Beau Kalden

You can download the UFO blueprints and all sorts of other stuff here, if you're interested. I'll let you use your own judgment as to the value of this information.

I have it on good authority that you can build a space ship yourself, powered by magnetic energy. I mean, I found plans and diagrams and everything. I read some of it to you on this week's episode, '[44] How to Build a UFO'.
www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/44-...

Anyway, we're still doing episodes about crazy old books, if that's your thing we've got it going on. Like and subscribe, and tell your friends.

In my opinion, 'Ur of the Chaldees' was a particularly interesting episode, talking about an archaeological expedition digging up an ancient Sumerian royal tomb. Although I've been informed that I mispronounced the word "chalcedony."

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/40-...

I've been hearing about 'The 48 Laws of Power' everywhere recently. It was mentioned even mentioned on Abbot Elementary. Well we read some -- it's basically a collection of anecdotes about swindlers, which we love on this podcast.
www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/41-...

We also considered whether "Death by Coconut" is a real thing. Turns out, yes, and also no. Both and neither. As is the case with most things in this world, there isn't a good clear answer to any question.

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/42-...

We haven't been posting here as much lately, but we're still cranking out episodes. Last one was about firearm safety from a Victorian-era military officer. Who better to listen to about gun safety than a colonialist warmonger?
www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/43-...

"Human bodies in various respects, resemble spunges, and are adapted to receive such emanations. When two human bodies are situated within each others atmosphere, the emanations and atmospherical atoms of each, will be blended together,
and received into each others pores."

"It is well known that flowers, onions, &c. &c. as also animals, and even minerals emit effluvias, for instance, brimstone emanates through the pores of the body, tarnishes silver in the pockets, and lace on the clothes."

"Pores were intended by the Divine Creator, to allow, or admit the passage of superfluous fluids from every part of the human body, for the obstruction of pores, must terminate existence."

Thanks again for finding/posting this book. On the podcast we're reading from it this week and next. We cover old weird public domain books and this certainly qualifies.

"Such was the credulity of mankind, that amazing numbers, myself included, were allured to practice this new science, and attempt to effect cures which could not be performed ... actions (which I did not perform) were so extremely wanton and absurd as most justly to merit censure."

"In the year 1788, ... he delivered lectures on animal magnetism, and was reported to have cured diseased persons, even without the aid of medicines, and ... at a distance; all which appeared to me to be very marvellous indeed, and ridiculous in the greatest extreme."

In 1801 England, "animal magnetism," which today we call hypnotism, was the hot medical fad. Doctor George Winter wrote a book explaining how animal magnetism supposedly works, so an informed sick person could choose between that and, say, bloodletting.

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/38-...

Happy 2026! There's no more classic New Year's Resolution than to quit smoking. Contrary to popular belief, it's actually easy to do. Just ask Allen Carr, author of today's reading, '[36] The Easy Way to Stop Smoking'.

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/36-...

Merry Christmas! Have you been good or bad this year? If you ask Niccolo Machiavelli in '[35] The Prince pt 2,' he would say that's irrelevant. The important thing is to APPEAR to be good, that's really all you need.

To al-Jammaz he said: "I saw you in So-and-so's entrance hall with a large bowl in front of you, and you were eating. Of what was the bowl made and what was in it?" "Dog's vomit in a swine's skull!" he replied.

What if your table manners were so bad, so uncouth, that we're still talking about you behind your back a thousand years later? In '[34] The Book of Misers' Al Jahiz shares anecdotes from 9th Century Arabia about sloppy dinner guests.

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/34-...

Incredibly, there is a big ol' book that contains every dream imaginable, and if you ever wanted to know what your dreams mean, you can just look it up. So it is claimed anyway. This week we're taking another look at [33] 'Ten Thousand Dreams Interpreted.'

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/33-...

'Stool'

Nothing is in situ, everything is in motion,
and the seated must prepare for the next moment where the memory of leisure is burned in neurotic effigy.
The stool abides these truths.

'Mouldering Corpse'

Here lies a humanoid
who'd have never guessed their torso would shelter dust from the gills of tiny mushrooms

but should have.

'Sandstone'

Rock is eroded to sand,
sand is blown into lakes,
lakes are buried in mud,
and mud crushes sand to rock.
Earth
is rearranged.

This week, we read item descriptions from the superbly-written game 'Caves of Qud,' winner of the 2025 Hugo Award. Whether its an extraordinary sci-fi device or a simple pile of dirt, Caves of Qud describes them both with awe and wonder.

I recommend checking out #CavesofQud, it's worth your time.

Take it from Machiavelli, in [30] 'The Prince,' only an idiot would hire mercenaries. The only thing worse than hiring an incompetent mercenary is hiring a competent mercenary.

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/30-...

What if there was a great big book that wrote about every single dream there could possibly be, so whenever you had a dream you could look up what it means? Well, that book exists: it's [29] 'Ten Thousand Dreams Interpreted' by Gustavus Hindman Miller.

Do your choices matter? Can you be held responsible for anything you do? Does the very idea of free will even make sense? Good questions tackled in under twenty minutes on this week's episode, [28] "What Does It All Mean?" by American philosopher Thomas Nagel.

www.plutocrat.biz/episodes/28-...

But the ordinary round of sensual gratification ceased at last to afford him delight. He was sometimes gloomy and reserved, and there was an unnatural wildness in his eye which gave indications of incipient madness.

Halloween Reading: "The Yellow Sign" by Robert W. Chambers | Duckfeed.tv Get more from Duckfeed.tv on Patreon

Our tenth annual Halloween Reading is now available for all Duckfeed patrons! This year I finish The King in Yellow by reading "The Yellow Sign", a story about a guy who sucks.

www.patreon.com/posts/hallow...

He was further to open a vein in his arm, and sign with his blood a contract that he would work the devil’s will in all things, and offer up to him a sacrifice of the heart, lungs, hands, eyes, and blood of a young child.

The grasping monomaniac made no hesitation, but agreed at once.

"It was proved that he took insane pleasure in stabbing the victims of his lust and in observing the quivering of their flesh, and the fading lustre of their eyes as they expired."