Life Advice From ‘Downton Abbey’

If you love the characters of this manor house show, then you will likely enjoy these tidbits of life advice.

Robert Crawley, Lord Grantham

“There is no such thing as a marriage between two intelligent people that does not sometimes have to negotiate thin ice.”

Violet Crawley, Dowager Countess of Grantham

“Principles are like prayers. Noble, of course, but awkward at a party.”

Sybil Crawley

“It’s the gloomy things that need our help. If everything in the garden is sunny, why meddle?”

Mrs. Hughes

“My advice, Daisy, is to go as far in life as God and luck allow.”

Hugh “Shrimpie” MacClare, father of Rose

“Love is like riding or speaking French. If you don’t learn it young, it’s hard to get the trick of it later.”

Cora Crawley, Lady Grantham

“I think accepting change is quite as important as defending the past.”

Carson

“In my opinion, to misquote Doctor Johnson, if you’re tired of style, you are tired of life.”

Isobel Crawley

“Cousin Violet has never let a matter of convenience stand in the way of a principle.”

Mrs. Patmore

“If you must pay money, better to a doctor than an undertaker.”

Branson

“Real love means giving someone the power to hurt you.”

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The Breaking Bad Fan Theory That Blew Our Minds

While he played a major role in the series, we ultimately don’t know that much about Gustavo Fring, the ruthless meth distributor and ruler of the fried chicken empire known as Los Pollos Hermanos. While he would ultimately come to regret his involvement with Walter White, there’s no denying his dealing with the notorious Heisenberg brought him quite a bit of benefit at first. But just how to Fring rise to power? What mysterious origins lie behind the Chicken Man?

What we know for certain is that Fring hails from Chile, and that he immigrated to Mexico in the 1980s during the Chilean dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. From there we know he fell in with cartel kingpin Don Eladio, who had one of his men, Hector Salamanca, shoot his longtime friend and crime partner, Maximino "Max" Arciniega in the head. But why didn’t he kill Fring as well? One Reddit fan theory sheds light on the subject, and totally blew us away.

Since Don Eladio has no qualms about killing off his competition, one can only assume Fring had some sort of protection, and fans suspect that protection may have come from the CIA. A possible theory is that Fring was once a Chilean aristocrat who helped the CIA install Augusto Pinochet in power. Once Pinochet became a liability, however, Fring moved to Mexico at the CIA’s behest to infiltrate the drug cartel, which would have allowed him to bypass immigration issues the spotty record of his past may have posed. It’s only a theory, of course, and we may never know the answer, but it sure is fun to think about!

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The Once Lost World of Radio Dramas

A drama can be every bit as compelling on the screen as it can be on the page. Dramatic movies and tv shows are in high demand, and the drama often works its way into other genres, with examples like Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad serving as shining beacons. Back in the world of the written word, dramatic books are enjoying a resurgence, not just in contemporary works but going as far back in time as the era of Shakespeare, which one could argue never went out of fashion.

In all of the praise and popularity that drama is enjoying, however, it’s worth remembering one of its many other forms: The radio drama. Radio dramas may trace their roots back as early as the 1880s, but it wasn’t until the 1920s that radio stations began producing and broadcasting shows regularly. It took a mere decade for radio dramas to begin flourishing in the 1930s, and by the 1940s radio dramas were a leading form of popular entertainment on an international scale.

With any rise must come a fall, and at the dawn of the 21st century radio dramas were all but forgotten, with few new shows being produced and those that were rebroadcast serving mostly as filler. Enter the age of the podcast: With content reaching a new level of global accessibility, not to mention an ease of production, the radio drama enjoyed a resurgence in popularity, albeit in a slightly different form, and now appears as if it’s here to stay.

Looking for more dramatic reads? Visit our online library at www.ennymedia.com for a wide variety of ebooks, audiobooks, music, and more, accessible anytime from your favorite devices.