Films and literature are full of those wicked characters who act against the protagonist and other good-natured people. Most stories need at least one character with evil deeds and intentions behind their name to make the story worthwhile. Nonetheless, in the end, the villain invariably faces retribution and the hero is saved. In this list we will discuss some of the nastiest baddies who have tormented both pages and screens and discuss how they met their demise, for the focus of this list, in the form of taking a tumble.

This jealous Queen has had her beauty washed away by years of aging, and now her stepdaughter, Snow White, is the fairest in the land. Angered by her magic mirror that has brought her this news, she sends her huntsman to kill Snow White. After he cannot find the heart to harm the beautiful young princess, the Queen takes on a peddler’s disguise and offers Snow White a poisoned apple. Snow White falls into a sleeping death, but her prince, and true love, kisses her on the lips and Snow White awakens. When the Queen intends to drop a boulder off a cliff on Snow White, the boulder crumbles into many tiny pieces and the Queen falls off the cliff to her death, where vultures devour her.

This queen is much like the one from Snow White. She sends Gizelle via a waterfall to New York City away from her love, a prince. The Queen is jealous of Gizelle’s beauty and wants her dead. Gizelle’s prince, Edward, journeys down the waterfall to find Gizelle. It turns out that Gizelle falls in love with a divorced father of a young girl and Edward falls for the man’s fiancee. It is proven that this father is Gizelle’s true love as he awakens her from the sleeping death from the Queen’s poisoned apple, whereas Edward’s kiss did not awaken her. Nonetheless, the Queen transforms into a dragon and chases Gizelle to the top of the empire state building, but she slips, breaks her wings and falls to the ground.

Gaston feels he is in love with Belle, a beautiful young woman who is regarded by the villagers as strange. Belle spends most of her time reading and her father is an inventor whose inventions never work. Nonetheless, Gaston feels attracted to her beauty and feels the need to woo and marry her. When Belle’s father gets lost, he finds himself at the Beast’s Castle. Belle’s horse takes her to find her father. The Beast sends Belle’s father away, but slowly grows to care for Belle, who has agreed to stay at the castle, in place of her father. The Beast releases Belle when she sees that her father is unwell. Gaston calls Belle’s father a lunatic for claiming to have seen the Beast. To prove him wrong, Belle shows Gaston the Beast with his enchanted mirror. Gaston resolves to kill the beast. After a great fight at the castle, Gaston falls from the roof. Belle admits to loving the Beast and he changes back into a prince.

A great example of a famous explorer turned madman, Muntz journeyed to Paradise Falls in his youth and brought back the skeleton of a giant, fabled bird. His colleagues thought the skeleton was fake, grew angry with him, and stripped him of his scientific awards. He promised to return to Paradise Falls to bring back a live specimen. 70 years of searching and tracking with dogs almost paid off, and would have if it was not for Carl Frederickson (an elderly widower who had dreamed of visiting Paradise Falls since boyhood) and stow-away Russell (a child wilderness enthusiast), both of whom were traveling in a balloon-hoisted house. They found the bird, and Russell called her Kevin. Muntz uses various wicked tactics at capturing Kevin, such as driving his dogs after Carl and Russell and trying to push Russell off his blimp in a chair. In the end, however, Muntz falls from his blimp into the jungle below, never to be seen again.

Captain Hook was a pirate who wanted to slay Peter Pan, the boy who would never grow up, and capture Wendy, the girl he took to live with him in Never Land. Hook was so evil he shot members of his own crew if they ever disagreed with him and tried to drown Wendy’s brothers. At the same time, there was a crocodile who had bitten off Captain Hook’s hand (hence the hook) and wanted to eat the rest of him. After the croc found Hook, Hook tried to fly away like Peter Pan by thinking happy thoughts, but, in the end, despair overtook Hook and he fell into the crocodile’s mouth.

Many believe Darth Vader to be the main villain in Star Wars, but perhaps the real villain deserving of first prize would be Emperor Palpatine, his master. Palpatine manipulated Anakin (the future Vader) since he was a boy to turn against the Jedi and join the Dark Side. Palpatine was successful until he decided to turn Vader’s son, Luke, to the Dark Side. When Luke refused, Palpatine unleashed lightning on the young Jedi intending to kill him. Vader, unable to see his son destroyed, turned on his master and threw him down the shaft of the Death Star, where the Emperor was vanquished.

Fantasia 2000 includes a rendition of The Steadfast Tin Soldier. The tin soldier is in love with a ballerina, but not if an evil, sword-wielding jack-in-the-box has anything to say about it. He loves the ballerina as well, and, upon seeing the pair dancing together, throws the tin soldier into the sewer! The soldier is released to sea, where a fish swallows him. Luckily, the soldier is rescued by a fisherman, and the soldier marches back to his box. The jack-in-the-box tries to turn on him again and they fight. However, this time, the soldier manages to send the the evil jack-in-the-box falling into the fire and the steadfast tin soldier affirms his love to the ballerina.

Maybe a bit of a victimized villain, but a villain nonetheless. Smaegol (the former Gollum) and his cousin find the ring while fishing in a lake, Smaegol kills his cousin and the ring corrupts him. Bilbo, the Hobbit, steals the ring and Gollum wants his “precious” back. Gollum meets Frodo, Bilbo’s nephew, whilst Frodo is on his quest to destroy the one ring of power. Gollum pretends to “swear on the precious” to lead Frodo on his quest to destroy the ring, when all Gollum really wants is to kill the young hobbit and take the ring back for himself. Frodo survives Gollum’s clever scheme to have him killed by spider Shilob, and proceeds to the Crack of Doom to throw the ring into the fire. Frodo succumbs to the ring’s power and decides to keep the ring, but Gollum bites off Frodo’s finger, and after an aggressive fight with Frodo, falls into the fire himself. Frodo is remembered as the hero who saved Middle Earth.

Probably the nastiest bishop you ever saw in twelfth century England. He poisoned the former bishop to make himself bishop and has Lady Regan Hamley kill the archbishop of Canterbury so he could become Archbishop. With the Hamleys (other villains) under his wing, they corrupted the church to take control. They impeded Tom Builder’s attempt to build a new Cathedral after the old church burned down. After framing Jack, Tom’s assistant, for the murder of Tom’s son, Jack’s mother presented irrefutable testimony against the bishop. Bishop Waleran climbed to the top of Jack’s newly build cathedral but fell from the roof after the audience of the trial pursued him. Prior Philip said “Ego the absolve” (I absolve you), but the Bishop just spat blood in Philip’s face and died.

The Hunchback, Quasimodo, from 15th century Paris, was a bell ringer that Frollo would never let leave the tower because of the hunchback’s disfigured appearance. One day, Quasimodo decided to disobey his master, and, despite much laughing and jeering from the villagers, met Esmeralda, and was immediately attracted to her. Frollo noticed Esmeralda, and wanted her as his own and had Quasimodo bring her to him. Quasimodo attempts to do so, but Frollo’s guards accuse him of kidnapping. Quasimodo is sentenced to pillory, but Esmeralda feels sorry for him when she sees him and gives him water. Frollo later sees Esmeralda making love with Phoebus and tries to kill him. The guards falsely accuse Esmeralda of the crime and sentence her to be hanged. Frollo says he will spare Esmeralda if she says she loves him, but she refuses. Quasimodo saves her from the hanging and pushes Frollo from the tower into molten copper. Quasimodo and Esmeralda confirm their love in the castle’s secret chamber.

Growing up in the 1950s-1980s we were surrounded by household items that we just took for granted. They were part of our everyday lives, some decorative, most functional, sometimes both. And pretty much everywhere you went, everyone had them, your family, your neighbors, your friends. Sadly, today many of these old household staples are disappearing, going the way of the icebox, the hand crank telephone on the wall or the coal bin in the basement – things that everyone knew in the 1920s but were pretty much gone when I was a kid in the 1960s-1970s. Of course we are all nostalgic for “the way it used to be” and glamorize things that really were not all that great for our parents, but for which we have fond memories as children. Still, it is sad to see some of these items disappearing. And for those commenter’s who are hung up on “American-centrist” lists, that’s all I can write about because, obviously, that is where I grew up. Did other countries have some or all of these normal household items back in the 1950s-1980s? Probably. Or at least I think so. Anyway, here is a list of the top ten common household items that are going extinct.

For most households, food was eaten at the dinner table, and nowhere else. But if you were having a party and needed to spread out, there were the ubiquitous table trays. People could eat their piece of birthday cake and drink their glass of lemonade using one of these easy to fold and put together metal table trays. The trays usually had some sort of floral pattern on them, or some festive scene. They usually came six trays to a storage rack. The rack had a handle to carry them around. You could find the rack with the six trays neatly folded and positioned somewhere out of the way, beside the sofa and against the wall. Maybe hidden inside a coat closet. But they were always there. As kids we would set these trays up around the living room, get blankets, drape them over the trays, and use it as a fort. You seldom see these folding table tray sets anymore.

What family living-room or den did not have a hassock (often referred to as a “poof” in non-US English)? Those (usually) round, Naugahyde, vinyl or leather-covered foot rests that no one ever seemed to use to rest their feet on. In fact, in my entire life, I can hardly remember seeing anyone actually using a hassock for the purpose for which it was intended. But they were always there, silent sentinels in their garish colors, guarding the TV set.

Mothers were really good at placing seasonal decorations around the house. As a kid, you didn’t need to have a calendar or even know what month it was. Just look around the house and mom was on it. Shamrocks and leprechauns hanging on the front door? It was St Patrick’s Day. Cornucopias and pilgrims? Thanksgiving. Eggs and bunny rabbits clinging to the windows? Easter. Mom has a closet somewhere in the house where she kept all this stuff, and she needed a lot of it. Valentines, Fourth of July flags, Halloween ghosts and witches on brooms. And of course, lots of Christmas decorations. People today seem to keep the Christmas decorative spirit alive, and some of the other big ones like Halloween and Easter. But you see less and less of the Lincoln and Washington cut out busts hanging on the door. Only the truly dedicated seasonal decorator was all over Presidents Day. I think that is sad; I think we move too fast and are not as in touch with the changes to the seasons and the various signposts along the way. Valentines into St Patrick’s Day. Easter into Mothers Day. Fourth of July into Halloween. Halloween into Thanksgiving and then Christmas.

When I was in fourth grade, all the way back in 1968, our teacher told us someday TV sets would hang on the wall like pictures. At a time when few of us even had color TV sets in the house that was kind of hard to imagine. But she was right, it has come to pass that almost all TV sets today hang on the walls. And while these TV sets are fantastic, you seldom see the old TV sets that were made to be another piece of furniture in the house. Decorative sets made of wood that sat on four legs, on the floor, usually in the corner of the living room (with one of mom’s seasonal decorations sitting on top).

And since most people have cable or satellite TV, they also do not have the other staple of TV communication – the rooftop antennae. Setting up, positioning, and repairing the rooftop TV antennae was the suburban equivalent of medieval jousting. All suburban dads had to do it to prove their manhood. There they would be, in all weather, up there on the roof, precariously perched near the electrical and phone wires, trying to get the antennae positioned just right to bring in some far-off TV station they wanted (usually so they could watch a boxing match, football game, or other sporting event). Or more frequently, just to get the damn thing to work. Suburbia and cities used to have a skyline of various size and shapes of TV antennae. Not anymore. Now you have over-sized pizza pans pointed at the sky. And some guy from the satellite company comes and works on it if it needs repaired. Dads are off the hook. Still, the poor reception we get on our TVs when it rains, or when we have a bad cable connection, are far removed from the days of trying to watch a TV show through the snow, static, and rolling picture that used to come as a routine part of antennae sets.

One of the best memories of these old TV sets came several years back when we inherited an old black and white TV from my wife’s grandparents. I brought it home and plugged it in and got my two teenage sons with me to turn it on to see if it still worked. I switched on the set and nothing happened. They immediately gave up, thinking, “that’s it, the set is broke.” I knew better, of course, and told them to wait. About 30 seconds later, after the old vacuum tubes warmed up, the set made that unmistakable sound we all remember TV sets making as they switched on, that sci-fi like noise, and the picture slowly started coming on as a dot in the middle of the screen that slowly got larger and larger. My boys were beside themselves screaming – “TV sets really do that?!” “No way!” “They really do make that noise?!” “You’re kidding?!” “We thought that was made up?!” No, I told them, that was how all TV sets used to start, you turned them on, waited, and hoped.

My grandmother had a foot-pump sewing machine, but when I was a kid they were already antiques. Every woman had a sewing machine, usually a Singer model in a case that she could get out of the closet, put on the table, plug in, and sew away. What a fantastic skill to have, to be able to sew. To put patches on our uniforms. To repair torn clothing. To make a new dress from a pattern. It seemed all mothers had that skill when I was a kid and it was commonplace to see the family sewing machine being used. Something else that you seldom see.

Before everyone had window air-conditioners, and then central air-conditioning, people did one thing in the summer months. They sweat. Summer months, especially July and August, were something that had to be endured. Unless you went to a public place like a movie theater, there was no air-conditioning. If it was 95 and humid outside, your house was even hotter and more uncomfortable. Trying to sleep at night was a real difficulty. The old window fan that rattled away and sucked in slightly less hot air from the outside, during the night, was a staple of all households. Many other rooms had floor fans that you could plug in and circulate the hot humid air around the room at your feet. Or as a kid you could turn it on and lay on the floor with your face in it, feeling the moving air. With central air-conditioning being almost universal now, homes seldom use window or floor fans. Dads around the world no longer have the joy of cramming the window fan into the window, adjusting it, screwing it into place, and then taking it out come fall.

And speaking of dad wrestling with windows, he had another biannual job to do, one even more hated than window fans. Putting in and taking out storm windows and screen windows. Again, in this age of air-conditioning and well fitted, double-panned, thermally insulated year-round windows, no one has to switch between storm windows in the winter and screens in the summer. But back then, this was a necessity. Screen windows had to be installed in the summer so you could let the air in without the bugs. Then at the end of the summer, the screen windows had to come out and the storm windows went back in. These storm windows were pathetic compared to modern windows – heavy, single-pane glass monstrosities that were hard to fit into the window slats and once in, rattled in the strong winter winds (and did a poor job keeping out the cold and wind). But like everything else back then, they were all you had. So they had to do. Thankfully, men don’t need to haul these things around and climb ladders to change windows anymore.

Family wall telephones were in every house back then. There may have also been some pedestal phone sitting on a coffee table or in your sister’s room. But somewhere, usually on the first floor, there was a phone hanging on the wall. Usually it came in the standard color – black. When it rang everyone knew someone was calling. The phone was usually located near some piece of furniture which had a drawer which contained two other disappearing pieces of the family household – the Yellow Pages phone directory, and mom’s little phone message book (that’s right, they had an app. for that even back then – it was called writing down the persons name and phone number in a little A-Z book). The original wall telephones came standard with 4-6 foot cords, so you pretty much had to stand at the phone to talk to whoever it was you were conversing with. Later on they developed 12 and even 18 foot long cords so mom could stretch that receiver over to the stove and keep cooking while she talked. We had one friend who had a mom who stretched their 6-foot cord into an 18-footer. We always joked she invented the extended reach telephone cord. Of course with cell phones, few people even have a phone in the house anymore, and the Yellow Pages may soon be extinct.

Every house had multiple sets of playing cards. Pinochle, bridge, or straight decks, usually all three. The area I grew up in was huge for pinochle, everyone had pinochle decks. You could walk into any corner store, department store, or convenience store and they sold decks of pinochle cards. Not anymore, pinochle decks are hard to find. They just don’t sell, so the stores stopped carrying them.

Playing cards was a social thing everyone seemed to do. Kids would get out cards and play a game of “war.” Mom would have pinochle or bridge parties and all her friends would come over, dressed to the nines, and mom would bring out all her best glassware. Dad might have some buddies over to drink beer and play poker. Card playing was just part of our lives. Sadly, we are not as social as we used to be, friends don’t just pop in to say hello and a card game spontaneously erupts. Moms don’t have regular card parties. If we play cards, it is on our smart phones or computers. Like that book “Bowling Alone,” we still play cards, just not with other people. How sad.

Of all the old household items I miss from my childhood, this is #1. The backyard burn barrel. It was a rusty old empty 55-gallon drum dad brought home from work or found at a junkyard, or God knows where he got it. In the autumn, my favorite time of the year, you knew winter was coming because the geese were flying south, you were playing football, school had started, and the smell of burning leaves was in the air (oh yeah, mom had the Halloween decorations up too). Everyone had one of these in their backyards to burn their fallen leaves. There were no curbside pick-ups to recycle the leaves back then. You just raked them up, and burned them. My mom loved it. She would stand there with an old broom stick handle, blackened at one end, and stir the smoldering leaves to get more air to them so they would combust better. We would rake up the leaves and walk over and dump arm fulls into the burning barrel. Then my mom would stir it like a witch attending her cauldron. There was just nothing like the smell of burning leaves in the autumn, and there still isn’t to this day. Most municipalities and cities banned the burning of leaves decades ago, so it is something you only found in more rural areas. Machines come around and vacuum up your leaves at the curb. Perhaps more environmentally friendly, but we have lost that wonderful seasonal odor as a result.

Remember S&H Green Stamps your parents would get when they bought groceries and other stuff? You had those little books and you would save the stamps all year. Then one day your parents would break out the box of stamps and the books and you would all gather at the table and have a green stamp-sticking party. By the end you were down to the little tiny one-cent stamps, trying to fill that last book (and your fingers were green). Then you counted your books and got out the S&H Green Stamp catalog and looked to see what you could redeem your stamps for. Ten books got you a new basketball! Twenty-five books got mom a new frying pan. Thirty-five books got you a new cooler, or the ubiquitous American eagle table lamp. The stuff you were able to get with your S&H Green Stamp books could be found all over the house. This explains why every house in the 1970s had the Bicentennial American eagle table lamps. It also explains why so many houses had #10 and #9.

We all make bad decisions. Fortunately our decisions don’t usually cause continent-wide destruction. Here are the most catastrophic decisions of the twentieth century. I think you’ll find a few surprises.

Though Harry Truman was under extreme pressure to end the war and reduce American casualties I think his decision to drop two atomic bombs on August 6th and August 9th, 1945 was in error. The Japanese were already defeated. According to Army Air Force General Henry H. (Hap) Arnold, “It always appeared to us, atomic bomb or no atomic bomb, the Japanese were already on the verge of collapse.” President Eisenhower declared in an interview with Newsweek: “…the Japanese were ready to surrender and it wasn’t necessary to hit them with that awful thing.”

Bad move. In the late 1960s and early 1970s the so very lofty upper-class took control of the Democratic Party. Since then the Democrats rarely win elections, no matter how stupidly the Republicans behave. Tragically some thought this new elitist Democratic Party would be pro-peace. In fact the Democrats are more war-like than ever, only now the wars are even more pointless. (Example: our invasions of small Muslim nations.) What happened to Democrats that stand up for working people?

General MacArthur said that any defense secretary who advises the president to fight a land war is Asia should “have his head examined.” Unfortunately this is just the advice Defense Secretary Robert McNamara gave to President Johnson, and troop levels rocketed upward in the mid-1960s. The war suited the enemy. No domestic opposition was permitted in Vietnam so the government didn’t have to worry about public opinion. Vietnam possessed a large population that could hide from American firepower in the dense jungle. In contrast, the United States media often criticized the war effort. Americans don’t like high casualties, especially not in an interminable war half way around the world.

The 9/11 Commission chaired by Republican Tom Kean concluded that Saddam Hussein did not aid Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attack. The Iraq Survey Group concluded that Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction after 1991. So why did so many people die in the 2003 launched Iraq War? Why the huge expense?

After World War II, many Jews fled to Palestine and established the new nation of Israel, thus antagonizing a huge new set of people – the Muslim community which now numbers about 1/5 of the world’s population. Hitherto Muslims had been particularly anti-Jewish, but after the Zionists massacred villages and forced the original population to flee, Muslims turned against the Jews. It would have been far preferable for Jews to migrate to any of the English-speaking nations.

The December 7th, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor was madness. What’s startling is that Admiral Yamamoto, who planned the attack, knew very well Japan could not possibly win a protracted war against the United States. The U.S. possessed a far larger population and greatly superior industrial strength. Though his staff celebrated on December 8th, Yamamoto was sunk in depression.

If only the decision had been made to remove Chairman Mao from power! The long-suffering Chinese people would have been spared the Great Leap Forward (actually Backward), the Great Famine of 1958-1962, and the Cultural Revolution. Just one of Mao’s bright ideas during the Great Leap Forward: his plan to exterminate sparrows. He thought the sparrows consumed primarily grain, where in fact they consume a lot of insects. With the sparrows gone the locust population exploded, causing immense ecological damage.

Winston Churchill never should have issued a guaranty to Poland in 1939, which led to war when Germany invaded Poland. As esteemed American diplomat and historian George Kennan wrote: “the British guaranty to Poland … was neither necessary nor wise.” The British and French didn’t have the power to save Poland from Germany. Churchill’s foolish guaranty only benefited Stalin, who was happy to see Germany, France, and Britain destroying one another. Stalin had killed millions of his own people in his vast system of prison camps and the engineered famine of 1932-1933 (the Holodomor). Churchill I think should be singled out as the single worst decision-maker of the century. As First Lord of the Admiralty he energetically banged the drums for war as Britain pondered whether to enter World War I. Churchill also deserves a great deal of blame for the disastrous Gallipoli campaign. Churchill as Chancellor of the Exchequer oversaw the catastrophic return of Britain to the gold standard, which helped bring about the Great Depression.

Prime Minister Clemenceau perhaps deserves the most blame for the vindictive Versailles Treaty (signed 1919) though some of his compatriots thought him too generous. Despite promises made to the Central Powers, territory was parceled out by the victors regardless of the wishes of the inhabitants. Germany was saddled with huge reparations payments, impossible to pay. Economist John Maynard Keynes wrote of this decision: “I believe that the campaign for securing out of Germany the general costs of the war was one of the most serious acts of political unwisdom for which our statesmen have ever been responsible.” The Central Powers were unfairly forced to accept sole responsibility for the war. Keynes concluded that the Versailles treaty was a “Carthaginian peace.” Versailles vengeance sowed the seeds for World War II.

In 1914 Prime Minister Asquith and Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey decide to involve Britain in World War I, although it was France and Russia – not Germany – that threatened the British Empire. British policy called for an alliance against the most formidable continental power, but long-term was Germany alone so overwhelmingly superior to both France and Russia? If Britain had not send troops the war would have ended within a year. Europe would have been spared one of its greatest nightmares – the millions that died from machine gun, cannon, disease, poison gas, and starvation. The rise of the Bolsheviks in Russia, with all its attendant misery, and the atrocities of World War II would also have been avoided. Instead of the Great War we would have had the relatively minor War of 1914, and Europe would never have descended into the depths of despair and decadence from which they still haven’t entirely recovered.

Music is a factor in almost everybody’s daily life, some more than others though. There are many places that come to mind, perhaps New York City, Los Angeles, London, etc., but unfortunately many great music scenes exist that are completely under-recognized. I’ve complied a list here.

Akron’s most famous band is undoubtedly the blues rock band The Black Keys, but the city also features a large indie music scene. The largest and most powerful genre in Akron though, is the Garage Rock scene. It has two annual festivals, Akron Summer Music Festival and Lock (which just wrapped up).

Popular Akronite Artists: The Black Keys, James Ingram, Devo, Len Chandler

Cape Town, South Africa’s second most populous city, has a jaw-droppingly huge electronic scene in which almost all electronic sub-genres are represented. You can hear New Age to Dubstep to Trance. The electronic scene flourishes along a traditional African music scene. It features one Jazz Festival held every summer.

Popular Cape Town Artists: Tidal Waves, Kinetic, Rattex, Yunique

Houston has a rap scene unrivaled in the region. Just going to downtown and uptown shows how large the rap scene is by the sheer number of music venues and nightclubs. Houston is isolated from many rap hubs so it has developed a unique, one-of-a-kind style. Many artists have very choppy and repetitive beats and lyrics creating a sound that is rare in rap music. The city also features several music festivals and many non-music festival events feature a concert or two.

Popular Houston Artists: Alicia James, Psyguy, Marx De Lux

In Minneapolis’ music scene nearly all genres are represented. With indie, underground, rap, electronic, and even a unique and thriving spoken word/poetry scene. The city also boasts around ten music festivals of many genres. With the largest being Bella Music Festival, which is primarily a local music festival.

Popular Minneapolis Artists: Soul Asylum, The Replacements, Bob Dylan (once based in Minneapolis)

Omaha has a history of music dating back to the early 1920s. It was one of the driving cities of African American music in the 1920s and 1930s. It was also a driving city of surf rock in the 1960s. Currently though, it has several scenes ranging from metal to hip-hop and several in-between including country, jazz and indie. It also features three annual music festivals.

Popular Omaha Artists: Bright Eyes, The Faint, 311

Iceland’s most famous artist is by far Bjork. Iceland features many other genres of music though, ranging from a very large indie scene to folk to electronica. It even features a SXSW-esque festival in Reykjavik called Iceland Airwaves in which all clubs in Reykjavik are filled with local and international artists. Iceland also has a number of niche music festivals. The most unique of these being Viking-themed, LBGT artists in a Gay pride festival and, a young artists-based festival.

Popular Icelandic Artists: Bjork, Sigur Ros, Mum, Esja

Denver is a very up-and-coming music scene. It includes many genres although metal and punk are the dominant ones. One of the rising genres though is the offspring of the metal scene and the small, yet vibrant jazz and funk scene. It is now one of Denver’s staple genres. Denver also features many music festivals.

Popular Denver Artists: Judy Collins, John Denver, Kyuss, 16 Horsepower

Ireland has a long history of music with its earliest (known) artist living in 920s A.D. The traditional Irish music still is relatively popular today, despite the large amounts of emigration in the area in the 19th and 20th centuries. Traditional Irish music still influences many Irish artists today. Today though it has several thriving genres including: indie, rock, and folk. Ireland also has dozens of music festivals.

Popular Irish Artists: U2, The Cranberries, Enya, Snow Patrol

Vancouver has a large and flourishing indie music scenes that is starting to throw out some big names in indie rock. Vancouver also has a small but very acclaimed hip-hop scene that has had some success. The electronic/industrial scene of Vancouver is not as strong as it used to be, but it is still relevant. Vancouver has a couple of music festivals, most notably the Vancouver International Jazz Festival.

Popular Vancouver Artists: Dan Mangan, The New Pornographers, Hot Hot Heat, Japandroids, Said The Whale

Denton is a Texas town located about 50 miles northwest of Dallas. The University of North Texas has one of the best music colleges in America. Denton has a music scene that is beginning to rival that of Austin’s. Denton has hundreds of artists in which every genre is represented. Its music scene has rapidly developed in the last decade. Indie music is the primary staple of Denton music. Denton also has a a festival that is made to rival SXSW, called 35 Denton. It also features a popular Jazz festival.

Popular Denton artists: Bowling For Soup, Fishboy, Meat Loaf, Neon Indian, The Riverboat Gamblers

Much like the men’s one, here is a list of the 15 biggest female snubs of the past 15 years (1996-2011). Again, all of these choices are just my opinion; I expect suggestions and disagreements. WARNING: there will likely be spoilers in this list.

We start our list with Keira Knightley as Cecilia Tallis in Atonement. She may not be given the benefit of the doubt, but this and A Dangerous Method (2011) show that when she is given good scripts, she can make the most of the material. She plays Cecilia with alternating lust and vindictiveness toward James McAvoy and Saoirse Ronan, respectively. She breaks free of Elizabeth Swann and gets a chance to play a three-dimensional character, and makes the most of it.

As Annette Bening’s partner in a two-mother relationship, Julianne Moore plays her character as a modicum of mystery. Her affair with Mark Ruffalo’s character Paul sets off a chain of heartbreak and confusion, which shockingly works itself out for her and Bening by the end.

Sarcastic and sassy, Shailene Woodley received a Golden Globe nomination as the smart-alec daughter of George Clooney. Unfortunately, a Golden Boy nomination eluded her this year. Her bitter monologue towards her dying mother reveals a vulnerability and sadness that will stay for a while. Her troubled character is only a teenager, but her performance is well beyond her years. With a little more time, this performance could probably be ranked higher.

Admittedly, the film hasn’t held up to its critical acclaim recently, but it is certainly good for an adaptation of a graphic novel. While Hugo Weaving is fantastic as V, it is Natalie Portman as the strong-willed Evey Hammond that makes the film. Her rebellion and corruption by V is one of the most enduring character performances of the 2000s.

As Josh Brolin’s trailer-trash wife, Kelly Macdonald provides his character Llewellyn Moss with a level head. Her final confrontation with Anton Chigurh, where she pleads (albeit unsuccessfully) for him to spare her life is one of the most enduring moments of the film. She alternates between comic relief, loving wife, and tough-willed woman throughout the film.

In many ways, Emma Thompson’s character Karen is the glue of the film – she is the sister of the new British Prime Minister, and she provides a shoulder for Liam Neeson to lean on. She also plays mother to two children, hoping to keep the cheer going during the holiday season. When she finds out about Harry’s (Alan Rickman) affair, she finally loses her composure and weeps while listening to “Blue” by Joni Mitchell. Nothing is more appropriate for this film.

Wood’s character Molly serves as a wannabe “femme fatale,” lusting after Ryan Gosling while still trying to impact the Democratic primary. After great performances in Thirteen (2003) and The Wrestler (2008), Wood becomes an adult in this film. Her character is a teenager in an adult’s body, and her monologue about getting pregnant and her subsequent frantic phone calls before her demise are shattering in a film that shatters the grand illusion of American politics.

As the mother of a 12 year-old boy, Toni Collette should have earned her second Supporting Actress nomination for this film. Her troubles with motherhood forces Hugh Grant’s Will to act as a surrogate to her son, while she struggles to put her life back together.

Mixing politics and satire, Hope Davis serves as a great foil to Paul Giamatti’s Harvey Pekar. 2003 was a better year for female performances than people realize (as will be seen later in this list), and Davis is no exception. Her “chronic nerviness” and scathing commentary help make the film one to watch.

Admittedly, Scarlett Johansson hasn’t made the best choices since, but one could argue that without Lost in Translation, she wouldn’t have broken out. Her counterpoint to Bill Murray’s character Bob Harris, her character is suffering a quarter-life crisis, and they struggle to pick themselves up surrounded by the lure of Tokyo’s nightlife.

As the enigmatic precog Agatha, Morton plays a frightening symbol of what the future could become. Seeking to avenge her mother’s murder, Agatha is the heroine in a film where anti-heroes are the norm, and her character helps Tom Cruise beat the system.

She may be more famous as Jake Gyllenhaal’s older sister, but Maggie Gyllenhaal’s performance in Secretary shows that she is talented in her own right. It’s a powerful character study about personal dysfunction and the power of submission, as she becomes the submissive partner of eccentric attorney James Spader. Her devotion – which could also be argued as being a stalker or as a weak-willed woman – holds up, and her character Lee is one of the screen’s premier female anti-heroes.

It could be said that her performance is better – and certainly just as heart-wrenching – as her Oscar-winning performance in A Beautiful Mind. As Kathy, Connelly is a recovering drug addict and alcoholic whose ignorance cause her to lose her father’s house. Connelly is brilliant as an addict, but even more as a seductress, luring married policeman Lester (Ron Eldard) into causing trouble for the Behrani family. I doubt Jennifer Connelly’s performance would have beat Charlize Theron, but man, it would have been closer than it was had she been nominated.

I think the only reason (as fickle as it sounds) that Mila Kunis was snubbed was because of her role as Meg Griffin. Regardless, Kunis’ character Lily is the embodiment of the “femme fatale” – or is it all part of Natalie Portman’s hallucination? One of the most psychologically chilling performances, Lily is hypersexual, and certainly convinced that she could be Nina. Her “bad girl” image is a perfect contrast to Nina’s conservative, controlled image which gradually falls apart. We get to see Kunis as a bad girl, and it’s a chilling portrayal.

Kate and Leo re-unite, and it’s evident the chemistry is still there between the two. I have no problem with Kate Winslet winning Best Actress, but this is the movie she should have won for, instead of The Reader. Her character April Wheeler starts as an enthusiastic and idealistic young wife, whose love and spirit wane over the course of twenty-plus years. Her scenes with Leonardo DiCaprio indicate that even when they aren’t living pseudo-happily ever after (a la Titanic), there is still an amazing camaraderie and friendship and deep-seated love and respect between them. Why she was nominated for The Reader instead eludes me, as she proves just how fraudulent and farcical the American can be, and often is.

I have written several other fire-related lists for Listverse but never one on this topic. Prisons, and insane asylums are not the kind of buildings people typically think about when they consider fire safety for the occupants. But humans can die just as easily and quickly in a burning building that is a prison as they can in a factory or a school. In fact, they can die far more easily as they are, in most cases, locked inside the building and can only escape the fire if someone unlocks the doors holding them in. In addition, many older prisons and asylums had little to no fire safety warning or suppression systems and were constructed of wood and other combustible materials. Finally, prisons and asylums were (are) usually overcrowded and those that are in charge of their operation are far more inclined to worry about intentional or accidental escapes of the prisoners/occupants than putting out the fire. All of these factors make fires in these types of building especially deadly for those trapped inside.

There have been many examples of tragic loss of life fires at prisons and what were then called “lunatic asylums.” I included both prisons and asylums in this list because they share so many common fire safety hazards – overcrowding, locked doors/cells, etc. There are scores if not hundreds of possible prison and asylum fires to include in any such list. For this list I chose a few notable, and few lesser known (in some cases, almost completely forgotten) tragic fires.

One thing that seems to never change when it comes to these fires is that reforms are talked about, questions asked, and concerns raised but the underlying causes of these fires such as overcrowding, are seldom addressed. I anticipate the most recent tragic prison fire of just two days ago, the tragic fire in Comayaga, Honduras, which so far has killed at least 355 people, will once again force us to evaluate fire safety in prisons and mental health facilities. And once again, probably nothing will change as a result. Here are ten tragic and horrible prison and asylum fires.

On March 7, 2005 the Higuey prison, made to hold 180 prisoners but used to house over 400, was the site of one of the worst prison fires in history up to the Comayaga Honduras prison fire. On that morning there was a riot of the prisoners at the prison. Supposedly the fight started in one wing of the prison between two sets of prison gangs and the guards were unable to control the riot. The prisoners then set fire to mattresses using weed killer to try to keep the guards away. The resulting fire and smoke killed at least 134 people and 26 more were injured. Only about 20 prisoners in the cellblock survived.

The Colney Hatch asylum was one of the earliest psychiatric prisons and was in operation from 1851-1993. Among its famous guests was John Duffy the serial killer, a possible Jack the Ripper suspect, and a woman who dressed as a man to fight on the front lines of World War I. It was a huge, sprawling complex (it was said that to walk the entire asylum took one over five hours) and housed up to 3,500 “patients.”

At around 5:30 PM on January 27, 1903, a steam whistle sounded a fire alarm at the asylum. City residents heard the siren and streamed into the London streets to see the growing blaze take hold of the building. The fire had started in one of the bottom block of wards. Soon the entire southern block, known as X Ward 5 was ablaze. The building was made of wood and the breeze fanned the flames. There were less than a dozen staff trained to fight fires in the prison fire brigade and they were quickly over matched by thee size of the blaze. The flames and smoke spread to X Ward 4 through the long corridor (said to be the longest continuous corridor in London). By the time London city firefighters arrived and were able to get water pressure, it was nearly an hour after the fire started and the entire temporary ward on the south side of the building was destroyed. The corrugated iron roof melted and collapsed. In all, five wards were destroyed. Apparently there were over 600 Jewish women (this was the Jewish ward of the building) in the five wards, but many managed to escape. The death toll was at least 52 people. Londoners were frightened that lunatics had literally escaped the asylum and were roaming the streets.

The Oakley Training School is a juvenile correctional facility located near Raymond, Mississippi and it is Mississippi’s sole juvenile correctional facility for children. Today it has a capacity of 150 students. However, it was originally called Oakley Farm and it was a State prison. Built in 1894, it failed due to poor soil in the area the women prisoners were moved to another State prison. But in 1913 it was still the Oakley Prison Farm and also the Mississippi state prison hospital and this is when the fire happened.

It is unclear how the fire started but like all buildings of the time it as constructed of wood and burned quickly. After spending the day working the cotton fields, the prisoners were locked up for the night on the second floor of the two-story prison building. When the fire started, it quickly burned the single stairs leading to the second floor. The prison had no fire apparatus to fight the fire. Local farmers ran to the prison to try to help the guards but nothing could be done. The prisoners screamed and tore at the cell bars, but no one escaped. When the fire ended, 35 prisoners, all of them African American, were dead.

The Maury County jail was located in the center of the city of Columbia Tennessee when it caught fire on Sunday June 26, 1977 during visitor’s hour. Before the fire was over, 33 inmates and 9 visitors were dead.

Unlike the older prisons that caught fire, Maury County jail was made of modern, fire-resistant construction – concrete and cinder block with few combustible building materials. However there was no fire alarm system, or sprinkler system, only fire extinguishers to fight a fire if one started. At the time of the fire there were 63 inmates, approximately 20 visitors, and 5 guards in the building. It was visiting hour and the visitors, as was the normal practice, were locked inside the jail with the prisoners.
Though the building was made of fire-resistant materials, the padding in the padded “drunk tank” was flammable – made mostly of PVC and other combustible materials, secured to plywood on the walls. Early that afternoon, a 16 year-old prisoner was moved to the drunk tank. He asked a visitor for a cigarette and the visitor gave him one, as well as his own lit cigarette to light it. At about 1:30 PM, the prisoner started yelling that his cell (the drunk tank) was on fire.

The guards opened the door to the drunk tank to rescue the prisoner (he would live as they dragged him outside) and a wall of flame and dense smoke blasted into their faces and the hallway. Visitors who were not locked in with prisoners quickly escaped but in the confusion, the guard with the keys lost them and they could not be located as the prison filled with black smoke.

Firefighters arrived quickly from the local fire department located one block from the prison, but already the building was filled with black smoke and they could not reach the prisoners trapped in their cells. They did, eventually get inside and put out the fire in the padded walls of the drunk tank. Meanwhile, firefighters using sledge hammers, cutting tools, and trucks and chains, pulled out some of the exterior walls to the prison cells and the few prisoners who escaped death managed to get out through these holes. But before it was over, 42 people were dead, most killed by carbon monoxide and cyanide gas from the burning plastic padding.

An almost identical fire to the Maury County jail fire occurred on June 21, 1977 at the Saint John city prison/holding center located inside the Saint John city hall, a 16-story high rise building in the center of the city. The building housed the city and municipal offices as well as the police and a small prison/holding area for prisoners awaiting trial. Again, the building was of modern, non-combustible construction, but contained a padded “drunk tank” holding cell. And again, this is where the fire started.

A prisoner was placed into the “drunk tank” padded cell, and a short time later other prisoners began to yell that there was fire. No one knows how he started the fire but again, as the guards arrived and opened the cell door, they were hit with a flash over of heat, smoke, and flames as the combustible and deadly gases from the burning plastic ignited. This quickly spread smoke through out the prison. Again, the guards managed to drag the prisoner out of the building and he lived, and in the confusion, again, the cell keys were lost, but quickly found. However, as guards attempted to open the metal cell doors to free the prisoners, they found the doors would not open. At first they thought the heat had melted and warped the locks but it was later determined the heat of the fire had slightly warped the metal cell doors in their sliding tracks so the doors would not slide. Firefighters had to use an acetylene torch to get into the cell block to remove the bodies.

Again, the fire itself was small and quickly extinguished, but the smoke contained deadly carbon monoxide and cyanide gas. When it was over, 21 inmates were dead.

When constructed in the late 1800s, the Seacliff Lunatic Asylum was the largest building ever built in New Zealand at that time. The asylum was built in an isolated coastal spot and forested area. It could handle 500 patients with 50 staff. Created by one of New Zealand’s legendary 19th century architects, the prison was grand in scale and design. One commentator, describing the location and scale/grandiosity of the prison remarked: “The Victorians might not have wanted their lunatics living with them, but they liked to house them grandly.”

On December 8, 1942 at around 9:45 pm a fire broke out in Ward 5 of the hospital, which was a two-story, wooden “out building” added onto the original construction of the prison. It held between 39-41 female patients, all of whom were locked inside their cells or a common dormitory. Male prison workers noticed a fire in the building and quickly tried to get the fire under control using a fire hose system. But the fire spread too quickly through the wood structure and though two women were saved, the rest perished as the flames consumed the building and it collapsed. All that could be done was to prevent the fire spreading to the remainder of the building. Either 39 or 41 people, all women, died.

The true extent of the horror at the Comayaga Honduras prison fire of February 15, 2012 is still not known. The latest reports have more than 350 prisoners killed in the fire. Sadly, this fire was only of several recent deadly prison fires in the country of Honduras. On May 17, 2004 the San Pedro Sula prison fire killed 103 prison inmates and followed another deadly prison fire in Honduras only a year earlier. (the April 2003 prison fire at the El Porvenir Prison farm killed 86 prisoners).

San Pedro Sula is the second largest city in Honduras and it is an economic center for the small country. But it is also a center for gang violence and leads the country in the number of murders. Many of the gang members were housed in the San Pedro Sula prison. The fire allegedly started with an electrical short in a refrigerator kept by gang members in one of the cellblocks but it is also thought that one of the prison gangs intentionally set the fire. All of the victims were gang members. The prison was built to hold 800 but was holding almost 2,000 when the fire occurred.

Even by the horrible standards of care received by those who were sent to 19th century insane asylums, the Longue Pointe asylum seemed to be something right out of a nightmare. The prisoners were chained, handcuffed and generally treated like animals, which was something all too common for such institutions.

Established in 1873 the Loungue Pointe asylum was one of Canada’s largest at the time and was completely operated by Catholic nuns. It held 1500 inmates. The fire originated around 11:30 AM on May 6, 1873 in the third ward in the women’s wing of the asylum. The asylum was divided into flats – the fire hit the fourth and fifth flats which each housed about 50-60 people. It was thought that one of the female inmates set fire to the building as she had previously tried to set fire to herself. Though there were fire hoses, it appears they were not connected to the pipes supplying the water. The women were of course kept locked away in the wards and it appears every one of them in the fourth and fifth flats died. When the fire was over, 94 of the women were dead as well as four Sister of Providence nuns.

An editorial in a Montreal newspaper the next day said that given the size of Lounge Pointe and the overcrowding it was only a matter of time until such a tragedy occurred. The paper blasted the lack of fire fighting apparatus and know how which could have saved many of the people and called for an investigation and reforms to be made to the asylum system in Canada as a result of the fire. The editorial asked if there were not in fact many large and similar public buildings which could also catch fire leading to huge loss of life, and wasn’t it just pure chance that fires did or did not kill? Also, they asked, “does not such an event (the fire) indicate that the whole system of Government inspection of asylums is for all practical purposes worthless?” The paper correctly pointed out that the chances of escaping a burning building are poor enough for the sane, but even less for the insane. It then went on to say, “the chances of a fire being started in such a place are greatly increased if over a thousand people living in it are lunatics.”

The worst prison fire in US history occurred on April 21, 1930 at the Ohio State penitentiary in which 322 people were killed. Built in 1890 and only designed to hold 1,500 prisoners, by the 1930s the Ohio State penitentiary was housing 4,300. It was undergoing renovations to add more space at the time of the fire and in fact, construction activities may have caused the fire (the cause of the fire was listed as ‘incendiary”).

What is known for certain is the fire started at around 5:00 PM just after prisoners had knocked off construction for the day. Did a prisoner set the fire as a diversionary tactic for a prison break? That was one possibility, though never proven. The fire began at the northwest corner of the prison roof. The fire quickly spread through the wood roof and frame of the six story tall prison. The guards became aware of the fire at about 5:20 PM but at first did not believe it. The guards quickly realized the fire was real and told Warden Preston Thomas. Thomas was convinced it was a prison break and delayed calling the local fire department, instead calling the local National Guard to come help keep order. By the time the Columbus Fire Department was notified 20 minutes later, they arrived to a scene of complete chaos and death as the fire raged through the wood structure with prisoners on the top two floors already being burned alive in their cells. Still, there may have bee n time to save at least the prisoners in the cells of the lower part of the prison, but guards later testified they were ordered not to unlock the cells and let the prisoners escape.

Finally, as the National Guard had arrived with the fire department, guards and the few prisoners who were not in cells desperately and heroically tried to get to the inmates still trapped inside. One man later said he had tried to reach a prisoner who was screaming from his cell “for God’s sake let me out, I’m burning!” but could not. He ran away as he could no longer stand the screams of the men dying inside.

As some of the prisoners were finally released from their cells, they attacked the firefighters for the fire hoses to try to save their fellow inmates. The National Guard had to put down a near riot. One guard reported: “we could not reach them for the bars, the convicts dropped to the floor, they were literally burned alive before our eyes.”

The full details of the February 15, 2012 fire at the prison in Comayaga Honduras are now becoming clear, and it is a horror story right out of the mind of Stephen King.

Honduras has the highest murder rate (80 per 100,000 people) in the world and has been described as a “failing state.” Gangs essentially rule the country. The country is a central area for drug and weapon trafficking between South and North America. All of the jails in the country can hold 6,000 inmates, but have over 12,000 crammed in.

At 11:00 PM on February 15, a prison inmate called the state governor Paola Castro and screamed that he was going to burn the place down. The man then set his own bed on fire. The governor dispatched fire officials to the prison who arrived but were not allowed in by the prison guards who thought the screaming they heard was part of a riot or prison break. After a delay of 30 minutes the fire fighters were allowed entrance but could find no keys to open the six barracks which each contained about 100 prisoners. All of these barracks were on fire.

It is thought that 358 died and perhaps 100 prisoners escaped but the final death toll is still unknown. Workers dragged out the charred bodies from the prison. Some inmates thought they could survive the fire by standing in the showers with the water running on them. They too died. Others were found pressing their arms against the corrugated metal roof trying to break out, piled one on top of each other.

Family members felt the fire was set by the government and was no accident. The angry crowd of relatives threatened the guards and police, who hit the crowd with tear gas and fired bullets into the ground. It is reported that half of the prisoners were not even charged with a crime and that for a prison built to hold 500, only 12 guards at night guarded the 800 inmates. One human rights documentarian stated: “When fires break out, they will not open gates to release prisoners and they die inside. It’s happened before … They haven’t learned because this is a collapsing country, they’re not interested in making change.”

Marcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman politician, lawyer, and orator who lived from 106 BC to 43 BC. He was one of the very few “new men” in Rome, meaning the first man in his family to become a senator, and gain the highest office of consul. He’s best know for stopping the Catiline Conspiracy, his philosophical works, and his devotion to the Republic. Cicero was invited to join the powerful political union formed by Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey, but Cicero refused, and became an opponent of Caesar. The following quotes come from his various writings, speeches, and letters.

1) “Where there’s life, there’s hope.”

2) “Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book.”

3) “My refutation would be framed in considerably more forcible terms if I did not feel inhibited by the fact that the woman’s husband- sorry, I mean brother, I always make that slip- is my personal enemy.”

Note: This quote is from Cicero’s defense of Marcus Caelius Rufus, who was charged by his former lover Clodia of trying to poison her, and murdering an Egyptian envoy. Cicero here references the rumor that Clodia and her brother, Publius Clodius, were also lovers. Clodius and Cicero were enemies mainly as a result of the Bona Dea scandal- Clodius was discovered disguised as a woman at a ceremony held at Caesar’s house, and when he went to court for sacrilege, Cicero disproved his alibi. The matter was made more complicated when Cicero’s wife accused him of carrying on an affair with Clodia. Cicero uses his defense of Rufus to completely tear Clodia apart, calling her “a lewd and depraved prostitute” among other things. Rufus was declared innocent.

4) “If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.”

5) ) “Six mistakes mankind keeps making century after century:
Believing that personal gain is made by crushing others;
Worrying about things that cannot be changed or corrected;
Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it;
Refusing to set aside trivial preferences;
Neglecting development and refinement of the mind;
Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do.”

6) “The life given us, by nature is short; but the memory of a well-spent life is eternal.”

7) “Though I miss the convenience of your help at every point, it is not for my sake but for yours that I am sorry you are unwell… Be sure at this time not to attend in your kindness to anything other than what is most appropriate to regain your health.”

Note: This comes from a letter Cicero wrote to Tiro. Tiro was a family slave, who continued to work for Cicero after he freed him. He was very important in Cicero’s life and career, since he took dictation for him, organized his finances, and helped him with his writings. He published some of his own work, including a biography of Cicero, but these have been lost. Tiro was also the creator of Tironian shorthand, which was used into the 17th century for note taking.

8) “To study philosophy is nothing but to prepare one’s self to die.”

9) “What is morally wrong can never be advantageous, even when it enables you to make some gain that you believe to be to your advantage. The mere act of believing that some wrongful course of action constitutes an advantage is pernicious.”

10) “Friendship makes prosperity more shining and lessens adversity by dividing and sharing it.”

11) “It is foolish to tear one’s hair in grief, as though sorrow would be made less by baldness.”

12) “You assumed a man’s toga and at once turned it into a prostitute’s frock. At first you were a common rent boy; you charged a fix fee, and a steep one at that. Curio soon turned of, though, and took you off your game. You were as firmly wedded to Curio as if he had given you a married woman’s dress. No boy bought for lust was ever as much in his master’s power as you were in Curio’s. How many times did his father throw you out of his house? How many times did he set the watchmen to make sure you did not cross his front door? And yet under cover of night, driven by lust and money, you were let in through the roof tiles.”

Note: The “you” being addressed here is Mark Antony. This quote comes from one of Cicero’s many Philippic speeches against Antony. As you’ll see by the last quote, Antony didn’t exactly laugh these speeches off.

13) “Not to know what happened before you were born is to be a child forever. For what is the time of a man, except it be interwoven with that memory of ancient things of a superior age?”

14) “No one dances sober, unless he is insane.”

15) “Let the welfare of the people be the ultimate law.”

16) “The young man should be praised, honored, and exalted.”

Note: Cicero said this about Octavian (Augustus). The last part in Latin is tollendum, the joke being that this word has another meaning besides to exalt: to be destroyed, or gotten rid of.

17) “What I most badly need at the moment is a confidant… And you whose talk and advice has so often lightened my worry and vexation of spirit, the partner of my public life and intimate of all my private concerns, the sharer of all my talks and plans, where are you? I am so utterly forsaken that my only moments of relaxation are those I spend with my wife, my little daughter, and my darling Marcus. My brilliant, worldly friendships may make a fine show in public, but in the home they are barren things. My house is crammed of a mourning, I go down to the Forum surrounded by droves of friends, but in all the crowds I cannot find one person with whom I can exchange an unguarded joke or let out a private sigh.”

Note: This is from a letter Cicero wrote to his friend Atticus.

18) “When I notice how carefully arranged his hair is and when I watch him adjusting the parting with one finger, I cannot imagine that this man could conceive of such a wicked thing as to destroy the Roman constitution.”

Note: This is in reference to Caesar, who had a reputation for being a bit vain.

19) “The name of peace is sweet, and the thing itself is beneficial, but there is a great difference between peace and servitude. Peace is freedom in tranquillity, servitude is the worst of all evils, to be resisted not only by war, but even by death.”

20) “Come here soldier. There is nothing proper about what you’re doing, but at least make sure you cut off my head properly.”

Note: Cicero said this to Herennius, who was ordered to kill Cicero by Mark Antony during the proscriptions of the seconded triumvirate.

I have always been fascinated by people that survived extreme situations. I always wondered how long I would be able to survive if I was lost on a snow-covered mountain or ledge-locked on a cliff or trapped in the middle of the ocean on a raft. The answer is – it depends. It all depends on how prepared you are for the situation, or even how lucky you are. The simplest of things could end up saving your life, like a nail or a piece of string. It was surprising to learn that almost all the people from this list were rescued just in time except, in my opinion, the longest survivors. Thousands of people have been lost at sea, never to be seen or heard from again, but yet, there are a small handful that survive against every odd. One of the basic rules of survival is three hours without shelter, three days without water and three weeks without food. Could you prove this rule wrong?

On a sunny day in late autumn of 1982, a boat set out on a routine trip from Maine to Florida. There where five people on board, John Lippoth and his girlfriend Meg Moony, Mark Adams, Brad Cavanagh and Deborah Scaling Kiley. Although they would have to endure each other’s company for quite a while on the trip, they were all strangers except for John and Meg. From the start of the trip things were going south as John and Mark just could not see eye to eye and were both heavy drinkers. The weather started to deteriorate on the 2nd day at sea, and by that evening the waters where raging with 60 knot winds and 15ft swells. Brad and Debora stood first watch for over 11 hours in the storm, while John, Mark and Meg where all below deck drinking. When John and Mark were sober enough to take their turn watching, Debora and Brad finally got some rest. They were woken in the middle of the night by panicked voices, and stood up to realize the boat was filling up with water fast. It turned out that John and Mark lashed the steering wheel and went back to sleep instead of staying on watch above deck.

They untied the life raft but it immediately blew away. Luckily they had an inflatable zodiac boat on board, which they inflated and got on the water. Everyone managed to make it to the zodiac, but Meg was caught in the rigging, and when she finally made it, she had deep lacerations, almost to the bone, on her arms and legs. Once they reached the zodiac, they tried flipping it round, but the wind kept blowing it back, so they ended up treading water for the next 18 hours while waiting for the storm to pass. Meg was exhausted and the others had to constantly support her weight just so that she wouldn’t slip beneath the water.

The next day, the storm had calmed down and they managed to turn the zodiac around and get in. Looking into the water from the boat they could see hundreds of sharks around them, and they stayed with them for the rest of the trip. By the third day, Meg had severe blood poisoning, and would lie in an almost catatonic state, without movement or speech. Mark and John had started drinking sea water that night and were becoming increasingly incoherent and delusional. John was the first to go, as he thought he could see land. He simply said that he was going to the shop for some cigarettes, slipped over the side and swam a short distance. The people on the zodiac heard a scream and then just silence and John was gone. Around the same time, the delusional Mark said he wanted to cool off and slipped into the shark-infested waters, there was a thud beneath the zodiac, and the water around them turned red as Mark disappeared from view. During the fourth night, Meg died.

The next morning when Brad and Deborah woke up, Meg’s body was stiff and they rolled her into the sea. It was not long after that they saw a boat coming towards them. The boat saw them and hauled them on board to end their tormenting journey.

On 25 April, Josh Long (17) and his best friend, Troy Driscoll (15), decided to go shark fishing. They launched their boat into the sea, near where they lived in South Carolina, without noticing the rip tide warning flags on the beach. The tide swept them out faster than they could dream of paddling back within minutes. In the struggle to paddle back, Josh knocked his brand new fishing rod overboard, and in frustration over losing his rod, he threw their bait over as well.

The boys started their hellish journey without any food or water or means to acquire either. In addition they also did not have any shade, or anything else, besides the clothes on their backs to shelter them from the blazing sun. All they could do to prevent heat stroke was to take short dips in the water, but after a close encounter with a shark, they stopped swimming as well.

They managed to hold on for an incredible six days with no water and only the occasional jellyfish as food. On the 6th day, after scratching dying messages into the boat, for their families, they heard a boat and managed to signal them to stop. After the rescue, both boys were taken to hospital to recover from the severe sunburns and dehydration that they suffered. Troy’s condition was so poor, that doctors said he would only have survived for a few more hours.

Amanda Thorns (25), her father Willie (64) and godfather Dennis White (64), set sail from the Cape Cod on the 6th of November. Even though Amanda had sailed around the Cape Cod area with her father many times before, this was to be her initiation into blue water sailing, and they planned to travel to Bermuda.

At about 12pm on the 6th, rough water rolled in and the three were forced into the cabin to try and wait tout the storm. On the 4th night, with the storm still raging, Captain Thorns stood watch on deck while Amanda and White tried to get some sleep. Between the 30ft waves came an even larger monster wave, and rolled the entire boat. The captain, along with the mast and almost all the rigging where swept off the boat and became tangled in a rope mess hanging down the side of the boat. They tried everything to pull the captain back on board when the ship turned around again, but their efforts where useless and they had to cut him loose to be swept away by the waves.

For the next three days Amanda and White grieved the loss of their father and best friend from below deck, constantly bailing out water and trying to keep warm, while the storm raged outside. Having lost all communication equipment and power to the boat, there was not much that they could do. Instead they listened to the anchor and mast (still hanging on the side of the boat)being slammed into the side of the boat over and over again, knowing that is could break the hull completely at any second. They tried to signal passing ships with half of their parachute flares to no avail.

Ten days after they had lost the captain, White managed to pull the anchor on board. As a last desperate survival attempt, white took the 10ft mast from the boats dinghy and tied it to what was left of the main mast. He flipped it open sideways and it caught wind. They managed to sail 50 miles on their first day, and on the second they were shooting off flares again, at a large tanker that was passing nearby. This time luck was on their side and the boat saw them. On 21 November they finally made it to Bermuda, grief stricken by the loss of the captain, but happy and lucky to be alive.

On 23 August, a 10m wooden Thai fishing boat, carrying 20 crew members, broke to pieces and sank in rough water. Most of the crew was forced overboard and where never seen again. Two men hung onto a large icebox, used to store fish, as the boat went down. They managed to climb into the icebox once it started floating, but there was no way for them to help any of the other crew members.

It is believed that the icebox was hounded by 50 knot winds caused by cyclone Charlotte, and it was by pure luck that the icebox did not capsize in the extreme weather conditions. The weather was both a blessing and a curse though, as the men would never have made it without the monsoon rains, which provided them with fresh drinking water almost daily.

They floated like that, with only some old fish that was left in the bottom of the icebox, and the rainwater which the icebox caught, until the 17th of January. They were spotted, by pure luck, by a routine customs search plane, which radioed a rescue chopper. The picture was taken from the customs plane, and shows the two men desperately waving their shirts in the air, in hopes of being spotted.

Following their rescue, they were taken to Thursday Island, where they were treated for severe dehydration, starvation and extreme sunburn. Once they had recovered, they were taken home to their surprised families.

When Samu Perez (15), Filo Filo (15) and Edward Nasau (14) decided to row home from Atafu Atoll, in a small metal dingy, on the 5th October, they could never have known what they were in for.

The dingy was swept off course by strong currents, and they were presumed dead after a 1000km² turned up empty. Their parents, along with 500 family and friends, mourned their deaths and they held a memorial service for them, all the while the three where floating in the vast ocean. Shock and elation where probably some of the words the families used to describe the moment when their children where returned to them, some 50 days later.

While drifting, the boys managed to stay alive by catching and eating raw fish and a seagull that made the mistake of landing on the three starving children’s dingy. Every morning they would drink the rain water that had landed on the tarp and in the boat, which provided them with crucial moisture. About two days before their rescue, death became imminent when they started drinking sea water because of a lack of rain for several days.

Mercifully, the boys where spotted and rescued by a tuna boat, off the coast of Fiji, near the end of November. When they were found they could not even stand up unaided. They had drifted over 1600km (1000 miles) from the Atoll the Fiji, in 50 days. In hospital they were treated for severe dehydration, starvation and sunburn before being returned to their overjoyed parents.

Steven Callahan was an avid sailor, naval architect and inventor, and was planning to sail from the Canary Islands across the Atlantic to the Bahamas, in a 6.5 meter self-built boat. About a week into his journey his boat was damaged during the night in bad weather, by something unknown (possibly a whale). He was forced to abandon ship and just managed to rescue his emergency supplies from the boat and inflate the life raft, before the boat sank. Among the emergency supplies that he saved were a sleeping bag, food and water rations, navigational charts, a speargun, flares, solar stills (for condensing sea water into fresh drinking water) and a copy of Sea Survival by Dougal Robertson.

Knowing that no one on land was expecting to hear from him for a few weeks, his survival instincts kicked in. Over the next 76 days he drifted with the south equatorial current and the trade winds.

After finishing the supplies saved from the ship, he tried his hand at spear-fishing, and he ate primarily mahi-mahi, tiger fish and flying fish. After he exhausted his water supplies, he used the solar stills to obtain some precious water during the day (all the stills combined produced about 500ml of water per day). On one occasion, the spear of his spear gun broke off in a fishes back, and as the fish continued to swim beneath the life raft, the spear ripped a massive hole in the bottom inflatable tube of the raft. This caused the raft to become impossible to stand on but Steven managed to repair the raft using some of the shade tarp.

On the 76th day at sea, being able to spot land for the first time in months, Steven had finally reached his destination. He was picked up by fishermen right off the coast of Guadalupe. He was taken to a local hospital, but didn’t even stay the night; instead he spent a month recovering on the island and then proceeded to hitchhike on boats through the West Indies.

Richard Van Pham was a 62 year-old man from Long Beach, California. He set out in May, on a 3-4 hour sailing trip to the resort Island of Catalina. Hitting stormy weather on the way broke his engine, mast and communication equipment. Unable to navigate his way back, he succumbed to the current and floated with his little boat for over three months.

He managed to catch and kill a turtle, which he ate and used as further bait. He would leave pieces of meat on the deck and when sea birds came to near to take the bait, he clubbed them on the head. He managed to evaporate seawater and used the salt to preserve the meat. He also managed to build a distilling device to evaporate and purify seawater to obtain fresh drinking water and he roasted seagulls on a small makeshift grill, using wood from the boat as fuel for his fire.

Every day he looked out over the horizon in hopes of spotting land or another boat, but almost every day he saw nothing. Then one day whilst looking out at sea, he saw a plane. The plane dipped its nose, as if to say “hi” and a couple of hours later a rescue boat came to his rescue after nearly four months at sea.

On a side note to this amazing feat of survival, Richard Van Pham was donated another sail boat after his rescue. This new boat had all the latest communication and navigation equipment on board. Not even two years later, he was discovered floating in the ocean again, luckily only for a couple of days, without a trace of the expensive equipment. After this rescue he was fined for not having the appropriate equipment on board.

Marilyn and Maurice had been sailing their 31 ft yacht from South Hampton for quite a few months before disaster struck. They set out in June and were planning to sail and immigrate to New Zealand. By February the next year, they made safe passage through the Panama Canal, and that was the last anyone heard from them. About a week after their safe passage, their boat was violently struck by a whale. Seeing the huge hole in the side of the hull, through which water was gushing, they immediately inflated the life raft and an inflatable dingy (which Maurice had insisted they take along). They threw whatever possessions they had into the raft, and tied the two inflatables together. They managed to save some tins of food, a small oil burner, a map, a compass, a water container, knives, plastic mugs, passports, and some extra rubber and glue (for patches), before watching their yacht disappear into the ocean.

For the first few days, they ate the cans of food that they rescued, and drank rainwater. When their food ran out, they ate raw sea turtle, seabirds, fish and even sharks that they caught with their bare hands and small hooks fashioned from safety pins.

They counted seven ships that passed them but did not stop. With each passing ship, their hopes of rescue where crushed. As the days turned to weeks and the weeks turned to months, their clothes rotted on their bodies and they developed severe sores and sunburns. Their inflatable raft and dingy deteriorated to the point where they needed to be inflated daily.

On 30 June 1973, their ordeal finally came to an end, when a Korean fishing boat, spotting the small blob in the vast ocean, decided to turn back for a closer inspection. By the time the raft was hauled closer, they were both slipping in and out of consciousness, in what we can only presume was to be their last hours alive. They had each lost over 20kg and couldn’t stand or function by themselves. Finally, after drifting over 2400km and 117 days, they were saved.

Poon Lim is a record holding sea survivor. As a 25 year-old Chinese seaman, Poon Lim was appointed second steward on a British Merchant ship. The ship left Cape Town with a crew of 55 on 23 November 1942. Just a few days after, they were torpedoed by a Nazi U-boat. The ship was sinking rapidly and Poon made the decision to jump over board. After the ship had disappeared beneath the ocean, he gasped for air between each wave, desperately looking for a life raft that could have inflated while the ship sank. Finally after struggling to stay alive for two hours, he spotted a life raft. He swam over to it and hauled his exhausted body on board

Also on board, Poon found a metal water jug, some tinned biscuits, some flares, an electric torch and a small supply of fresh water. He rationed himself to eat just two biscuits and drink just a few sips of water per day, calculating that he would be able to survive almost a month on the supplies he had. By the end of the first month, after seeing several ships but not being rescued, Poon realized that he would have to float on the raft until he found land.

He caught fish using the wire from the torch as a hook, with a piece of biscuit as bait. After he had caught one fish, it became easier, as he used some of the previous fish as bait for the next. He also managed to catch seagulls and sharks, whose blood he drank to quench his thirst. He made notches in the wood of the raft to keep track of his days at sea and went swimming twice a day as exercise and to prevent his muscles from atrophying.

On the 131st day, Poon saw a change in the color of the water and he saw more sea birds and kelp. On the 133rd day he saw a small sail on the horizon, and soon the small boat came to his rescue. He was at the mouth of the Amazon River, and had crossed the Atlantic. Poon lost only 10kg throughout his ordeal, but managed to keep his strength up and could walk unaided after his rescue. Poon still holds the record for longest survival on a life raft and said that he truly hopes no one ever has to beat his record.

Lucio Rendon, Salvador Ordonez and Jesus Eduardo Vivand, along with two other companions set out in a 25 ft fiberglass boat, on a three day shark-fishing trip, early on 28 October 2005 from the port of San Blas Nayarit, Mexico. After baiting and placing their shark-fishing equipment, they celebrated and prepared for the big catch that was coming in the following day. The following day they returned to where they thought they had left the rigging, but it was gone. They spent the next couple of hours, and all their fuel looking for the expensive equipment. By the time they had run out of petrol, they were too far away from shore to row back, and the winds, combined with the westerly current swept them out into the wide ocean.

They had supplies for about four days, but after this time had passed, they became increasingly aware of their growing thirst. There was no more fresh water, and they had run out of food. For three days they drank and ate nothing. On the third day, the men succumbed to their intense thirst and drank some sea water. This only made them feel sick, but by that night definite moisture could be felt in the air, and by the fourth day without water, a light drizzle started falling. They cut the tops off their plastic fuel containers, rinsed them with sea water and when the rain came down more heavily, they were able to fill four fuel bottles, giving them 200 liters of fresh water. Food was not so easy. Lucio said, “We only ate twice in November. Hunger like I had never before imagined.” The first meal they had was a sea turtle that surfaced for some air. They lifted it out of the water, cut its head off and drank its blood. Then they shared the flesh between the 5 of them and ate it raw. Their two other companions could not stomach the thought of eating raw flesh, and died from starvation in late November.

They continued to catch turtles (Salvador made a turtle tally on the side of the boat which came to 103 turtles by the time they were rescued) and seabirds, and after a few months, they made hooks from nails and screws and used the barnacles that started building up on the hull of the boat as bait. They would use the barnacles to catch small fish and then use the small fish as bait to catch larger fish and using this method, they managed to catch dogfish, sharks, sawfish and dorado.

They salted and dried some of their meat to save it for times when they couldn’t fish. It is believed that the only reason that the men did not get scurvy, was because of the large amounts of fish which, if eaten raw, contains small amounts of Vitamin C.

The men drifted until 9 August 2006, when they were spotted on the radar of a Taiwanese fishing trawler. The trawler investigated and came across the three very skinny, but healthy men. They were saved! Spending over nine months lost at sea had landed them in the record books as the longest sea survival ever. They were found about 200 miles from the North coast of Australia, and had drifted over 5500 miles, across the Pacific Ocean. By the 25th, they were back at home, where their town’s people believed their survival to be a miracle. A miracle that happened to three men, whose names incidentally mean savior (Jesus and Salvador) and light (Lucio).

I’ve been a role-playing gamer for more than 30 years, and I’ve been to more conventions and play days than I care to remember. I’ve seen the best and the worst of the gaming industry. I’ve been there for the highs and the lows. This list is compiled based solely upon my observations, nothing more. If anyone can provide real-world data to disprove what is here, then you’re a bigger geek than me.

Hundreds of years in the future, the Earth undergoes a dramatic change. Intersections of ley lines (lines of magic energy that crisscross the globe) tear Rifts in space-time, opening a passage to other places, times, and dimensions. Through these portals come dimensional beings or D-Bees. With the appearance of the Rifts also comes magical power, and magic and technology often collide in the world of Rifts. It is not unusual to see an elf armed with an automatic weapon, or a wizard facing an army of robots.

Rifts is a world where anything can happen, and typically does. Japan has become the cyberpunk society that science-fiction has always portrayed it as being. South America suffers a plague of vampires. Atlantis has risen from the waves once more. Europe is again a vast wilderness opposed by an empire of gargoyles. Africa has returned to nature, making it once more a wild and dark continent. China is overrun by demons. In North America, the Coalition States are the primary power. Australia has been flooded by a great inland sea, and with the return of magic, the Aborigines have enjoyed a resurgence. Even the depths of the ocean are no haven in Rifts, as the Lord of the Deep battles the Whale Singers and the New Navy for the fate of the planet.

So with all this great setting and story, why is Rifts #10 on the list? Simply put, it’s all in the mechanics. Most people will be quick to tell you that while Rifts is a great setting with wonderful backstory and the potential for years of play, the mechanics quickly kill the enjoyment. Each supplement that is released features more powerful options than the previous one, and many of the more attractive role-playing options are left behind by the ever-present advance. Coupled with the fact that the rules are inconsistent even within their own setting, the whole can make it difficult to enjoy. Imagine playing a modern-day human with no magical powers or supernatural abilities while your buddy plays a dragon. That’s the kind of disparity that is seen in Rifts games.

The World of Darkness is White Wolf Publishing’s role-playing game of supernatural horror. It takes place in a universe where vampires, werewolves, and other icons of horror exist simultaneously and interact with one another (often violently). The primary books in the collection are the World of Darkness core rules, Vampire: the Requiem, Werewolf: the Forsaken, and Mage: the Ascension. There are also a number of other books that have been made available, including settings that take place in other periods of history.

So, horror role-playing, rich backstory – why is it only #9? There are two reasons. First, the original role-playing game was quickly overshadowed by the live-action variant called Mind’s Eye Theater. Secondly, in late 2003, White Wolf stopped publishing books for the line, ending the setting in an event called The Time of Judgement.

Some campaigns continue, but by and large, the role-playing game is seen less and less often these days, and even the live-action game is starting to become scare outside of conventions.

Mutants & Masterminds is a breakthrough super-hero role-playing game from Green Ronin Publishing. Based off the wildly successful d20 System from Wizards of the Coast, Mutants & Masterminds has since grown into its own and fills its niche beautifully. It has transformed from a variant of d20 into a system all its own, custom-designed to handle the mechanics of super-powered role-playing.

The system is flexible enough to allow you to play any kind of character imaginable, from an everyday beat cop to a paragon with world-shaking abilities. Moreover, it is well-balanced such that characters of an equal power level are more or less on equal terms, even if one has godlike abilities and the other is largely skill-based with a few gadgets thrown in. And more recently, Green Ronin has partnered with DC Comics to bring forth the DC Universe role-playing game, powered by Mutants & Masterminds.

The reason it sits at #8 is simply because there isn’t a lot of love for super-hero games these days. In the early years of role-playing, there were a great many super-hero game systems, but these days, Mutants & Masterminds pretty much stands alone in the field. It is a great game, just suffering from a lot of competition and a lack of interest.

Traveller is a classic science-fiction role-playing game, and by classic, I mean that it was there at the beginning. Many of us veterans can recall our first experience with Traveller, and in many cases, it meant suffering a character that perished during the creation phase. Yes, Traveller was unique among its peers in that character creation was half the fun and that there was a significant risk of a character dying before ever making it to the table!

Traveller is one of the few systems that evolved, but never really died. It changed form, adapted, and the timeline advanced, but the setting itself remained what it always had been. And now, more recently, the classic Traveller is back, thanks to Mongoose Publishing! The newest ruleset harkens back to the old days, when character creation was something that took a while. The sudden death aspect has been removed (though you can reinsert it if you wish) and a few things have been streamlined, but this is the Traveller that I grew up on.

But why is it only #7? The same reason that Mutants & Masterminds is so low on the list. It suffers from a lot of competition and the science-fiction genre is low on the interest scale right now. But this game is generating a lot of good press, particularly among role-playing veterans, so look for it to undergo a resurgence.

Call of Cthulhu is based on the works of H.P. Lovecraft, an author of the 1920s who specialized in horror. The original game, produced by Chaosium, was set in the 1920s and featured ordinary humans that went up against some very extraordinary foes. Many times, they would face minor beings from other worlds or dimensions, or the occasional group of human cultists, but just as often, their foe would be a creature from beyond space and time, too powerful for them to ever truly defeat. Call of Cthulhu is very much a game of settling for winning the battle, but not the war.

If there’s no chance of success, then why play? Well that’s the fun of it, you see. It’s not about defeating the darkness, it’s about surviving it and overcoming the odds. It has been jokingly said that the longest-lived characters in Call of Cthulhu have the highest movement rates, and there is some truth to that. Knowing when to turn and run can be every bit as valuable as an ancient incantation. And remember, you don’t have to outrun the monster; you only have to outrun the slowest member of your party. I have witnessed groups maiming each other’s characters to avoid being devoured.

I place Call of Cthulhu at #6 because it still remains a staple at gaming conventions. It is by no means the most popular role-playing game out there (it takes a special kind of player to adapt to the style of gaming it entails), but it maintains a loyal following and is still supported by it’s company today.

Some of you are looking quizzical now, asking what the heck is Hackmaster? Well to answer that, we have to go back to the year 1990, when Jolly Blackburn drew a cartoon strip in the pages of Shadis magazine. This strip was a peek into the lives of a group of role-players that called themselves the Knights of the Dinner Table, and their game of choice was Hackmaster, a fictional game stylized after Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, but with humorously tongue-in-cheek elements.

Flash-forward now to 2001, with the Open Game License in effect and the d20 movement underway. Kenzer & Company, formed in 1994, gains permission from Wizards of the Coast to produce a parody of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition called, appropriately enough, Hackmaster. The game was an immediate success among fans of the comic strip.

While it is recognizable for its source material, it has also developed its own feel and is imminently enjoyable for fans of the old Advanced Dungeons & Dragons from which it is derived. The mechanics are familiar enough to appeal to veterans, but the world and setting are unique enough to stand on their own.

GURPS, published by Steve Jackson Games, stands for Generic Universal Role-Playing System. It was groundbreaking in that it was one of the first role-playing games to introduce a single mechanic that allowed players to play in any genre, from fantasy to horror. The Basic Rules explained the mechanics of the system, while numerous wordbooks offered details for adapting the existing rules to nearly any setting you could imagine! By 2005, over 150 wordbooks had been produced, covering everything from Stone Age adventuring to the far future of Traveller.

Today, GURPS is in its 4th edition and the rules, while remaining fundamentally the same as they were in the 1st edition, have been streamlined and simplified. GURPS 4th edition was released in 2005 and already has over 50 supplements in print, in addition to being completely compatible with the dozens of 3rd edition supplements that exist.

For my money, GURPS is all about realism. Certainly, it can be played as a very heroic, action-oriented game, but at its heart, it is all about realism. Firefights in GURPS tend to be deadly, and you won’t find many rules for disregarding inconveniences like the laws of physics. Whether you’re seeking a set of guidelines that will keep your players on the straight-and-narrow or a game that lets you mix genres at will, GURPS won’t let you down, and thus earns a solid 4th place on our pick list.

A newcomer to the gaming scene, Savage Worlds debuted in 2003. Like GURPS, it is intended to be a multi-genre system that is billed as “Fast, Furious, Fun!” In fact, every aspect of the mechanics seems to be aimed towards that mantra. Character attributes, of which there are only five, are expressed as types of dice (four-sided, six-sided, eight-sided, etc.). Skills are quantified in the same manner and are very broad and interpreted very loosely. Character creation takes but a few moments of time.

Making a skill check is as simple as rolling the die-type equal to your skill. If you roll a four of higher, you succeed. It really is that simple. Player characters tend to get a few advantages, such as the ability to “ace” die rolls (if the maximum possible result is rolled, roll again and add the total of the two rolls) in order to gain “raises,” which in turn allow greater degrees of success. Combat initiative is determined with a standard deck of cards with the jokers left in.

In all, with a strong core mechanic and the support of some dozen or so setting books, the Savage Worlds system is a popular and worthy successor to the more realistic and detailed GURPS system. It takes a little getting used to the idea that shooting lets you fire everything from a sling to a rocket launcher, or drive encompasses not just cars, but trucks, bicycles, tractor-trailers, and tanks. The whole idea is “Fast, Furious, Fun!” Once you accept that, the game becomes an ideal way to kill an evening or three.

Pathfinder grew as an expansion of Dungeons and Dragons 3.5. It takes the best of everything that 3.5 had to offer, fixes some of the more outstanding problems, and presents an entirely new setting that breathes new life into the familiar game system. The result is a unique campaign world with a rich backstory, a plethora of new options for familiar characters, and plenty of room to grow and expand.

It uses a simple mechanic; just roll a twenty-sided dice (an icosahedron, dont’cha know?), add in any applicable modifiers, and compare the result against a target number either assigned by the Dungeon Master or a table of typical target numbers. If you beat the target number, you succeed at the action.

For me, what makes Pathfinder so cool is the campaign world that they have established. If it is a common fantasy trope or a real-world culture, the Pathfinder world has an analogue to it. A county of elves? Got it. An India-like setting with maharajah? Yep. A vast and dark jungle region? Right here. A land of samurai and ninja? You know it. A proud warrior culture that raids other lands? Uh-huh.

In short, Pathfinder offers you all the adventure you could ever want or need, along with a familiar, but original way to play!

Did anyone doubt that this would be in the number 1 slot? If so, shame on you. Love it or hate it, there can be no contest that Dungeons & Dragons remains the bestselling and most popular role-playing game.

Dungeons & Dragons got its start back in 1974 as the brainchild of Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The pair often played miniature war-games and decided to give them a unique slant, placing them in a fantasy milieu and focusing on individual characters as opposed to entire troops. The game was an instant hit, and the hobby was underway. Thirty-four years and ten revisions later, the game has evolved to what it is today.

From its roots, the core of Dungeons & Dragons has remained fundamentally the same, but the mechanics have undergone sweeping changes with each new edition of the game. This has caused some players to turn away from newer editions, continuing instead to play their favorite edition. Only just recently, a fifth edition of the game was announced (this will actually be the 11th revision) as being in early stages of production.

Throughout its long history, the venerable Dungeons & Dragons game has seen plenty of controversy. Particularly in the mid-’80s, the game came under fire from religious groups and concerned parents and was accused of everything from teaching children witchcraft to urging players towards suicide. In fact, far from what has been shouted about in the media, the game actually offers a great many benefits, including sharpening math skills, social interaction with peers, and developing imagination.

Though the latest release of the game (4th Edition) has been criticized as being “too videogame-like” and too far removed from the origins of the game, it has been promised that the 5th edition will return the game to its roots. No one knows what the future holds, but for now, the game remains at the top of the pile.

Chimpanzees are our closest living relatives, and yet they were unknown to most of the world until Charles Darwin wrote about and popularized them in 1859. Much about them has only been discovered recently, and misconceptions abound due to the exaggerations and artistic license used in works of fiction. Nevertheless, our similarities and differences are not what many people think. By learning about our relatives we can better understand ourselves.

Chimpanzees are often incorrectly called monkeys, but they are actually in the great ape family just like us. The other great apes are orangutans and gorillas. There is only one species of human alive at present: homo sapiens. In the past, many scientists tried to argue that there were several species of human, and would often hasten to add that they themselves belonged to the ‘superior’ species. However, all humans can produce fertile children and so we are all the same species. Chimpanzees, on the other hand, are actually two species: pan troglodytes, the common chimpanzee, and pan paniscus, the gracile chimpanzee or bonobo. These two types of chimpanzee are completely separate species. Humans and both chimpanzee species evolved from a common ancestor, possibly sahelanthropus tchadensis, between five and seven million years ago. Only fossils of this ancestor remain.

It is often said that humans and chimpanzees share 99% the same DNA. Genetic comparison is not simple due to the nature of gene repeats and mutations, but a better estimate is somewhere from 85% to 95%. This figure may still sound impressive, but most DNA is used for basic cellular functions which all living things share. For example, we have about half the same DNA as a banana, and yet people do not use this to emphasize how similar bananas are to us! So 95% does not say as much as it first appears to. Chimpanzees have 48 chromosomes, two more than humans. It is thought that this is because in a human ancestor, two pairs of chromosomes fused into a single pair. Interestingly, humans have some of the least genetic variation of all animals, which is why inbreeding can cause genetic problems. Even two completely unrelated humans are usually genetically more similar than two sibling chimpanzees.

The brain of a chimpanzee has a volume of 370mL on average. In contrast, humans have a brain size of 1350mL on average. Brain size alone, however, is not an absolute indicator of intelligence. There have been Nobel Prize winners with brains ranging from below 900mL all the way up to over 2000mL. The structure and organization of the various parts of the brain is a better way of determining intelligence. Human brains have a high surface area because they are much more wrinkled than chimpanzee brains, with greater numbers of connections between many of its parts. These, as well as a relatively larger frontal lobe, allow us much more of the luxury of abstract and logical thought.

Chimpanzees spend a great deal of time socializing. Much of their socializing is grooming each other. Juvenile and adolescent chimpanzees will often play with, chase, and tickle each other, as will adults with their offspring. Shows of affection include hugging and kissing, which are done between chimpanzees of any age or gender. Bonobos are especially frisky, and nearly every show of affection is done sexually, regardless of gender. Chimpanzees strengthen friendships by spending extensive time grooming each other. Humans spend a comparable time socializing, albeit more through talking than grooming. Nevertheless, much of the vast amounts of inconsequential chatter we produce is simply a more sophisticated version of chimpanzee grooming – it serves little other purpose than to strengthen our relationship bonds. Humans also demonstrate stronger relationships through physical contact – a pat on the back, a hug, or a friendly shove. Primate social group sizes closely reflect their brain sizes. Chimpanzees have about 50 close friends and acquaintances, whereas humans have between 150 and 200.

Chimpanzees have complex greetings and communications which depend on the social statuses of the communicating chimps. They communicate verbally using a variety of hoots, grunts, screams, pants, and other vocalizations. Most of their communication, however, is done through gestures and facial expressions. Many of their facial expressions – surprise, grinning, pleading, comforting – are the same as those of humans. However, humans smile by bearing their teeth, which is for chimps and many other animals a sign of aggression or danger. A much greater portion of human communication is done through vocalizations. Humans uniquely have complex vocal chords, allowing us a great range of sounds, but preventing us from drinking and breathing simultaneously like chimpanzees can. Moreover, we have very muscular tongues and lips, allowing us accurate manipulations of our voices. This is why we have pointy chins whereas chimps have receding chins – we attach our many lip muscles to the prominent lower chin, but chimpanzees lack many of these muscles and so do not need a protruding chin.

Chimpanzees and humans are both omnivorous (eat plants and meat). Humans are more carnivorous than chimpanzees, and have intestines more refined towards the digestion of meat. Chimpanzees will occasionally hunt and kill other mammals, often monkeys, but otherwise restrict themselves to fruit and sometimes insects. Humans are much more dependent on meat – humans can only obtain vitamin B12 naturally through eating animal products. Based on our digestive system and the lifestyles of extant tribes, it is thought that humans have evolved to eat meat at least once every few days. Humans also tend to eat in meals rather than continuously eating throughout the day, another carnivorous trait. This may be due to meats only being available after a successful hunt, and so are eaten in large quantities but infrequently. Chimpanzees will graze on fruits constantly whereas most humans will eat no more than three times in a day.

Bonobos are renown for their sexual appetite. Common chimpanzees can become angry or violent, but bonobos defuse any such situation through sexual pleasure. They also greet and show affection to each other through sexual stimulation. Common chimpanzees do not engage in recreational sex, and mating only takes ten or fifteen seconds, often whilst eating or doing something else. Friendships and emotional attachments have no bearing on with whom a common chimpanzee mates, and a female in heat will generally mate with several males, who sometimes patiently wait their turn directly after each other. Humans experience sexual pleasure, like bonobos, however even sex for reproduction only takes much longer and requires more effort; long-term partnerships naturally form as a result. Unlike humans, chimpanzees have no concept of sexual jealousy or competition, as they do not take long-term partners.

Both humans and chimpanzees are able to walk bipedally (on two legs). Chimpanzees will often do this to see further ahead, but prefer to move on all fours. Humans walk upright since infancy and have evolved bowl-shaped pelvises to support their internal organs while doing so. Chimpanzees, leaning forward during movement, do not need to support their organs with their pelvis and so have broader hips. This makes childbirth much easier for chimpanzees than for humans, whose bowl-shaped pelvis is in opposition to a large birth canal. Human feet are straight with toes at the front to help push directly ahead when walking, whereas chimpanzee feet have opposable big toes and are more like strong hands than feet. They are used for climbing and crawling, involving sideways, diagonal, or rotating movements.

Humans have white around their irises, whereas chimpanzees usually have a dark brown color. This makes it easier to see where other humans are looking, and there are several theories as to why this is so. It may be an adaption to more complex social situations, where it is an advantage to see whom others are looking at and thinking about. It may help when hunting silently in packs, where eye direction is vital to communication. Or it may simply be a genetic mutation with no purpose – white around the iris is seen in some chimpanzees also. Both humans and chimpanzees can see in color, helping them to choose ripe fruits and plants to eat, and have binocular vision; their eyes point forward in the same direction. This helps see in depth and is crucial to hunting, rather than eyes on the side of the head like rabbits which help avoid being hunted.

For many years, humans were considered to be the only tool-using animal. Observation in 1960 of chimpanzees using sharpened twigs to fish for termites has since changed this. Both humans and chimpanzees are able to modify their environment to forge tools to help with daily challenges. Chimpanzees will make spears, use stones as hammers and anvils, and mash leaves into a pulp to use as makeshift sponges. It is thought that as a result of walking upright, our front limbs were much freer to use tools, and we have refined tool use to an art. We live constantly surrounded by the products of this ability, and much of what people consider makes us ‘successful’ is rooted in our tool making.