My mother once picked up a book called From a Certain Point of View, as a Christmas gift for me. It’s a collection of short stories set in the Star Wars universe. The book’s short stories tell the plot of Star Wars from the point of view of minor characters. For example, in the first story in the book, the captain of the escape brigade gets the point of view, which is neither the droids C-3P0’s or R2-D2’s, nor Princess Leia’s. It is the same plot as the first scene of the film.
The book is celebrating Star Wars‘ fortieth anniversary, so I am taking the understanding that the book is a 2017 volume. 2017 was the year of Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi.
The Last Jedi took a different point of view that was a departure from styles of the previous Star Wars films. It recreated Luke Skywalker as a figure afflicted with existential angst. The book only contains scenes from the 1977 Star Wars film with a yowl from Rogue One to begin the book.
I don’t know why I haven’t read it sooner. I think the interest in Star Wars for me returned with the Disney+ series The Book of Boba Fett. Thinking about the desert planet of Tatooine through the eyes of Boba Fett got me feeling good again about Star Wars. Boba Fett’s the character whom Lord Vader used to freeze and transport Han Solo back to Tatooine, to the palace of Jabba the Hutt in the second and third movies of the original trilogy.
Star Wars is an unusual fantasy. With the film, picturing each second from these brief tales ought to be a breeze.
Everyone has the same shot at the same time in their lives. Fortune favours the bold, and I remember working locally in sales and my manager, a lightweight, middle-aged lady matched against my early thirties or mid-thirties, called out, “Didn’t your grandmother teach you that?”
The lesson was both spoken and fated to be a memory, until tonight. The subject of a day-to-day example is hard for me to compose. I almost feel as though I should read something new. I didn’t know I would find it so hard to write a post about the question of what every person needs to learn. I thought I could write of love, or perhaps family, but I didn’t settle on either of those topics. I remember what my sales manager asked about my grandmother, and I knew that was probably the best lesson the lady would give me.
It was a seasonal job, mostly year-round. I exited it discretely by failing to call up the office, at the end of December. Some well-timed holiday wishes and I might have stayed employed there. A call a little too late, and I saw I’d been too optimistic. The same opportunity was present for everyone who knew to call. I was too late, and it wasn’t owing to my ability to do the job that it became kind of a fail for me, it was realizing that perhaps I’d better settle in or I would be left behind. It was a two-part lesson.
The second part is to go the distance and make an initiative. Two notes: draw on whatever positive direction you were sent. Once situated, continue and you’ve got a cue to aim with.
It’s the end of March and two weeks ago was St. Patrick’s Day for 2020. The weather in Southern Ontario was reasonable in light of expectations. I found myself spending less time on Facebook. My sister telephoned me a couple of times.
A cousin of my mother, Cathie, along other lovely people, with a hobby of genealogy, ending with a nice account of the Irish my mother’s side of the family has. It looks like this St. Patrick’s Day, 2020, I’ll be a little less Irish. It looks grim.
the act or instance of making or becoming different.
I wish a lot of things were different, but I never would have chalked up the possibility of experiencing our pandemic catastrophe in my own life. I read of environmental warnings, like that there could be, say, eight years until the damage to the planet caused by humans becomes irreversible, or that global warming will cause sea levels to rise, however active God is on the picture at large. I don’t know how human beings will fare.
To consider attacks between warring groups the world over, hellbent on decreasing each other to iotas, to very small pieces, I think also police and military unfairly treat peaceable citizens, because the police loathe the skin colour or addiction, behaviour that doesn’t toe the line for the safety of the public. I think about these now and again, yet I hadn’t thought of what really descended three months ago. It is hard to contextualize that.
I always do my best to enjoy St. Patrick’s Day, as so many do with aplomb and style. I welcome the end of winter. We are all called on to be, not so much Godfearing, as instead socially distant from one another.
Good on us all the same, that we can find solidarity in separating from one another, in a fashion that, like the lot of the unlucky addict, is no fault of our own.
We will have to come up with new measures to survive, and we have to do it at a time when I am sure many of us would be happier celebrating St. Patty’s in the usual fashion, wearing the colour green, and staying out late. We’re told to stay out of bars and restaurants and nightclubs and still young people want to go to those kinds of haunts. I want to be young myself, but not to the extent I want to risk sacrificing growing old.
I wanted to think about a superb St. Patrick’s Day, and although I recall it every year, I don’t know I could say that any specific March festivity was better than some other. A number of them were beautiful and left me feeling blessed. I am grateful to The Lord.
1998 occurs to me, becoming 21 years of age. However, against how this spring is going, I don’t think the excitement of taking a visit back in time is going to especially cause me to feel better. I like to enjoy speaking a kind word at certain times, because a little kindness sprinkled in the mix, while not reversing the uncertainty that we’re facing, does help temper the darkness.
I would like to wish you a happy St. Patrick’s Day, dreadful or not.
St. Patrick’s Day isn’t to be overlooked, obviously. Go with the luck of the Irish! Let’s have a safe spring!
You’re of course welcome to comment and to follow. All the best to you, and to your loved ones.
I think of The Beatles being a radical success in music history, given the enormity of their popularity, even decades later.However, how does that view of The Beatles relate to contemporary ideas about success, and how it is won?
I have ten reasons I’m suggesting that success like what The Beatles enjoyed is actually a weak link in terms of what it means for the individual to pursue preconceived notions of success and how it is misleading. The first four were presented in a previous blog post. The remaining six are presented here.
Streaming services
Netflix is the leader of the pack, I believe, for video streaming. They devote an enormous budget to original content and their selection of existing content is good. That said, Disney is in the streaming video service market. Netflix in my region is compatible with my Tivo, as are other video streaming services. The selection of videos on Netflix is good. I want to step out of the chain of logic to ask if that implies that Tubi, a free video streaming service also compatible with my Tivo is a weak link. Netflix is a completely enjoyable experience and Tubi is likewise an extra addition to the Tivo I use. It isn’t too hard to say which could be better assessed to be a radical success, in the future. That said, while Netflix has been successful remaining ahead of the curve, Tubi is probably under far less pressure. Does Tubi’s relative weak link status mean that it isn’t a success? It is free to use.
Photographer: Rawpixel.com
Going forward with the theory that radical success means enormous difficulty, consider the contender that could grab much of Netflix’ market share, Disney. Disney is unlikely to be going anywhere, given its weight as an entertainment brand, being known for its films, television, toys and theme parks.
Which of the two, Netflix or Disney, will be more of the radical success–that a good streaming service can be? Or will they both amount to great success? Disney has built in family appeal, given its products are for both adults and kids alike. Netflix has been building that kind of appeal from scratch, but persistently. Will either Netflix or Disney be a weak link? It seems important to me that entertainment be good, when it is accessed, or experienced.
Netflix has a reputation for spending extravagant amounts of money on shows and films. Disney already has an enormous built-in capacity for success in the future, in addition to plans for its video streaming service.
3. I started this post by saying there is a fiftieth-anniversary release of The White Album coming 11/9. From what I understand about music streaming services, Spotify has a great conversion rate bringing customers from free use of Spotify onto the premium version. I would ask, if taken to task, whether Spotify will be a “weak link.”
From everything I can say, music with Spotify is magnificent. It seems to be an awesome service.
It is understood that The Beatles essentially recorded The White Album live to 8-track tape, and for everything they’d done in the name of their music, they were in fact recording music that would be a bit of a farewell to their fans. If less scrutiny was being given to the music emerging on The White Album, would The Beatles have lasted longer? And recorded songs for longer than they did? I think it is possible, for when something is intended to be “perfect,” it is often a departure the way a pinnacle climbed must then be descended.
US Politics
4. If you are following my argument, you might guess that the weak link I’m referring to is the former President of the United States, Donald Trump. An example of someone about who there is much to decry that could be a weak link is the President.
As he is someone who was a TV star, I think it is worth mentioning here the radical success that he is known for enjoying and how at the same time the President has mounting problems that he is both a radical success, being wealthy and commanding power, but also a “weak link” in that he could bring down the whole show if he is not effective. President Trump has a knack for appearing with ferocious emphasis again and again in the news, and yet he faces so much criticism and real-life repercussions and consequences that I think he makes a great example of a “weak link” who is at the same time a radical success.
The President brings to mind so many components and elements of radical success gone wrong that it is becoming clearer all the time that the President of the United States is an extremely divisive man. Donald Trump Says China Remix
Photographer: Diego Jimenez
Motivated to Entrepreneurship
5. The ninth reason I want to assert that a weak link can be very much undermining is the idea that if you begin to succeed as an entrepreneur you can find yourself under more pressure than you ever anticipated facing. Making money is many people’s idea of success, but you usually have to put in years of work to make your dreams come true. And in this scenario, ironically, you yourself could be the weakest link if you don’t meet obstacles well.
Unless you keep improving, day in and day out, you could end up being the weak link in your organization simply owing to the fact that your luck could change. If you have found a strategy that makes you King Midas, turning everything you touch to gold, if all of a sudden your luck changes, you may now be suddenly be faced by weakness. The Secret to Self-Motivation | Gary Vaynerchuk’s GREATEST Motivational Speech Ever!
Aerial view of computer laptop on wooden table
You need to keep improving and being good. Everything that took you somewhere is behind you; you have to continue to make great decisions. I suspect you’ll see for yourself if you falter.
6. The final reason I want to take back to Geeks + Gamers. If you have someone, like Jeremy, who is comfortable discussing games, films, and sports, an articulate individual, who sees success coming from YouTube, from a Facebook group, from Twitch I suppose, who challenges who is at the top, as with The Last Jedi, I think it is a philosophical note to say that if you are at that pinnacle, there is any number of reasons your descent will be hastened by those who come after you. You have to reach that pinnacle in excellent form; and you have to leave it in such a way that it endures, that there could be a fiftieth-anniversary, that there could be another billion-dollar blockbuster, that there could be a second term. This is all vital, from a philosophical standpoint, what must be done if radical success, like the kind that spreads all around the globe, is to be achieved and then preserved. CLICKBAIT : A YOUTUBE STORY
If you have read this, please feel free to “like,” “follow,” and/or comment.
When my maternal grandmother was in her golden years, she tried to assure me, “Don’t worry!”
It hasn’t been that bad.
Today’s WordPress Daily Prompt is the word, “fret,” and it’s a timely choice by the folk at WordPress.
What’s being outlined by writers on tech around the world in the news and elsewhere is big trouble… the Cambridge Analytics scandal dealt with Mark Zuckerberg decimated trust in Facebook and cost Zuckerberg a fortune. For someone like me, maintaining a tiny little Facebook business page to assist with the operations and goals of our likewise tiny little nonprofit, I am sure I am characteristically flabbergasted the same as so many other people struggling to market their brand on Facebook in the same boat.
It is potentially back to the drawing board for many.
Meanwhile Twitter, beginning the twenty-third of March, put into effect a change in policy that restricts marketers from tweeting the identical thing across multiple Twitter accounts, which is less a problem for me personally as I only have one Twitter account, but which is intended to scale back the impact that spammers and the like can have if they’re active on several Twitter accounts. For example, there is far less risk that trending topics on Twitter will be launched by the dubious and artificial method of conflated Twitter accounts bringing to prominence a devious trend.
It is nonsense, though, because honest Twitter users who make Twitter part of their business model have far less freedom to market their brand. It also comes on top of several months of other changes to Twitter that consistently kept people who love Twitter up in arms, like notably extending the famed hundred and forty character limit for a tweet to twice that, two hundred and eighty characters.
The little tweet was suddenly full on birdsong, and now, counterintuitively, restrictions are in place so that the social noise on Twitter is slowed down considerably.
Photographer: Mahkeo
My little blog defaults to options to share a post on both Facebook and Twitter, and now both social media giants are mired in an unpredictable morass that quiets down an outcry that until this year seemed like just a normal part of using the social media leaders.
Could be time to shop around.
Twitter finally made a quarterly profit, it is worth noting, so the changes effected under the leadership of Jack Dorsey may continue to prove effective. For Facebook, on the other hand, the steep increase in distrust of the formerly reputable social media giant will play out a drama that will see many Facebookers transmuting their internet profiles elsewhere, or at least becoming far more aware of what can happen to data once it is committed to the Internet.
Photographer: Flo Karr
What’s happened with Facebook is only one page in the news-intensive deconstruction of all the trouble the United States is seeing given their leadership is so unsteady at a time when a strong technology industry is necessary for friendly waters in the face of the potential for major change in the near future when many players want as much control as possible over the cyber landscape.
There is every reason to fret. Above and beyond prayer, it would be advisable to equip yourself with as much information as possible to ride the tide back to shore. It is exciting to observe, and if you have a tidy niche from which to beam the perspective you want people to take, I’d recommend you do it with dedication and surety.
If you’ve read today’s post, I thank you. Any like, follow or comment is welcome.
The Myth of the Independent Blogger and How I Learned to Love It 