Author: aaforringer

My writings about the world, sci-fi, fantasy, and outright lies.
Posted in Quotes

Failures

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Ninety-nine percent of the failures come from people who have the habit of making excuses.   George Washington Carver

George Washington Carver (1860s – January 5, 1943), was an American botanist and inventor. He actively promoted alternative crops to cotton and methods to prevent soil depletion.

While a professor at Tuskegee Insitutute, Carver developed techniques to improve soils depleted by repeated plantings of cotton. He wanted poor farmers to grow alternative crops, such as peanuts and sweet potatoes, as a source of their own food and to improve their quality of life. The most popular of his 44 practical bulletins for farmers contained 105 food recipes using peanuts. Although he spent years developing and promoting numerous products made from peanuts, none became commercially successful.

 

 

Posted in Quotes

Afterlife

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I don’t believe in an afterlife, so I don’t have to spend my whole life fearing hell, or fearing heaven even more. For whatever the tortures of hell, I think the boredom of heaven would be even worse.   Isaac Asimov

Born on January 2, 1920, in Petrovichi, Russia, Isaac Asimov immigrated with his family to the United States and became a biochemistry professor while pursuing writing. He published his first novel, Pebble in the Sky, in 1950. An immensely prolific author who penned nearly 500 books, he published influential sci-fi works like I, Robot and the Foundation trilogy, as well as books in a variety of other genres. Asimov died in New York City on April 6, 1992.

 

Posted in Quotes

Don’t

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You don’t go to Gettysburg with a shovel, you don’t take belt buckles off the Arizona.   Robert Ballard

Robert Duane Ballard (born June 30, 1942) is a retired United States Navy officer and a professor of oceanography at the University of Rhode Island who is most noted for his work in underwater archaeology: maritime archaeology and archaeology of shipwrecks. He is most known for the discoveries of the wrecks of the RMS Titanic in 1985, the battleship Bismarck in 1989, and the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown in 1998. He discovered the wreck of John F. Kennedy‘s PT-109 in 2002 and visited Biuku Gasa and Eroni Kumana, who saved its crew. He leads ocean exploration on E/V Nautilus.

 

Posted in Quotes

Serious

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I do take my work seriously and the way to do that is not to take yourself too seriously.   Alan Rickman

Alan Sidney Patrick Rickman (21 February 1946 – 14 January 2016) was an English actor and director known for playing a variety of roles on stage, television and film. Rickman trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London and became a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, performing in numerous theatre productions of both classical and modern. On stage, Rickman is most known for his role as Le Victomte de Valmont in the 1985 production of Les Liaisons Dangereuses, for which he was nominated for both a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play and a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Play. Rickman was also nominated for a second Tony Award in 2002 for playing the role of Elyot Chase in Noel Coward‘s Private Lives. In 1996, Rickman gained critical recognition for his portrayal of the dark monk Grigori Rasputin in the television film Rasputin: Dark Servant of Destiny winning him a Golden Globe Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, a SAG Award and a Satellite Award all for best actor in a miniseries or television film. Rickman’s most notable roles are through his film work. One of his most famous performances is as the Sheriff of Nottingham in the 1991 film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, which earned him a BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. However, Rickman’s most popular role is as the mysterious Professor Severus Snape in the Harry Potter film franchise.

Posted in Movie Speeches

Pacifist?

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A nice little anti-war speech in this episode of The Twilight Zone, No Time Like the Past, a little time travel, a man tired of the hate, wars, and all the problems of the present days goes back to live in 1881.  Written by the man himself, Rod Serling.  

 

Hanford: … You some kind of a pacifist, Driscoll?

Paul Driscoll: No, just some sick idiot who’s seen too many boys die because of too many men who fight their battles at dining room tables… and who probably wouldn’t last forty-five seconds in a REAL skirmish if they WERE thrust into it.

Hanford: …I take offense at that remark, Mr. Driscoll!

Paul Driscoll: And I take offense at “armchair warriors” like yourself – who clearly don’t know what a shrapnel, or a bullet, or a saber wound feels like… who’ve never smelled death after three days on an empty battlefield… who’ve never seen the look on a man’s face when he realizes he’s lost a limb or two, and his blood is seeping out. Mr. Hanford, you have a great affinity for “planting flags deep, high, and proud.” But you don’t have a nodding acquaintance of what it’s like for families to bury their sons in the same soil!

 

 

Posted in Uncategorized

Things

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It’s amazing how the biggest things in our lives – when we’re around the fireplace and talking about them when we’re older – the things that matter the most to us start off amazingly small and in a humble way.    Frankie Ballard

Frank Robert Ballard IV (born December 16, 1982) is an American country music singer-songwriter and guitarist. He has released two albums each for Reprise Records and Warner Bros. Records, and has charted eight singles on the Hot Country Songs charts.