Ending With A Bang

Ending With A Bang

By Jonathan Aquino

Saturday Stories

May 25, 2019

I

I have always loved "The Big Bang Theory" because it is very super smart. It is on my top favorite American sitcoms along with "Frasier" and "Friends." It just ended like "Game of Thrones" and "Avengers," and since I started on a new work schedule that I've requested, it feels like the end of an era. I learned from Sheldon that 73 is the perfect number because 73's mirror is 37, and 37 is the 12th prime number, and 12's mirror is 21, and 21 is the product of 7 and 3, and the 21st prime number is 73. If you convert 73 to binary numbers, it is 1001001 which is also the same if you read it backwards. That was during episode 73. Then Raj said that when you type 5,318,008 on a calculator and turn it upside down, it spells "Boobies."

II

One of my favorite scenes is when Sheldon met Stephen Hawking. Another is when Penny gave Sheldon a gift, a signed napkin, and Sheldon almost fainted as he read: "To Sheldon ... Live long and prosper ... Leonard Nimoy." Another is the four of them had a flat. Leonard was trying to change the tire and he was tapping it in a certain rhythm, and Howard and Raj began to sing the opening of "We Will Rock You" in time to the beat. Then they were very shocked when Sheldon also began to sing: "Buddy, you're a young man, hard man, shouting in the street, gonna take on the world someday ... You got mud on your face ... you big disgrace ... waving your banner all over the place..."

III

I got a copy of the original script for the pilot episode by Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady. It begins in a fertility clinic, and Sheldon just finished a deposit at the sperm bank while Leonard was in the waiting room. But in the TV series, they came in and asked if it was the place where smart people can donate, and the receptionist said if they had to ask that, they are in the wrong place. Then they left when Sheldon felt some moral quandary. He said: "I couldn't stop thinking we were committing fraud. Some poor woman is going to pin her hopes on my sperm. What if she winds up with a toddler who doesn't know if he should use an integral or a differential to solve for the area under a curve?"

IV

And of course, I also like the opening theme – "Our whole universe was in a hot, dense state ... then nearly fourteen billion years ago expansion started, wait ... the earth began to cool, the autotrophs began to drool, Neanderthals developed tools, we built a wall ... we built the pyramids ... math, science, history, unraveling the mysteries that all started with the Big Bang!"

Photo courtesy of PristineAuction

The Dragon Has Landed

The Dragon Has Landed

By Jonathan Aquino

Saturday Stories

May 18, 2019

I

One of the many things I'm grateful for is that there is no drama in my life. I have seen a lot of it in the things I read, and while I feel rejuvenated with quiet moments with a book, I'm glad the drama cannot touch me. I'm currently reading, aside from the metaphysical books by Dolores Cannon and Ruth Montgomery, the Game of Thrones graphic novel series. I'm now on the twelfth, which began when young Bran was abducted by Wildlings and ends when Ned Stark was attacked by Jaime Lannister – all shown in Season 1 of the "Game of Thrones" saga on HBO.

II

The next episode next week will be the last. Season 8 would only have six. In Episode 5, Daenerys destroyed King's Landing with her one remaining dragon. There was an agreement that when the church bells ring, it would signal the surrender of the kingdom, and they rang, but she went on her attack – burning even innocent women and children. Her Unsullied and Dothraki armies killed the surrendering soldiers. It was a bloodbath.

III

There was so much death as the bells rang throughout the realm. The episode was perfectly titled "Bells." It reminds me of the 1624 poem by John Donne:

"No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man
is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine;
if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe
is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as
well as if a Manor of thy friends or of thine
owne were; any mans death diminishes me,
because I am involved in Mankinde;
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; It tolls for thee..."

IV

It also calls to my mind a scene with Tyrion and Varys in Season 2 when the bells of King's Landing were ringing as they prepared for the attack of Stannis Baratheon to seize the throne in what would be known as The Battle of Blackwater Bay:

Varys: "I've always hated the bells. They ring for horror. A dead King, a city under siege..."

Tyrion: "A wedding..."

Varys: "Exactly."

Varys would later be executed by Daenerys. In the chaos also came the epic final showdown between the brothers Sandor and Gregor Clegane – The Hound versus The Mountain. And as Cersei and Jaime Lannister tried to escape, they were buried alive in the rubble. I hope Daenerys dies next, if only for either Jon or Bran to claim the Iron Throne, not her. Everybody on Arya's death list – Joffrey, Cersei, the executioner Ilyn Payne who killed her father Ned Stark, the knight Meryn Trant who killed her teacher Syrio Forel, Walder Frey who killed her mother Catelyn and her brother Robb, and many more – are all dead. Time for a new one. As the mysterious Faceless Men assassin Jaqen H'ghar always said: "Valar morghulis" – "All men must die."

Game of Thrones

Season 8

Episode 6

See My GOT Notes on Facebook

Photo courtesy of Comixology.com

A True Man of God

A True Man of God

By Jonathan Aquino

Saturday Stories

May 11, 2019

I

Paramhansa Yogananda once said, "Live quietly in the moment and see the beauty of all before you. The future will take care of itself." I first read "Autobiography of a Yogi" two weeks ago, seventy-three years since it was published in 1946, yet I knew right away why it is become one of the greatest and most influential spiritual books of all time. During the funeral service of Steve Jobs which he arranged himself, guests were given a little brown box as a farewell present, and inside the box is this book. It was a great privilege for me to meet a real saint through his own words. I felt great awe when I read the stories of his teachers and their miraculous lives and deeds – Sri Yukteswar, Sri Lahiri Mahasaya and the great Sri Mahavatara Babaji. 

II

Yogananda was a channel of wisdom and a bridge between East and West, the first teacher who taught the art and science of yoga to America. He was born on January 5, 1893 as Mukunda Lal Ghosh in Gorakphur, India. He has shown a keen interest in spiritual awakening since a boy, and at seventeen, he met his guru Swami Yukteswar. At twenty-two, he became a monk with the new name of Swami Yogananda Giri. He came to the United States in 1920 to represent India at the International Congress of Religious Liberals in Boston, and then he went on a spectacularly successful speaking tour. The rest is history, but it doesn't even scratch the surface of Yogananda's powerful mystical  

  

III

I believe that the core teachings of the major religions of the world are the same, and I still remember how my belief began. Many years ago during the mid-nineties, I met some members of the Hare Krishna movement at the Luneta Park. I would often go there in the afternoon and read a paperback under a tree. I saw them singing and dancing beside the fountain. The lead singer was an American who had shaved his head, playing a guitar, and the others are dancing and playing tambourines. They all wore loose-hanging white and orange garments. I sat on the grass, captivated by all that cheerful energy. One of them, Ravi – I still remember his name – gave me a copy of the book "Christ and Krishna" by Swami Bhaktipada.

IV

One of their songs was the classic from George Harrison, another of the many people whose lives have been touched by Yogananda. In the iconic cover of the album "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" by The Beatles, there is Yogananda on your upper right in front of Bob Dylan. Also in that photo are Sri Yukteswar, Sri  Mahasaya and Sri Babaji. My friend Kavi and the other Hare Krishna devotees were singing – "My sweet Lord ... I really wanna see you ... really wanna be with You ... really wanna see You, Lord ... but it takes so long, my Lord ... my sweet Lord..." 

My Sweet Lord

George Harrison

Photo courtesy of TheWritePlace.com

Iron Man Episode One

Saturday Stories

May 4, 2019

Iron Man Episode One

By Jonathan Aquino

I

I enjoyed Avengers: Endgame when we watched it last Saturday. My prediction was correct that they would travel in time through the quantum realm. I won't give any spoilers, but the scenes I remember most were when Tony met his father before he was born, and when Thor met his mother on the day she died. I'm curious about time travel, which I've also talked about in my stories about The Flash and Legends of Tomorrow, because my favorite TV show of all time is Voyagers! So, if I took even just one Infinity Stone from the past, then the entire course of history would change because Thanos wouldn't have gotten them all. That means there would be no Snap.

II

But is there only one timeline? Doc explained it to Marty in Back To The Future. When a person goes back, it creates a "temporal events sequence" which creates an "alternate reality." Imagine a horizontal line on a blackboard, with the past on the left and the future on the right. Apparently Biff went from 1985 to 1958, which created an alternate 1985, which Doc showed by drawing a tangent line. Biff made a fortune from betting on horses because he already knew who will win. Marty blamed himself, and Doc tried to console him by saying: "That's all in the past." Marty replied: "You mean the future?" And Doc said: "Whatever!"

III

So, if I'm coming from 2023, five years from the Snap, and I go back to 2012 during the Chitauri invasion to get the Tesseract (which contains the Space Stone) and Loki's scepter (which contains the Mind Stone), then would my presence create an alternate timeline? And then of course, I could meet my 2012 self, like what happened to Cap. But ... wait. They were supposed to bring back the Infinity Stones. So if I take the Time Stone from the Ancient One when Stephen Strange was not yet Sorcerer Supreme, then I give it back to her after I defeat Thanos, wouldn't the same series of events still happen – the Ancient One would someday give it to Doctor Strange who would eventually give it to Thanos?

IV

I had a double dose of Iron Man last week. The first was the movie, and I found a copy of the first Iron Man comics – the March 1963 edition of Tales of Suspense, created by the great Stan Lee. Iron Man originally looked like when he first appeared in the first Iron Man movie directed by Happy Hogan. Tony was a prisoner who created his suit to escape, but instead of the terrorist group Ten Rings, his captors were the communist group Red Guerrillas led by a superhuman warlord named Wong Chu. During the explosion when Tony was caught, pieces of shrapnel entered his body, and when they reach his heart, he would die. A prisoner named Professor Yinsen was there to help him, but time was running out.

Photo courtesy of Marvel