Friday the 13th

 

Friday the 13th is considered an unlucky day in Western superstition.

 It occurs when the 13th day of the month in the Gregorian calendar falls on a Friday, which happens at least once every year but can occur up to three times in the same year. 

2015 had a Friday the 13th in February, March, and November, 

 will happen again in 2026;

 2017 through 2020 had two Friday the 13ths;

 2016, 2021 and 2022 had just one Friday the 13th, 

as will 2025; 

2023 and 2024 have two Friday the 13ths.

A month has a Friday the 13th if and only if it begins on a Sunday.

Unluckiness of "13"

One source mentioned for the unlucky nature of the number "13" is a Norse myth about 12 gods having a dinner party in Valhalla. 

The trickster god Loki, who was not invited, arrived as the 13th guest, and arranged for Höðr to shoot Balder with a mistletoe-tipped arrow.

 "Balder died, and the whole Earth got dark. The whole Earth mourned. It was a bad, unlucky day."

 This major event in Norse mythology caused the number 13 to be considered unlucky.

The superstition seems to relate to various things, like the story of Jesus' last supper and crucifixion in which there were 13 individuals present in the Upper Room on the 13th of Nisan Maundy Thursday, the night before his death on Good Friday.

Wednesday 11th June 2025 - Strawberry Moon

 At midnight, in the month of June, 

I stand beneath the mystic moon  

—Edgar Allan Poe

 

According to the Buddha's teaching, 

the beginning of the life-stream of living beings is unthinkable. 

The believer in the creation of life by God may be astonished at this reply.

 But if you were to ask him 

'What is the beginning of God?' 

he would answer without hesitation

 'God has no beginning', 

and he is not astonished at his own reply

 

Who is to decide which is the grimmer sight: 

withered hearts, 

or empty skulls?

 

Like a half-exposed rotten log

my life, 

which never flowered,

ends barren.

—Minamoto Yorimasa

 

Spring being a tough act to follow, 

God created June

 “In early June 

the world of leaf and blade and flowers explodes,

 and every sunset is different.” 

 

It was June, 

and the world smelled of roses.

 The sunshine was like powdered gold 

over the grassy hillside

 “I wonder what it would be like to live

 in a world 

where it was always June.”

Fly 2

 

I am in the camp of people who does not like sequels for the sake them 

Grease 2 being the obvious 

Sister Act 2 being another 

See start of Scream 2 for interesting debate on this 

However this was a film that needed to be made 

The part two we all wanted to see 

Yes it starts with what if Veronica keeps the baby of course

 But the actual story Martin the son born this way, not a gene splicing experiment 

Mr Bartok as the villain 

The science and the horror taken to the next level 

The sickening, horrifying, yet satisfying ending as the villain gets his just deserts 

Not the masterpiece of part one 

But great in every way it was intended to be

 Kill Bill has the classic explanation, that Superman is who he is and Clark is the disguise, making him the opposite of the other heroes mentioned, Batman and Spiderman 

Lois and Clark 

This version has Kal El accepting that Clark is the real identity, the person he has been his whole life, while Superman is just the costume he puts on to allow him to use his powers in the open - 

"Superman" was never meant to develop as a separate personality, that happened after Clark in disguise as "Superman" had to interact with people 

The Blur in Smallville just turned up, took action, and raced off - nobody saw anything more than the blur, so he never had to interact and develop an identity, as "Superman" or anything else

 You get disputes such as how Heaven Is A Place On Earth copied the commercial version of You Give Love A Bad name 

(other versions of Bad Name including acoustic and live can sound different from how the album produced version ended up, released as the lead single ) 

Then you get disputes where it is a different song with the same title 

eg I Wanna Hold Your Hand 

eg Thinking about you 

eg Mirror Mirror 

eg Shooting Star 

eg Heart of Stone 

I could go on 

anyway

 Love Is A Wonderful Thing by the Isley Brothers

 by Michael Bolton 

The problem here was though MB happened to write a song with the same title, some people feel the song sounds the same, at least in places, particularly the chorus

 The verdict he copied it subconsciously, not intentionally 

After all, where do songs really come from when someone starts to write them 

And everyone has influences they acknowledge 

With Bon Jovi, after the success of Slippery When Wet, when JBJ started writing what became Bad Medicine, the lead song from the new album, he had the same progression as Bad Name, more or less the same words and story 

So JBJ plagiarised himself without meaning to do it 

The song was rewritten and redone of course 

With MB, conjecture was he probably never heard the IB version - it was not a big hit when released, it was not a song played a lot on the radio, and many people say they never heard of it when the dispute came up

 

There are days that make the sacrifices seem worthwhile... 

and then there are the days where everything feels like a sacrifice. 

And then there are the sacrifices that you can't even figure out why you're making

 we deny that we are in denial. 

 

 you can waste your life drawing lines

or you can live your life crossing them

 

You try just as hard. 

You do the same things you've done for years, even better than you used to. 

But what if it still doesn't feel like a win anymore? 

Does that mean you've stopped playing? 

No. 

It means it's time to change the game.

 When training for a marathon, a runner's body composition physiologically changes. 

With consistent exercise, the heart improves its efficiency to send oxygen to the muscles. 

Muscles adapt to using and storing energy while bone density increases to make bones stronger. 

On average, the process takes around 20 weeks of mental and physical dedication, stamina, and complete exhaustion, to complete race that's over in a day. 

When people cross the finish line, or complete an impossible task, they often report feeling empty.

 Anticipation and motivation become replaced with apathy and disappointment. 

Science will tell you it's due to a drop in dopamine levels. 

Or maybe it's because we're suddenly faced with the fear of not knowing what's next.

 In the early days of medicine, when most diseases were untreatable, what patients wanted to know was how long they had left. 

People believed the best doctors weren't the ones who could help you buy more time, but the ones who made the most accurate prognosis. 

Now that we have more tricks up our sleeves, we're less interested in calculating the odds and more concerned with beating them. 

But just because we don't spend as much time predicting the end, doesn't mean it's not coming.

 If you only had ten months to live, what would you do? 

Would you hold your people close? 

Or would you let them go? 

Throw caution to the wind? 

Or turn back to the safest, most comforting place? 

Because it might be the end of the road. 

Or it could be just the beginning.

We lie to ourselves so much that after awhile the lies start to seem like the truth. 

 We only see what we want to see, 

and believe what we want to believe, 

 

Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. 

It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. 

Every morning in Africa a lion wakes up. 

It knows it must outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death. 

It doesn’t matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle: 

when the sun comes up, 

you’d better be running.

Brain

 

The body has approximately eleven organ systems, all doing different things at the same time.

 In order to keep us functioning, or, well, alive, they need one voice, a leader, a master.

 And in our brains, that job belongs to the pituitary gland. It senses the body's needs before they even arise, working non-stop. The pituitary gland communicates with all of the other glands, telling them when to produce the vital hormones we need to function. It keeps everything running smoothly, in perfect order. 

There's no denying it. It has the toughest job in the place. It's pretty simple. If the brain's working, the body will listen. Your limbs want to hold you up. Your lungs want to breathe. Your heart wants to beat. 

But none of them are any good without the brain. 

The brain keeps everything all together. 

Like a boss.

 

Don't let fear keep you quiet. 

You have a voice, so use it. 

Speak up. 

Raise your hands. 

Shout your answers.

 Make yourself heard. 

Whatever it takes, just find your voice 

and when you do, fill the damn silence

 

The body is a slave to its impulses. 

But the thing that makes us human is what we can control. 

After the storm, after the rush, after the heat of the moment has passed, we can cool off and clean up the messes we made. 

We can try to let go of what was.

Curiosity killed the cat.

 

It also killed a lot of Ancient Greeks when Pandora had to open that box full of death and pestilence and stuff. 

Why do we have to know what's behind door number three, even when we're pretty sure it'll be bad for us? 

Put yourself in Pandora's shoes. She's given a gift, a wondrous box, filled with things she never even knew existed. 

Of course she opened it. 

Wouldn't you?

 

Homeostasis is our body's way of maintaining a consistent and steady internal state. 

Multiple system work in sync to regulate factors like temperature, blood pressure, even sodium levels. 

These systems are designed to resist and combat anything that tries to throw our bodies off. It's a continual loop with checks and balances. 

Until something manages to break the cycle. 

There is such a thing as predictive homeostasis. 

It's when our body anticipates responses to future challenges.

 It understands that change is inevitable and doesn't have to be catastrophic.

 

How inappropriate to call this planet 

"Earth" 

when it is clearly 

"Ocean”

Superman 2

 That magnificent moment when the music starts, the bones start cracking and Zod starts gasping 

You didn't get to hear the rest of the fanfare as the whole cinema was standing, cheering and clapping 

You don't get many moments like that

Though you do wonder would the Red Krypton sun not harm humans in some way, have an effect on Lex and Lois

Interesting how only Lex and Non notice the red lights out there - Ursa and Zod are watching Clark in the pod and have no idea 

An "underated" power of Superman - his planning and tactics were so great he could defeat a General that way

 

For millions of years, mankind lived just like the animals. 

Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. 

We learned to talk and we learned to listen. 

Speech has allowed the communication of ideas, enabling human beings to work together to build the impossible. 

Mankind's greatest achievements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking.

 It doesn't have to be like this.

 Our greatest hopes could become reality in the future.

 With the technology at our disposal, the possibilities are unbounded. 

All we need to do is make sure we keep talking

Ghost

 Willy was evil, an evil man who did evil things, killed for gain, no remorse 

Willy deserved what he got

 Dragged to Hell literally 

Those who have seen Jacobs Ladder and understand what he was going through - if you resist you see devils ripping your life away, if you are at peace the devils are really angels lifting you free of he earth 

Those who follow the Christian faith believe Jesus died for our sins - those who repent can be forgiven - there is no sin so great that it cannot be washed away by the blood of Christ 

What the Chief says to Paul in Green Mile about a man who truly repents getting to go to Heaven, how he imagined it 

A lot of us have lost people 

Patrick himself lost his father shortly before this film was shot, and he spoke about how this helped him come to terms 

The next film he made was the spiritual character Bodhi of course 

Then Patrick lost his long battle with cancer - so his own death was not sudden, he was waiting 

As so many people do in that situation 

So you have to know at that point what you believe in 

Do the "athiests" really believe in those final moments there is nothing "next"

 In the military there is a saying "there are no athiests in the foxhole" 

Carl never meant for Sam to die, never meant for things to get that our of control, and was scared for his life if he didn't get the money back to the owners - "I just want the cheque" , not for himself, for greed, just so he wouldn't be killed 

Would an option be to see Carl confess, be absolved, repent and then be saved? 

Is Carl not going to a deep circle of Hell the way Willy is, maybe just some level of Purgatory where he can be purged of his sins 

Road To Perdition looks at this 

That great line Paul Newman delivers 

"This is the life we live, the life we have chosen and there is only one certainty - none of us will see Heaven" 

An evil man choosing an evil life who has accepted he cannot go to Heaven and is choosing Hell 

Would he choose Hell if he really knew what Sam, Willy and Carl know

 Willy chose Hell 

Scrooge and Marley - you wear the chain you forged in life 

Could Carl have been forgiven and saved ?

Subway Ghost

 I always thought he was a suicide, jumped in front of the train 

There is a lot of that in any city, including New York 

They pushed me, what you think I jumped

 Denial - can't admit he did it 

Depressed and ended his life 

Is suicide a mortal sin, the way it is depicted in other stories - in which case he would have been taken to Hell 

If he was an innocent then Heaven would open the way it did for Sam, and he could choose to reject it and stay as Sam did

 Maybe this is showing Sam that if he does not wrap up his unfinished business and move on soon, he would be trapped in a loop like we see here 

Who sent you 

A reference the the earthly people who pushed him and killed him

 A reference to THEM come looking for him, to take him 

As you don't have a choice when the devils come for you, but you do have a choice with the angels, maybe he does the Descarte thing of seeing the angels come to lift him as demons come to rip his life away 

Oda May warns Sam about holding on to life, give up the ghost 

So if you don't move on soon enough, you lock in and create your own hell on earth, and cannot see the angels for what they are when they come to help you

 God gave you free will, so in death you still have this, the angels cannot take you unless you want to go, so you stay on earth as a ghost

Monday May 12: Flower Moon

The "Flower Moon" nickname is because of the flowers sprouting across North America this month, according to The Old Farmer's Almanac. May's full moon goes by several other names connected to the season, including Budding Moon, Leaf Budding Moon and Planting Moon.

The Flower Moon is named for the abundance of blooming flowers that typically appear this month. It reminds us to pause and reflect as the night sky takes on a calm, serene appearance

represents the blooming of flowers in May, which is when the Reign of Terror began. The title symbolizes the destruction of Native American culture and nature-related traditions by white colonizers during this period.

 

The most merciful thing in the world, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents

... some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, 

that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new Dark Age.

 

Scientists do not join hands every Sunday and sing 

"Yes gravity is real! I know gravity is real! I will have faith! 

I believe in my heart that what goes up, up, up must come down, down, down. 

Amen!"

 If they did, we would think they were pretty insecure about the concept

Pain

 

Pain. 

You just have to ride it out, hope it goes away on its on.

 Hope the wound that caused it heals. 

There are no solutions, no easy answers. 

You just breath deep and wait for it subside.

 Most of the time pain can be managed,

 but sometimes the pain gets you when you least expect it, hits way below the belt and doesn't let up.

 Pain. 

You just have to fight through,

 because the truth is you can't outrun it... 

And life always makes more.

 

vulnerability isn't the opposite of strength. 

It's a necessary part. 

We have to force ourselves to open up, to expose ourselves. To offer up everything we have and just pray that it's good enough. 

Otherwise, we'll never succeed.

 

When people hear our names, what will they remember? 

What did we leave behind?

 Did we blaze trials? Did we guide a new generation? Did we bestow all the wisdom we could? Have we paved a legacy? 

Maybe instead of wanting to be known for what we've done, let's be known for who we are.

 

With some things, we just have to wait and see. 

We have to reach down inside ourselves and find that last piece of strength. 

As impossible as it can be to find, we have to rise to meet the occasion.

 We have to rise to keep going.

 

Religion is a culture of faith; 

science is a culture of doubt.

 

Religion is an attempt to get control over the sensory world, 

in which we are placed, 

by means of the wish-world, 

which we have developed inside us as a result of biological and psychological necessities. 

But it cannot achieve its end. 

Its doctrines carry with them the stamp of the times in which they originated, 

the ignorant childhood days of the human race. 

Its consolations deserve no trust. 

Experience teaches us that the world is not a nursery.

 The ethical commands, to which religion seeks to lend its weight, require some other foundations instead, for human society cannot do without them, 

and it is dangerous to link up obedience to them with religious belief.

 If one attempts to assign to religion its place in man’s evolution, it seems not so much to be a lasting acquisition, 

as a parallel to the neurosis which the civilized individual must pass through on his way from childhood to maturity.

 

There are some moments that everything goes to hell, 

and no matter how much you've seen, how ready you are, how much help you have, nothing can truly prepare you.

The trouble is, in these moments, every instinct in your body tells you to freeze. 

So what do we do when instinct tells us to freeze? When we can't see the right answer? 

In those moments, it's usually a good idea to trust the instinct and say pause, 

because decisions made in the heat of the moment can ruin a whole lot of lives.