The Ultimate Answer to Kings: How to know when you've got too much time on your hands...

They say that Louis XIV had the inscription Ultima Ratio Regum cast into all the cannon of the French Army. It means "The Ultimate Argument of Kings," and that always struck me as one of the most honest and up-front things any ruler or would-be ruler ever said. "We can dress it up prettier than this, but when it comes down to the unvarnished truth this is what it's about: You'll do as I say or I'll send my goons to kill you."

I thought about that for a long time. If there's an ultimate argument, it seems only logical that there must be an ultimate answer. For years I thought the ultimate answer must be the bullets in my rifle, but it never seemed quite right. I've got bullets - he's got frigging Cannon Balls. I mean, if there were three hundred million rifles throwing bullets at him, then maybe. But we all know that's not going to happen. So if there's an ultimate answer to his ultimate argument, it sure as hell ain't bullets.

It finally came to me - and that's when I left the city, abandoned a goodly percentage of my goods, and gave all that was behind me a good, stiff Randian Shrug.

The ultimate answer to kings is not a bullet, but a belly laugh.

Friday, September 30, 2011

How to know when you've got too much time on your hands...

Daughter sent me this. :-)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...: Back when 8" floppies were the state of the art there was a program for the IBM System 23 that would play the William Tell Overture on a dot matrix printer. The musical 3.5" drives are cool too, but not an original idea. How about an orchestra consisting of floppy drives, teletypes, printers and maybe a telegraph key?; September 30, 2011 at 7:28 PM
Anonymous said...: Realest grin I've had in a while.

kel; September 30, 2011 at 9:00 PM
Tam said...: I feel like such a dork for thinking that's cool. :); October 1, 2011 at 7:41 AM
The Grey Lady said...: Is it possible that some folks just have to much time on their hands?; October 2, 2011 at 7:39 PM