Quote
"I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve. "
J.R.R. Tolkien
Joke
Why do trees seem suspicious on sunny days?
They just seem a little shady!
Fun Fact
Earth won't always have the same North Star.
The North Star might seem like a fixed marker in the sky. However, what we now recognize as the North Star, Polaris, hasn't always been our guiding light—and it won't always be in the future. By the year 13,000 A.D., the star Vega will take its place, according to NASA. And by the year 26,000, Polaris will be right back where it was and return to its status as the North Star.
History Fact
Child killer and rapist Pedro Lopez, known as "The Monster of the Andes," was convicted in 1983 of killing 110 young girls (though he confessed to killing 300)
Movie/TV Trivia
A different denouement for Die Hard with a Vengeance saw McClane turning the tables, so to speak, on Simon Gruber giving him a series of riddles to solve. The face off eventually ended with Gruber blowing himself away with a rocket launcher after the New York cop tricks him into thinking it’s pointed the wrong way. Daft.
Movie/TV Quote
"I have to return some videotapes."
American Psycho (2000)
Mary Harron's adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' savage satire of Reagan-era American capitalism does so much more than capture the brutality and humor of the book. With Christian Bale as the psycho, Patrick Bateman, his extreme aversion to human social interaction takes on a deathly serious tenor as embodied by the line Bateman uses to get out of any situation fast. It's a wholly unbelievable excuse that reveals how little empathy and social awareness Bateman possesses, especially when he uses it as an alibi and immediately following a claim that he's "in touch with humanity." Nearly 20 years after the movie came out and ages since videotapes were supplanted by other media, "I have to return some videotapes" still reigns as the absurd rejoinder that shows just how little regard you have for the person you're talking to. Try it out the next time you're breaking up with someone, or are being questioned regarding a coworker's suspicious disappearance.
Conversation Starter
Do you think your priorities have changed since you were younger?
Writing Prompt