Mom, don’t look now, but, it’s time for the July quiz!!
But before we start, this might be a good time for me to mention that I registered with hpathy.com so I can read the ezine now!
Good for you!!!
Now that that’s out of the way, I have good news, and as you know, it’s my job to spice up the Hpathy Quiz with my timely announcements.
Is that what you’re doing? I have to make an announcement first! If the video starts playing spontaneously, just click on it and it will stop. It will go into “pause”. Scroll down. Hopefully that won’t happen but lately it’s been happening to me. Sorry, go ahead.
It says so on my blurb written by Firuzi.
It says what?
That I’m here to spice up the Quiz with my timely announcements! I’m just trying to live up to my title.
What title, pray tell, is that?
Shanapedia!
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Shanapeeeeeeedia! The Encyclopedia of Miss Shana. Well that’s different. Never mind!
Now where was I???? Oh yes, announcement the first–
Smokey Robinson.
Finally, someone who can actually sing! William “Smokey” Robinson, the Vice President of Motown Records and lead singer of The Miracles.
He has an album of duets coming out this year with Elton John and James Taylor.
Here we go again with Elton John and James Taylor! Why can’t you get into Smokey Robinson? He’s written over 60 hit songs! Did you know he wrote “My Girl” for The Temptations? I’ve got sunshine, on a cloudy day….
Announcement the 2nd, it’s time for the Death Report! You might want to sit down for this, Mom; even though you were the one who told me–screaming from the living room. Bobby Womack died after a long illness.
I didn’t even know he was sick. My favorite songs that he’s written are “Woman’s Gotta Have It” which appears as a James Taylor cover on his
In The Pocket album:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SleOEJVP38
and “It’s All Over Now” which the Rolling Stones covered:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ut0iEM1hkOM
So your favorite songs by Bobby Womack are by someone else? Well great, that’s just great!!!
I wonder which Bobby Womack song I want to play? So many….so many…. how about,
“If You Think You’re Lonely Now, Wait Until Tonight”:
I thought it was just, “If You Think You’re Lonely Now”.
Well, excuse me, Mrs. Know-It-All! Or should I say, Miss Pedia!
What would you ever do without me to correct you on things? Also, did you know that Gerry Goffin, Carole King’s ex-husband, died? But, that’s a story for next month’s Death Report.
Why isn’t it for this month’s Death Report? Oh, wait a minute! Shana, we forgot our “Funny Thing” segment! You know, where I recount one of the famous “funny things” you said as a baby?
Which one is it this time?
“Do cows make good pets?”
When did I say that?
Last week.
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And now for our Quiz!!!! As you may already know, Shana and I are having another one of our “completely different”, “famous people” quizzes this month!
Your job is to find the remedies for…
Basil and Sybil Fawlty of the critically acclaimed sitcom, “Fawlty Towers”!
“Fawlty Towers” is a British comedy from the 1970’s, created by “Monty Python’s” John Cleese. Shouldn’t you explain it to our non-British readers, Mom?
Wouldn’t you like to explain it?
You’re so much better at explaining things than I am.
I guess it’s up to me, again, as usual!
OK. “Fawlty Towers” is supposedly the name of a small hotel in England owned by Basil and Sybil Fawlty.
The comedy angle comes in from Basil either insulting the guests who aren’t sufficiently “upper class” for his taste or fawning over the ones who are! Other causes for laughter include Basil’s never ending cost-cutting schemes that always backfire, like hiring a Spanish waiter who can’t speak English!
Sybil, Basil’s wife, is very down-to-earth, level-headed, very nurturing of all the guests and is forever having to untangle the missteps of her neurotic, cheap, and pretentious husband!
In this episode, called “The Psychiatrist”, one of the hotel guests, Mr. Johnson, has really offended Basil’s aristocratic sense of decorum; a “commoner” by all accounts, Mr. Johnson seems to be primarily interested in chasing women and drinking. Sybil is especially taken with Mr. J’s “charms”. Basil spends the episode attempting to prove to Sybil that lover-boy has sneaked a girl into his room! Complicating this effort is a psychiatrist who has checked into the hotel, causing the repressed Basil to be so self-conscious about appearing “normal”, that he winds up acting noticeably insane!
Your mission is to find the constitutional remedies of Basil and Sybil Fawlty. Oh, and P.S., “Fawlty Towers” is the funniest show on television and you will soon see why:
Send your votes to me at [email protected], the answers will be in next month’s ezine, see you then!
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Votes
Sybil Basil
Calc-c. Lycopodium
Pulsatilla Arsenicum
Calc-c. Lachesis
Calc-c. Lycopodium
Pulsatilla Lycopodium
Calc-c. Arsenicum
Sepia Arsenicum
Dear Elaine and Shana Lewis,
the Constitutional Remedies for Basil and Sybil Fawlty are:
Lycopodium for Basil and Calacarea Carbonica for Sybil.
Best Wishes,
Dr. Anastasia Kimtsou.
You know, that made a lot of sense to me, and was what I believed also, and then I read Maria’s email:
Hi Elaine and Shana! May I say that I crack up every time you and Shana have a disagreement over, usually, James Taylor!
About the quiz: Oh boy!!! That is really a hard guess!
For the wife I have ABSOLUTELY no idea!
D’oh!
For the husband I also found it very difficult, but I could maybe vote for Lachesis.
Hmm…that is intriguing, really. Lachesis is the venom of the bushmaster snake.
Just because for the mocking, the ridiculous monkey gestures, the suspicion. Could it be Hyoscyamus too, maybe?
No, Hyoscyamus is literally insane. Basil is not insane, but he’s…what? That is the question! And just like with the Homer Simpson Quiz, we have to make a list of the elements of the case, then try to find rubrics (headings in The Repertory) for them, if possible.
Let’s think about Sybil. Sybil is…what?
Responsible
Sincere
Helpful
Cheerful
Chatty (talkative)
Affectionate
Dutiful
***
And what about Basil…Basil is…
Haughty
Mocking
Quarrelsome
Critical
Dictatorial
Vindictive
Boasting
Paranoid
I’m sure there might be more, so, feel free to come up with your own ideas.
It is the most difficult quiz ever, I think!
I did not know that!
So, only with your precious help I could reach to a decent vote 😛
Have I been helpful?
Yes you have been very helpful!
Woo-hoo!
I will stick with Lachesis for the husband and I will vote for Calc-carb (made from the oyster shell) for the wife, mostly because she has a giant hotel (“home”), like a big oyster shell, for a giant family of customers. She takes care of people. I can’t think for a better vote than that. But if I am wrong I will try again 🙂
No; in fact, very good, Maria! Sybil was a tough one, that is why I wrote an article about Calc-carb in this issue (July 2014) because I knew that without it, no one would be likely to guess Sybil’s remedy. Did you see the hint I gave from Philip Bailey’s book?
“The image of the matronly inn-keeper’s wife, extending hospitality to all, keen to gossip and not above bawdy fun….If they trust you, they are likely to be chatty and pally… Unlike Natrum, Calc usually feels worthy of love and happiness and is able to receive as well as give. Family life comes naturally.”
Now doesn’t that sound like Sybil?
But Basil! I was so sure Basil was Lycopodium! “Everyone’s going to know Basil,” I thought, “but they won’t know Sybil.” But then after seeing your vote for Lachesis, I started thinking… and thinking…and now I am SOLD on Lachesis!
I know why almost everyone voted for Lycopodium. It’s because of the famous Lycopodium rubric, “Mind: contemptuous, hard, for subordinates, and agreeable–pleasant–to superiors”, but guess what? Here’s something you probably didn’t know…. Lachesis is in that rubric too!!!! And here is the line Sybil shouts at Basil that I’m sure made everyone think the remedy was Lycopodium:
“I have had it up to here with you! You never get it right, do you!? You’re either crawling all over them, licking their boots; or spitting poison at them like some benzedrine puff adder!”
But it’s her last words we need to take heed of! Puff adder? Spitting poison at them? She’s describing a snake! Lachesis is a snake! And in truth, Mr. Johnson is probably Lachesis too; hence the two of them butting heads! You can see that Mr. Johnson is a non-repressed Lachesis, clearly a lady’s man, who has definitely charmed Sybil and gotten Basil’s back up! In fact, you could conceivably call this episode of Fawlty Towers, “The Lachesis Episode” because everything about it revolves around sex (and drinking too, I might add; you may recall Mr. Johnson ordering a bottle of champagne; and in case you didn’t know, Lachesis people are quite likely to have a drinking problem). Lachesis is in BOLD under “Sexuality, lasciviousness, lustful”, while Lycopodium is there only as a 1 (in plain type).
The episode begins with Mr. Johnson, shirt open as per the 1970’s, joking with Sybil at the front desk. Basil chimes in with numerous cutting remarks and unflattering mocking gestures, when suddenly, in walks the doctor! Immediately Basil changes his tune, “I’m sorry, we hadn’t been told, that you were a doctor! How do you do?” But later in the dining room, Basil finds out that the doctor is actually a psychiatrist! He becomes frantically paranoid! To Sybil he whispers, “Just keep your distance, OK?! You know what they’re all obsessed with, don’t you? Sex! You know what they say it’s all about, don’t you? Sex!”
From then on, paranoia reigns (Lachesis is a 4 under “Paranoid”, Lycopodium’s not even there!) and Basil orders everyone not to speak to the psychiatrist! He proceeds to misconstrue everything the psychiatrist says and answers inappropriately and then tries to walk back his answer when he realizes he’s said the wrong thing:
“Hello! You know, we we were at cross-purposes just now; there you were talking about sex, I thought you were talking about walks. Holidays!!! Holidays!!! Sex! Ha-ha! No, my wife and I have one about twice a year, I mean a holiday, holiday; whereas, as far as a good walk goes, well, we have a jolly-good walk around 2 or 3 times a week!”
Basil then turns his attention to his Lachesis rival, Mr. Johnson, who has sneaked a girl into his room, and determines that he will flush the two of them out if it’s the last thing he does! (You know the Lachesis snake will chase you down if you get in his territory and Basil is doing just that, pursuing Mr. Johnson relentlessly.) I think he was probably jealous that Mr. J had a girl in his room (and we know that Lachesis is a 4 under “Jealousy”, n’est-ce-pas?); plus, in the middle of all this, a blonde female guest from Australia checks into the hotel, and Basil can’t take his eyes off her and follows her to her room at the same time that he is hell-bent on exposing the fact that Mr. Johnson has a girl in his room!
So you can see that the theme of this episode is sex, an “animal” theme if ever there was one, not a “plant” theme or a “mineral” theme, I’m afraid; and it’s all coming together under Lachesis. What have we got here? Lasciviousness, jealousy, vindictiveness, sarcasm, alcohol, paranoia, suspicion and mocking…. with all arrows pointing at Lachesis! Way ta go, Maria! You solved the case!
Basil=Lachesis
Sybil=Calc-carb.
Let’s thank everyone who voted:
Mati Fuller
Dr. Anastasia Kimtsou
Jitka
Miroslav
Natalie
and
Career Day Contest winner, Vamsi Sudha
and of course, Maria! Dr. B, what do we have for Maria?
For Maria we have, “Maria”, from “Westside Story”:
Perfect!
The most beautiful sound I ever heard…Maria, Maria, Maria, Maria…
Maria, I just met a girl named Maria, and suddenly that name, will never be the same to meeeeeeeeeeeee…..
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Elaine Lewis, D.Hom., C.Hom.
Elaine takes online cases! Write to her at [email protected]
Visit her website: elaineLewis.hpathy.com
