different from the sum of individual parts

 

ticking time bomb

"Stress is the worst use of imagination."
- Deepak Chopra [born 1946]

disco hockey tips

inspired 1984, Brave New World

hunting people

Spain as a toilet

down and out in paris and london

poverty between the world wars

even 7 pints/week is too much

1984

glorious future

proprietor "coolest bike shop in the world"

 

big kids

 

bag of sulphuric acid

Gaslighting

 

"you can never trust what you read"

“Life is pain, anyone who says differently is selling something.”

– William Goldman [1931-2018]

want a free mint wheelchair?

If you live in the Waterloo Region of Ontario, and need a free wheelchair, contact me: 

richard.cassel@alumni.utoronto.ca

to act in all things necessary for the salvation of God's children

Image credit here.

"I became a Father - I joined the priesthood."

never wrong

 

save our young males

 

on substance abuse

"Reality is an acquired taste."
- Matthew Perry [born 1969]

20000 rpms

"I don't like driving. Except when I'm going really fast."
- Sir Lewis Hamilton [born 1985]

cremated, no funeral

Carl Sagan's "Contact" read by Jodie Foster

 

Human Capital Management

Up in The Air [2009]

Ryan Bingham:

        [sitting across the aisle from each other on a plane] Natalie, what is it you think we do here?

Natalie Keener:

We prepare the newly unemployed for the emotional and physical hurdles of job hunting, while minimizing legal blow-back.

Ryan Bingham:

        That's what we're selling. It's not what we're doing.

Natalie Keener:

        

        Okay, what are we doing?

Ryan Bingham:

We are here to make limbo tolerable, to ferry wounded souls across the river of dread until the point where hope is dimly visible. And then stop the boat, shove them in the water and make them swim.

"Que sais-je?

“Don’t discuss yourself, for you are bound to lose. If you belittle yourself, you are believed. If you praise yourself, you are disbelieved.”

– Michel de Montaigne [1533-1592]

career day

"I am not a manual labourer and please God I shall never be one, but there are some kinds of manual work that I could do if I had to. At a pinch I could be a tolerable road-sweeper or an inefficient gardener or even a tenth-rate farm hand. But by no conceivable amount of effort or training could I become a coal-miner; the work would kill me in a few weeks."

- George Orwell [1903-1950], Road to Wigan Pier

thinking and feeling

"If all were rational nothing would get done."
- Attributed to Abigail Adams [1744-1818]

that's a wrap

 

hellraiser

 

"The only exercise I get is walking behind the coffins of old mates who exercised."
- Peter O'Toole [1932-2013]

severance

Free return Hong Kong lights

To combat lost tourism due to Covid and civil unrest, in 2023 Hong Kong will spend $2 billion to cover return flights anywhere globally here.

where the Foo Fighters stay

... and where celebrities like Arnold Schwarzenegger [born 1947] eat breakfast here.

Rob Riggle Plays Golf

 

prodigy

 

trouble-free

Papyrus depicting Cleopatra VII sitting on her throne

Relatively little changed for 3000 years in Ancient Egypt [3100 BCE-30 BCE] e.g. the wheel was adopted late and was not used in the construction of the pyramids. Secondary sources claim it was a time of relative happiness.

my relationship with a former professor

 

kicked out high school for cheating

 .

As punishment, Owen Wilson [born 1968] was sent to the New Mexico Military Institute for two years, where he met Wes Aderson [born 1969] who was friends with his roommate and launched his acting career. 

embarrassing

"It got to the point where I was so isolated with my work, music that I became socially awkward, strange. But I recovered. I integrated back into society through mixing , circulating"
- John Legend [born 1978] who is an EGOT by winning and Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony.

the news is the blues

"I got way too many blues for any more bad news."

- Kanye West, Gorgeous [born 1977]

Bipolar Disorder discussed here.

Why art?

Battle Between Marduk And Zu, Sumerian c. 3500 BCE

"Art helps to form the connective glue of society. It is no accident that art is a feature of every human civilization that has ever existed. Furthermore, the enjoyment of art plays a direct part in the life of each individual person. In other words, an individual may spend part of his time reading books, part of the time looking at paintings, etc. Even if the time we spent listening to music had no effect whatsoever upon our other activities that time would still represent some not insignificant fraction of our lives. However art does affect our other activities, and in some sense our whole life. Art connects us to our souls; it expresses our deepest feelings and validates them for us."
- Michael H. Hart [born 1932]

blacklisted

"If there's a blank day on my calendar, I feel that I've failed, that it's all over."
- Joan Rivers [1933-2014] whom Johnny Carson [1925-2005] banned from the Tonight Show and all ancillary  programs like Late Night with David Letterman [born 1947] for launching her own talk show.

the absurd

“We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don’t like?”

– Jean Cocteau [1889-1963]

abstract artist

“You can be very wild and still be very wise.”– Yoko Ono

“You can be very wild and still be very wise.”– Yoko Ono

"You can be very wild and still be very wise."
- Yoko Ono [born 1933]

fresh water from salt water

 

colloquial

“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.”

– Robert Frost [1874-1963]

How long would it take to count to a trillion?

More than 31,709 years.

20th century's coolest

 

"Racing is life. Anything before or after is just waiting."

- Steve McQueen  [1930-1980]

when art became status symbol

 

Rouge River

 Toronto forests supplied the ship masts that the British navy used to thwart Napoleon.

The art of making difficult things seem easy

Sprezzatura 

nitwit

"Madison, what you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it."

- Billy Madison, 1995

kiss a fish

 

promoted government-sponsored policy of full employment

“Asked whether history had ever seen anything like the Depression, John Maynard Keynes replied: “Yes. It was called the Dark Ages, and it lasted four hundred years.”
— Jon Meacham [born 1969]

routine

Upon waking in the morning, Motörhead's Lemmy [1945-2015] would have a shot of whiskey (eventually naively replaced by vodka as it seemed to him to be healthier) chased by a can of beer. Total daily consumption varied but several bottles of Jack Daniel's were often drained by bedtime.

directory

Q/ Why are there so many Smiths in the phone book?

A/ Because they all have phones.

obsolete interceptor

 

Economics not American meddling doomed the Avro explained in Part 1 and Part 2.

come together

 

Family illness led to a new architectural era here.

be prepared

“O God, help me to win, but in thy wisdom if thou willest me not to win, then O God, make me a good loser."
- Robert Baden-Powell [1857-1941]

set a course for adventure

 

how many times uttered over 92 years?

 "I'll cram the Empire State Building [construction commenced 1930] up your ass, one brick at a time."

be a man, you pussy

 

civil war veteran

“All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusions is called a philosopher.”

– Ambrose Bierce [1842-1914]

gimp

"If people in your life are not uncomfortable, then you're not really writing."
- Quentin Tarantino [born 1963]

taste

"I don't like plays after the third performance. On Broadway it goes on for 8 times a week for months and I get bored regurgitating the same lines over and over. Movies are better. One take and done."
- Sir Anthony Hopkins [born 1937]

caretaker

 Broke literary ground here.

against unworthy triviality

 

"It's not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters."

- Epictetus [55-135 CE]

unusual suspect

"Unfulfilled potential is the saddest thing in life."
- Chazz Palminteri [born 1952]

Southern Gothic

"It's a pity you got published so young. You'll only see the world from a successful perspective."
- Tennessee Williams [1911-1983]

longevity

"I keep a shot of sour mash - Jack Daniels - next to my bed so I have incentive to get up every morning."
- John Huston [1906-1997]

robe and dagger

“Nine-tenths of tactics are certain, and taught in books: but the irrational tenth is like the kingfisher flashing across the pool, and that is the test of generals.”
― T.E. Lawrence [1888-1935]

Eisenhower era advocacy

 

80,000

 The average person meets 80,000 people in a lifetime, which is the capacity of FedEx Field:

not british or columbian

 

best and worst cities

 

Data explained here.

"It's all nerds and Nazis."

 

spinning on one foot

"Whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should."
- Pierre Elliot Trudeau [1919- 2000] quoting Max Ehrmann's [1872-1945] "Desiderata" after a failed election

advance

“You will never win if you never begin.”

– Helen Rowland [1875-1950]