Frank's list of the best of the best!

Looking for some insight into my character, into what makes me tick,
why I do the things I do, and say the things I say?
Don't you have anything better to do?
No! Well then, you've come to the right place.
Here is a list of things that are really important to me.
Thoughts, quotes, ideas, media, and so on.

BOOKS
If there could be said to be such a thing as magic, then books are one of the places it must hide.
"Books are the carriers of civilization."
- Henry David Thoreau

The Singularity is Near by Raymond Kurzweil
The race for the future is on! Will we win?
"One conversation centered on the ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life,
which gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race
beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue."


Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
One of the most important books ever written!
"But money is only a tool. It will take you wherever you wish, but it will not replace you as the driver.
It will give you the means for the satisfaction of your desires, but it will not provide you with desires."
- Francisco d'Anconia

The Art Of War by Sun Tzu
The standard for those looking to learn strategy.
". . . supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting."

Tai-Pan by James Clavell
A treatise on leadership, and a thrilling saga.
"A tai-pan is always alone. That's the joy of it and the hurt of it."
- Dirk Struan

Illusions by Richard Bach
A strange and wonderful book.
"Your friends will know you better in the first minute you meet
than your acquaintances will know you in a thousand years."

Guns of the South by Harry Turtledove
An alternate history with characterizations so strong, I feel like I've met them.
"You Southerners may have made the Confederacy into a nation,
General Lee, but what sort of nation shall it be?"
- Lord Lyons

The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice
The vampire saga from the vampire's point of view.
"This knowledge may change you somewhat.
That's all knowledge ever really does, I suppose . . "
- Marius

I, Robot by Isaac Asimov
I know this one dates me, but I don't care, I love it.
"A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law."

The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
"It's better to count on people's faults than on their virtues.
Father Aramis, you're a great philosopher!"
- Athos

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
"I want to be Providence, for the greatest,
the most beautiful and the most sublime thing I know of in this world
is to reward and to punish."
- Edmond Dantes / The Count of Monte Cristo

Anthem by Ayn Rand
"I understood that centuries of chains and lashes will not kill the spirit of man
nor the sense of truth within him."
- Equality 7-2521 / Prometheus

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Its religious connotation's and subtext aside, this is a great book.
"Or would you know, the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself?
It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago.
You have laboured on it since.
It is a ponderous chain!"
- Jacob Marley

Stranger In A Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
"Whenever anyone comes here to live, I make it plain that this is neither a sweat shop nor a whore house, but a home . . .
and, as such, it combines anarchy and tyranny without a trace of democracy, as in any well-run family,
i.e., they are on their own except where I give orders, which orders are not subject to debate."
- Jubal Harshaw

Job: A Comedy Of Justice by Robert A. Heinlein
"Don't bow down or offer worship. Just stand your ground and tell the truth.
If you die, die with dignity"
- Jerry Farnsworth / Satan

BROADWAY SHOWS
What can I say, I love Broadway shows, but I only like a few.
On the other hand I haven't seen too many of them either, so if your favorite isn't listed,
just assume I haven't seen it yet.

Rent

Gina and I were lucky enough to see this show with the original NY cast. Simply unbelievable!
"So let's find a bar, So dark we forget who we are
Where all the scars of the nevers and maybes die"
- Mimi

Jesus Christ Superstar

I picked up the new version of this on DVD and I can't stop watching it.
"Put away your sword, Don't you know that it's all over
It was nice but now it's gone, Why are you obsessed with fighting?
Stick to fishing from now on"
- Jesus

Aida

Gina and I saw this with Adam Pascal from Rent and it was really something.
"To sail away to half discovered places
To see the secrets so few eyes have seen
To see moments of enchantment on our faces
The moments when we smile . . .
and those between."
- Radames

DRINKS
Yes children, like many I enjoy a drop of the grape now and again.
Unlike most I'm very, very, fussy about what I drink, when I drink, and with whom I drink.
"One drink is just right; two is too many; three are too few."
- Spanish Proverb

Samurai
This is just half Saki and half Plum Wine over ice.
My favorite drink of all time.

Gin and Tonic
I like this with a one third gin to tonic mix, and lots of limes and a few lemons sliced up and mixed in.
The perfect drink for hot summer days, and easily passed off as lemonade.

FOODS

Sushi
No contest here. I'd rather eat sushi than anything else.
(Well, OK, almost anything else.)

Pizza with Pineapple
My next choice is quality Pizza with fresh chucks of pineapple on it.
I worked in a pizza place when I was younger so I'm very fussy about how it taste.

GRAPHIC NOVELS
I don't collect them anymore, but I still thought I would make mention of the best of the ones I've ever read.

The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller
The definitive piece on Batman.
"This should be agony. I should be a mass of aching muscle - - broken, spent, unable to move.
And, were I an older man, I surely would . . . but I'm a man of thirty . . . of twenty again.
The rain on my chest is a baptism - - I'm born again."
- Batman

The Watchmen by Alan Moore
An original universe with awesome and very mature themes and characters.
"Stood in firelight, sweltering. Bloodstain on chest like map of violent new continent. Felt cleansed.
Felt dark planet turn under my feet and knew what cats know that makes them scream like babies in night.
Looked at sky through smoke heavy with human fat and God was not there.
The cold, suffocating dark goes on forever,
and we are alone."
- Rorschach

Kingdom Come by Mark Waid and Alex Ross
The combination of art and story here are enthralling.
"Heroes act in a certain way. This isn't it."
- Superman

MOVIES

Watchmen

It wasn't the Graphic Novel but it was still really good.
"I've walked across the sun.
I've seen events so tiny and so fast they hardly can be said have occurred at all,
but you... you are a man.
And this world's smartest man means no more to me
than does its smartest termite."
- Dr. Manhattan

V for Vendetta

Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici.
"By the power of truth, I, while living, have conquered the universe."
- V

The Lord of the Rings:
(The entire trilogy!)

These are simply brilliant films and an awesome, staggering, production.
Aragorn: "I promise, I will not let the White City fall or our people fail!"
Boromir: "Our people, our people! I would have followed you to the end...
my brother... my captain... my king!"

Star Trek

All of them except 5. That never happened! It was just a bad dream, really.
I love Star Trek. I love the whole Star Trek universe.
"If Spock were here, he'd say that I was an irrational,
illogical human being for going on a mission like this . . .
Sounds like fun!"
- James T. Kirk

Gladiator

Ridley Scott's sense of life matches mine so well in this movie that it never fails to move me.
"What we do in life, echoes in eternity."
- Maximus

Blade Runner

Another Ridley Scott Opus. I love this one too. The imagery, characters, and music, simply overwhelm me.
"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Time to die."
- Roy Batty:

Highlander

Only the first one! Good direction, good story, original idea, great music.
MacLeod: "How do you fight such a savage?"
Ramirez: "With heart, faith, and steel. In the end, there can be only one."



Circle of Iron
AKA: The Silent Flute

A martial arts movie? Must be seen to be believed.
"Each morning when I awake like a scholar at his first class.
I prepare a blank mind for the day, to write upon."
- The Blind Man

Gattaca

Great stuff! An all too plausible look at a future of genetic engineering and control.
"You want to know how I did it? This is how I did it Anton:
I never saved anything for the swim back."
- Vincent Freeman / Jerome Morrow

The Day the Earth Stood Still

A timeless masterpiece.
"I am impatient with stupidity. My people have learned to live without it."
- Klaatu

2001 - A Space Odyssey

A classic!
"I am putting myself to the fullest possible use,
which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do."
- Hal 9000

Logan's Run

Another classic!
"Look! Don't you understand?! It's different now because it's me! My life!"
- Logan 5

Wizards

Ralph Bakshi's imaginative animated classic
"I've got stuff that'll take twenty years to kill you . . .
and you'll be screaming for mercy in the first five seconds."
- Avatar

The Nightmare before Christmas

I love this Halloween spin on Christmas.
"Bumpy sleigh ride Jack?!"
- Santa

Scrooged

Another holiday favorite.
"For a few hours, out of the entire year; we are the people we always hoped we would be."
- Frank Cross

Airplane
Completely juvenile, but somehow still very funny.
Rex Kramer: "Standby Striker. Our one hope is to build this man up, I've got to give him all the confidence I can.
Striker- have you ever flown a multi-engine plane before?"
Striker: "NO, never."
Rex Kramer: (Radio still on) "SHIT! This is a God damned waste of time, there's no way he can land that plane."
MCrosky: "Grab a hold of yourself, you gotta talk him down, you gotta."
Rex Kramer: "We ought to route him in Lake Michigan, at least we'll avoid killing innocent people."

MUSIC
There's an old saying that talking about music is like dancing about architecture.
Well then, let us dance; as a non-musician, and a poet, lyrics are very important to me.
I like music that is theatrical.

Rush
Always my first choice. I'd rather listen to Rush than anything else.
Bad Rush is still better than good everything else.
"Summer's going fast, The nights growing colder
Children growing up, Old friends growing older"
For more notes on Rush see my poetry page.

Jethro Tull
Ian Anderson's work really stands out for me.
"We'll wait in stone circles, `til the force comes through,
lines joint in faint discord, and the stormwatch brews
a concert of kings, as the white sea snaps,
at the heels of a soft prayer,
whispered"

Queen
The old stuff, and the whole Highlander soundtrack were just incredible.
"But touch my tears with your lips, Touch my world with your fingertips,
And we can have forever, And we can love forever"

Steve Vai
Passion and Warfare, listen to it, nothing I could say here will make any difference.
"I'm fearless in my heart. They will always see that in my eyes.
I am the Passion; I am The Warfare. I will never stop . . .
Always constant, accurate, . . . intense!"
- Steve Vai

"Accurate is my middle word."
- Original

Go West
For really tasty pop fun and romantic lyrics you can't beat these guys.
"The day that we're together, Well it can't come to soon.
Baby, I will be the sun, You'll be the moon"

Sting
I get a bit of heat for liking this guy as much as I do.
"Forever conditioned to believe that we can't live
We can't live here and be happy with less
So many riches, so many souls
Everything we see we want to possess"

Peter Gabriel
"Security"! Great stuff! I know the whole album by heart.
"Though you may disappear, you're not forgotten here
And I will say to you, I will do what I can do"

Genesis
The old stuff. Very theatrical, very good on shady summer days.
"They've got no horns and they've got no tail
They don't even know of our existence"

Klaatu
"Hope". These guys were almost completely unkown but they still ruled.
"When to his end the old man came Death told him "You'll not die in vain"
And on his lips the fatal kiss was placed
But from within his falling chest
The old man uttered one last breath
And had we heard his parting word
We'd know that he had said . . ."

Quotes
Here are some of my favorite quotes:

Original Quotes

"Sarcasm is the bastard child of a stunted intellect."
- Original

"Enlightenment isn't a possession, it isn't something that you get and thereafter you have.
It's something that you chase and only truly have, when you're really reaching for it."
- Original

"You can kill me. You can take away the rest of my life and any time I might otherwise have lived.
However I am not afraid to die because you can't take away the life I've already lived.
In leading the life I've led I have already won. Hell, I didn't think I'd live this long.
You can't change the past or the nature of who I really am and what you really are."
- Original

"I never trouble myself with seeking revenge.
When those who have wronged me wake up each morning, they're still themselves and I'm still me.
What further revenge could I seek?"
- Original

"The sensation that I am living in a mirror universe of bearded Spocks
and Personal Guards has become overwhelming."
- Original

"Look at the universe! There is no place for your primitive, superstition religions.
They are not, taken all together, worth the skinned knee of one child,
let alone all the lives you have sacrificed to them."
- Original

"Your life belongs to you, live it well.
Live it head on, face first, and accept no excuses for circumstances or misfortune."
- Original

"Life is too short for prejudice, bigotry, and all the other assorted forms of hatred born from fear.
Try to look beyond your narrow perspective and see the beauty of humanity as it is,
and not as you would have it."
- Original

Some humerous quotes

"These are the worst powers ever. 'Predict the past', What the hell was I thinking?"
- Patrick Flanagan
(From one of our late night RPG sessions.)

"Pepper in my cheese?! For this perfidy the devastation will not cease for ten thousand years!"
- Patrick Flanagan

"I can't live the button-down life like you. I want it all! The terrifying lows, the dizzying highs, the creamy middles!
Sure, I might offend a few of the blue-noses with my cocky stride and
musky odors--Oh, I'll never be the darling of the so-called "City Fathers" who cluck their tounges,
stroke their beards, and talk about 'What's to be done with this Homer Simpson?'"
- Homer Simpson (The Simpsons)

"What is your fascination with my forbidden closet of mystery?"
- Chief Wiggum (The Simpsons)

"I've learned that life is one crushing defeat after another until you just wish Flanders was dead."
- Homer Simpson (The Simpsons)

"I've never been a praying man, but if you're up there, save me Superman!"
- Homer Simpson (The Simpsons)

"Jesus, Allah, Buddha - I love you all!"
- Homer Simpson (The Simpsons)

"Ooh, look at me! I'm making people happy!
I'm the magical man from Happyland, in a gumdrop house on Lollipop Lane!"
- Homer Simpson (The Simpsons)

"I wish god were alive to see this."
- Homer Simpson (The Simpsons)

"When I was a boy of 14 my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around.
But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much he had learned in 7 years."
- Mark Twain

Important Quotes

"Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless,
and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful."
- Samuel Johnson
(With thanks to Timothy Riess.)

"The enemy is fear. We think it is hate; but, it is fear."
- Gandhi

"And to such among you who hate the thought of human joy,
who wish to see men's life as chronic suffering and failure, who wish men to apologize for happiness
-- or for success, or ability, or achievement, or wealth -- to such among you, I am now saying:
I wanted him, I had him, I was happy, I had known joy, a pure, full, guiltless joy.."
- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

"The larger the island of our knowledge, the longer the coast of our ignorance."
- Unknown

"Knowledge is power."
- Unknown

"To see what is right, and not to do it, is want of courage or of principle."
- Confucius

"What is a friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies."
- Aristotle

"Dignity consists not in possessing honors, but in the consciousness that we deserve them."
- Aristotle

"There is a level of cowardice lower than that of the conformist: the fashionable nonconformist."
- Ayn Rand

"When we are young, wandering the face of the Earth,
wondering what our dreams might be worth,
learning that we're only immortal; For a limited time."
- Neil Peart (Rush)

"Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance.
If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant,
if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant,
then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them…
We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant."
- Karl Popper, "The Open Society and Its Enemies"

"A Rattlesnake, if cornered will become so angry it will bite itself.
That is exactly what the harboring of hate and resentment against others is - a biting of oneself.
We think we are harming others in holding these spites and hates,
but the deeper harm is to ourselves."
- E. Stanley Jones

"Some men never seem to grow old.
Always active in thought, always ready to adopt new ideas, they are never chargeable with fogyism.
Satisfied, yet ever dissatisfied, settled, yet ever unsettled, they always enjoy the best of what is,
are the first to find the best of what will be."
-William Shakespeare

"Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste death but once."
- William Shakespeare "Julius Caesar"

"Be careful what you pretend to be, because you are what you pretend to be."
- Kurt Vonnegut

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
- Oscar Wilde

"I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs."
- Frederick Douglass (On escaping slavery)

"All cruelty springs from weakness."
- Seneca

"Anger, if not restrained, is frequently more hurtful to us than the injury that provokes it."
- Seneca

"As long as you live, keep learning how to live."
- Seneca

"If you wished to be loved, love."
- Seneca

"This I believe: That the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world.
And this I would fight for: The freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected.
And this I must fight against: Any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual."
- John Steinbeck

"The time appears to me to have come when it is the duty of all to make their dissent from religion known."
- John Stuart Mill

"The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community,
against his will, is to prevent harm to others.
His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant."
- John Stuart Mill

"To laugh often and much; To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;
To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends;
To appreciate beauty, to find the best in others;
To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition;
To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived.
This is to have succeeded."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"It is never too late to give up your prejudices."
- Henry David Thoreau, Walden

"Not being known doesn't stop the truth from being true."
- Richard Bach

"Let us have faith that right makes might;
and in that faith let us dare to do our duty as we understand it."
- Abraham Lincoln

"I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character."
- Martin Luther King Jr.

"Honesty is the first chapter of the book of wisdom."
- Thomas Jefferson

"Live as if your were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever."
- Mahatma Gandhi

"Consider your origin; you were not born to live like brutes, but to follow virtue and knowledge."
- Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy

"The purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and die, but to enjoy yourself and live."
- Ayn Rand (as John Galt in Atlas Shrugged.)

TELEVISION
The single most powerful, influential, medium ever devised; and look at what we do with it.
Most television is just terrible, but there are a few exceptions.

Star Trek

The worst Trek is better than almost anything else on TV.
Of the series' The Next Generation still stands out as my favorite.
"The first duty of a Starfleet officer is to the truth; be it scientific truth, historical truth, personal truth.
It is the guiding principle on which Starfleet was founded!"
- Captain Picard

Dr. Who


Fifth Doctor: [Touched, raises his hat in salute] "To days to come."
Tenth Doctor: "All my love to long ago."

I love the new Doctor Who but I still can't get into the older stuff.
Patrick Flanagan once epxlained the older Dr. Who to me this way:
"Dr. Who is a really excellent radio show, that is televised for some reason."

Torchwood

"Tell me what it means to be human in the twenty-first century."
- Captain Jack Harkness
As much as I love the New Dr. Who I really love this dark, wild, mature spinoff.

Battlestar Galactica

(The new one.)
I really hated the way this ended but cannot fault it for it's drama and story telling.
Really great! Edward James Olmos as an actor is inspirational.
Really well written, detailed and interesting to watch.
I love the fact that the good guys (the humans) are polytheists and the bad guys (cylons) are monotheists.
"The dignity and integrity of the human race ride with us."
-Admiral Adama

Shõgun
(The television miniseries)

I can watch this nonstop, straight through, and quote most of it.
A wonderful production based on a really great book.
Also Toshiro Mifune reminds me of my father.
"They fear nothing, least of all death."
- Vasco Rodrigues

Connections
All of them. I love this show, as well as The Day the Universe Changed.
"Never before in History has so many, known so little, about so much."
- James Burke

The Simpsons

Simply the funniest show ever made.
"They have the Internet on computers, now?"
- Homer Simpson

Black Adder

Another very funny series. I like them all, but season two was the best.
"To you Baldrick, the renaissance was just something that happened to other people wasn't it?"
- Edmund Blackadder

Highlander

The TV series; it didn't exactly follow the first movie
but the characters were good and it more than stands up by itself.
"It's good to be a myth."
- Methos

Kung-Fu

The original series.
"Wherever you are, I will be with you. Wherever I am, you will be with me."
- Kwai Chang Caine

The Twilight Zone
The old original Rod Serling show.

"You unlock this door with the key of imagination.
Beyond it is another dimension- a dimension of sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind.
You're moving into a land of both shadow and substance, of things and ideas.
You've just crossed over into the Twilight Zone."
- Introduction

Television Episodes:

The Inner Light
Star Trek: The Next Generation:
My choice for the best hour of television ever.

Picard/Kamin: "Seize the time Meribor! Live now!
Make now, always, the most precious time of all.
Now will never come again."
Meribor: "I love you father."

Mirror, Mirror
Star Trek
My all time favorite classic Trek episode.


"If change is inevitable, predictable, beneficial;
doesn't logic demand that you be a part of it?"
- Captain James T. Kirk

The City On The Edge Of Forever
Star Trek
(Yes, thank you, sit down Harlan.)

"Let me help. A hundred years or so from now, I believe,
a famous novelist will write a classic using that theme.
He'll recommend those three words even over 'I love you.'"
- Captain James T. Kirk

Duet

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Really good DS9 Episode.
Kira: "Why? He wasn't Gul Darhe'el!"
Bajoran: "He's a Cardassian. That's reason enough."
Kira: "No. It's not . . ."

The Darkness
Highlander

Tessa Dies.

The Obsolete Man
The Twilight Zone
"Any state, any entity, any ideology that fails to recognize the worth,
the dignity, the rights of man, that state is obsolete.
A case to be filed under 'M' for mankind... in the Twilight Zone."

Eye of the Beholder
Original Title: "A Private World of Darkness"
The Twilight Zone

"Now the questions that come to mind.
Where is this place and when is it, what kind of world where ugliness is the norm and beauty the deviation from that norm?
The answer is, it doesn't make any difference. Because the old saying happens to be true.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, in this year or a hundred years hence,
on this planet or wherever there is human life, perhaps out among the stars.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Lesson to be learned... in the Twilight Zone."
- Narrator

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