News Spike

Tuesday 18 December 2018

Don’t Be Like Judi Densch

Don’t Be Like Judi Densch — a Remoaner who never talks to her Mother.

Monday 17 December 2018

A Device with which to Look at a C***

Q : What essential tool is required to perform an act of speculation?

A : A Mirror.

What are The Most Valuable Things That Everyone Should Know?

What are the most valuable things that everyone should know?

Tell the truth.
Do not do things that you hate.
Act so that you can tell the truth about how you act.
Pursue what is meaningful, not what is expedient.
If you have to choose, be the one who does things, instead of the one who is seen to do things.
Pay attention.
Assume that the person you are listening to might know something you need to know. Listen to them hard enough so that they will share it with you.
Plan and work diligently to maintain the romance in your relationships.
Be careful who you share good news with.
Be careful who you share bad news with.
Make at least one thing better every single place you go.
Imagine who you could be, and then aim single-mindedly at that.
Do not allow yourself to become arrogant or resentful.
Try to make one room in your house as beautiful as possible.
Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today.
Work as hard as you possibly can on at least one thing and see what happens.
If old memories still make you cry, write them down carefully and completely.
Maintain your connections with people.
Do not carelessly denigrate social institutions or artistic achievement.
Treat yourself as if you were someone that you are responsible for helping.
Ask someone to do you a small favour, so that he or she can ask you to do one in the future.
Make friends with people who want the best for you.
Do not try to rescue someone who does not want to be rescued, and be very careful about rescuing someone who does.
Nothing well done is insignificant.
Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world.
Dress like the person you want to be.
Be precise in your speech.
Stand up straight with your shoulders back.
Don't avoid something frightening if it stands in your way – and don't do unnecessarily dangerous things.
Do not let your children do anything that makes you dislike them.
Do not transform your wife into a maid.
Do not hide unwanted things in the fog.
Notice that opportunity lurks where responsibility has been abdicated.
Read something written by someone great.
Pet a cat when you encounter one on the street.
Do not bother children when they are skateboarding.
Don't let bullies get away with it.
Write a letter to the government if you see something that needs fixing – and propose a solution.
Remember that what you do not yet know is more important than what you already know.
Be grateful in spite of your suffering.

I am Captain Benjamin Sisko

Commence station log,
Deep Space Nine,
Commander Benjamin Sisko,
Stardate 46388.2.

At the request of the Bajoran Provisional Government,

Starfleet has agreed to establish

a Federation presence in this system

following the withdrawal of

Cardassian occupational forces.

Bajor Monastery

OPAKA:

Your arrival has been greatly anticipated.

(She caresses his left ear.)

OPAKA:

Have you ever explored your pagh, Commander?

SISKO:
Pagh?

OPAKA:

A Bajoran draws courage from his spiritual life.

Our life-force, our pagh,

is replenished by The Prophets.

(She squeezes the lobe.)

OPAKA:

Breathe.

SISKO:

Kai Opaka, if we could discuss -

OPAKA:
Breathe!
Ironic. One who does not

wish to be among us -
is to be The Emissary.
Please, come with me.

(She touches a control and the pool reveals itself to be a hologram hiding a staircase downwards)

[Secret cavern]

OPAKA:

You are correct that Bajor is in grave jeopardy,

but it is the threat to our spiritual life that far outweighs any other.

SISKO:

Perhaps, but I'm powerless until...

OPAKA:

Commander.

I cannot give you what you deny yourself.

SISKO:

I'm sorry?

OPAKA:

Look for solutions from within, Commander.

Nine Orbs, like this one,

have appeared in the skies

over the past ten thousand years.

The Cardassians took the others.

You must find The Celestial Temple

before they do.

SISKO:

The Celestial Temple?

OPAKA:

Tradition says the orbs were sent

by The Prophets to teach us.

What we have learned has

shaped our Theology.

The Cardassians will do anything

to decipher their powers.

If They discover the Celestial Temple,

They could destroy it.

SISKO:

What makes you think I can find your “Temple”?

(Opaka hands him the Orb box.)

OPAKA:

This will help you.

SISKO:

Kai Opaka -

OPAKA:
I can't unite my people till I know

The Prophets have been warned.

You will find The Temple.
Not for Bajor,
Not for The Federation,
But for your own pagh.

It is, quite simply, Commander,

The Journey You Have Always Been Destined to Take.

The Non-Problem of Male Fierceness

When a Man tells you, in every second that you spend in his company

By His Every Word,

Every Gesture,

Every Deed

By His very Energy -

"I Shot a Man in Reno Just to Watch Him Die."

You are NOT Required to Be Polite to Such a Man.

To Do So would be

Contemptible.

And a

DIS-GRACE.

So, When You Meet Me,

Have Some Courtesy.

Have Some Sympathy.

And Some Taste.

STARLING

Barney, back when you turned Dr. Lecter over to the Tennessee Police -

BARNEY

They weren't civil to him.

And they're all dead now.

STARLING

Yeah. They only managed to survive his company three days.

You survived him six years at the asylum.

How'd you do that?

It wasn't just being civil.

BARNEY

Yes, it was.

INT. APARTMENT BUILDING - UPSTAIRS HALL - DAY

Starling knocks. Waits. The door opens and the orderly

peers out with the dead dove in his hands.

STARLING

Hi, Barney. I need to talk with -

BARNEY

Would you agree, for the record, Officer

Starling, I've not been read my rights?

STARLING

This is just informal. I just need to

ask you about some stuff.

BARNEY

How about saying it into your handbag?

Starling opens her purse and speaks down into it as though

there were a troll inside -

STARLING

I have not Mirandized Barney. He is

unaware of his rights.

Barney widens the door so she can come in.

INT. BARNEY'S APARTMENT - CONTINUOUS

Barney sets the dove on a desk and drags a computer mouse

to the "file close" x. Just before the screen reverts to the

AOL Welcome page, Starling glimpses the site he was on when

she interrupted him with her knock - stock quotes.

STARLING

How you been?

He doesn't answer. Sits his huge frame down on his desk

chair. She moves some newspapers aside on a couch, one of

which shows a photo of her from the Drumgo raid. They

consider each other for a moment. Eventually -

STARLING

Barney, back when you turned Dr. Lecter

over to the Tennessee Police -

BARNEY

They weren't civil to him. And they're

all dead now.

STARLING

Yeah. They only managed to survive his

company three days. You survived him six

years at the asylum. How'd you do that?

It wasn't just being civil.

BARNEY

Yes, it was.

They both hear something - a flutter - and glance out to the

fire escape. The dead dove's mate has landed on the railing.

STARLING

Did you ever think, once he escaped,

he might come after you?

BARNEY

No. He told me once that, whenever

feasible, he preferred to eat the rude.

"Free-range rude," he called them.

He smiles. Glances out the window again to the cooing dove.

Picks up the dead one, carries it out and sets it down on the

wet grating.

STARLING

Any idea what happened to all his stuff?

His books and papers and drawings and -

BARNEY

Everything got thrown out when the place

closed.

He comes back in. She starts to say something, hesitates.

Once she starts on this subject, she knows one of them will

wind up very unhappy.

STARLING

Barney, I just found out that Dr.

Lecter's signed copy of The Joy of

Cooking went to a private collector for

sixteen thousand dollars.

BARNEY

It was probably a fake.

STARLING

The seller's affidavit of ownership

was signed, Karen Phlox. You know Karen

Phlox? You should. "She" filled out

your employment application, only at the

bottom she signed it, Barney. Same thing

on your tax returns.

Long silence. Then Barney sighs.

BARNEY

You want the book? Maybe I could get

it back.

STARLING

I want the x-ray. From when you broke

his arm after he attacked that nurse.

Barney gets up again, but doesn't run off to get it. He

slowly paces around.

BARNEY

We talked about a lot of things, late at

night, after all the screaming died down.

We talked about you sometimes. Want to

know what he said?

STARLING

No, just the x-ray.

BARNEY

Is there a reward?

STARLING

Yeah. The reward is I don't have my

friend the Postal Inspector nail you on

Use of the Mails to Defraud, you don't

get ten years, and you don't come out

with a janitor's job and a room at the Y,

sitting on the side of your bunk at night

listening to yourself cough.

He stares at her, gets up finally, disappears into the

bedroom. Starling looks out to the fire escape again. The

surviving dove has dropped down and is now walking in circles

around its lifeless mate.

Barney returns with a file box and a large envelope. Hands

it all to her. She unfurls the string-clasp. Pulls out an x-

ray of an arm. A radiologist's and Lecter's names are on it.

BARNEY

I'm not a bad guy.

STARLING

I didn't say you were.

BARNEY

Dr. Chilton is a bad guy. After your

first visit, he began taping your conver-

sations with Dr. Lecter.

He produces from his jacket pocket several cassette tapes.

As he hands them to her -

BARNEY

I was good to you. Tried to make it

easy for you the first time you came down

to the violent ward to interview Dr.

Lecter. Remember?

STARLING

Yes.

BARNEY

You remember saying thank you?

She doesn't because she didn't, and now regrets it.

STARLING

I'm sorry. Thank you.

BARNEY

You mean it?

STARLING

Yes.

BARNEY

I'm going to show you something then.

I don't have to show it to you, remember

that. But I believe your gratitude is

sincere.

He goes to a fuse box on the wall. Takes something out of

it. Turns around to face Starling, wearing the famous mask

from Silence of the Lambs, and her hand flashes toward her

sidearm, a movement quickly stopped.

BARNEY

This is my retirement fund.

(removes the mask)

If you'll let me keep it. I can a lot

of money for this and get out of here for

good. I want to travel, and see every

Vermeer in the world before I die.

She thinks about it, doesn't immediately answer him. He

walks out onto the fire escape again and addresses the bird -

BARNEY

Go on. You've grieved long enough.

He shoos the dove away, picks up the dead one, comes back

in and drops it in the wastebasket by his desk.

STARLING

What did he say? About me? Late at

night.

BARNEY

We were talking about inherited, hard-

wired behavior. He was using genetics in

roller pigeons as an example.

They go way up in the air and roll over

backwards in a display, falling toward

the ground. There are shallow rollers

and deep rollers. You can't breed two

deep rollers or the offspring will roll

all the way down, crash and die. He

said, "Officer Starling is a deep roller,

Barney. Let's hope one of her parents

was not."

As Starling gets up and gathers everything except the mask,

she hears the surviving dove call out once from somewhere in

the trees.

INT. FBI LAB - DAY

The two x-rays, one overlaid on the other, clipped to a

light box. A technician adjusts them so the bone structures

correspond in position as closely as possible and points out

to Starling -

TECHNICIAN

They're the same arm. The discrepancy is

the dates. This one -

He slides the x-rays apart, touches a thin gray line on one

of them -

TECHNICIAN

- shows the hairline fracture he

sustained in the fight with the orderly.

This one -

(the other x-ray)

- the more recent one, supposedly,

doesn't. This is the newer of the two -

(the other one)

- the one from the asylum.

INT. BEHAVIORAL SCIENCE - LATER

Starling puts the earliest-dated cassette into a player,

presses "play," walks up to the blackboard and under Verger's

heading - below "Meat-packing heir" and some other notes -

writes, "He lies." From the tape player -

LECTER'S VOICE

Surely the odd confluence of events

hasn't escaped you, Clarice. Jack Craw-

ford dangles you in front of me, then I

give you a bit of help. Do you think

it's because I like to look at you and

imagine how good you would taste?

There's a pause. Starling, remembering the moment clearly

even now, mouths along with her recorded voice -

STARLING'S VOICE

I don't know. Is it?

INT. CELL - BALTIMORE STATE HOSPITAL FOR THE CRIMINALLY

INSANE - DAY - (FLASHBACK - 1994)

It's Lecter's cell. And it's almost pitch black. Then,

as he turns a rheostat, the lights slowly rise, revealing the

cell to be almost empty, stripped of its books. He's lying

on his cot.

LECTER

I've been in this room for eight years,

Clarice. I know they will never - ever -

let me out while I'm alive. What I want

... is a view.

Sunday 16 December 2018

The Wyrm of Conscience Still Benaws Thy Soul...

HEAR ME, O YOU WRANGLING PIRATES !!!

• TELL The TRUTH —

• Or, at least,

• DON’T LIE

GLOUCESTER

Have done thy charm, thou hateful wither'd hag!

QUEEN MARGARET

And leave out thee?

Stay, dog! For thou shalt hear me!

If heaven have any grievous plague in store

Exceeding those that I can wish upon thee,

O, let them keep it till thy sins be ripe,

And then hurl down their indignation

On thee, the troubler of the poor world's peace!

The worm of conscience still begnaw thy soul!

Thy friends suspect for traitors while thou livest,

And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends!

No sleep close up that deadly eye of thine,

Unless it be whilst some tormenting dream

Affrights thee with a hell of ugly devils!

Thou elvish-mark'd, abortive, rooting hog!

Thou that wast seal'd in thy nativity

The slave of nature and the son of hell!

Thou slander of thy mother's heavy womb!

Thou loathed issue of thy father's loins!

Thou rag of honour! thou detested--

GLOUCESTER

Margaret.

QUEEN MARGARET

Richard!

GLOUCESTER

Ha!

QUEEN MARGARET

I call thee not.

GLOUCESTER

I cry thee mercy then, for I had thought

That thou hadst call'd me all these bitter names.

QUEEN MARGARET

Why, so I did; but look'd for no reply.

O, let me make the period to my curse!

GLOUCESTER

'Tis done by me, and ends in 'Margaret.'

QUEEN ELIZABETH

Thus have you breathed your curse against yourself.

I, I, I

Too Much Talking.

People Love To Talk More Than Anything Else About THEMSELVES* ( * which is completely meaningless in terms of anyone else’s journey through life — it doesn’t apply to anyone else and can’t. Ever.)

Talking Drowns out Truthful Speech.

The Moral...?

• Talk Less

• Smile More

• PAY ATTENTION

Saturday 15 December 2018

Fear

Fear.

Fear attracts

The Fearful.

The Strong.

The Weak.

The Innocent.

The Corrupt.

Fear.

Fear is my Ally.

CAMILLE PAGLIA : If Someone Offends You by Speech, You Must Fight Back by Speech

“If Someone Offends You by Speech,

You Must Fight Back by Speech”

“I Believe in GREATNESS ...”

As did LE GENÈRALE, Charles De Gaulle — *The Politics of Granduer.*

That’ll make them shoot at ya — people misunderstand (because of Tribalism and Confirmation bias and competitive Victimhood, the history of Political Assassinations :

Traceable back at least as far as Julius Caesar,

It Was The Killing of The Charismatics —

They were White and They Were Black,

of The Left and of The Right.

JFK and Heinrich Himler

Malcolm X and George Lincoln Rockwell

MLK and George Wallace

I find it deeply insulting that ‘Machiavellianism’ is include as one spoke of the so-called Psychic Dark Triad.

I am a Machiavellian and proud of it — Machiavelli never taught how to BECOME powerful or advocated Tyranny, he taught how to BE Powerful and wield Power by emulating the Deeds and Habits of Great Men.

People today are at best embarrassed by Greatness, more usually made insecure and feel threatened by it, and most often outright terrified of and hostile to it — they worship mediocrity, in a very practical sense.