Sunday, July 4, 2004

Happy Fourth of July.

The sounds of battle raged around her, the screams, the death cries, the thuds and groans, the clash of steel–but she heard none of it.

She waited calmly until she saw the body crumble. Then she reached down and, sifting the dust aside with her hand, she grasped the hilt of her sword and lifted it into the air. Sunlight flashed on the blood-stained blade, her enemy lay dead at her feet. She looked around but could not see Tanis. She could not see any of the others. For all she knew, they might be dead. For all she knew, she might herself be dead within the next moment.

Laurana lifted her eyes to the sun-drenched blue sky. The world she might soon be leaving seemed newly made–every object, every stone, every leaf stood out in painful clarity. A warm fragrant southern breeze sprang up, driving back the storm clouds that hung over her homeland to the north. Laurana's spirit, released from its prison of fear, soared higher than the clouds, and her sword flashed in the morning sun.

-- The Annotated Chronicles of Dragonlance, Dragons of Autumn Twilight, Ch. 14, page 456.

"Tomorrow I will leave this place," Laurana said softly, her luminous eyes on the dragonlance. "I will go to Palanthas. I will take with me the story of this day! I will take this lance and the head of a dragon. I will dump that sinister, bloody head upon the steps of their magnificent palace. I will stand upon the dragon's head and make them listen to me! And Palanthas will listen! They will see their danger! And then I will go to Sancrist and to Ergoth and to every other place in this world where people refused to lay down their petty hatreds and join together. For until we conquer the evils within ourselves–as this man did–we can never conquer the great evil that threatens to engulf us!"

-- The Annotated Chronicles of Dragonlance, Dragons of Winter Night, The Funeral, page 905

But there was death here, Tas knew; death and suffering. He'd seen too many die, too many suffer. His thoughts went to Flint, to Sturm, to Laurana.... Something had changed inside Tas. He would never again be like other kender. Through grief, he had come to know fear; fear not for himself but for others. He decided right now that he would rather die himself than lose anyone else he loved.

You have chosen the dark path, but you have the courage to walk it, Fizban had said.

-- The Annotated Chronicles of Dragonlance, Dragons of Spring Dawning, Ch 7, page 1213

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Mario ex Piano

I have tried, before, to play the Mario theme on the piano. The best I could manage was one-fingered bits, with a few chords that barely touched.

Here's a ten-fingered glory. Watch the sinistral hand. =)

http://flury.sytes.net/videos/mario%20piano.wmv

Or, to save it,

http://flury.sytes.net/save.php?url=http://flury.sytes.net/videos/mario%20piano.wmv

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