EVER WONDER ABOUT LIFE IN A MONASTERY?

Monks have been credited with innovations that have shaped everything from the study of genetics all the way to aviation principles. When you think of a monk you normally think of a person wearing a large robe seeking a form of lifelong spiritual enlightenment.

A monastery, as I imagine it, is a place of silence and introspection. I assume the monastery is a sort of fraternity that's dedicated to a singular noble purpose. I get the feeling though that human nature really surfaces. I mean all that silence, introspection, and thought must lead to curiosity. There have to be some questions surfacing at times.

I think life in a monastery really adds to the creative nature of a person. No type of vice, enlightenment, a clear head, it all really leads to creativity that goes beyond simple questioning and deep into examining the laws established by science, the very science that often challenges religion and dismisses spirituality. Yes, life in a monastery must be some kind of something.

NAPOLEON BATTLES TONY MONTANA: THE COKE HEAD BONANZA

I have heard it said that Napoleon was a coke head. While I don't think  shall ever get any real confirmation on that, it would not surprise me. Napoleon was like Tony Montana, crazy for power and full hubris. Something tells me that Napoleon was the kind of guy that would grease himself up after coking himself up, and attack some house girl. I know this sounds far fetched but if the vatican has been know to have the hidden orgy here and there, why not? Napoleon looked like a little sex freak anyway.

I can imagine a talk between Napoleon and Tony Montana, it would be something like this:

TM: Hey man, you listen to me you little fucking cucaracha

NB: La merde

TM: I got the yayo you mother fucker

NB: Je suis le grande fromage

TM: We do it my way now you little maricon de mierda shit

NB: Je ne parle pas la merde

TM: I fuck you up Im Tony Montana fucking chata

NB: Je aime les vagin et les pénis

TM: I kill you, you want war mother fucker

NB: Je suis un grand cocaïnomane bisexuels

I am sure the end result would be a fabulous scene that would mix Waterloo with the final battle of Tony Montana up in Coconut Grove. I don't find Napoleon so fascinating simply because he was stupid enough to fight beyond his prime. If Napoleon were alive today he would probably be a member of the tea party. It's great to mix fiction along with historical inaccuracy because it provides a lot of material, perhaps I'll write a story about Napoleon in present time.

LUXURY ALWAYS BECOMES NECESSITY

Cell phones, pagers, and any amount of things that you can imagine have been a luxury at one point or another. At one point cell phones were so rare that they were a status symbol, much in the same way as a Commodore 64 or IBM PC JR. Now some two and half decades later we look at cell phones, computers, and just about everything that was once a luxury, as a major need. I remember being a middle school kid and seeing pager as a luxury and seeing pagers become a must a couple of years later.

I remember being in the cool kids club with my NEC pager with a giant screen. There was something special about having the same piece of equipment as a Doctor. I remember my father's pager had no screen, just a speaker, and some buttons on the side.

The fact is that while some luxuries will always remain just that their predecessors while simple were also luxuries. Let's talk about cars for a second, a Ferrari is a luxury but a Ford Model T was one too. Cars were a luxury as well at one point and in some parts of the world they are still luxuries by virtue of cost, taxes, and fuel. 

Perhaps the next big necessity will be something cool like a hovercraft or spaceship, maybe a car that can be used as a blender. Life will always have special surprises for us.

Tragedy Imitating Art

Often times we wonder if what we see in film can translate to real life. Take a movie like "Death Wish" for example. We wonder if there really is some architect with the desire of to kill every dirty bastard criminal out there. Then you have 007 films where the super spy  sleeps around, drinks, and kills bad people without worrying about getting an STD,cirrhosis, or retribution. In reality precision killing and action packed sequences do not seem to occur, at least not often.

In the French Alps the bodies of four victims were found gunned down in cold blooded and precise fashion. This brings me to a very simple question, why? We live in a world where there is enough killing so why make it worst? In this case a mother's dead body was covering her 4 year old daughter's live body. There was another girl 8 years old with a gunshot wound to the head still alive. The girl's father and a passenger, a woman, were both shot and not too far a cyclist was shot execution style.

I am sure people would question what the father did or the mystery woman or even the cyclist. I am sure the questions will pop up such as

1. Was the father the target?
2. Was the mother the target?
3. Was the lady target?
4. Was the cyclist the target and the family in the way?
5. Why was this family targeted and the cyclist a victim of circumstance?
6. Why was the family in vacation in the French Alps?
7. What kind of gun was used?

The questions will come around and the conclusions will follow I am sure. Every imbecile wanting to play CSI and Homicide investigator. I look at this and think that the world is truly a fucked up place where safety is a foreign and alien concept.

Let's do something about this type of thing, life is short but it should not be cut so short that whatever we do ceases to have any meaning whatsoever.