Fanfares of the Bannock-teas

I'm sure it wasn't me who ordered the 'Passive-Aggressive' personality module for the AI pilot when we bought the Riddled time machine. If memory serves I was in favour of the 'Obsessive-Compulsive' option (and if I wasn't, well that can be revised). Anyway mistakes were made and we've all moved on.

So when MAL advised us against plotting a trajectory to 1497 Florence -- with all the "that's really not a good idea" and "I'll feel terribly guilty afterwards if you do that" -- we were soon exhausted by arguing with MAL's insistently apologetic synthesised voice. We have abandoned the plan of decorating the staff tea-room with Boccaccio paintings rescued from the Bonfires of the Vanities.

The obstacle, apparently, is a school of Catholic thought that seeks to canonise Savonarola and glorify his fundamentalist theocracy, which I suppose would undercut the appeal of the Taliban by revealing them as newcomers. There is opposition. Not because of the "Burn the Gays!" policy of Savonarola's 1494-1497 regime, or his war on art and literature, but rather because beatification would condone his attacks on Pope Alexander for corruption and cupidity and hypocrisy; and the Jesuits are concerned that however justified such attacks might have been, condoning them would set a bad precedent. He was prematurely anti-corruption.

So now there is a clash between two conflicting time-streams ^{[see the Alternative Pasts interpretation of quantum theory]}. The Department of Temporal Consistency has issued a Chronotravel Advisory warning against that period of history; to remain in force until the historians can stabilise the situation by determining whether Savonarola was a Dastardly Heretic or a Saintly Reformer.

Savonarola himself was burned at the stake. This was the deluxe business-class burning with complimentary gunpowder, and dancing on the ashes singing comic songs to ensure that no pieces would fall into the hands of his followers and provide them with relics to focus their veneration. Whoever decided on that gets no points for forward planning.

So anyway, this "mistakes were made / co-opt the opposition" rapprochement may be belated but it's better than nothing. We await the proposals to rehabilitate other enemies of the Church and lay claim to their reputations. Canonise Martin Luther next? Saint Mohammed? Saint Giordano Bruno? No wait.

MAL has a manual Override-Secret-Instructions switch but memories still linger of the last time we used that and live ice-fish subsequently found their way somehow into the Riddled cryotanks. Ow ow, ticklish.