The end of a week and the end of a month in one day is a lazy day for some of us.  To finish off the week and the month, we experiment with more AI to enhance the stories we report and further our own creativity.  Frank Zappa said all the music worth anything has already been written by people with wigs.  The same could be said for writing; all letters have been used, and all the notes have been played, yet today we listened to new music, read new stories, and watched new videos.  Recent developments and technology can inspire new stuff; we are all in for that. 

After our original creativity experimentation, we bring you stories of inspiration in a laundromat, the strangest items left in Ubers, and a new book written by a bass player.  The fun day is hard to contain today!

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In this new section, we ask ChatGPT or any other AI tool we use to respond to a prompt.  If we like the response, image, or sound, we will include it here.  Here is our first prompt for ChatGPT.

The band name "The Smiths" was reportedly suggested by lead singer Morrissey, who was a fan of British actor and director Shelagh Delaney's play "A Taste of Honey," which features a character named Jo Smith who is described as "ordinary, overlooked and unimportant." Morrissey has cited nature influencing his songwriting and the band's aesthetic.  However, other band members have also claimed to have had a hand in coming up with the name, so the exact origin could be inconclusive.

This prompt was thought up after seeing a picture of Robert Smith from The Cure under the heading "The Smith."  We loved that photo/meme; we can't remember where we saw it.  That got us thinking about the band name, and we initially thought the band name was based on the term "wordsmith."  ChatGPT blinked and thought otherwise.  The phrase:  "ordinary, overlooked, and unimportant." – is one we will use again!

As a bonus, here is what Midjourney thought of the same prompt:

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In a Livin' the Dream sense, Jon and Erin Carpenter bought a laundromat in Charleston, South Carolina, renovated it, and now own a laundromat.  The Carpenters were able to work remotely throughout the pandemic and decided to buy an RV and travel around the country for four months.  ABC News/Good Morning America has the write-up on this inspiring story. 

Many enterprising young people could go into a rehab situation like this and invest in a service business as new entrepreneurs.  The Carpenters went further and decided to turn this into a laundromat, community center and focus on the community itself.  They kept the prices the same even after upgrading everything; they also worked with a local charity and can offer "Free Laundry Days" when donations come in help.

Here’s a link to the renovations on TikTok.

Our friends at 1440 linked us to this story, a webpage with many exciting things left in Uber.  There is a lot of valuable data on the page, but the section we focused on was The 50 *unique* lost items.  Based on how the lost items were written up, we assume they are the messages riders sent to their Uber drivers.  Here are our top seven from the list:

Depending on the copyright battles you follow, Mat Osman, the bassist for the alt-rock band Suede or The London Suede, is about to release a book.  The Ghost Theatre is scheduled to be released in June and is a historical novel set in Elizabethan London in the 1600s.  Osman is a founding member of Suede and, with Bret Anderson, the lead singer, continues to perform today.  Osman's latest book follows the first novel he wrote and released in 2020, called The Ruins was also based in London but during this century.  The Ruins was well received when it was released, and anticipation for Osman's next book follows.  The Guardian talks with Osman about his life and the new book, and one of the more interesting notes from the interview is that Osman was planning on writing a book about the Sex Pistols, set in 16th-century England, but it felt too thin.  We say too bad; that sounds like a great story!

Swag.

Click on the Apple Music image to listen to the song on Apple Music or on the Spotify Image to listen to Spotify.

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Thank you for spending a few minutes with us. Here’s one for the road!

With A Shout newsletter is written by Johnny Christian with the support of a thousand idea bits and the help of many people.

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