stop ourselves from biting our nails, or drinking too many glasses of wine but our mind is still trying to do it. One of the forms of Meditation that could help is called Chakra.
Murali Dharan – Chakra meditation is about connecting to the seven spiritual power points in our body which is actually located in our spine area. So, from the base of our spine to the top of our head there are seven chakras....so in teaching this meditation I teach them how to open these chakras and what we can do to work on these chakra points. How does this chakra meditation help you? O.k. the first thing the chakra meditation is very helpful in self healing, clearing spiritual blockages and helping one to raise their spiritual vibes, frequency and connecting to the higher self.
We are painting with a very broad brush here to give you a flavor of the things he goes into in the book. The idea is to show you how to gain the wisdom you need to deal with daily battles. To give you self-knowledge, serenity and success and it begins by getting closer to the light.
Murali Dharan – The purpose of this book is to help a person relax their light. So if they want to relax their light there are two ways we can daily do our meditation on top of our gratitude. The second part is to cultivate these dynamic and powerful qualities. These dynamic and powerful qualities are the seeds of consciousness. So if we are practicing this, bringing these qualities into our daily lives we are able to get cl...
Héguanzî, the Dao of Unity
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
12/12/22 • 6 min
Over two millennia ago, in troubled times not unlike our own, a mysterious figure, distinguished by a pheasant feather in his cap, emerged with poetic visions of a future world of peace and justice. Like Laozi, Pheasant Cap (Héguanzî) understood the underlying unity in things and the power of Dao to make things happen.
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram.
If you’ve ever been curious about ancient China and its cultural history then this is your show. Here for the first time, we are going to get an insider’s view of early Daoism as it influenced philosophy.
Let’s start with a simple question, “How did a young boy named Chin (Qin) growing up in exile become China’s First Augustan Emperor (Qin Shihuangdi)?
Marnix Wells – Well this is all the best of a mystery because most of the records were destroyed after the fall of Qin which ended in a bit of a holocaust or an inferno when the future Han dynasty took over. This is now being remedied somewhat by the discovery of tombs with silk manuscripts miraculously preserved from that period and they show a lot of connections with the Héguanzî and his writings which I estimate in the period from about 250BC to 221BC which was the date in which Qin conquered the last of the six kingdoms and started the unified Chinese Empire and they still see this as the foundation of the unified China.
So not as simple a question as I thought but the discovery of new material is painting a clearer picture of the past. It’s all available now in Dr. Marnix Wells’ book Héguanzî, the Dao of Unity, Linking Politics, Philosophy and Religion in Ancient China.
Marnix Wells – This boy who actually grew up, was born in the state of Chow which is where this book is centered. Later he managed to get back to Qin and claim the crown and from there he became the emperor and the conqueror of the whole Chinese world and founded the Empire.
Dr. Wells knows a great deal about Chinese history. He has a first degree in Chinese from Oxford and a PhD from London School of Oriental and African Studies. He also spends time working as a shipping manager in the Far East where he acquired first-hand knowledge of the people and their heritage. As you know — one way to better understand a country is not only to visit there but to have a look at its history and Chinese History paints a unique picture of Unity.
Marnix Wells – The Qin that founded the Chinese empire was basically in some sense tapping into Héguanzî, because he has this vision of old nations and racism coming together and while it wasn’t done peacefully as sit turned out, none the less they did adopt this idea of sort of centralized unity which China has enjoyed for the last 2000 years so it’s a good lesson of the world at the same time it’s also something we need to be careful about because it’s also a potential threat for the rest of us unless we can somehow work things out.
Yes, we do have an issue with Unity in this country right now but I am optimistic that the tide is turning on all that. We have had our differences over the years and we usually find a way to unite.
So if you find Ancient Chinese culture fascinating or you just want to broaden your worldview. Maybe you’re curious about early dismissed writings, now vindicated by some new archaeological discoveries — then this is probably a great resource for you.
Marnix Wells – I’m attempting to kind of bridge the gap between academia and the man on the street. Of course this is very dangerous because on the one hand you get the reaction from many ordinary people saying that, oh well this is something outside their understating and on the other hand you get the academics saying we haven’t peer reviewed it and so forth I would welcome any academic challenge because I’ve put in a lot of footnotes to back up what i say so if someone has a different interpretation that would be great.
We live in a global world. We do a great bit of business with China. We hear something about China in the news almost everyday but I wonder how much we really know about the country, its people and its origins.
Marnix Wells – Indeed, we need to learn more about the rest of the world. We need to know more about China and its culture. not from the propaganda so much as from the actual history and also into Asia, Africa, South America you know we mustn’t shut ourselves away in our Western paradise, or not so paradise. We must engage with the world.
So jump into your time machine and head back to the China of warring kingdoms in 250 B.C. on the eve of imperial conquest. The key to your travels is the internet where you’ll find a book about how the Chines...
Chaos in Quantum City
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
10/19/22 • 6 min
What is your super-ability? Would you consider your primary skill to be your superpower? What if you had an actual superpower, what would you like it to be? This episode is based on the book Fog Vol. 1. Chaos in Quantum City by Athanasios Panayotou.
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram!
We all have unique skills and abilities but what if our strengths, our unique abilities, were our superpowers? Imagine finding yourself in a world where all that is possible. A world with a lot more than meets the eye and in that world these things are possible.
Speaking of Super-powers, when I was very young I wanted to be invisible. I thought it would be so cool to be able to go anywhere without being seen. Probably because I was a teen-aged boy and there were girls’ locker rooms to be explored. As I grew up my interests became much more sophisticated. Invisibility changed to the ability to fly — because why not. Over the years I’ve given this a lot of thought. Now, I think if I could have any superpower it would definitely be super-strength. My hero has always been Spiderman and you can do a lot of good with strength like Spidey’s but I digress...
Athan Panayotou lives in the city of Larne in Northern Ireland. It’s a city very much like the one you live in. A place where young people dream about being a superhero or having super powers. Right around the age of seventeen he became enthralled with the superhero fantasy.
Athan Panayotou – I’ve always wanted to make my own kind of superhero kind of universe and from a very young age like sixteen-seventeen I had illustrations of these characters that I was doing and I really wanted to write the stories as if they were like the comic books and I ended up making it into a novel.
His novel is now reality and it’s called Fog Vol. 1. Chaos in Quantum City and it is just the beginning! He calls it Volume one because there are definitely plans to expand this universe in fact Volume two is already written – but not published – but for now let’s focus on Volume one.
Athan Panayotou – It’s set in Ireland. There’s a lot of history I’ve fabricated too in between present day and 2183 to have things different and changed and new cities that have appeared. I like to say that it’s set in Galway but it’s like a fictional version of Galway.
So this gritty take on the superhero genre is set on the West coast of Ireland in the fictional city of Quantum.
Athan Panayotou – Quantum City is like a semi Utopian, the other half Dystopian, it’s not all good and there’s always people plotting behind the scenes and these characters just kind of get thrown in mix and have to figure out what’s going on and how they’re going to use their abilities.
So Nathan, Keris, Felix and Natasha are just a few of the characters that are tasked with defeating the threats that plague them in Quantum City. Threats like Elliot...
Athan Panayotou – He’s the one that’s stirring the pot. He is causing grief and uh, what’s the word...hindering. He’s a hindrance . He’s got his own plan in the works and things he wants to do and they’re not morally good. Elliot’s very upper class, stereotypical kind of snob, he’s very intelligent, he can be kind of unhinged.
There is humor, suspense, revenge and of course superpowers but not everyone uses their unique abilities for good. How did they even get their abilities? Was it something they wanted or was it done to them? The answers are all in the book but here’s the deal. You can’t just have abilities. You have to have a a good story and this book does have that. A good story and some great characters. In fact character development is one of Athan’s super-powers.
Athan Panayotou – Yea, definitely, I really do love character development. The characters definitely aren’t the same as they were in the start of the book as they are at the end of the book. I really had a lot of fun with their individual journey’s and like how they change. I really do love the change in character development, I love it.
The lives of these characters are completely changed over a couple months as they acquire their special abilities and work to take responsibility for them. And as you might expect, not everyone uses them for good. In one pivotal scene Kerys infiltrates Elliot’s company using her thorn-based abilities.
Athan Panayotou – Kerys goes on a bit of a rampage she goes after the company that wronged her and she just kind of let’s all hell set loose there’s a pinnacle moment that happens there where things happen, I’m not gonna spoil but I just had a lot of fun writing her as a character and how she deal w...
Galusha Anderson Civil War Pastor
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
10/10/22 • 8 min
Should a pastor keep the peace or stir the waters?! This was the moral dilemma that Rev. Galusha Anderson faced when he arrived from the North to serve a congregation of divided loyalties in a divided city during the Civil War. This episode is based on the book GALUSHA. Crisis and Courage in a Civil War Pastor by Stephen D. Jones.
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram
We live in divided time. Is that the understatement of the day or what? I’m not just talking about politics. It used to be that way but it seems we keep finding new and bigger ways to get more and more divided. Think about it. Which side are you on when it comes to the economy, racism, immigration, climate control, taxes and the 1%, Gender equality and the list goes on. It’s a lot more than just liberal vs. democrat. How did it get this way? Good question and it demands more attention than just this one episode of Newsgram but I’ll tell you what. Let’s take a trip to a time when our country was it’s most divided, the 1860’s and visit a city uniquely positioned on the far West end of the Mason Dixon Line.
Stephen D. Jones – Well the unique thing about St. Louis during the civil war is that people on both sides lived side by side. They shopped in the same shops they lived on the same streets, the same neighborhoods, they attended the same churches, belonged to the same organizations and clubs and so forth and yet they were sending their sons out to kill their other sons on the battlefield. You don’t usually think of that in such close proximity. So these people had to learn how to hold deep passions which they did both pro-Union, pro-confederacy, but not have it blow up in the city of St. Louis and the fighting largely did not take place in the city of St. Louis. It happened all around it but not in it.
That is Reverend Stephen D. Jones of theFirst Baptist Church of Kansas City Missouri, just a few hours drive from St. Louis. He recently wrote a book about another man of the cloth, the Reverend Galusha Anderson, pastor of the Second Baptist Church of St. Louis. (The Story of Border City During the Civil War)
Stephen D. Jones – I had never really heard of him before I went to St. Louis.
He was there doing some research and came across a book called “A Border City During the Civil War” by Galusha Anderson and it inspired him to write his own book which is called GALUSHA. Crisis and Courage in a Civil War Pastor and one of the things I found most interesting about all of this was learning about some of the challenges that pastors face when dealing with a divided congregation. To bring it closer to home for you let me ask you a question. Have you ever faced a serious moral dilemma, and realized that there is both a costly way through it, and an easy way out? Which would you choose?
Stephen D. Jones – I think many people have kind of a crucible moment in their lives where you get tested and pushed to the limit and your true metal comes out and I think that’s what happened during these, really only six years that he served in St. Louis but they were crucible years for Galusha for several reasons, personal as well as pastoral. I was so taken by what happened to him, to his family, that I read the book several times and I began to realize that underneath that history that he was trying to write was his own personal story and it just kept coming out and I don’t think he intended it. I think if somebody told him, “you are writing a lot about yourself”, he might have edited it out, thank goodness he didn’t and what I did was pick up on all those personal vignettes and put them together and ofd that it told a striking story that i felt deserved to be told.
Galusha Anderson became the first pastor in St. Louis to take a stand against slavery and for the Union. Not an easy stand to take.
Stephen D. Jones – There was one Sunday night when he decided as the first pastor in St. Louis to speak out against slavery and against the succession of the southern states, against the confederacy. It did what everybody feared that it would, which was that his church was one of the larger churches in town and it was not quite evenly divided but there was an awful lot of confederate supporters in his congregation and the next Sunday morning they were all gone.
You were thinking that the confederates were going to burn down the church weren’t you? So was I. Galusha wasn’t the only pastor dealing with this moral dilemma but the difference was he spoke out. The others just kept quiet about the issue making Glaus...
Do Ask, Do Tell
NewsGram with Sam Youmans
01/23/23 • 5 min
The original Bill of Rights is now about 210 years old. Is it time to re-evaluate our fundamental constitutional rights? Are we ready to trust ourselves as individuals with the personal responsibilities that go with rights? This show is presented from the personal perspective of John Boushkaa gay man who grew up in a period of enormous change and migration toward cultural individualism. He is author of the book Do Ask, Do Tell: A Gay Conservative Lashes Back
Welcome to this edition of Newsgram.
Starting in February of 1994 and running all the way through September of 2011 “Don’t ask, don’t tell” was the official US policy regarding non-heterosexual people in military service. It was instituted during the Clinton administration and by 2008, more than 12,000 officers had been discharged from the military for publicizing their homosexuality.
It was overturned by the senate during the Obama administration on December 18, 2010. The repeal allowed gay and lesbian military members to serve openly in the armed forces.
This is not a history lesson on gay rights and the US government — we don’t have that kind of time but a little background is necessary. Today we are going to focus on John Boushka’s new book about several important issues including what “discrimination” is really all about, and what the debate regarding “family values” is really all about. Why equal rights for gays is important for everybody and how the “Don’t Tell” mentality interferes with political and social debate in many areas but since all that is clearly laid out in th ebook let’s take a step back an examine what life was like before writing it, because for anyone who has ever come out publicly, it is a moment you will never forget.
John Boushka – It was Friday November 24th 1961. The day after Thanksgiving 1961.
The Day after Thanksgiving, John Boushka walked into the Dean’s office while he was away at college and admitted that he was having feelings for men. There had been no sexual experience before that but the feelings were there.
John Boushka – The call from what my father said came in around eight o’clock in the evening. The dean identified himself and said they needed to come back to Williamsburg to talk to me. Him and my mother and so it would have been a very stressful thing for a couple to wonder why a dean wanted to talk to their child. Can you imagine what that would have been like?
I’m already wondering about a lot of things. Like why that call needed to be made in the first place. I guess because it was 1961, which also explains what happened next.
John Boushka – The end result was I was taken out of school. I would only be allowed to go back if a psychiatrist certified it was ok for me to go back to school.
The assumption being there is something psychologically wrong with being gay and further evaluation was necessary. Couldn’t just let him run free on campus with those crazy feelings of his.
John Boushka – This is one of the reasons why you had McCarthyism and you had witch hunts in the government and state department because the psychiatrist profession was making money off it. Today, Gender theory, who is making money off of it.
A lot to think about but poor John had to spend six months at the national Institute of Health in Bethesda Washington
John Boushka – There was actually a program to examine this problem in the fall of 1962 and some of the book deals with that.
When you look at the way things were then and you hear the stories about what life was like it’s absolutely fascinating and if you feel like we haven’t made progress I can tell you that when you hear John’s story you will understand that we have definitely made progress.
He talks about joining the military in the late 60’s and while Don’t ask Don’t tell may not have been the official policy it was definitely a thing. He also spent time in Dallas in the 80’s. Not the best place to ride out the Aids scare.
John Boushka – In Dallas they threatened to reinforce the Sodomy law with what was a much more draconian law in Texas in the mid nineteen eighties before they had a test for HIV that was politically a very difficult time. I talk about that in the book
Yea, Dallas definitely had its share of controversies in the 1960’s in effort to come full circle here let’s fast forward to the Clinton Administration. When you look at the living conditions of servicemen, which is what they had to do to come up with this policy, there are a lot of parallels with the living co...
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How many episodes does NewsGram with Sam Youmans have?
NewsGram with Sam Youmans currently has 164 episodes available.
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The podcast is about News, News Commentary, Podcasts, Books and Arts.
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The episode title 'Traditional Short Stories for Children' is the most popular.
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The average episode length on NewsGram with Sam Youmans is 7 minutes.
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Episodes of NewsGram with Sam Youmans are typically released every 3 days, 22 hours.
When was the first episode of NewsGram with Sam Youmans?
The first episode of NewsGram with Sam Youmans was released on Dec 25, 2017.
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