The history of Brexit -- so far

We've found this nice article in the Guardian, and present a few highlights with the original HTML-markup still in place and a picture that could start the next Agatha Christie film (scroll down):

May has failed, so far, because she could not win around Conservative rebels, mostly hard Brexiters from the European Research Group. A last, desperate promise to quit if MPs backed her deal only reduced rebel numbers to 34, 28 of them linked to the ERG.
...
Few Conservatives expected Brexit to triumph in the referendum. But the 52% result and May’s elevation to Downing Street changed the picture dramatically.
...
Boris Johnson, the face of the leave campaign, was given the job of foreign secretary, but May marginalised him from Brexit policy. Chris Wilkins, a former speech writer for May, said: “She sees him as fundamentally unserious, and for her that is the worst criticism.”
The prime minister later remarked there was no off-the-shelf plan for Brexit. Instead she set about devising policy in the strictest secrecy, barely consulting cabinet colleagues on the most important diplomatic event since the UK joined the European Union 40 years earlier.
Policy was initially delivered via speeches. According to Wilkins, texts were only shared with cabinet members the day before. There was no general discussion at cabinet...
...

It won't stop, it won't stop

Not Brexit

"Let me start by saying: no one is a bigger feminist than me!"

Brexit...accomplished

Escher's Brexit

A teaser of sorts...

...writes our trusted editor Tony Foster and sends this photo...depicting the manuscript of our play with his mark-up:

So, yes, the title has changed (again) to "Electro-Magnetic, Dolly, Absolutely Electro-Magnetic", a cheap play on, well, you know what...

...for people who did not follow this, Dolly is the lead-robot of the play, sort-of.

Generation V -- cables and tails -- teaser

We found this gif today...

...isn't it titillating?

And here are two fragments from our play to explain this. Both are from Act III, the last act.

Scene I, Eliza in conversation with Robert (the robot):

ELIZA: ‘Ma’am’, yes. Living flesh, come to think of it. I’ve never seen you naked, mister.
ROBERT (table has turned): Why should you…we never…
ELIZA: Strip! Undress! I want to see your willie!
ROBERT (intimidated, crouching?) I’m not…I’m not…I’m a machine!
ELIZA: That’s what they all say.
ROBERT (gesticulates towards the charging cable, to which he is still connected): Have you ever seen live humans with a charging cable?
ELIZA: In my days, absolutely. I’ve seen any kind of cable going in and out of humans. Ask Steve.
ROBERT (shocked?): Ma’am.
ELIZA (getting closer): Call me Eliza. Your willie, Robbie.

Robert crouches away from her.

ELIZA: No robot would be this prudish.
ROBERT: I show emotions as a function of projective expectations…
ELIZA: You sound like a shrink…
ROBERT: …expectations projected onto me by the environment.

ELIZA moves away from ROBERT, then lurches forward, and disconnects his charging cable, which stops blinking. She reconnects it, and it starts blinking again.

ELIZA: Alright. I got swept away. It runs in the family.

Five stars again --- Green Eyes and This Is Heaven

Cool folks. Today isn't particularly good a day, but then we discovered these reviews by John_C (his handle, we presume)  both of the GREEN EYES and THIS IS HEAVEN on Inkitt. Have a look:

Amazing -- Green Eyes

I’ve have never actually told someone to leave me alone until I started reading Green Eyes: an erotic novel (sort of) by Michael Ampersant. I held it in my hands and read the first chapter when someone came up to me to ask me a question. I literally held my hand to his face and told him to stop talking, and that I was reading. He didn’t talk to me for a few days. He got over it and read the book. I tried to interrupt him and he stopped me. Karma.
Michal’s protagonist, John Lee, is narrating the story. He’s so funny that I really want to meet him. His descriptions, side notes, and remarks are so powerful. I’ve never met someone so funny, entertaining, and naive in some ways. Okay. I admit I’m naiver that he is. My point is that I love the character. If I met him I would ask, “How?”
The style of the book was new for me. I don’t particularly write in this style. Now that I have I admit I wouldn’t even know how to start. Michael’s style is unique, part description, part I’m telling you what happened, and he also shows you what’s going on. And there is a lot of things going on. He has this unique talent of introducing something traumatic in a very nonchalant way that when the shocker comes out I jump.
What I like the most of the book is that it took me to worlds where I’ve never been. I have never known men could do the things they did in this book. When I’m reading I feel what John is doing and seeing. A few times I cinched because I thought I was there. I can honestly say, I have yet to read another book like this. I’m an honored man for having read Michael’s book.

The sad truth

The press and Donald Trump

Titanic missing the iceberg --- Generation V

We've finished a draft of our play (its latest working title being: "Electro-magnetic, Dolly, Absolutely Electro-magnetic"), and then we hit on this picture, and on a title for it...

The Titanic missed the iceberg

...and we have this Titanic-meme going on in the play (we always have a Titanic-meme going on somewhere)...so, let's see. Here, Terentia Striker, the court-appointed bailiff, charged with the repossession of lead-robot Robert, in Act II, Scene 6:


STRIKER: Oh, I see. I am as confused as usual. (Striking a confidential pose) If it weren’t for my flapper-girl demeanor, my charming giggle, and all the other traits which make me the most cast-against vessel of repossession, I would be totally unfit for this job. And if it weren’t for Triple-X, the oarsman, anchor, and helmsman of our voyage through the choppy seas of financial distress, this vessel of yours would have rearranged the deckchairs a long time ago.

There is more...Cheers!

German for beginners

via GIPHY 
 Kleine Sünden bestraft der liebe Gott sofort

Discuss: In a real theocracy...

"In a real theocracy...

the Trump Evangelists would soon find themselves burning on the stake."

Eric Satie

We've always been wondering, for no particular reason---Eric Satie, the inventor of (musical) minimalism, how did he look like? And today we found this beautiful picture on Tumblr:

Erik Satie par Santiago Rusiñol, 1891

Michael Cohen bad, bad

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders yesterday issued the following statement regarding Michael Cohen's testimony before a Congress committee today:

"Disgraced felon Michael Cohen is going to prison for lying to Congress and making other false statements," Sanders said in that statement. "Sadly, he will go before Congress this week and we can expect more of the same. It's laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word, and pathetic to see him given yet another opportunity to spread his lies."

Think this through, think this through, Sarah. How about dropping the word "convicted" and stating:

"It's laughable that anyone would take a liar like Trump at his word, and pathetic to see him given yet another opportunity to spread his lies."

Isn't it? 

Mexico will pay for the wall

Q&A --- Q: Who will remember D. Trump in 2 000 years?

A: Everybody. He'll be remembered together with Washington and Jefferson. 

Comment: just consider this---which Roman emperors do you "remember"?

Hint: You remember Caesar, of course, who's was only a "dictator", but who started the whole thing. You remember Augustus, Caesar's adopted nephew, and, yes, you remember Nero and Caligula. 

"There are no good songs anymore," our friend and ex-rock-star Sacha complains on a regular basis. But then, we go for a walk in the Estérel, and when we come back there's something on KISS-FM [footnote] the preferred local station, and we know: This is was a good song:

The power of love is a curious thing

Make a one man weep, make another man sing

Change a heart to a little white dove

More than a feeling, that's the power of love

Tougher than diamonds, whips like cream

Stronger and harder than a bad girls dream

Make a bad one good, mmm make a wrong right

Power of love will keep you home at night

Don't need money, don't take fame

Don't need no credit card to ride this train

It's strong and it's sudden and it's cruel sometimes

But it might just save your life

That's the power of love

That's the power of love

First time you feed it might make you sad

Next time you feed it might make you mad

But you'll be glad baby when you've found

That's the power that makes the world go round

Don't need money, don't take fame

Don't need no credit card to ride this train

It's strong and it's sudden and it's cruel sometimes

But it might just save your life

They say that all in love is fair

Yeah but you don't care

But you know what to do

When it gets hold of you

And with a little help from above

You feel the power of love

You feel the power of love

Can you feel it?

Don't take money, don't take fame

Don't need no credit card to ride this train

Tougher than diamonds and stronger than steel

You won't feel it until you feel

You feel the power, feel the power of love

That's the power, that's the power of love

You feel the power of love

You feel the power of love

You feel the power of love

[footnote] Once in a blue moon, sorry.

"You believe in the devil, only" -- Generation V -- teaser

Progress, progress, what else. We've finished Scene 3 of Act III, three (or four) more scenes to go. This fragment here is from Scene 1 of Act III, but we're fairly proud of it, and it's (a) about an important issue, the difference between "man" and machine, and (b) it doesn't require much context. Eliza, the aging psycho...psycho-analyst and her trusted household robot Robert in conversation (enjoy, you're not asked to buy anything):

ELIZA: Go, get the champagne. I have something serious to ask. And I need your input before it’s too late.

ROBERT stretches his legs, disconnects the charging cable, gets up, huffing and puffing, proceeds to the kitchen, and returns with the champagne bottle and one flute, which he tries to hand to ELIZA.

ELIZA (refusing the tumbler): You need a glass, too.
ROBERT: We’re running in circles, ma’am.
ELIZA: Go, get yourself a flute. It’s an order.

ROBERT sets bottle and tumbler on the floor, makes his way to the kitchen, returns with a second tumbler. He hands one flute to ELIZA, pours the champagne. ELIZA points at the second flute, insisting. ROBERT pours champagne into the second flute. ELIZA’s keeps insisting, until he picks up that flute, and they clink glasses.

ROBERT: You don’t touch glasses with champagne; the bubbles impede the clinking.
ELIZA: You sound like Dolly, Robbie.
ROBERT: Robots learn from humans, robots learn from robots.
ELIZA: My question, Robert, my question is…
ROBERT (half-interrupting): …‘What’s the difference between man and machine?’ Isn’t it?
ELIZA: What’s the difference between WOMAN and machine...(laughs)...you have a willie, I don’t...So sorry...please go ahead. The future of mankind depends on your answer.
ROBERT: We robots are metal and fiberglass and silicon and so on; you are water, proteins, enzymes, and so on.

Cannes, on the Croisette, the Burberry shop

We had to inspect our car, I mean (talking a bit like Dolly), we had to have our car inspected, and during the car-less hours we took a stroll on the Croisette, and here's one of Chang's results: 

Quote--unquote -- Benjamin Franklin

(Plus ça change:)

Benjamin Franklin, in "Dangers of a settled bureaucracy" (1787)