Life is a scriptless stage and a plotless play.
Learn to perform its demands with wits to the end,
Casting a heavy mantle of bleakness away
Or act in a shadow of sorrows at your wits’ end.
Set the stage with Oblivion and Memory:
Invoke Oblivion when times are gloomy,
Cherish Memory when they are flowery.
Paul was still struggling to repel a hangover from last night’s spirited social with the town’s business committee chaired by Kohn Elephant at his elegant mansion. It was a nice occasion to meet with other men of his age who owned means of business either solely or jointly in the town. Besides, such evening social could provide Paul a chance to get away from Pula’s tittle-tattling about drudgery of household management, such as a need to have a leaking sink pipe fixed, writing checks for their monthly dues, setting up a weekly sales agenda for their Bonjour Cake Shop. Paula may be an excellent housewife dedicated to the wellbeing of her family with frugality, she seemed to be out of touch with sweet malibriety that had delighted Paul before their daughter Laura was born. That was what Paul was missing from Paula. That was what kept himself away from Paula.
“I will have a slice of Pecan Pie and a cup of cafe au lait.” Paul ordered his staple morning diet at La Boum and then started reading the newest issue of the Times. He scanned the front page to see if there was anything interesting except articles regarding sports, entertainment, and politics – yes, politics, which Aristotle once said that anyone not interested in politics should be either a divine being or a beast. Paul was unsure of which of the kinds he would belong to, depending upon his mood of a day, but it wasn’t simply his cup of tea because it’s all a reality show. Of course, Paul being a good citizen casts his vote in gubernatorial, mayoral, general, not to mention, presidential elections. But the idea of politics as a subject looks too grim and pompopus and prepertorial. Paul’s vision of the world is of a Rational Optimist equipped with bookish knowledge and abstract ideas about humanity balanced with his sharp intelligence.
However, Paul loves to read about those farcical world leaders whose scurrilous remarks on their political nemesis done in equally outrageous gestures or facial expressions all in captured in the eye of camera. At the moment, Paul’s prime interest was fixated on Jong-Un Kim, the puffed up man in anachronistic Mao suit tyrannizing the northern half of the Korean Peninsula. That fat man sure had guts to defy the international rules and regulations to respect human rights in all defiant manners. Paul thought to himself while reading an article about Kim’s turning surly over the joint military drills executed by U.S. and S. Korea last week. You gotta be kidding, Paul could not believe that this so-called a leader of a nation could possible act like a spoiled kid. And Paul would love to discipline him by every possible civil means of chastisement. For what else can work for such a short-fused, ruthless despot running his country as it were a huge concentration camp – a bigger, more surreal version of Far Eastern Auschwitz camp? Paul was also going to follow up on whether or not the US – North Korea summit meeting on disband N. Korea’s nuclear programs would be indeed held on June 11th in Singapore, a rich city-state in Far East because he would love to know if Kim would show up in a Mao suit again at such a historic meeting. He would bet $50.00 for Kim’s materialization in the ugly communist uniform.
Caligula: A Life From Beginning to End by Hourly History
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
For nearly two thousand years, Ancient Rome was a great arena of fearless political gladiators whose ambitious instincts to rule the world coincided with epochal shifts in demography and geopolitics in the regions it had conquered. No wonder the history of Ancient Rome is fraught with memorable figures whose names are immortalized in a variety of literary forms: Plays, Poems, Paintings, and Films depict the deeds and actions of these men of exceptional characters, one of whom is unforgettable Caligula as elegantly narrated in Caligula by Hourly History.
Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus was born in 12 A.D. The nickname “caligula” derived from caliga, meaning “little military boot” was attached to him as a term of endearment as Caligula accompanied his father Germanicus on the military campaign to Germania at the age of two attired in a full soldier’s uniform. In fact, Germanicus was a renowned Roman general whose valor was second to none and very popular among soldiers and citizenry. Perhaps it was this great popularity that caused his demise and the tragic end of his beloved family under the rule of Tiberius, the second emperor, the successor of the first emperor Caesar Augustus (which also indicates that Caligula was a distant nephew of Julius Caesar.) It was believed that Piso was responsible for the assassination of Germanicus out of jealousy and imprisonment of the family except Caligula who had managed to escape the arrest by fleeing to Tiberius in Capri when his mother Agrippina the Elder and his two elder brothers were horribly mistreated in prison and beaten to death. And it was this Tiberius who named the only living son of the popular Germanicus to be his successor – the third emperor.
Thus Caligula’s rise to the throne of the emperor was the sine qua non of the tumulus aftermath as a result of his father’s death that rekindled the ember of political intrigues of the Senate and the Praetorian Guard. What’s more, the first six months of Caligula’s reign was regarded as quite innovative and auspicious. With a huge sum of money in the Roman Treasury, Caligula’s achievements included the following: 1) to reinstate the popular vote allowing all citizens to speak in the government process; (2) to make the ledgers of the use of treasury funds public; (3) to raise the salaries and provide bonuses to every branch of military; and (4) to recall all those who had been exiled under Tiberius.
According to a popular theory, Caligula was struck with a serious mental illness eight months after his enthronement. Some say that Caligula suffered from a lifelong epilepsy as evidenced by his having never learnt to swim, whereas swimming was a popular form of exercise at the time. It was also this time when Gemellus, the young grandson of Tiberius who had supposed to co-rule with Caligula was executed under his order along with Caligula’s father-in-law and brother-in-law with his younger sisters being sent into exile. However, curiously enough, he saved his uncle Claudius, who had been afflicted with a serious illness that left him with a severe limp and partial deafness.
Caligula’s stupendousness of eccentricity continued in building two large ships for personal use, one of which was a floating palace and erecting many monuments commemorating himself as well as theaters, temples, and entertainment complexes for his personal use at the expense of the treasury funds. Furthermore, by 40 AD Caligula proclaimed himself to be a god in attempt to dictate religious aspects into political policies by beginning to refer to himself as “Jupiter” in public documentation while still alive.
However, the reign of Caligula’s pseudo-theocracy met its end when Cassius Chaerea, a member of the Praetorian Guard, and his accomplices faced Caligula during a public event held in honor of Augustus and stabbed the emperor until he fell to the ground and breathed no more. It was only three years and ten months that Caligula ruled the young empire and it was how it was ended.
Caligula by Hourly History is a comparatively light read, written in plain English from insightful views on the notorious emperor Caligula based upon factual analysis and historical backgrounds that help the reader understand the cohesiveness of how Caligula rose to power in the turbulent time of political intricacies, which might have caused the young and impetuous emperor to be agitated and anxious evermore as his ambition to emulate the ruling style of Augustus and the popularity of his beloved father clashed with a harsh reality. Caligula’s acting upon instincts or “guts” did not work out for him because of his trauma as a result of the tragedy of his once beloved family in combination with his impulsive temperament that needed a wise guardian to tame it. If you have heard about Caligula but do not know much about him other than you have seen him in movies, which have a tendency to portray him as a downright madman indulging in every form of debauchery you can possibly imagine, this is the read you can enjoy in your spare time at one sitting.
The Defeatist is
cheerless, thoughtless, faithless, witless, spiritless, colorless, scentless, lightless, mindless, senseless, hopeless, merciless, restless, aimless, deedless, fruitless, hapless, pitiless, pointless, shitless, sleepless, sightless, and endless of his anguish evermore.
The Idealist is
bountiful, graceful, fanciful, hopeful, beautiful, grateful, truthful, wishful, insightful, thoughtful, colorful, careful, delightful, helpful, playful, joyful, useful, blissful, eventful, soulful, faithful, fruitful, meaningful, restful, merciful, and youthful in his being evermore.
Since the opening of a chic French Restaurant La Boum, it has gained a reputation for serving a mune of homestyle dishes at reasonable prices in a very lovely atmosphere. Notwithstanding auspicious popularity of his restaurant, Randy the chef and owner of La Boum is still a simple man at heart, always finding happiness in every little way like St. Therese of Little Flower advised and practiced in the 19th century. In fact, it was Randy’s consistent positiveness and pleasant deportment coming from his heart that impressed highly enterprising and brilliantly intelligent John Elephant, a town’s real estate developer who owned most of the commercial and residential properties in Avonlea Consequently, John let Randy rent the restaurant for for an unspecified period on one condition that Randy’s monthly due would always be made on time.
“Hey, how’s it going, Randy?” Looks like your restaurant is in boom like the name of it, La Boum.” was John’s affable greeting to his new friend and tenant Randy. “Hey, buddy! Couldn’t be better! I mean. ever since I opened up the restaurant, there has never been a day where there is an empty seat. I did not advertise on my restaurant on the media myself! I call it a miracle!” Randy’s heartfelt rhapsody of the successful launching of his restaurant business amused John all the more. That’s why Randy was a good friend of him. John needed Randy’s rustic and artless simplicity. Everything Randy said and did was of ingenuousness, which John had scarcely encountered. Maybe it’s really an act of Providence that Randy and John were good friends.
In the meantime, Seraphina and Mathilda were having their afternoon lunch in the restaurant after their fabulous window shopping in Lotte Department Store newly renovated with more variety of selections from apparel to shoes, cosmetics and household appliances, chocolates and restaurants. “I don’t like the new version of the department store.” Seraphina, who was tired of walking around the aisles, confided to her friend Mathilda before her first bite to a Chef’s Sandwich, one of Randy’s specialties. “It’s just all a pompous hyperbole of the same stuff only arranged and called differently. But I have to admit that the whole interior design of the lobby is quite elegant with aromas of sohistacately scented perfume that sweeten the entire floor.
Mathilda thought that Seraphina was often hard to please, critical of anything glamourous or popular contrary to her fashion-conscious appearance that seemed to belong to a crowd in a Vanity Fair. “I like the remodelled store. It has now a wider aisles to walk around with attendants with more professional but nicer attitudes and more various items to select. It had taken about 8 months for the store to open it again. And I honestly think they had put quite a few huge efforts to make it better to accommodate themselves to today’s demanding satisfaction of us customers. So we should give them a laudable credit even just for the bona-fide efforts. Don’t you think so, Seraphina?”
Having heard all this, Serapina felt herself a bit ashamed, or modified for being so critical of anything new or modified because a new thing always terrified her; she lacked adaptability. She’s conservative at heart, but thanks to her good and graceful nature, she wasn’t a conventionalist. “Mathilda, I did not intent to criticise the store’s generally improved atmosphere. In fact, I liked how the whole lobby smelled with perfumes of beautiful scents that were totally different from the ones you could get in drugstores or some other shoddy places. Maybe I was just too tired after walking around the store because I get easily peeved for such things… But I am glad to come out with my good friend today and enjoy this moment of repose with this delicious food. ” Upon finishing her apological statement about her abrupt curtness in the beginning, Serapina began to eat her sandwich with pleasure, which made Mathilda smile and start enjoying her custard pie with her heart’s content.
The Mysterious British Isles: A Collection of Mysteries, Legends, and Unexplained Phenomena across Britain and Ireland by Charles River Editors
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Great Britain, which is composed of England, Scotland, and Wales, is arguably one of the ancient lands imbued with history and tradition, full of primeval sites, historical artifacts, unique landscapes where skyscrapers casting shadows over castles, and a people of equally unique heritage and culture. But most of all, to me England appears to be a gem of the Crown, the archetypal image of Great Britain because there is London that has existed for thousands of years. The Mysterious British Isles by Charles River Editors offers the reader an elegant history of London with interesting information on the city itself, including backgrounds of famous buildings, places, and on its equally fascinating inhabitants who lived and worked to make their ends meet before our time.
London has been a cosmopolitan city for centuries, and it is a city of amalgamation of the ancient and the new with churches built atop pagan temples, ordinary commercial buildings grounded around medieval burial grounds, and so on. To illustrate, St. Paul’s was built upon an old temple to Diana, the Roman version of Greek goddess Artemis. Also, Westminster Abbey, dating back to the reign of William the Conqueror and the Norman Conquest, was originally located on the Isle of Thorney – supposedly the site of a Roman temple to Apollo, which was destroyed by an earthquake and then replaced with an Anglo/Saxon temple to Thor. It was in 610 A.D. that it finally made Christian by King of the East Saxons, who had converted to Christianity, in dedication to St. Peter.
In addition to the aforesaid great churches, the ancient Roman time street named Hounds Ditch, still running through the City of London, was used as the old London’s dumping ground. But Hounds Ditch is not the only place of the disposed remaining to be seen today. There are quite a few modern buildings with part of their plots unused, bits of empty lands in crowded, expensive London with signs warning people to “Keep off the Grass.” In fact, they are old plague pits, mass graves used to place a myriad of infected corps during the period of great plagues in London.
Since London has been the center of economic activities, many professions have been come and gone as a consequence of changes of social and economic systems. Some of the worthwhile professions to mention in memory of the people who worked in them for their livelihood are listed as follows:
The Mysterious British Isles by Charles River Editors encapsulates some of the most interesting facts of Great Britain, such as the aforesaid history of London and facts of its inhabitants. It also covers subjects such as famous criminals, fairies and giants, and legends of historic places throughout the Isles. It is worthwhile to read this book as a concise but essential reference book on Great Britain either to satisfy your curiosity for the country where the Sun never set on in the past or to occupy yourself with something at once entertaining and informative during your lunchtime, coffee break, or before going to bed.
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