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Quote of the moment Vol.2

“We have had no good comic operas of late, because the real world has been more comic than any possible opera.” – Illustrated London News, Jan. 17, 1931 G. K. Chesterton

Highlighted Quotes That Caught my Attention At The Moment

"I am the last monarch of the old world. As Emperor, it is my duty to protect my peoples from their politicians" -Franz Joseph, Emperor of Austria-Hungary

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In Which November 2026 is welcomed with Christmas and more Artificial Intelligence Thoughts!

Good morning, my friend, cordial reader of this present post! Happy Sunday, and happy November!! The month building up to the best of the year! We are closer to the end of a deeply chaotic one, speaking of which, closer than not. 2025 was quite eventful, but 2026 makes 2025 looks as tepid as 2015 in comparison. As the Christmas part of the year unfolds, more and more breathe relieved, though the perspectives for 2027 are nebulous at best. October was a huge pile of anxiety. The glee of the first half of the month, where I live, turned to immense dread and resentment after the election results in Brazil. The events of such horrendous circumstance are still unfolding. I wrote it was as if the end of the Soviet Union... my more pessimistic side thinks it is more akeen to the Hungarian Spring, though. Perhaps, as Poland, we will have a anticommunist upheaval now, and reap the good rewards later. Perhaps we will have a moment of chaos before it implodes, like with the Soviet Union... the ca...
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In Which I try to save Byzantium

Hello my friend! Good morning and happy Saturday to you! How are you today? How was your week? Do let me know! And how is the weather? Is it windy and feels like fall, or is it cold and feels like winter? I love that Christmas is here! And I hope the decorations may be up soon, so I can take lots of pictures and rejoice on the beauty of it all! Well, speaking of Christmas, this week, I was a man in an impossible mission. Playing a game called Europa Universalis 4, which became my addiction the past weeks or so, I had one obsession: Save the Byzantine Empire from the evil and overpowered Ottomans, who surrounded me from every corner! It was a doomed mission, since I tried more than 10 times (some of those 10 times were daily) and all those 10 times, in a point or another, resulted in failure in a way or another. Having to repeat the steps as Byzantium the countless times is very draining! That game, Europa Universalis, is the most delightful pain! It is impossible to describe how satisfying it is to just administrate your empire, making sure you have your bills paid, your armies well trained, the right alliances, just taking care of a nation from the age of Discovery to the age of Industry! A very ambitious enterprise, the game has so many expansions that it requires a subscription service to have access to all of them in a reasonable price (it's 11 reais of subscription for about 110 expansions, addons, dlcs, and so on). The temptation of getting a decaying Empire and restoring its former glory, or at least survive with it was enough to keep me hooked for many failed attempts, that left me frustrated and beaten, but a new day comes, and I get up and ask for more. My friends are very familiarized with the pain of losing so many times in this 4x strategy game. And to add to the challenge, I play on a mode that doesn't allow for "time travels" to fix mistakes and so on, the called IronMan mode, the one that allows you to experience Europa fully, and the one that allows you to earn the game achievements.

This is a magnificent example of Byzantine Art! The mosaic tradition of the Greeks and the romans that they were lived on when Byzantium was alive. When the events of the game happen, Empress Theodora is long gone and her Empire is at the brink of foreign plunder, but her strenght and her impressive figure are a great inspiration, those are reflected on a quote by her that I'll post here: "(...) May I never be deprived of this purple robe, and may I never see the day when those who meet me do not call me empress (...)".

You all know me, I'm a sucker for achievements. So yes, this is the reason I haven't been updating on the blog for this week or so, I was playing Europa, and thinking about writing a guide as Byzantium once I nailed at least one match with it. Well, I have not so far, I reached the 17th century with Byzantium, that's as far as I could go. One day, I'll get to the endgame with a big prosperous empire and will have the Ottomans on its knees, but that day may be very far in the future, because, let me repeat it, it is A VERY HARD achievement to do so, the dozens of tries I had don't lie. And again for the guide, since this game is very RNG reliable (something strategy gamers are very familiarized with) and so on, I just don't think I'm the right guy for the task, for now. This post is getting long, so I should wrap it up, and the idea of continuing to write about my attempts and the tutorials I followed are very good ones. Now, so many things are brought into my attention, such as Christmas time! Well, Byzantium is directly related to Christmas, so I guess this fits! Anyway, I wish you all very good moments, and I see you all real real soon!

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