Low Definition or: My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nachos

Perhaps the public wouldn't be so skeptical of the Pluto decision if its suggested planetary guidelines were less vague, but that doesn't make the event any less groundbreaking.

In fact, the line of reasoning employed by this decree will likely ripple across disciplines into the field of human biology: any day now, we will hear it announced that Gary Coleman is no longer considered to be a person.

We Won Them Over With Ice Cream

Until I have money, this may never become what you'd call a "travel blog" -- at least in the traditional sense. However, when other people visit here from foreign lands, I can always write about their trips.

This summer my friend and former co-worker, Andrea, got a pre-grad-school gig for teaching English to Taiwanese foreign exchange students. It was a group of about fifteen, ranging from 11 to 27 years old, but most of them college-age. Andrea asked for volunteers to visit her class so her students can practice conversing in English, and there were also opportunities to showi the folks around Colorado Springs outside of classtime. I joined in a couple of excursions, the highlight being the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo.




"Jeffrey", the oldest, demonstrably had the most cajones of any guy in this group if only for his ability to purchase and wear this hat.





Many of them chose to go by their selected "American names", some of which weren't really names but rather English descriptors they favored. A particularly fluent girl, "Wonderful", had to explain that one to me. The two of us would discuss sports and cultural traits of the U.S. and Asia. I learned some new things from her:

... "I didn't expect people in Colorado to be so nice. So helpful. They say hello to us and smile."

"Really?"

And she had some things to learn from me:

... "in fact, until this generation, soccer in America was mostly seen as a sport for girls."

"For GIRLS?"

The most difficult American custom for the Taiwanese students to come to terms with, at least from Andrea's and my perspective, was the ability to voice criticism without fear of certain punishment of some kind.

Here's a scenario. When I first met the group back in June, I walked into the class while they were watching Ken Burns' edge-of-your-seat "popcorn" documentary, Lewis and Clark: The Journey of the Corps of Discovery. My interruption seemed welcome. I love a good Ken Burns doc (The Civil War, Baseball, etc.), but when it amounts to 240 minutes of foreign gibberish laid over panning and zooming illustrations of trees and canoes and bears, it then qualifies as assisted suicide.

Andrea flipped the lights on as the second hour came to a close, and judging from the students' groans of wooziness, lights off was clearly preferable. She then asked the class if they'd like to see the other half of it later. They nodded.

"No, no, see, you don't have to watch it," she said. "If you guys don't like it, we can watch something else. I won't be offended -- I only checked this one out from the library because that's what they had."

The students glanced at each other, muttering in hushed Mandarin.

"If you thought the movie was boring," she continued, "it's okay. You should tell me so we can do something more interesting."

I chimed in. "If we think you like it, we will make you watch the rest of it."

"No!" they rang out. "No, let's do something else."

If you'd talked to the Taiwanese students during their first month in the U.S., they'd set out to convince you that everything was just sunshine and hamsters. Though I know they mostly enjoyed their stay, it wasn't always exciting considering they had no ready transportation -- a punishing handicap to have in this town.

Once they opened up and were more confident in disclosing their collective impressions, the group became much easier to cater to. From what I could tell...

They Liked:

-Manitou Springs: the #1 shopping destination for wooden lighters, saltwater taffy, and little bitty buffalo figurines. They bought these in excess on their last-day souvenir blitz , for which I tagged along. It was like participating in a drill. After "William" was checked out for a pair of silver earrings, his classmates waved him along like he should steal home, and we'd dash into the next shop that had a standing cowboy-slot machine at the entrance.

-Ice cream: Five minutes into that segment of the barbecue, it was clear that we didn't buy enough quarts of Josh and John's.

-Metallica, Tom Petty, and a song called "Earthquakes and Sharks" by Brandtson: These were tunes on a mix CD in my car that they'd clap or bob to the most. They weren't familiar with any of the artists, but if I had a Beatles CD, it would have been much different.

They Did Not Like:

-Hiking: At least not after a religious volunteer group decided that these greenhorns could get a good gosh-darn warmup by scaling Mt. Silverheels. Which is something everybody does their first week in Colorado, and I was apparently unaware.

-Downtown Colorado Springs: "Everything is too expensive."

Overall, the students seemed to have had a good experience here. Not sure if any of them will make a return visit to the Springs in years to come, but that's just because there's so much more country you'd want to experience before retreading this place. They'd have to experience a lot more than just Colorado in order to get a good picture of what is America.

But the same can be said to me.

Just Finished a Book: Dante's Inferno

This one was a long time coming. I got The Inferno from a good friend of mine for Christmas, and it was particularly hard to get into, though it's been one of the most enriching reads I've had.

My version was the Barnes and Noble Classics edition that employs the teriffic Henry Wadsworth Longfellow translation and, more importantly, a detailed Endnotes section that runs about a hundred pages. If you've ever read or tried to read The Divine Comedy, you know what a boon that is ("Who the hell is Cardinal Guido Cavalcanti de Arezzo degli Rosso Rigatoni?).

I will say that Dante Alighieri's Inferno, and perhaps The Divine Comedy as a whole, should be one of mankind's greatest epic poems, but it does have the most preposterous premise I've ever encountered. I'll make up a contemporary comparison that should give you an idea.

Okay, let's say former NYC Mayor Rudolph Giuliani wrote an entire collection of love poetry -- not of his wife but of an ideal woman/mistress we'll call "Beatrice" (just stay with me). His love poetry wasn't recognized as spectacular, but it was still pretty good. Now let's say after that, Rudy Giuliani wrote himself into an epic poem, which starts him out walking through a dark forest until he encounters the ghost of Abraham Lincoln. Giuliani is then praised by Lincoln as the greatest politician of modern times, and that he will be conducted on a private journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. Beatrice, Lincoln tells him, sits in heaven among Biblical women such as Rachel, and she personally sent Lincoln to take him on the trip.

It gets better. Once he reaches the First Circle of Hell (Limbo), Giuliani is greeted by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Teddy Roosevelt, who all embrace him as their peer. And Giuliani's poem about his fictitious adventure across the divine realms carries from there.

The Inferno is much like this, only instead of a politician (though he was that, too), Dante lauded himself as a great poet. Also, Virgil (who wrote The Aeneid) leads him through Hell instead of Abraham Lincoln. So Dante is very, as he might say, egocentrico.

As one would expect, The Inferno holds a lot of thinking material for theology that still very much applies to the present. One of the most thought-provoking concepts that it explored was how one should appropriately respond to the souls of the damned. Early on Dante encounters Francesca de Rimini in the Circle of Lust, where souls are punished by being whirled around in a tempest for all eternity. She tells Dante her story of how she'd carried on a love affair, for which she was murdered by her husband once the cuckold found out. In relating her tale she successfully evokes pity in the Pilgrim, and Virgil reproaches him for shedding tears for her. Virgil essentially tells Dante that to have any sympathy for the damned is to show a weakness of character. One must have the faith that Hell's punishments are perfectly deserved, and to think otherwise is to lack confidence in God's idea of justice. The notion of treating the damned (especially former friends and comrades) with nothing but righteous indignation is understandably difficult for Dante to get his head around, and though he does stumble a few more times in the journey, he is eventually able to close himself off from the pathetic appeals of all of Hell's inhabitants.

And I had trouble with this idea, too, but it all really is a matter of having the confidence in God's plans - and that Hell's punishments are doled out in the proper order of intensity (here's a map of The Inferno that states the order while resembling a kid's menu from Shoney's). I can't imagine somebody looking at the hierarchy of sinners and saying, "Yep, that's about right." Should counterfeitors ("falsifiers" on the map) really be kept deeper in Hell than murderers? An economist could argue so. Is it truly worse to betray your host than it is to betray your own kin? In medieval Italy, it was. Everyone has a different idea of which sins are worse than others -- at least different from Dante's -- and that's why we wonder if the sinners in the poem really are deserving of their fates, and thus unworthy of any sympathy.
You simply have to accept that Dante's idea of just desserts is also God's. But the concept is really something.

Another thing that makes the The Inferno stand out among all epic poems, let alone works of its time, is Dante's ambitiousness in both the monumental subjects he's tackling and the level at which he succeeds in tackling them.

When a medieval poet was to describe a sight or sensation that was overwhelming, it was customary for him to tell you that the thing was simply beyond description ("classical inexpressibility topos"). Chaucer, for example, did this frequently in some of The Canterbury Tales and more so in Troilus and Cressida, where he had the job of convincingly illustrating what it is to be in love. While he attempted and nailed some marvelous conveyances of infatuation and grief, Chaucer repeatedly admitted that his words simply failed him, so to preserve the incomprehensible perfection of the subject and his own reputation. This goes along with the tradition that poets of the time be humble in their craft, admitting their limits while asking for plenty of support from Calliope, the muse of epic poetry.

But you know what Dante thinks? Dante thinks they're all pussies.

When it comes to the indescribable, he goes for it. In doing this, he draws grandiose similes from Roman mythology and the Bible to relate the feeling of Hell at a frightening (and fitting) level of dreadfulness:

(Paraphrases, of course)

-"Remember how Queen Hecuba of Troy watched the Greeks slaughter her children as her great city crumbled, driving her so insane that she began barking like a dog? Well, these spirits I saw were more insane than that." (Canto XXX)

-"Want to know what the Ninth Bolgia looked like? Picture the all the bodies of the massacred Romans in the Second Punic War and those of the Trojans when Aeneas invaded Italy -- together -- and you're still not even close." (Canto XXVIII)

You'd expect Dante would cop out of conveying what it would be like to finally confront the almighty Lucifer (O Reader, you wouldn't want to know!), and you'd be wrong. Yes, he does offer the traditional "beyond words" preamble, but Dante tends to follow these with descriptions that actually do the thing justice. Here's how he treats Dante the Pilgrim's first sight of the Devil:

"Ask it not, Reader, for I write it not,
Because all language would be insufficient.
I did not die, and I alive remained not;
Think for thyself now, hast thou aught of wit,
What I became, being of both deprived." - Canto XXIV

To look upon Lucifer immediately struck him half dead. That's almost good enough for me, but Dante goes from there to portray Lucifer's wings, face(s), and collossal size to name some nasty attributes.

Previous to him, the classical poets like Ovid were known for describing humans morphing into beasts, and vice versa, but Dante one-ups them by setting to paper the novelty of a snake and a man transmuting (they come together and the snake becomes a man, the man becomes a snake). He actually begins the passage by saying something to the effect of "check this shit out, Great Poets! You've never done this before!" (Canto XXV)

The man had the audacity to take on what were considered the limits of human comprehension, and he often did so successfully in this book, alone. So yes, Dante is a cocky bastard, but he backs it up, making The Inferno such a rewarding read once you give it a chance.

The Dragon's Tail

I used to find it unnerving that it should be leave it up to the White House to investigate itself over mistakes that may have enabled 911, but I failed to realize that the media already does this sort of thing all the time. Rarely, though, have I seen this self-indictment occur with such passion as when a strange man in Bangkok confessed to the murder of JonBenet Ramsey.

The national news media have suddenly flipped to another face. The eye that used to glare at the Ramsey's in suspicion has softened to a look of reverance and pity, while scorning whatever evils happened to inflict such misery on these American martyrs.

It's surreal.

Last Thursday's Primetime provided a telling example, and a particularly dizzying one because of all the questions it presented the audience over the media's handling of the case. I'm no Aristotle, but I don't think we're the ones who should have to answer them.

-Why were the parents criticized for seeming detached in their public appearances?

-Why were theories of an intruder committing the murder dwarfed by the far less credible allegations that, say, that Mrs. Ramsey murdered her in a fit of rage when learning she had wet the bed?

-Primetime started showing photos of JonBenet in a T-shirt and jeans, or JonBenet in pajamas, which I have never seen in my life. I was unaware that the girl wore anything besides a black-and-white cocktail dress and layers of make-up. Asked Primetime, why all the pageant pictures and no normal little girl photos to accompany the stories?

"So what was it," asked Primetime finally, "that made people all around the country mourn the death of this little girl?"

Hmm. Was it, umm... YOU?

You. ABC News. The National Enquirer. The media. All of you, who spent the last decade airing or printing these "breakthroughs" of how the parents just aren't fainting on camera to appease us or how the son must have been homicidally jealous of his sister's attention. Let it be said that the publicity overkill you gave this case brought it many investigative resources it wouldn't have otherwise had, but the Ramsey's have to weigh that against ten years of hell. And let's hope they find that overdue justice for their daughter is worth the cost.

But the strangest part is the praise they bestow upon them now. Watch how many of these shows and articles suddenly underline the suffering of the Ramsey's, as if to highlight the durability of the human spirit. Coming from shows like Primetime, much of this treatment translates into: "These courageous parents... how did they find the strength to carry on after all the shit we did to them?"

At the end, Primetime asked us another question: What made JonBenet so appealing to the media? Why her, and not 9-year-old Amber Hagerman from Arlington (does the term "Amber Alert" sound familiar?) whose still-unsolved murder took place the same year? Primetime didn't speculate for too long on this one. But yes -- yes, as opposed to the 800 other American prepubescent girls who were both sexually assaulted and murdered that year -- why JonBenet Ramsey?

One can legitimately say that it was a matter of social class, or age, or the perverted sexual intrigue of child beauty pageants, or hair color for Christ's sake, but you can't look to these news programs to openly submit any answers. It's already too obvious. The news media are stabbing at the dragon's tail, which we can plainly see runs right up and around to their own ass.

In my wacko dreamland, the media would end this superficial self-indictment right now. News programs and magazines, then, would say nothing to the American public on the matter except for whether established pedophile John Mark Karr is guilty, and if so, whether he'll be put to death, and if so, with how many volts.

I Like(d) To Read

It's my fault, I know.

I registered for three literature courses this semester at UCCS (University of Colorado at Colorado Springs), and this just comes with the territory... not to mention a price tag of $200. I know students in the natural sciences who take as good a hit from buying just a single hardcover textbook, but what's neat about being an English major is that you have so much more to show for it.

My dream is to have a semester reading list I could climb. However, the fact that I'll graduate next May leaves me only one more opportunity.

(My other two Fall classes are TV Production and Mass Media, but they don't count. If you've ever taken a Communications course, then you know that textbooks aren't exactly necessary for success, regardless of what the professor would have you believe.)

Anyway, in case you're trying to read what's in the stack, top two books are Dickens' Great Expectations (hurray!) and Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights (boo! BOO!); no escaping those two titles, so fair enough. Then I've got Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, which also includes some his stories Young Goodman Brown and the Birth-mark (hell yes).

The anthologies in the middle are English and American lit, but the most notable one is on the bottom. That blue monster is a survey of works that run from Beowulf to The Life of Samuel Johnson, and it's the kind of book that you keep around for seemingly endless perusal or if you just want to be a show-off. So needless to say, its value to me is twofold.

These new classes start up a week from today, and at this point I still have that scholarly resolve to read every chapter, story, and essay that my professors throw at me, and then some. I feel like the guy in the Twilight Zone episode who is the last man on Earth with all the books he could ever want.

But the thing is, I can only make good on my resolve to read everything if I either get struck with insomnia or survive nuclear fallout. But if that's the case, then things are lookin' up.

Ever Wanted To Be a Writer For Letterman's Top Ten Lists?

Well, you can forget that nonsense because you're never going to be. However, there is a site I've been visiting for years that posts bi-weekly top ten lists, to which anyone can submit a presumably humorous one-liner. Christian and Scott's Interactive Top Ten List has been going strong for 11 years, and has a vast archive of user-created lists. First a user suggests a topic, the site authors approve it, and then people who think they're just hi-goddamn-larious submit over 500 entries for the list. The authors then draw from these to compile the funniest top ten.

I've submitted things under the names Macdeth, Cyrano, and Dr. Onteevee. To name a few, my entries (ahem) can be seen in the more recent "Signs You Have Become a Video Game Hero," "Reasons to Look Forward to the World Cup," and "Uses for an Out-of-Gas Hummer"

Once you see one of your genuine entries posted on a new list, it's a good feeling. Then you get all jazzed and submit like crazy to the upcoming ones, but success isn't always forthcoming. Soon you begin to question Christian and Scott's appreciation of a good Lindsey Lohan burn, and the interest fades for a while. But the site is always there, and I've pilfered many a joke from its regulars for use in conversation.

There Can Only Be One

The congressional incumbancy rate being 98-99%, I'm surprised aspiring congressmen haven't attempted more Macbeth-style assassinations. Instead they seem to prefer waiting. For Colorado's 5th Congressional District, though, the wait is finally up.

When 20-year-term Rep. Joel Hefley (R - Pangaea) was showing signs of wearying, a line was forming in my district for those who wanted to beat his high score. Before ballots were cast, six Republicans were vying to represent the Centennial State in congress for a term that will likely turn out to be centennial, as well:

John Anderson -- Former Colorado Springs Sheriff (who's gonna blast them terrorist varmints)

Duncan Bremer -- El Paso County Commissioner

Jeff Crank -- Hefley's Chief of Staff

Doug Lamborn -- State Senator/"Tax Crusader"

Bentley Rayburn -- The "I'm Not A Politician, I'm a Military Guy" Guy

Lionel Rivera -- He's the Colorado Springs Mayor (said Springs residents: "You know, I heard about that!")

Now, I hear tell that in parts of the U.S. they have congressional races with the Conservative vs. the Liberal. In Colorado, it is more commonly the Conservative vs. the True Conservative. A Colorado Republican primary is necessary to weed out the five posers among the candidates, so normally campaign ads around here consist of the competitors playing "Out the Liberal":

"Sure, Bill Williamson says he supports upper-bracket tax cuts and funneling all remaining state education funding toward military defense, but did you know that he DOESN'T want the Ten Commandments tatooed into the groin of every registered newborn child? Clearly he is not interested in your values, Colorado. Vote for values -- vote for Bob Robertson."

This year the ads were pretty tame, threatening to make the 6-man battle royal uninteresting even by election standards. The Reagan-inspired cease-fire on attack ads (between Jeff Crank and Duncan Bremer) was just a wet blanket, if you ask me.

But then came the day that the absentee ballots were to be mailed in, and in an assuredly unrelated stroke, mud-slingin' was on. Lionel Rivera and Jeff Crank, being targeted by groups tied to Doug Lamborn, were accused of being "pro-gay radicals" and potential tax hikers (said people who know Jeff Crank: "Daaaah ha ha HA!"). For either allegation to stick would cost them the race, so Rivera took a nap and Crank riposted by calling Lamborn anti-military. As they say: "SNAP!"

Mr. Crank's counters were less widely publicized, preserving his Good Guy image with voters while Lamborn's own supporters began deserting him. Then came election night, and Crank was ahead in every county, dooming Lamborn's bid for greatness. But not unlike Gandalf the White in The Two Towers, the absentee voters returned in the end to drive Lamborn to glorious victory.

Now it is over, and by the dawning light the people of Central Colorado have championed their True Conservative, who this November will face Democratic candidate Jeff Fawcett. In lieu of an election, Colorado tradition decrees, the True Conservative may meet the liberal in a town square and behead him. This year's liberal, however, will be heavily moneyed by the currently overflowing campaign coffers of the Democratic Party, which they may use to buy Mr. Fawcett a very nice suit. Must he perish, quoth they, he shall be perish in style.

Hey Other College Dudes

When you're finished with a bottle of booze, throw it away.

Throw it away.

You don't have to keep it. Or set it in a bookcase that is stocked with your housemates' other spent bottles with the aim of impressing guests with "dude, look at all the things we drank!"

So you're alcoholics with range.

Huzzah.

A Lesson in Imbecilitude

If you scroll down a bit to my previous post, you'll see what motivated this one. Mr. Casey Pollack (a.k.a. jesusmarine2005) admitted in one statement that he was "new to the Christian thing", but as you'll see he learned to shit fire and brimstone pretty quickly. Also, he is what Plato would refer to as the Form "Ignorance", and perhaps that is no coincidence.

That Flying Spaghetti Monster thing got me thinking about the divide between the religious folks I like and the ones I don't particularly fancy, and it's not just a matter of extremism. I find that it mostly depends on how much of a novelty faith is in that person's life.

I enjoy hanging out with the people to whom their religion is like a spouse of 10 years. They know a lot of what's wrong with it and a lot of what's great about it. They question why they're with it sometimes, but overall they're glad to have found it. Their faith brings them comfort and not frenzy. Love and passion, but never more of the latter. I know that over half of all American marriages end in divorce, but just humor me, here.

Born-agains, on the other hand, are oftentimes more in love with their faith, disregarding rational thought and outward awareness for the squall of emotion that comes with the sudden desire to be saved. Feeling that they found Christ is, as I've had it described to me, like finding their soulmate. Except that instead of encouraging friends and strangers "get out there and find yours!" born-agains say, "you must have mine and mine only." Naturally, the only other people who can stand them are those who are also "in love".

Let's just say that Mr. Powell's online detractors and myself are not, and that's made most of the difference.

Imbeciles Do Battle!

The Church of Flying Spaghetti Monster is a joke that got way out of hand.

It started with a letter. Out-of-work rapscallion Bobby Henderson wrote to school boards in the Bible Belt requesting that if they're considering mandating teachings of Intelligent Design based on the Christian god, they should also allow for alternate interpretations of it, accounting for the fact that people believe in many gods. Hence, schools should have no qualms with additionally teaching the origin of the world as it was set forth by the invisible, omnipotent deity known as the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

It isn't the best analogy for what Christian Intelligent Design advocates, as at least one thoughtful objector insists, but in my opinion it's not far off. I got a real kick out of it.

But see, this letter, which was meant as a joke, has spawned an actual "church" complete with its own bible. As with any effective work of verbal irony, there will be a percentage of readers who don't understand that it's merely a joke, which in this case includes some of its "pastafarians". The other demographic makes up much of FSM's touted Hate Mail section, and you can guess who they are.

The hate mail does have its moments of valid criticism (coming from folks who "get it" -- but still aren't fond), but many of the... erm, interesting letters, I believe, are not a product of religious beliefs per se. Many of the venomous responses to FSM are people using so-called Christian righteousness to mask what seem like massive head injuries.

I suggest you read the "Casey Powell Hate-Mail Saga" if you'd like to observe a study in human psychosis. This character is an example of the above, and he doesn't just send FSM one humdinger of a hate letter from jesusmarine2005@yahoo, but a string of emails, and then he rumbles with his critics in the three-ring circus that the comments section has become. Here is the progression of Mr. Powell's conversational tactics:

1. Rage: He follows up the original letter with an onslaught of emails once he learns that Bobby Henderson posted the letter on his site. He almost immediately demands to have his named removed from it and thus remain anonymous.

2. Threats: Casey threatens to sic his lawyer on Bobby for "libel" and "invasion of privacy" as he sends Bobby dozens more insults within hours (And no, I don't have that backwards). The asking price? $400,000 in damages.

3. Bargains: Eventually, Casey curiously offers a deal to FSM that if they remove his original letter, he will promise to shut down his fledgling anti-flying spaghetti monster "smeer" site (It's a tiny Blogger page, in fact, that he has probably lost interest in).

4. Apologies: In an especially intriguing shift, Casey seeks forgiveness for his very un-Christian comment that Bobby is a "fucking retard" whom he hopes will "burn in hell."

5. Disownment: It wasn't Casey Powell who wrote the original email to begin with, as he later reveals, but someone who broke into his Yahoo account to send FSM the hate letter, unbeknownst to the real Casey Powell. Paranoia of a defamation conspiracy? Personality schism? Spectacular attempt at saving face? The plot thickens.

I admit I may not have the order right, which you might find forgivable considering that Mr. Powell revisits these stages repeatedly throughout the discussion. But it's all quite fascinating. Right down to the part where he tells his detractors:

"I hate you. Like serious. But I also pray for you. I pray for you despicable bastards because I hate you and Jesus' fatherly plan says that I should love you and forgive. So yes. When I say that I hope you all get cancer, what I am really trying to say is that I love you."

I don't like taking things out of context, which is why I stongly suggest you look over the site I linked (though it may take a couple hours -- worth it for some). Still, you can look at a quote like that and wonder if context is even necessary for passing accurate judgment.

What bother me almost as much as our theologian in question are the more infantile counterattacks to his statements. Though most of the anti-Casey camp only offers condescending jibes along the lines of, "Hey Casey, thanks for the laughs, you rascal," others sink to his level of nastiness and name-calling without providing relevant critique. You'll get a thinker here or there, but the side of "good" is made up of one too many quasi-intellectual potsmoking man-boys who think they are roxorz. I liken the spectacle to a deathmatch between ten hyenas and a lobotomized yeti.

But then again, this is the readership of Flying Spaghetti Monster. I've never read a thread so involving, but by expecting an enriching debate perhaps I'm taking it a little too seriously.


"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."

-- Albert Einstein