Ah, language! You are so changeable – so slippery sometimes.
I mean, here’s the source for a saying we hear everyday but today we say “Hoisted with his own petard.” And when and how do these tiny shifts happen?

Also? We have here an editorial choice between “engineer” and “enginer” – which may be a matter of spelling and pronunciation on one hand but also a matter of meaning on another. Without consistent spelling at the time when Shakespeare’s plays were printed, we can never really know for sure if Shakespeare meant “engineer” and “enginer” now. I know what an engineer is – and have no idea what an enginer is. Which is why, if I were editing, I might just go with the word more people have a sense of the meaning of. But – apparently enginer might have metaphorical connections, military connections to the ghost being called a pioneer. (Often printed as PIONER) See – we have these tricky extra e’s that either obscure meaning or enhance it.
And with language, we are always hoist with our own petar. Language will get us back every time we think we’ve built it flawlessly.

I have been making myself anxious about this conference in Montreal. There is not much to do to prepare for it so I am making preparation by getting nervous. It is possible it could change my life. It is also possible that it will have no impact. There is nothing I can do from this vantage point at any end of the spectrum. Whatever wheels are set (or not set) in motion, I must simply turn the key and let it work.

Hamlet understands precisely what Claudius is up to with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. It is interesting how accurate his sense of this plan is. Is it because he understands how Claudius thinks? Or has he been doing some spying himself?
The former is a little bit more interesting – because if Hamlet fully understands Claudius’s plan to have him killed in England, he might have a bit of Claudius in him himself. He is – after all – related. There are likely familial traits and ticks – things they have in common.
It might be really interesting to see a production where you could really see the family traits in them…where there were obvious habits of mind, body, rhythm.
So often we think of Claudius and Hamlet as so very different from one another – but what if they were more alike?

This is an interesting reveal –
We (the audience) know what Hamlet doesn’t trust Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, he’s let us know in previous scenes – but this is not a truth he’s shared with Gertrude before now. It’s like he’s turned some truth corner or a trust corner – and his former attempt to play the game just falls away. It’s like – at some point in this scene – he just decides to start trusting his mom. And it would appear to be when she tells him she has no breath to tell anyone anything. That would appear to be all he needed to stop scolding and start laying down some truth.

Punctuation questions again. I feel like when I hear/see this performed it is almost always spoken with a period. I’d need to do a more thorough edition comparison – but it may well be an editorial choice to make this a real question.

The difference in meaning would be significant. One assumes that Gertrude does, in fact, know about the trip to England – the other leaves it more open. I don’t think Gertrude probably knows about the underlying purpose of the trip to England but it is clearly a bit of a sore point between everyone.
Hamlet may have a sense of the intended reason for the trip but this question could be a probing of the levels of awareness Gertrude has.
“You know that.” Assumes knowledge.
“You know that?” Assumes nothing.

When I start to feel small and without purpose
When I start to hate theatre and slip into impossible cynicism
When I need to feel artistically at home
When I lose faith, lose heart, lose enthusiasm and drive
When too much time has passed and I miss my friends and mentors

Is the famous ape an ancestor of Curious George? I mean, this is very Curious George-y behavior. Crawl into a basket to see what’s in there? Try it out?

I mean, it’s a sad conclusion –
But Curious George’s grandfather or great great grandfather or something might have had his baby monkeys and then had a fall.
There does seem to be a literary, if not biological ancestry here.

There are not nearly enough baskets on tops of houses anymore. Not nearly enough. I have never seen one, in fact.

I like the idea of a basket full of birds that rests on the top of every house. It’s very fanciful. It seems like a fairy tale world where everyone has a little basket of birds – and the birds are like little secrets that you keep at the top of your house. You can take them out for those you trust – but otherwise, there your secrets sit, just chirping away – enjoying the sun on the top of the house.

A trusted employee of a friend forged her signature on a series of checks and stole a hefty sum. The discovery has rocked everyone – me included and I’m not even involved.

The thing that is so baffling is the why – as well as the mystery of the who. Like – who was this person deep down that she could make a decision like that. We all thought we knew her. She was nice, sweet, attentive, kind. If you asked me, “Do you think this person could steal from her employer?” I’d have said, “No!”
Unless it was just, like, some office supplies or some shit. I could see her taking some paper clips or something. Because, big deal. But forge checks? No.
Who would do such a thing?
Apparently not the people you’d expect.
It changes the narrative of the sweet, kind person to something strange and dark and insidious. How did this happen? How did this person transform significantly? Who did she become to have this seem like a good idea?

New tactic! Call your mother/queen fair, sober and wise and call your stepfather/uncle/king an idiot.
I’m intrigued especially by the bat. What about Claudius calls to mind a bat? Or a toad, for that matter. A Tom Cat, I understand.
But it’s interesting.
All three of these descriptors of Claudius appear very rarely in Shakespeare. What do these animals signify for him? These days we think of a toad as a symbol for ugliness and a bat is associated with the occult. A tom cat, again, probably the same. A tom cat tom cats around, getting with all the lady cats and generally being an oversexed nuisance. I can see the association here.
And with contemporary associations – the paddock and bat as well. They’re small dark creatures. And even if this is pre-Vampire associations – a bat has such a creepy nocturnal presence, it might not be necessary to add blood drinking to make it a little scary.
These are none of these cute or nice animals. But – again – I’d love to see some other Renaissance references to these animals – in case there are other associations I’m missing.