The Color Purple

Dear God, 

I know it pisses you off if we walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and we don't notice it.

I also know you walk by and you notice everything. And I can't understand: why do you allow this to happen?

The Color Purple, Alice Walker

Byron in Cambridge

Whilst a student at Cambridge, Byron was annoyed with the university rules that banned keeping a dog. This is how he decided to have a tame bear instead. There being no mention of bears in their statutes, the college authorities had no legal basis to complain. Later, in one of his letters, Byron cheekily suggested that the bear apply for a college fellowship. :))

He was very fond of animals; his dog has a funeral monument larger than his master's. The inscription on this monument became Byron's "Epitaph to a dog":

"...one

who possessed Beauty without Vanity,

Strength without Insolence,

Courage without Ferosity,

and all the Virtues of Man without his Vices."

I am reading Byron's Don Juan and I have some news for you. Remember old Don Juan? The womaniser that we all know? He's long gone... and now we have the new Don Juan, a simple and naive young man easily seduced by terrible women! And I can't help but feeling sorry for him. :))

My advice: stay out of Byron's way and do not believe a word he says; he is indeed "mad, bad, and dangerous to know" as I have heard.

Why call it a tourist season if we can't shoot them?

Park Guell - Barcelona

Things go wrong for a reason. Park Guell, for example, originally an unsuccessful housing site. Truly unsuccessful. And it was later converted into a garden. That garden has grown to become one of the best parks in the world. Very, very popular... so very popular that the people living close to the park asked themselves: "why call it a tourist season if we can't shoot them" :))

What was intended to be a market place for the residents of the housing site, is today a famous feature of the park - a plaza bordered by what is known as the largest bench in the world.

I do believe in etymology. Words did not come from nowhere. SUCCESS comes from an old Latin word meaning “come after”…and that is why when you think you’re unsuccessful you should remember that SUCCESS “comes after”…

Wherever I hang me knickers

"Homesickness" comes from Swiss dialect, expressing the longing for the mountains. In the 17th century, pining for their mountains, home and family when away, Swiss mercenaries introduced the word "homesick" to other European languages.

Later on homesick poetry came about. "Wherever I hang" is my example:

I leave me people, me land, me home
For reasons I not too sure
.....
So I pick up me new-world-self
And come to this place call England
At first I feeling like I in a dream -
....
And is so I sending home photos of myself
....
I begin to change my calypso ways
Never visiting nobody
Before giving them clear warning
And waiting me turn in queue
Now, after all this time
I get accustom to de English life
But I still miss back-home side
To tell you de truth
I don't know really where I belaang
....
Wherever I hang me knickers - that's my home.

Brilliant line, but it doesn't work for me ;)

PS Happy New Year everyone!!!!!!!!!

The Seat of Love

The heart has long been considered the seat of emotions. And we believe that our hearts feel the love.

But the liver rivaled the heart as the supposed seat of love, passion and courage. Ask Shakespeare if you don't believe me. He knows I am telling the truth. It is in Macbeth where he says:

"Go prick thy face, and over-red thy fear,
Thou lily-liver'd boy."

The liver is typically dark reddish-brown; a "pale, bloodless" liver can only be that of a coward ;)

But that's an old story. Long time lost story. Nowadays it is believed that love goes through the stomach! And I am sure you know exactly what I mean.

Heart, liver, stomach... And I am asking you: What next?

Flying over Bucharest

An Englishman, a Frenchman and a Romanian are traveling around in a plane. Suddenly the Englishman stands up, sticks his arm out of the porthole and declares, "We're flying over London!". The other two, dazzled, ask him, "But how can you tell?." "I can see the Big Ben!" is the Englishman's reply. After a while, the Frenchman suddenly stands up, sticks his hand arm out of the window and says, "We're flying over Paris!". The others, amazed, ask him, "How possibly can you know?" "Look, there is the Eiffel Tower!" claims he. Finally the Romanian stands up, sticks his hand up and declares, "We're flying over Bucharest!". The other two, amazed reply, "But how can you tell?" and the Romanian, retrieving his arm, "Look, they've just stolen my watch!"


As promised, some music:

On Frankenstein

1816 was The Year Without a Summer, also known as Eighteen hundred and froze to death. During its snowy summer ( and I mean snowy summer! ) Mary Shelley and her lover Percy Bysshe Shelley visited Lord Byron at his villa by Lake Geneva in Switzerland. It was the "wet, ungenial summer" that forced the Shelleys and their friends to spend their Swiss holiday indoors. I guess they were getting kind of bored ;) so they entertained themselves by reading ghost stories. To refreshen the atmosphere Byron challenged the Shelleys and his physician Polidori to each compose a story, to see who could write the scariest tale.

Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein,
Byron wrote a fragment based on Balkanic vampire legends,
Polidori wrote The Vampyre (the first vampire story published in English)
and Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote his wife's novel preface. :))

Polidori based his principal character on Byron and named him "Lord Ruthven" as a joke. Not sure it was a good joke, as Polidori was soon dismissed.

It's not that obvious who's behind Mary Shelley's monster. I have a suspect. Let me give you a few clues:

In 1814 Mary and Percy Shelley eloped to France. Upon their return, Percy, who was an advocate of free love, invited his wife to join his new household. Just as their sister :))

Being commited to free love, Percy Shelley believed that his community of friends should share everything: ideas, books, wifes, etc... He urged Mary to share her favours with his best friend, although she felt no attraction for him. He also might have had a relation with Mary's step-sister. Mary had asked Percy to send her step-sister away from their household, but he refused to change the manner in which he conceived his community to be organised. Yay, free love !!!!

Percy left Mary to nurse their sickly child on her own, while he entertained her step-sister Claire. When the child died, he went on entertaining Claire...

Unintentionally Percy even contributed to the death of their second daughter by ordering Mary to travel with the sick child in the Italian summer heat.

More clues?

If you actually read all the way to the end, then it is time to say THANK YOU!