I am full of deceit

Moving

2008-08-27T15:47:00.000-05:00

Ok, so now this is here. That is all.

Face

2007-11-12T09:35:00.000-06:00

Did you know Mitt Romney's name is spelled Mitt? What is that about? What an ass.

My car got a boo-boo. A big one. It's in the front. It looks like a crater. I have no car. I have the estimate. Gulp.

Here's why Meet the Robinsons is amazing:
1. Time travel paradoxes. Yes we all saw Donnie Darko and blah blah, but this is cartoons.
2. Cartoons. Yes they're still around and still fun even though you're not still a kid.
3. Evil robots. Robots are one thing, but I'm talking evil robots. You don't get that often.

I'm totally excited for Mass Effect, coming out two days before thanksgiving. Mass Effect is a game. It's like when all you wanted to do as a kid was be Luke Skywalker. And now you can, only there aren't annoying things like George Lucas to screw it up.

I joined Facebook. No, I don't know why.

The Rollout

2007-11-01T02:28:00.000-05:00

Invites are starting out. It's starting slow at first, so don't be alarmed. And feel free to let me know if you want to check it out. Google Docs is a first for me so we've got a learning curve to climb.

More as each day progresses.

Pre-Party

2007-10-31T01:24:00.000-05:00

Updates for next time:
I kept a record of all the debit card transactions I went through from last Tuesday, October 23, until this Tuesday. One week. Prepare to poop your pants. Detailed reports will follow at my leisure.
Script is on schedule. Unveiling likely tomorrow night, although if you get an invite, you might not get it until Thursday. But November 1st is a promise I am keeping.

Meet the Robinsons will blow your mind. I'll explain in due time.

Oct. 23rd

2007-10-23T18:54:00.000-05:00

Did you get the new Radiohead? You decide what you pay for the download. That's initiative.

I watched jets fly over the city today. They float and drift between buildings, looking for the strip of land large enough to hold their bulky frames.

What if you aren't good at what you love? Maybe the test of courage is answering the question. I'm trying to answer it. Not answering means not failing. I'm trying to keep that, but it creates such a weight upon my body. And that weight is the idea that I am losing my chances. That the world of possibilities, of success and failure and surprises and new directions is slipping silently through my outstretched fingers because I didn't bother to clench them and unrelentingly fight for what ever dreams I have. Because I am afraid.

And this couldn't be a movie or an entertaining story because the answer is so obvious: fight. Fight and fail, fight and win, just fight, so that a story could be told, the story of fighting. I'm held back by a fear of finding my own story.

I am the man from the Harry Potter books who died exactly the same way he lived, without a fight. So I am going to fight.

By November 1st, I will put my script up at Google Docs and send out invitations to those friends who want one, and then they can give me feedback and criticism and construction and that is a step out of the mire. This is a definitive date, so that I can be held to it.

This tastes like paint

2007-10-09T22:42:00.000-05:00

There's something about Fall that's nice. The smell of the leaves, or the bite of the cold, or the taste of a hot chai while the wind chaps your face.

I don't update more because I don't have more to say. Work is the same. I will leave soon, I think. I don't know. If I leave this job, do I leave Chicago? Fly to somewhere that is different or new or without people I know or without a job? I did that here. It was a hard few months.

The truth is that I need to work more on the things I care about and let those grow so I can feel some sprinkling of the thing we called fruitfulness.
Bear fruit. Bears eat honey. Honey is not a fruit.

Move the earth.

If Halo was my job, I'd get fired

2007-10-05T01:08:00.000-05:00

I haven't updated. The last two weeks have been nothing but work and Halo 3. Which is to say work sucks and Halo 3 is fun.
Autowobble
That's me. It's my...Gamercard.

Work doesn't suck. It just mostly sucks. Its like finding a pizza box in the trash and there's still an untouched pizza in the box! It's free pizza... but it's in the trash. That's like my job. It's really nice to train people about how to be a good barista, but it really sucks being overwhelmed with trainees, not getting paid enough, and dealing with the bureaucracy (hard to spell!) of a corporation. It ends up draining on me. I might quit. Or I'll just stop caring.

I need something more creative. Is it possible to find a job where the two sides of your brain, right and left, are able to operate in unison? Is that a job people have? Or is your hobby your way of using the other side of the brain? So if I got a creative job, I'd make syllabuses in my spare time.

I really do think I'm hilarious.

I took this picture several times

2007-09-21T11:27:00.000-05:00

Halo 3 comes out in just 5 days and I'm really excited. See?

I can't sweeten my coffee without sugar. Do you understand that? Any suggestions?

Oh, and I cut my hair.

Shut up.

Remote Command

2007-09-12T21:06:00.000-05:00

No haircut, still. Arrgh. This is just like buying shoes. Impossible. Maybe tomorrow. A nice Orlando Bloom look. Yup.

I'm having a serious issue at home. My remote control. For a while now the 1 and the 4 buttons have been a bit... touchy. Sometimes I could just push them, sometimes I would have to mash them down. It wasn't too bad until recently. The 4 has become a bastion of rebellion, requiring intense pressure for any sort of response. And I think the rebellion has spread, because now 5, previously thought to be a stalwart supporter of my will, has begun acting up. There's no telling how far the rebellion might spread. I may have no choice but to leave the tv on at all times, if the power button leaves me. I must plan my defenses.

Things are running smoothly.

Moving Through Uncertainty

2007-09-10T10:00:00.000-05:00

Ok, I have to be brief because ideally I'll get my haircut today. I was going for Aveda but the opportunity passed so now I'm looking at you, Hair Cuttery. Would anyone ever want to go somewhere called the Cuttery? Apparently. I'll be sure to put up the sexy pictures if they happen.

Speaking of sexy pictures, no one comments about Will Smith? Come on! This is the Willenium!

I'm trying to write. Sort of? I'm looking at a finished script that isn't... formatted correctly? I'm trying to edit out some inconsistencies and maybe make it more script-standard, if that exists. But then there's always the possibility that I'll always be working on it so I never have to test its quality. Right. I think right now we're somewhere in the middle, which is ok, because it means I'm still legitimately working. I just need to be more consistent.
I also started working on an old script I wrote as a short film in college. I've always wanted to expand it into a feature length, but I don't know if there's a whole story there. Or if there is, it has nothing to do with what I already wrote, and I need to tear up the old stuff, which feels like throwing away the map when you're lost.

Ick. Haircut is tomorrow. I was reading through Madeleine L'Engle's Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art yesterday. I mentioned it a long time ago on that blog I used to have that wasn't here. She makes me think that art can be good regardless of the artist. Kurt Vonnegut says something similar. But I think there's an idea that because we are flawed, or corrupt, or self-righteous, we can't create something beautiful, or worthy, or desirable. In reality, with L'Engle or Vonnegut, the art becomes great because of what it tries to be, rather than what it is, or the artist. And I like that idea, that art and creation and the ways that we express ourselves make us greater than we are, that we can then rise above our faults without excusing them.

The Once and Future Miss Teen USA

2007-08-30T21:27:00.000-05:00

The crisis is over. No worries. Time heals and this too shall pass and all that.

Have you seen the girl who's really dumb? I don't mean that in a negative way. I mean it in a "wow, I'm really sorry that this is all over TV and the internet. Good luck being 17" kind of way. To be fair, plenty of people would have had the same answer or worse. And besides, it's not like things on the internet stay around more than a few days.

She came in fourth.

Work kind of sucks right now. Or I suck. I had a headache all day yesterday until I took some medicine in the evening. But then this morning (6am rocks) it came back and it was the exact same headache. Only now it was worse and I wanted to vomit. I don't think it was a migraine because you're supposed to see spots of light with those. Maybe that will be tomorrow.

Independence Day is on. Welcome to Earf.

Seven Sentences

2007-08-27T22:23:00.001-05:00

Let's forget about that last post. It has nothing to do with you.

Everything to do with me. This is my blog, right? I'm not sure what I'm saying here. I'm sort of... delayed. Remember that DJ Unkle video with Thom Yorke where the guy is getting hit by all the cars? You can watch it now. I either feel like that guy or that song.

I'm sitting here wondering where the rest of me is. My hands are moving across the keys but the words are coming from far off, by ansible. I am a ghost and I am haunting my own head by remote control. It will take some time to get back. But you can't get back time. You can't get back things once you let them out. They're gone, in the ether, to be absorbed or rejected by everything around you. I'm trying to call home by ansible. Is this thing on? Traveling across time and space. Wasted time for empty space.

I know I'm not making sense. I'm not trying to. It's a tactic we all use to say how we feel without anyone knowing what we're talking about. We're protecting ourselves from the publicity that is a blog. I'm being ambiguous because I want there to be space between myself and my feelings and you knowing what my feelings are, so that I am existing in an impenetrable shell.

The walls of Jericho fell in seven days. Mine fell in seven sentences.
Someone find the nearest fallout shelter.

Bitterness

2007-08-26T16:57:00.001-05:00

When you really work hard at something and want to show it off, people end up asking why you weren't busy doing something else.

And then they wonder why I don't keep in touch.
It was nice to see everyone I got to see this weekend. This isn't directed at anyone who actually bothers to read this.

The Gears of History

2007-08-21T20:37:00.000-05:00

On the train today I started reading over this guy's shoulder. He was reading a really long article from the Times called The Politics of God. It's really interesting, and while I haven't finished it, it got me thinking about a lot of things. But first, here's a quote:

At first, this modern political theology expressed a seemingly enlightened outlook and was welcomed by those who wished liberal democracy well. But in the aftermath of the First World War it took an apocalyptic turn, and “new men” eager to embrace the future began generating theological justifications for the most repugnant — and godless — ideologies of the age, Nazism and Communism.

Yeah, good stuff. He talks about how we have a different view as Westerners and I started thinking about Manifest Destiny, the idea during the 1800s that it was our God-given duty as white Americans to conquer the Western US and convert the heathens within. It seems similar to the rhetoric we hear from Iran or Al Qaeda.
I also started thinking about a really great book I've only listened to a bit, Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. He takes a panoramic look at history and anthropology to try and discover why Europe overtook the rest of the world while Africa rots. He's insightful enough to inspect all the science and possibilities for why we are where we are. It's a great book. And I'll read it soon.

This had nothing to do with me, except for the part where I read over someone's shoulder on the train, which is actually quite rude.

Screenwriting Blogs

2007-08-04T12:29:00.001-05:00

This blog needs some serious work. I've got a few friends who are not yet added to the links and I want to start adding some other cool links I've found. I'll start now. And by now I mean soon.

Thanks to a friend and an article in the New York Times, I've discovered two pretty cool screenwriting blogs. (An interesting aside: Screenwriting isn't a recognized word in the blogger spellcheck. Neither is spellcheck.) The first, from a smart lady who worked on Angel, and Firefly, among others, is currently Co-Executive Producer of Battlestar Galactica. Her name is Jane Espenson, and other than the difficulty of getting her name right, she tells you what she had for lunch in each post.
The second is a guy named John August, who has to his name movies such as Go, Big Fish, Charlie's Angels, and an interesting upcoming movie called The Nines. They both seem very interesting and knowledgeable in screenwriting matters. Beyond that, they also take the time to offer helpful advice, which is perhaps the only way people who want to be screenwriters can learn how to be screenwriters without the difficulty of Hollywood reality first.

I've started showing my script to people. It feels pretty good actually. But I only have two (maybe three) copies, so sharing is difficult, especially when many of these people live outside of Chicago. I'm beginning to consider emailing PDF files to those who request it. The problem is both losing control of my work (in the sense that I can't get it back from them) and the difference of reading something on a screen, which in my opinion is without flavor. But economics might force my hand, because each copy runs about...$7? Enough that I don't want to make too many, especially when I'm still finding errors and changes will still be made.

I'm heading home tomorrow. It's been a nice trip but I'm sunburned and have go to back to work so that I can be my own special part of the economy.

Swallowed By The Sea

2007-07-30T21:06:00.000-05:00

I'm in North Carolina on vacation. It's nice. There is the sea, and family, and those things are nice.

There's much we haven't spoken of. This is not the place. But it's there, hanging over our heads. And no amount of explaining explains justly, because sometimes there is no justice in things.

I'm looking out at the sea, the endless sea, and I'm amazed at how far it goes. Exactly the same as a hundred thousand years ago, still vast and constantly in motion. Still lapping at our feet, trying to swallow us. Untamed and restless, and I feel lost in the stretch to the horizon. The clouds billow overhead, and they show the different colors of the sun's light. And at night, the moon rises slowly out of the water, bigger than life and yellow, as if it's trapped in an antique painting, slivers of cloud cutting across it. And there's sand beneath my feet, and for a moment I feel like I'm on solid ground.

Beyond our pale bodies, there's no interruption to the ripples of the sea. They only fade when my eyes fail me. There's something comforting there. As if we're looking at something more, the last vestiges of a world we can never understand, hidden deep beneath the white caps. And my eyes fill with water if I look too hard.

There is peace in this place, even if there is not peace where we are right now.

And the Deathly Hallows

2007-07-27T21:01:00.000-05:00

I just finished Harry Potter. Finally. Finally.

The Mariner's Revenge

2007-07-19T15:56:00.000-05:00

I got to see a free concert at Millennium Park last night. The Decemberists along with the Grant Park Orchestra! Aww yeah. It was nice. I got there late and so didn't have a good view behind the thousands of others ahead of me, but they were still fun. Afterwards it began to rain and my friends and I decided to go and play in Crown Fountain, which consists of two small towers that pour water down over their sides while also displaying people's faces. It's a lot of fun even though the faces are slightly jarring. Look.

It was tons of fun. Then it started raining and then we realized we were really cold. And soaking wet. But what fun.

Eric, and anyone who loves Civilization games, you should read this article about the history of the game.

I'll see all you peeps later. Harry Potter comes out this weekend and I don't think I'll have time for lesser things. But after the dust settles we can discuss.

In Case You Missed It

2007-07-01T17:47:00.000-05:00

This story is at first hilarious and then kind of terrible and sad. It's really one of those WTF moments. Like, where did the peacock come from?

Indeed. I am finishing The Historian finally. I should be done with it by the end of the day if I stay on track. But I just took an unplanned nap on the couch and woke up caked in sweat, so things don't always go according to plan.

Tonight we're hitting up the Taste, which is the Taste of Chicago, which is "here's a lot of different food from all around the city, please stuff your faces." Very exciting.

Shake Those Spears

2007-06-22T11:14:00.000-05:00

Have you heard of Helio? The phone company that's not a phone company? They sell phones that do things like surf, take pictures, integrated MySpace and Google Maps. Anyway, they're sort of like an alternate I've been thinking about. Helio has a cool phone called "Ocean" that has a full keyboard as well as a separate numeric pad. Why is numeric spelled like that? Why isn't there a b?

Anyway, I'd really like a new phone. I already mentioned this, but you know.

I saw She's the Man, the adaptation of Twelfth Night starring Amanda Bines. What I was hoping for was something akin to 10 Things I Hate About You, perhaps the best film translation of a Shakespeare play next to Ian Mckellen's Richard III (set in an alternate fascist Britain, yes you should see it). And when I say something so inflammatory, I only mean that the film was a great way to appreciate Shakespeare while also enjoying pop-ska and Seattle. You should also watch Ran ("Chaos" in Japanese), by Akira Kurosawa. Based on King Lear and set in feudal Japan. Samurai.
Anyway, She's the Man was iffy. Amanda Bines is very funny for a 12 year old, but she's not. The film lacks a comedic subtlety and maturity that would make it a lot funnier. Whatever, if tweens read Shakespeare, it's all good. Did anyone ever see O? Julia "again" Stiles and Mekhi "There's no movie" Phifer.

Oh, I forgot about The Lion King. That is definitely up there. It is a candy-coated Hamlet. There's no Uncle-Mom stuff and Nala doesn't commit suicide, but it's an amazing adaptation. Rewatch it. For realz.

Buttermilk Biscuits!

2007-06-18T00:11:00.000-05:00

I kinda want an iPhone. Gross. Try not to think about it. Try not to stare.

Remember REM? I just thought of that song that has a lot of "Try not to..." in it. Yeah, I just looked it up. It's called "Try Not to Breathe" and it was on Automatic for the People, which I owned but can't find and therefore can't listen to right now. And now I'm thinking about Nightswimming. And these songs we grew up with.

This is an update. Read it, and weep for your future!

I am almost done with Battlestar Galactica: Season 3. It's all I have left to watch and I'm both terrified and thrilled to finish it. And then I'll experience what everyone else has already been going through, the waiting.
And almost done with The Historian. And I am so terrified and thrilled to reach the conclusion of that!

Other than that, work is long and sometimes wearying. And it's really hot here.

Video Vriday. I mean Thursday.

2007-06-07T09:10:00.000-05:00

This is Galactica actual.

It's video posting day, brought to you by YouTube and me. I think some of you will like some of these, but I doubt all of you will enjoy any one of them.
For the Harry Potter fans, you can't go wrong with a bit of Potter Puppet Pals.
And if you like ridiculous and at times inappropriate (I'm telling you now) comedy, then you should check out Liam Sullivan. Specifically, the hot video on the internet right now, Shoes. But make sure you take the time to watch the well orchestrated semi-sequel Text Message Breakup. The real winner, that everyone should enjoy without fear is Muffins. Because seriously, sometimes you just want variety.
And then, this is me being stalked by a mime. My friend, school project, you know. It happens.

More videos as I find them.

Happy Birthday Katie

2007-06-02T22:53:00.000-05:00

The Cavs (the Cleveland NBA team) just made it to the NBA finals for the first time in their history, which is really nice. It's like 15 years ago, only Michael Jordan isn't shutting us down every year.

I have a fear with my script. Not that it's badly written or uninteresting, because those are things that I can deal with as they come. My fear is discovering that someone has already written the same story, and even worse that they have done it better than I could. And the idea of someone reading my work and having those thoughts is worse than not liking it at all.

I always avoid volunteering information about myself unless people ask directly. Do you think that's residual shyness from 6th grade? Or is that the idea of being mysterious? All I know is that most people don't know I write or have a script. And these are three things I really really like without any idea as to why: Skyscraper architecture, ships, open spaces (water, fields). It's something I can't figure out but I'm hooked on them.

Reading The Historian might be more enjoyable for me (and you?) because I really enjoy history already, so hearing about real history in a fictional context is intriguing.

Entertainment for Here or There

2007-05-30T00:54:00.001-05:00

Let me take this time to direct you to some changes in the Monsterbeard links.

First, Bob has moved to a new blog (for the moment) that he wants to call "Bobservations." Yes, yes, that chuckle is what he wants. You should read it because he's pretty interesting when he updates.
Second, Seth has also made a somewhat temporary switch to Tumblr, for whatever reason, and he lives far away in LA, so reading his blog is a good way of knowing what's up with him, since you can't just hang out that easily.
Thirdly, I left Katie out of the initial list because I didn't realize she was still updating. In fact, I still dont' know if she does, but I am very close with her, so she is great.
And bringing up the rear, I have a friend from Chicago who is currently touring with a group called Komen on the Go, which is great. Her travels and travails are recorded (for the time being) at her new blog. So you can go read about the behind the scenes of breast cancer awareness.

And, Lyndsey uncovered a hilarious website that posts the all too familiar notes we find (or leave) for others at Passive-Aggressive Notes. If there are more, I'll be sure to post them. Also, the above people links will be added momentarily. Read this from the CS Monitor in your downtime. I haven't yet. I'm working on it. And in case the last post didn't express it, I really am happy about toughening up on Sudan.

On Memorial Day of All Days

2007-05-29T00:25:00.000-05:00

Hey, Cindy "The Shiz-nit" Sheehan is giving up the fight, by which I mean her fight. Because I can't really say that she's giving up a fight that I have never really taken part in, at least not nearly on her level, which I really admire. The article is really sad because she's someone whose motivation and frustration are all real and have nothing to do with herself. But she found herself against walls of people too busy using her for themselves, which left her disillusioned.

And, yes, something might actually be happening in Darfur. Sanctions are going into effect even as you read this. It feels like you have been pushing against an enormous rock called "Endless Bad Shit" and then a giant comes along and effortlessly flicks the rock a few hundred feet. And you look at the rock and you look at the giant (who, by the way, is curling back up to go back to sleep) and you think "Can't you just move it the rest of the way too?"

To explain this analogy, my train of thought is "Gee, while you're busy debating the consideration of the decision to gather troops for the possible eventual peacekeeping in an alternate reality Sudan, do you think you can also get a gun and just shoot those assholes in the face?" Which, to be honest, is exactly my line of thought. I lost that feeling of "Can't we teach these people to get along" when a bunch of guys in a jeep started playing the "drive around and rape all the women" game. After that I decided I'd prefer we just shoot them in the face. But when I say them, I really mean everyone who can be called "the Sudanese Government." And then we'll peacekeep there for a little while because we're so great at nation building.

You can fill in a bunch of angry rambling here. There's no need. It would end something like: But I really did have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend.

Today I worked for 11 hours straight

2007-05-25T21:25:00.000-05:00

Happy Memorial Day weekend. Memorial Day is to honor fallen US soldiers. Not to be confused with Remembrance Day (which we call Veteran's Day) which is to honor the fallen soldiers from the world wars.

The World Wars. My upcoming novel. Soon to be released on trade paperback by Bantam Books! Isn't that the perfect title for a sci-fi paperback about a war between Earth and Mars? I seriously should get a $10,000 advance for that last sentence alone.

I worked from 6:15am to 5:30pm today. It was long. But that is nothing. Next week we will have an orientation for 12 new hires. Typically that number is around 4. So the next month will be quite a bit busier as we try to find a place where 12 people can all learn how to use a register together. But I have the weekend off, so I get to go home and visit some family and friends and celebrate a birthday and do laundry for free.

I've been reading on the train to and from work. It's really nice, especially because the book, The Historian, is very suspenseful. The only problem is that during rush hour its much more difficult to stand and read and hold on and not bump into people during the trip. But at least it's daily reading. And you need that when you're talking about a 660 page book.

Marco DeMarco

2007-05-22T23:53:00.000-05:00

I'm boring. I don't have much to say right now. I'd love to talk about how great Avatar or Battlestar Galactica is, but the dorks have probably seen more than I have and the non-dorks don't care.

Heroes! Did anyone watch the season finale? It was disappointing, but I still like the series. It was only disappointing because the series tends to hover on greatness. Like, oooh, people with abilities, only they don't really use them to do cool stuff very often. But with its popularity, Season Two might have better effects and thus, more action.

I finished my revision of my screenplay. Did I mention I was writing a screenplay? I think like a year ago I said it would be done in a month or two. Well eventually I actually finished it (around Christmas) and now I've finished revising it. I'm not yet comfortable enough to let anyone just read it or critique it, and I don't want to force it on people, but I am probably going to give it to a small number of friends and family in the hopes that they might give me good insights and feedback. I don't want to say that you are on this list, because there's the chance that you don't want to be on it. And there's the chance that I'm afraid of putting you on it. Do you know what I mean?

Tell you what: If you would like to be on that list, send me word. And then you are probably on it. But this is not an instant thing. We are looking at a few weeks from now at least.
And I'll give you this: The title is The Pirate Princess.

Thanks for keeping this between us.

They Are Coming For One of Us

2007-05-19T18:16:00.000-05:00

My new job, which started out kind of slow, gets better with each day. I'm already getting the hang of training people on my own and learning how to certify them. Yesterday, though, we had to fire a trainee because he was swearing in frustration at the register. His first time there. In front of customers. They call it termination. And then they call it Term for short, which makes it so inhuman.

But, that's the way things go and I don't really think he would have made a good employee in the first place. Not that he can't do a goob job, but he just doesn't seem fit for retail (which is definitely not a bad thing, although people is job one).

Wait, did I just say people is job one? Can I say that without sounding like a corporate sellout (which I guess I am). Well, yeah, I'm going to say that, because people should always be job one. If you put something else before people, you lose something. And I don't mean this to the extreme degree. I mean this in the simple way.

I may have gotten my old boss fired. I do not feel bad in any way. More on this as it happens.

UPDATE: I guess I never bothered to fully explain my new position. My title is Assistant Training Coordinator. I have close to the full authority of a Manager and in some cases more. My job is to prepare new hires for what they'll be doing and what they should know. I'll also be involved in the expansion and development of training programs. I wear business casual.

Do You Like Business Casual?

2007-05-16T00:41:00.000-05:00

I start my new job tomorrow morning. And I just closed and it's really late and I should be sleeping! But I'm a bit nervous/excited so here I am.

Tonight this guy came in and while he was waiting for his drink, I overheard him telling his friend about how one time he had been shot at! It was crazy and when I said that his story (which I didn't hear the rest of) was intriguing he said "yeah, don't go to Portland, Oregon." Wha-wha-What? "But I hear it's so nice there" I said, with the hopes of keeping a trip to Portland in my list of things to do. "Well, not if you're my skin color, but you would have a great time," he said. Now would be the time to point out that he was non-white. Although, interestingly enough, he was quite light-skinned. Anyway, it didn't make me feel better. I wanted to say something about racism in certain areas of the country, but what am I thinking, the whole damn place is full of racists (and non-racists too). It's not like we took all the racists and put them in [insert stereotypical area of the country].

For the nerds, I'm really excited about this Japan-only game demo I just downloaded off of Xbox Live. It's a R(ole)P(laying)G(ame) called Eternal Sonata with an amazing premise. The game takes place inside of Chopin's head after he falls into a coma shortly before his death. He dreams up a world where music is a physical part of life, or something like that. I mean, that sells you right there. But the game world is also really beautiful, with lots of bright colors. I'll tell you how it is, but I'm really excited to try it out.

Ninjas are Instruments of Death

2007-05-10T23:03:00.000-05:00

Patrick- I started blogging again to give you a suckerpunch to all five of your senses! No one ever sees a ninja coming! And... wait, you thought Spider-man 3 was "o.k."? Maybe you need a slap to those senses. Did you see it? And the emo peter is a problem because he's ruining it for all of us who really are emo! Seriously, no one should see this movie. I can't stress that enough. If you want, watch the first two back to back, you'll enjoy them and pretend that every Spiderman movie of the last 10 years has been great.

I'm watching a show on Animal Planet right now that features a prehistoric aquatic dinosaur being ambushed by sharks and/or another prehistoric aquatic dinosaur. I kid you not. Thank you CG.

And just now I may have run out of things to say for the moment. Yup. Ok then.

War and Peace

2007-05-08T03:20:00.000-05:00

I got the job! Yay! Exciting. We'll see how it goes and check back as it developes. Which they might say in... tv news?

Speaking of newsworthy, I have to tell you about two really interesting games I downloaded recently.
The first is called PeaceMaker, and you take on the role of either the Israeli or Palestinian leader and your job is to, well, make peace. Stop me if you've heard this one. Anyway, it's a really challenging and informative game, with all events and pictures taken from actual headlines. The first time I played, I made about 3 moves before the Israeli "Director General" decided that I wasn't fit for office. Give it a try because the demo is free and it's a great example of videogames attempting to educate people and invite a new perspective on an old problem.

The second game is, interestingly enough, the exact opposite. It's called Defcon, and if you've ever seen the movie WarGames (you should. TBS), then you already know all about Global Thermonuclear War. The goal is simple: Lose the least. It is impossible to win, simply because you and your opponents are trading nuclear detonations. Millions on both sides are bound to die, which creates an oddly beautiful display of why nuclear war is terrible. Watching two dozen glowing green harbingers of death arch across the sky to their whited out targets on your screen gives you a sick pleasure, undercut by the white flashes wiping out your own cities at the same time. If you try this one, let me know, and we can set up a time to play a multiplayer game over the internet. I would like that.

A strange game. The only winning move is not to play.

Why Does Sam Raimi Suck?

2007-05-05T22:47:00.000-05:00

Advice: Don't see Spider-Man 3. It is bad. It is so bad I want to send a letter to Sam Raimi asking for him to send me a check for $10. Really. Yes. I'm sorry, it wasn't supposed to be this way, so let's just do ourselves a favor and wait for it on TBS in like 8 months. You will thank me.

The Intricacies of Displacing Persons

2007-05-02T23:32:00.000-05:00

WTO: The World Trade Organization (Really, formerly GATT). People like the WTO because it breaks down trade barriers that make it harder for weak economies to trade with strong economies, eg. The US places tariffs on things like Steel and or Corn, which makes it harder for other countries to sell those things at a similar price. The WTO doesn't allow these tariffs.
People don't like the WTO because if you are a member of the WTO and you have environmental laws in place that prohibit the productivity of a corporation in your country, that corporation can sue you and you will have to pay the corporation an amount equal to the lost productivity. The same is true with labor laws. In short, the WTO supercedes concerns for the environment or labor for the sake of productivity, which allows corporations to more easily abuse economic situations (eg. sweatshops, pollution, and child labor).

FTAA: The Free Trade Area of the Americas. In the works for years, the FTAA is an attempt to unite the countries of the Americas (yes there are two! Neither of them is us!) into an free trade zone so that production and money can more easily flow between us. It is, in many ways, a WTO just for us, and carries the same pros and cons. Additional cons might be that conflict and narcotics might more easily flow throughout. Think if there were no checkpoints between here and Columbia. You could pave the streets in bricks of cocaine. And perhaps find members of FARC hiding in your yard.

Immigration Issues: Here's the thing, I have no idea what each side wants and I have no idea where I stand. Is it a problem that unchecked persons are making their way across our porous borders? No. Is it a fact that illegal immigrants provide a slice of productivity and economy that is unrealized by the general populace? Yes. Can we stop people from crossing our borders? No. Can we make it safer and perhaps easier for them to cross said borders? Yes. Is that a good idea? I don't know. The chance that you are an immigrant to this country is very high. Is an immigrant today different from one 200 years ago? Are Mexican lives less valuable than European? Is the US so afraid of terrorists that we are willing to become xenophobic fear-mongerers?

See, it all sort of ties in together. We're coming around full circle. The openness of free trade, the mingling of different cultures and problems, the loss of security and justice with the mix of rich and poor. There are answers somewhere, I think. But pursuing those answers means giving up comfort, making hard choices where the choice we didn't make seems so close to the right one.

It is like trying to unravel the world's largest ball of string. But we can all tug on a thread.

As If Things Aren't Weird Enough

2007-05-02T14:38:00.000-05:00

Why can't the size of my font be remembered? Why can't I set it to something besides Largest to Smallest? I should really take the time to make this place look a little more "me."

I'll find out about this new job on Friday. Which is to say they'll make me an offer. But I'm free to refuse it. Will I? Stay tuned.

I'd really like to save up money and then just do whatever for a month or something. I know a lot of people do that, but I specifically want to drive west (something I still haven't done) and see Portland. I'm hearing more and more great things about it. But I have a friend who has plans to move to Montana. Missula, Montana. Check.

I have tickets to Spider-Man 3 at Midnight tomorrow. Are you jealous? Not as jealous as all the people there who see me in my Spider-Man black costume. Oh baby.

I'd like to talk later about some things. Remember, WTO, FTAA, immigration issues, who the hell am I? That's a synopsis of what you can expect either later tonight or tomorrow. It's also similar to the conversation I had with my Mexican-American friend. Yes, I can say my because she's the only person I know who is of Mexican descent.

NEWS ON THE MARCH! Is having a hard deadline of October 1st a good thing for the situation in Iraq? Can you suggest an answer that no one is hearing? Discuss

This Machine Will Not Communicate

2007-04-30T01:34:00.000-05:00

Let me suggest something to all those Radiohead fans out there. The next time you're having a bad day or in a bad mood or just want some piece of mind, you should take a moment to listen to Ok computer. Trust me, it is worth it. Not because it's particularly uplifting or anything, but because it is an amazing album, and it will bring back soothing memories. It's a wonderful experience.

Happy Birthday, Bob. It was a nice weekend.

You should see The Prestige. It's good. And, if you enjoy the process of making movies, you should also see Brick, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt (huzzah!). It is an exceptional film noir set in high school. But it is well presented both visually and scriptually (what?). As a crime drama, it is excellent.

The hyenas drive the impala toward hidden flankers. You should be watching Planet Earth.

My Brightest Diamond Is

2007-04-21T00:17:00.000-05:00

I find the new Google/Blogger fusion distracting. While it is nice to know that there is a single entity in charge of the internet, putting speed bumps in my way does not help me. I had an old blogger account, so when I signed in, they prompted me to create a google account and use my existing google email. I did so, I thought I was fine. But then when I tried to sign in and somehow used the wrong username or password or both, I inadvertantly created a new blogger with my alternate email! Oh my stars!

That's boring.

So, even if she didn't realize it, both Talya and I saw The Decemberists, and it was a great show. Their music is... eclectic, as if to write songs they simply pick up a book of world history, open a page, and decide to sing about it. Gypsies, Legionnaires, Crane wives, I mean, just look at their website. It is not your pop-rock. But it is enjoyable and it is worth listening to, which is what we're after, right?

The opening band was called My Brightest Diamond and if you like PJ Harvey, Tori Amos, Over the Rhine, Bjork, then you might want to take a moment and check them out. Use that Google thing everyone talks about. We were trying to figure out where the lead singer was from because her accent was delicious, but we couldn't decide. We both suggested Norwegian.

That interview for my job went really well. It was really nice to sit down and talk to someone (who would be my boss) about what we'd like to do with the training program we have and how to improve it. And on more than one occasion I said the exact thing she was looking for, which feels really nice. The average salary of a Customer Service Trainer is between 40 and 54K for Chicago, according to Salary.com , but i doubt they'd even believe me if I suggested it. I don't know what they're suggesting yet, but I'm willing to bet it's under the 10th percentile. The good news though, is that it's not about the money, it's about a new job, a new boss, and a chance to do something I enjoy. I should have one or two more interviews in the next week or two. I'll let you know.

Turn the Page to Tomorrow

2007-04-19T00:45:00.000-05:00

This Virginia Tech thing is getting worse. I guess. I mean, how do you get worse at this point? You don't. You're just grateful it's over.
It's like, we focus so much on this kid, this messed up kid who loses his way and that sucks, and we don't get to look into the lives of the victims, remember who they were, their aspirations, who they would have become. All we get is their faces, their ages, their majors. We get just a hint of what could have been, and maybe that's the most heartbreaking part. The dream deferred? If only.

Talya and I are thinking of going to see The Decemberists play here in Chicago tonight. It's $26. And I also have an interview for an assistant training coordinator position, which could be really cool and a nice promotion if I get it. And maybe some big bucks! Big as in more than I'm making now. So, not that big.

Whatever. If I don't leave my current job, I will most definitely quit. It is too much of a headache dealing with my superior. I know, what kind of job could I have that would be so stressful? I'm a frickin barista! But I promise, this guy is terrible, and I say that after several months. Ok ok, enough. So, definitely moving on. I feel stuck in a way I haven't experienced before. Stuck not that I can't go forward, but that I can't go upward. Or outward.

I am an egg and you are the hammer.

Goodbye, Blue Monday

2007-04-12T22:46:00.000-05:00

I just found out Kurt Vonnegut died today, at the age of 84. He was a really fun writer to read, which is nice. I wouldn't call his writing particularly eloquent, or whatever makes a writer "great." But he made terrible things entertaining. He made it ok to laugh even though so much of the world has gone to shit.
These are books that he wrote that I really like:
Slaughterhouse Five
Breakfast of Champions (My favorite)
Cat's Cradle
Mother Night
Welcome to the Monkeyhouse

Apparently he only wrote 14 novels, which I didn't know, because it seemed like a lot. But some of his books are collections of short stories (the Monkeyhouse above) or prose. Anyway, it's spectacularly terrifying to read Slaughterhouse Five and realize that the story that he is telling you has real parts that were from his actual life. And that in turn makes you grateful he wrote about it. So if you haven't, you should pick up a copy. If for any other reason than because he just died, and people will be touched, I guess.

I got to see him speak in 1998 at Ohio State, which was actually an incredible experience. At first I had to sit in another room (one of three maybe) watching him on video. But then everyone left and they had a Q&A, which me and my friends got to go and sit in on. In it, he told a story about the dirtiest limerick ever told, which you can find in one of his books. It's pretty funny if it's told right.

So it goes.

Links

2007-04-11T20:43:00.000-05:00

All my links got deleted when I made the switch to a new template. It's also been a while so please, if I've forgotten you, feel free to leave a comment so I can add you. The links are in no particular order, so don't worry about your "status." And we'll have more.

There Went My Heart

2007-04-11T15:05:00.000-05:00

I was supposed to go to Africa this June. Two months from now. But the truth is that we gave up because the cost is around $3000. The idea is to go there and make a documentary of sorts that focuses on good instead of bad. Not all good, like rainbows and sunshine. But good like Africans are capable of sustainability and economic growth and all the other answers to the question of “Why should I give a fuck about Africa?”

I still don’t know the answer to the question. But I doubt the answer was ever the point, if you have to ask the question in the first place. Right? But I’ve been wrestling with the meaningless of life as of late. And I wonder, what does it matter if a million people in Darfur are violently ripped from this Earth? Doesn’t it save them from dying of diarrhea or some equally curable and laughable affliction? Doesn’t it also give us one less thing to care about? One less place to throw money, a million less people eating our food, using up our planet?

I know this is hard to think about. I don’t want to think about it. But they are the questions that those in power ask every day. And the best answer they come up with is “It makes us look bad” and so they give speeches and quell the rumbles of their conscience, and people continue to die.

And here I am, preaching about the cares I spend .2% of my time considering. I don’t write this to guilt you. I write it to guilt me, because I’m the pessimist now, and I’m angry about it. Because I can’t answer those questions, and I’m afraid of the answers I consider.

It’s good to be back. I should seek before I speak again. I should try before I complain. I should live I love you instead of saying it.

Resurrection day

2007-04-06T01:53:00.000-05:00

Hey, Happy Passover. And Easter. Here’s what you can say to all your non-christian friends: Did you know this Friday is Good Friday? Do you know why this Friday is good and all the other ones aren’t? It’s because it’s when Jesus was crucified.
Wait, what?
What a great conversation starter! Did you know that this holiday is much more significant than Christmas? But we get presents at Christmas. Sometimes people get presents on Easter too, but it’s not the same. It doesn’t have carols. Christmas has carols. Christmas Carols, we call them. They’re not Easter carols. Did you know why Easter is called Easter? I’ll give you a hint, it has nothing to do with Jesus or graves, or any sort of rising from the dead. Give up! It’s a pagan holiday. The early Christians were persecuted and so sought to hide their worship and celebration by putting them at the same time as major pagan holidays. Christmas was put in December so that while the rest of the Roman empire was celebrating Saturnalia, Christians could celebrate Christmas. The same can be said about Easter, except without the carols. If you'd like to know more, click a book!

We've got Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Black Saturday, and Easter Sunday! It's like our version of Hanukkah. I also heard once that Wednesday is supposed to be when Judas accepted the 30 pieces of silver and so is known as Spy Wednesday, but I don't know how accurate that is. It would really make Monday and Tuesday really uncomfortable, you know? How about Angry in the Temple Monday and Trying to Explain to These Dudes About My Impending Death and Glorious Return But They're Just Not Getting It Tuesday?
We'll work on it.

Peeps for all ma peeps!

Returning

2007-04-04T20:05:00.000-05:00

Hi. I’m back. Sort of? I don’t know. It’s not like I’ve been busy, too busy to blog. It’s just that I lose focus, which is why I’m bad at keeping in touch with people. It’s not like I love them less or don’t like talking to them. It’s just that I lose focus and then months go by and then you feel too guilty to make first contact, so you wait for them, all the while feeling more and more guilty and less and less able to make it right. And I hate talking on the phone.
Whatever. I’m sorry I’ve been gone, not because you miss me, but because I miss you. So I’m here, for now. And you can always email or call of course. It doesn’t mean I won’t lose focus again. It just means I like you.

You should see Blood Diamond. It’s good. It’s not perfect, but Leo’s Afrikaans accent goes beyond an accent and into the culture of speaking that can only come from real effort. And Edward Zwick made it. He also made The Last Samurai, a movie I love. And it has a message about Africa and diamonds. It makes some strong accusations against De Beers, the largest diamond company in the world, but I don’t know how unfounded they are. There was a big stink made by the New York Post (an utterly unremarkable paper notable only for its distinct likeness to diarrhea) that the film crew promised prosthetics to some of the amputee extras and then bailed on them. That was countered by the LA Weekly saying that no promise was made. In any case, money was raised for the kids and I’m pretty sure they got their prosthetics. Now if only artificial limbs could create real solutions in Africa.

I also saw Jesus Camp. Yuck. There’s some debate out there about it, Whether or not its indoctrination of children or whether the people in it are ethically sound, I don’t know. What I do know, and the worst part of it for me, is that every adult in the film speaks with division. All the language of both the positive people and the negative ones is divisive and meant to create a fervor about the corruption of American values. Makes me sick. And to be honest, it’s not that great. It’s about 90 minutes tops, and there isn’t really any resolution to the story or anything. It just sort of ends and you think to yourself “that’s it?” But, it will probably spark debate, which is what’s nice about controversial documentaries.

And I started watching Battlestar Galactica. Forgive me for a moment of complete dorkiness, I beseech you. BSG, as I shall refer to it, is about a band of about 50,000 humans lost in space after their machine creations, the Cylons, ambush and destroy their worlds. So these people are constantly on the run from the Cylons and fighting amongst themselves for a variety of reasons. It’s great because it deals with issues that we deal with in our (I’m sorry about this) “Post 9/11” world, including terrorism, liberty vs security, and the balance between the military and civilian government.

What’s up with this whole British hostages in Iran thing? Seriously, Iran, chill out. I know you feel like you’re running out of friends who hate Israel and oppress their women, so you have to do something drastic or whatever, but come on. Don’t forget about Syria. Or most of Iraq for that matter. And you could always opt for a new plan of “Oppression Lite.” Just look at China, worked for them. And now they’re holding the Olympics! You still have time. Tehran 2016. Come on, at this rate you’ll be a burgeoning democracy by then, with a US security force to boot! And look at how well that turned out for… Well, in any case, I prefer wars to hostage crises. Just feels more honest that way. So enough with the hostage taking.

This is now.

So Goes the Nation

2006-10-18T03:19:00.000-05:00

Aren't blogs, like, so 2005?

I got robbed last week. And when I say robbed, I mean I was connived into voluntarily giving someone money. It was at work, out of my drawer, and it was $100. Confusion and misdirection and you're either a magician or a thief. And the police said there was no crime because I voluntarily gave him the money. It was humiliating. A control freak losing control is not enjoyable. In fact, it was the focus of my entire week. But whatever, I'll punch him in the nose if I ever see him again.
And that's exactly the worst part of it all. I lost a small slice of myself that cares for other individuals, that wants to help the poor or educate the masses. And I don't know if I can get that back.

I had the chance to see Barak Obama speak today, but I declined, because it required that I purchase his new book, The Audacity of Hope, to do so. It's a book that I'd like to read, but not for $25. Besides, he's not even president yet.

Saturday, I'm playing in a poker tournament that my roommate is hosting. I'm pretty excited about it, and if anyone is going to be in the Chicago area (ahem) and wants to play in a poker tournament (it costs money), holla back.

Speaking of location, it's important that everyone in Ohio vote this time around, as in, next month. Why? Because Blackwell is running for Governor and there are few Ohio politicians who come off as being more miserable human beings than Blackwell (Ney and Trafficant, anyone?). He's part of the reason Bush won Ohio in 2004. I'm serious, there's even a movie being made about it.

Ohio in the fall is one of the most beautiful things I know. Seeing it makes me sad that I don't get to see it. Don't you just love the nip in the air while you walk down a multicolored tree lined street sipping a hot chai that warms your face and hands? Yeah.

Back In Black

2006-09-25T20:47:00.000-05:00

Hi. Remember when I had a blog? Yeah, that was like, a month and a half ago. And what has changed in that time?
I brought my bike to Chicago, which is amazing. It's great having a way to get around that is fast and yet free and doesn't require parking. Except it's scary, because not only are there cars driving next to you, but there are the doors of the cars parked on the street. And honestly, that's the scariest thing. That and the fact that I haven't ridden a bike in maybe 5 or 6 years. You do actually forget.

I'm still at my job, and I still like it a lot. It's surprising how nice it can be to be a barista in the morning, where you might be the first person someone gets to interact with, and what kind of effect that might have on their day. But I also close a lot, and when you're closing a consistent thought running through your head (besides, "why God, why did that person just order a smoothie ten minutes to close?") is "please everyone get out." Because, seriously, I want to get home, and I've got another hour of work after you leave anyway. But overall, it's all good.

I read a promising article on Somalia in the NYTimes today. It turns out that the Islamists who took over the capital a few months ago are doing a lot of good so far, investing in the community. The fear was that they'd turn into another Taliban, banning girls from school and all that. But instead girls are in school, and kids can play soccer, and other good stuff. It's certainly not perfect, but it's promising, especially because the Islamists have told the UN they want to have democratic elections as soon as possible. Hooray for that.

I'm reading Wicked right now, which you may have heard of as the book about Oz before the Wizard? Talya and I saw the musical, after she had read the book, and she suggested I read it. The writer has a very strange style that I can't always get into, but it's nice to read such an imaginative work on an existing classic.

I'll try to be here more

LA to Ohio - Omaha

2006-08-15T00:48:00.000-05:00

Bob and I are on a trip across the country, from Los Angeles (The Angles of the Hypotenuse, from the French) to Ohio. Right now we're in Omaha, Nebraska. Last night we slept on and off in the car instead of a hotel or camping. That means we drove from Los Angeles to Omaha with only the briefest of stops in Las Vegas (The Vegetarian Cuisine, from the French again) and Greeley, Colorado. Some lessons I've learned:

- There's a good chance that if you are standing still in a casino, a man will approach you and tell you that he is high on both ecstacy and coke and then offer you both.
- A cattle farm with thousands of cattle in a small space smells like tens of thousands of pounds of cow shit, in the form of tiny mountains. The smell stays in your mouth for several miles.
- Nebraska is boring and flat. Utah and the Western side of Colorado are pretty, unless it's dark.

There are plenty of pictures to check out. Seth has some great ones up already.

August Already

2006-08-09T23:32:00.000-05:00

I've been busy. We just opened a new frickin' store. And it's sexy like a new car that you shouldn't have paid so much for but you love it anyway. I promise more later today.

I can't tell you how good The Illusionist looks. And if you're anything like me, and you watched TMNT with awe and reverence as a child, then you don't want to miss the trailer for their new movie, which looks a good deal better than Transformers, ick. Thanks Michael Bay. Ok, more to come.

Superior Visors!

2006-07-25T23:09:00.000-05:00

I've been not posting. Did you guys know I got a promotion? I'm officially a shift supervisor, and besides the pay raise, I get to boss around the underlings (also known as my co-workers) and be in charge of maintaining order while the manager is gone. Behold my great powers! I shall smite you from on high atop my supervisory crag of power (Since I work at Argo, you might call it an Argo Crag? Anyone?).

Before I give a sufficient update, you should check out comics, because comics bring joy to an internet gone wrong. Check out Comet 7 because it has fun art and funny punchlines. I especially enjoyed this one. And if you're in the mood for dinosaur clipart with witty text, check out Dinosaur Comics, particularly this empowering exploit.

That was a joke. Tell me, how are you?

Squid Studios Games

2006-07-12T19:11:00.000-05:00

My apologizes to Patrick for not linking to this earlier. I got your email and thought "wow, that's freaking awesome" and then tucked it away as something to reference when in need of "freaking awesome." However, it is more appropriate and fun to let anyone who might not know in on the secret.

Squid Games is a boardgame design company headed up by dear Patrick Filipiak, the coolest bounty hunter this side of Corellia. You should check out what they have brewing and give them some love and feedback, because who doesn't love an entire night devoted to games and friends? Squid Games is also under the new "Cool Places I Go" links section.

Today We Celebrate

2006-07-04T11:37:00.000-05:00

Instead of one long entry up for two weeks, I do two short ones for each day. Or a long and a short. Oy. I completely forgot to mention The 4th yesterday, but that’s what today is, Independence Day.

Look, I’m really worried about this shuttle launch. The chief engineer and chief safety officer are both opposed to the launch, and it seems a tremendous risk to go ahead with it. In truth, I think everyone at NASA realizes that the shuttles are no longer a viable option for space travel. But they won’t have their new spacecraft until 2010? So they have to bridge the gap with going ahead with launches when they shouldn’t. And on the 4th of July, no less. People say that if there’s an accident, it will be the end of NASA, but I don’t think it will be NASA’s fault. Imagine the political pressure of pulling off a successful, picture perfect launch on our Independence Day. Bush’s ratings might go up a point. Not that it would be his fault. It’s just unfortunate that they’ve decided to go ahead with it. But by the time most of you read this, you’ll already know if it was good or bad, so we’ll have to see.

Speaking on politics, I know it feels shitty to celebrate an Independence Day in this country when almost every section of our government is turning into a great Constitution eating maw. But, that’s not what our country’s about, and I think we know that, and that’s why we’re so mad. I mean, if we were in China, we wouldn’t gripe about how oppressive the government is because it’s a given. But here, we have the right to know that our country was not designed to be run this way, listening to our conversations, holding people without trial, limiting our access to information. It’s all bullshit, and we know it. So instead of being pissed about how our government is abusing its role, let’s reflect on what our country is supposed to be. Here's Jon Stewart's first broadcast after 9/11, 9 minutes of sorrowful yet hopeful honesty. I suggest you read either the Declaration of Independence, the Gettysburg Address, or the I Have A Dream speech today, because I think it’s good to hold that optimism in our hearts when there’s so much pessimism all around us.

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

I Saw Hostel Tonight

2006-07-04T00:15:00.000-05:00

My blog entries are too long. I’ve known this for a while but I wasn’t sure how irritating it was for others until… recently. I just get caught up in reading my own brilliant thoughts that I can’t stop. So I’m sorry.

One of the speeches I gave for Inco 103 (Public Speaking) just came back to me. It was entitled “How to Play Perfect Dark.” It was early in college, maybe sophomore year, at time when Catherine and I lived under the same roof back home, and much of our valuable time was spent destroying the lives of simulated villains on the N64. And you’re supposed to give an informative speech on what you know, so there we have it.

The cover of the 50th anniversary edition of Fahrenheit 451 is really well done. You know those giant book covers they have on the wall of Barnes & Noble’s? This cover would look great up there. Conveniently, I’m in a B&N right now.

Schlosser Nation

2006-06-26T23:08:00.000-05:00

So, about a month or so ago I got to see Eric Schlosser speak at Borders. He's the man who wrote Fast Food Nation and he's on a book tour for another book called Chew On This written by he and his fact checker from his previous books, Charles Wilson. Chew On This is basically Fast Food Nation for kids.

Anyway, there was security there because Mr. Schlosser has been threatened by lots of people, like the retailers of america, the farmers association and other organizations with real names. But what was great was that he emphasized the right to choose what you eat. What he really wants is to make people aware of the full truth, instead of what they get from billions in advertising, which is that McDonalds fries count as vegetables. He was big on personal choice and personal responsibility, almost Libertarian. I really liked that.

Most people asked about health concerns. I asked about social justice for the workers preparing the food. And about Chick-fil-a. It turns out that they have a generally respectable opinion on the company, which was refreshing because it tastes so good.

On Saturday my roommates bought a big screen TV. And I played "Cornhole" for the very first time. It is harder than it looks.

Darfur

2006-06-15T23:32:00.000-05:00

This is in response to a discussion at Bob's blog.
What needs to happen in Darfur? Personally, I think that we need an international (preferably UN sanctioned) intervention force large enough to go into the Darfur region and provide security for the people there. Take the estimated number of soldiers it would take to secure the area, double it, and send them in, with the authority to defend both themselves and any people coming under attack. After securing the area, they should disarm the militias that are causing the violence in the first place, making sure they aren’t in a position to start things up again when the intervention force leaves.

Why this can’t happen: First of all, Sudan. Many African countries and the UN want to send in an African intervention force, but Sudan is hesitant to allow them into its sovereign territory. Since the UN is a body that is restricted by the sovereignty of its members, an “invasion” is out of the question, despite the fact that the militias are most likely loosely controlled, if not directed, by the government in Khartoum.
There’s also the issue of committing troops, whether US or otherwise, to die for a cause that doesn’t directly affect us. After Somalia, it is unlikely that any President will ever risk our troops for purely humanitarian causes again, regardless of the flaws inherent in our presence in Somalia in the early 1990s.

There’s a lot of room here to talk about the issue of unilateral action and the defense of human rights, Somalia and Rwanda, but genocide will never break the sovereignty of the Sudanese government because no one gives a shit. It is too costly (politically and economically) to invade a country to stop the killing of a few hundred thousand people, most of whom live in extreme poverty and will all probably die before the age of 40 regardless. We can’t see it on our streets. It doesn’t keep us from getting to work (gas prices) or our own soldiers from coming home (Iraq).

How do we persuade our representatives to care about the issue? I think telling them that we care about it is all we can do. If we care, and contact them, they have to care, because they depend on us for their jobs. They do actually represent us. Sure, one voice isn’t much, but that’s why we’re doing it, not just you, or me, or George Clooney or Bono. All together, we are a thunderstorm. If our voices and the sanctity of life don’t sway them, then relate Sudan to the war on terror (a very real correlation). It’s my belief that the only true way to eliminate the terrorists is to leave the world, and all the terrorists supporters, with little reason to hate us. We do that by giving them aid and food, so why not security and protection, and perhaps the promise of a life where going to look for firewood doesn’t carry the risk of gang rape.

Dear Sir or Madam Representative, I care about the genocide in Darfur. It needs to stop because it goes against the principles this country was founded on. I realize we cannot commit troops or much money to any sort of intervention force, but I urge you to use all time and influence possible to get the Sudanese government to allow an international security force into Darfur to stop the killing. This is a time when a positive US image abroad is vital to both the war on terror and our security at home. Please make a stand to show the world that we care about more than just ourselves. Don’t let this be a time we say “never again” again. Thanks.

Those are my thoughts on Darfur. Despite being already longwinded, I could probably go on for a bit longer, because the complexity of everything means that saying “we should send in an intervention force” is ignorant, because it’s a temporary solution. In the long run, with good policy and perhaps a sense of companionship, we need a stable Africa, where the leaders step down from power when they lose an election and a well-paid, standing army can provide constant security against internal and external threats.

Where did I go wrong here? Where did I go right? Are there better ways?

8-Letter Word For...

2006-06-15T19:33:00.000-05:00

Best Movie Ever

Seven Brides for Seven Horcruxes

2006-06-12T20:52:00.000-05:00

Patrick- I understand your reasoning for choosing a bear or a mountain lion as North America's greatest predator, but I would have to disagree. Certainly a bear or lion would be the most intimidating and most powerful choice, but that's like choosing a giant ogre or troll over an elven assassin. Think about that? Those wolves, they're thick as thieves, sneaking about, stealing chickens. By the time you realize they've surrounded you, it's too late.

Bob is asking what should be done about Darfur. I plan on submitting my ideas, and I would encourage you to do the same. Maybe together we can come up with a realistic suggestion for our congresspersons.

Thanks Lyndsey, for the promotion. More work for the same amount of money. A real treat.

Over this past weekend, while moving Talya to her new residence in Akron, I may have listened to a total of 9 or 10 hours of Harry Potter on my iPod, audiobook style. Sadly, I'm not burned out, but I may have permanently damaged my brain. Last night I had a dream while my alarm was going off that I had to get up to keep Malfoy from getting more polyjuice potion. And I want to use a British accent and say things like "loads more" or "That's just it, isn't it?" which seem to pop up more in Harry Potter than other places, like TV.

Next time, I need to tell you about Eric Schlosser.

Canis Lupus

2006-06-05T00:32:00.000-05:00

Right now, I am watching "Growing Up Wolf" on Animal Planet. I really like wolves. There's something distinctly different about them from domesticated dogs. Besides their slinky grace, I'm fascinated by their complex social structure. They're also the coolest predators of North America. I also heard Hugh Jackman (of X-Men fame) studied the way wolves hunt for his role as Wolverine. Anyway, enough dork talk.

Wait, actually, dork talk may be all I have to offer. The other day, a guy on the "El" train (not the The train, but elevated) was reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which I have already read and am currently working through the audio version. I got to chatting with him about it and other good fantasy works. It was a really nice conversation, and the second one I've had on the train because of Harry Potter. But then I had to leave, because it was my stop. And most of the time, taking the El during rush hour sucks.

Has anyone seen the USA show The 4400? It's about 4400 people who were abducted over the course of the last 60 years, but now all of them suddenly returned at the same time, and some have special powers, or something. It sounds like something that is totally awesome, and it's produced by Ira Steven Behr, the main creative force behind Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Bob, I am directing this at you, if you haven't already seen the show.

Owls are a hoot!

Married to the Sea

2006-05-29T01:32:00.000-05:00

Too long, much too long. Have I shown you guys this yet? It's a webcomic called Married to the Sea, and it's done by a married couple (who each have their own comic) from Columbus, Ohio. It's sometimes very funny and other times a little too vulgar, but all in all a good read. They take old 19th and early 20th century drawings and put funny words next to them. Catherine could never get over this one, but others might be just as effective. I once suspected Lyndsey and her husband, but they are either great at playing dumb or had no idea what I was talking about.

I've got to send shoutouts to all the people who have accomplished a great deal at this time. Proud graduates from accredited universities. Talya, Catherine, Katie, and Jess are all graduated or will soon from each of their institutions, and I'm very proud of all of them for their efforts. Hooray for learning and degrees and lawyers and college! Hooray!

Photos for You

2006-05-11T00:00:00.000-05:00

I finally uploaded the interesting photos from the Darfur Rally and my haircut. I even chose to show my ugly mug (there's a warning for all of you). I put the pictures on Flickr because there are more than I'd like to put here. So here are the links, I hope they work.
Darfur Rally
My Haircut

I'm a little frustrated with Flickr's options for how to organize the presentation of my photos, but whatever. Sorry if you don't like my haircut or face. There's nothing I can do about what I was born with.

The Electronics Entertainment Expo is currently going on and there's some pretty exciting stuff going on for nerdy people. Like a Halo 3 trailer, and some Nintendo Wii game previews. There was also a new technology that maps a person's face for sports games, and the example that EA used was a model of Tiger Woods that was disturbingly real. Anyway, it led me to what might be my new obsession, Uncanny Valley.

Uncanny Valley, if you don't want to read for yourself, is when robotic or animated "humans" reach a point where their likeness is so close that it creates a jarring effect because we can tell that there is something that's just not right with it. This is mostly in CG movies, like Toy Story. The toys look real because they look like animated toys. But the people look weird. Anyway, it's a fascinating concept that I knew, but didn't know it had a name. Some choice quotes from the Wiki article:
"Pixar stated that the reason for stylizing the characters in The Incredibles was not due to an inability to make the characters more realisitic, but an attempt to avoid the Uncanny Valley."

"Erotic sequences with Uncanny Valley characters, as featured in Final Flight [of the Osiris, from the Animatrix], are particularly disturbing, since they provide conflicting messages of 'this is arousing' and 'this is non-human'." Dwell on that.

Where is the Router Plug?

2006-05-06T13:00:00.000-05:00

I can't upload all the pictures from the rally yet because people are moving in right now and we haven't gotten the internet situation figured out just yet. However, as soon as I can, I will. It was a great time in D.C., although all the museums closed before the rally ended. And I have to tell you that I cut my hair. I donated about 11 or so inches of hair to Locks of Love while I was home because the time had finally arrived. It was actually harder than I thought, which is weird because it's why I grew my hair out in the first place. I'll be sure to show you all the pictures from that also. Soon.

May 9th is Nintendo's E3 press conference, where we'll finally learn the secrets to their new console, the Wii (no, I'm serious. It's pronounced "We").

Save Darfur

2006-04-29T18:35:00.000-05:00

Jess, Talya, and I are in a hotel room outside of D.C. right now. Tomorrow we're going to a rally against the genocide in Darfur. That's why we're here. The National Mall. We're heading early to hit up some Smithsonians, if you know what I mean. Free museums covering the most important events in U.S. history? This dork says "yes please!" Pictures may follow.

Puppy Power!

2006-04-20T13:09:00.000-05:00

Wasn't Easter nice? I had a nice Easter visiting Talya and seeing her new puppy. He is difficult to dislike, because he's just so cute. Well, when he's not eating things he shouldn't be or biting you. He's teething, so he enjoys chomping on wrists and fingers. In fact, he seems to just go for your hand instead of the toy you're holding. But, I don't want to paint a negative picture. He is soft and small and often cuddly. And since Talya does not have the technology, here he is:
And a profile shot:
As you can see in the picture, he isn't showing much interest. There's a slight worry that he might be deaf, but we have no way of knowing for sure. Puppies are supposed to be a distracted group. He does have one continued interest though: his own penis. Yes, it seems every day holds new surprises as his snout and crotch mingle again and again.

Disturbing images. Anyway, during the course of the weekend we also got to see V for Vendetta and Thank You For Smoking, both of which were phenomenal. And, I think both are even worth the price of a movie ticket. What's difficult is that you can't really know what will be worth it until you see it, except for, like, Spider-man 3 or something.

In other big news, I got a job at a tea house where I'll serve teas of all kinds. Yesterday I tried a sample of a tea called "Gunpowder," which just begs to be ingested. I start on Monday and I really like the people I'm working for (www.argotea.com) so far.

Last night I saw Jonathan Safran Foer as promised and he was nice and funny and sort of what you'd expect, I suppose. Since my copy of Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close was in Ohio, I drew a copy on a piece of paper. No, I'm serious. I traced my hand with red marker and filled it in, wrote the name on it, and then surrounded it with yellow. He signed it in an unidentifiable scribble that anyone could argue was fake. Oh well. One thing I'll tell you is that book signings kind of suck, at least at borders. To get a seat you had to have a copy of the book and all of the employees save the leader were in some kind of "I don't know how to answer anything" land. And, the only people who ask questions are the people you'd expect. Like the people who were always right in Poly-Sci class. But, it was JSF, whose first book I now want to read because he was cool.

And Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation (which always makes me want to sing "Teenage Wasteland") will be at the same store in three weeks, so I might go to that, and have my book with me. He's promoting a new book, called "Chew on This: Everything You Don't Want to Know About Fast Food" which seems to be a young adult version of FFN, which is kinda dumb.

You're Entering the No Spin Zone

2006-04-12T13:47:00.000-05:00

Morning is a relative term anyway, so no guff. Not that anyone noticed. Most likely, most of you have things to do during the day, things that don't include checking blogs every hour or so. I'm not saying anything incriminating, am I?

Back on track. I renewed my lease and I'm staying in Chicago, at least for the time being. You wouldn't believe how this area heats up once baseball season starts. Noise, fans, souvenirs, scalpers. It's like a hibernating bear has finally awoken and, having been dormant for 5 months, must feast ravenously in an all-consuming quest to... consume. It's exciting, especially because the weather gets warmer every day and because we can sell our parking spaces for $25-30 a pop. It's an unexplainable joy when someone hands you that much cash for standing on the corner and holding a sign. In fact, the worst part of it is when our last (of four) spots gets taken, because that means there is no more money to receive. The only comfort is the unreasonably long baseball season. And the money.

Another exciting thing coming down the road is that Jonathan Safran Foer (the author of The Red Hand Book) will be appearing next week at my local Borders Books Music Movies Café Emporium. I am planning on attending, and perhaps even discovering if "The Red Hand Book" is a widely used title. Signing and reading most likely to follow.

I'd also like to report that I have reached the halfway point in a screenplay I mentioned earlier and I'm extremely pleased with my progress. It is tentatively titled "The Pirate Princess" and is an action/adventure/ romantic/comedy that may or may not turn out to be good. However, it's the first time that my screenwriting has ever felt natural, in the sense that sometimes I couldn't write fast enough to keep up with my mind. Other times, writing scripts in classes, the process was a relatively awkward affair, like the painful moving of a kidney stone. Not to say that my writing is perfect now, certainly not. I've already accidently reread to find sentences like "he darkly looked across the darkening dark room." Ok, I exaggerate, but really, when I've been writing I've mostly been concentrating on getting the image onto the page, with extensive rewriting withheld for the second draft. Because it's easier to be completely creative and completely logical (different sides of the brain) all at once than constantly switching back and forth.

Check out KT for some great travel stories from her invasion of Turkmenistan, full of neither Turks nor Stans, but probably men. The blog revival is upon us! Happy Resurrection Day.

Right Quick

2006-04-11T22:08:00.000-05:00

Let's make a deal. Tomorrow morning I will update this blog. Until then, content yourself with the many other blogs and forms of information and entertainment available across the electronic landscape of the Intertron™.

Should I Stay or Should I Go Now?

2006-03-29T18:06:00.000-06:00

I like this article from CBS on Games and Storytelling. Any article about games becoming art is usually interesting because games are at the same time very similar to other story forms and also very unique.

I'm currently conflicted between moving back to Ohio at the end of April (when my lease here is up) or staying in Chicago. It's not like I've really found anything or one that I enjoy here. If anything I'm getting used to how it has been so far. I have no job responses but my current roommate might be able to hook me up to a teahouse. A teahouse? Yes. If I stay where I am living, rent goes up. If I find a new place, I have to move. If I go home, I move but don't spend money. And currently my roommate is interviewing people to move in here.

So, going home to Ohio Pros: Free, no monetary commitments, nicer living conditions, closer to friends, family, girlfriend.
Cons: Back where I started, living with people I already get frustrated with, still no job (but easy to get one).

Staying in Chicago Pros: Still on my own, in a city of "opportunity," summer is coming
Cons: Spending money without a job, slim job prospects, still far away from friends, family, girlfriend.

I'm undecided. The stubborn side of me (I have a stubborn side?) wants to stay here to be "independent" (at least geographically) and all that crap. To "make it." The other side of me says "Lessons learned, matured, it's time to go home and get redirected to the right place, which isn't here."

If I think with my mind, I should probably stay here. If I think with my heart, I should go home and enjoy it.
But joy isn't the reason for living. Ok, ok, now I'm rambling. Most of you have moved to strange places without security. Would you do it all over again? In fact, should I just move to where you are and live off of you? Just kidding, I don't think anyone reading this makes enough to support another person. At least not yet. Anyone want to go in on 1000 MegaMillions tickets?

I'm just asking.
And if you have any advice or opinions that you'd rather not share publically (the secrets of becoming rich, for example) you can always email me at monsterbear [at] gmail [dot] com. Wink, wink.

Facial Reconstruction

2006-03-23T00:40:00.000-06:00

I may have been wrong about the Perry Bible Fellowship. Exibits A, B, and C.
It's just that there seem to be an overabundance of jokes about people having sex or staring at boobs. And those get tired pretty fast. However, jokes about people being crushed inside a transformer? Well, I mean, how often do we get to laugh about a situation like that?

Today I was thinking. If the parts of the face had personalities, the ears would be the old married couple who constantly bicker. The eyes would be creepy twins who say the same thing. The mouth would be a smartass. And the nose would be Eeyore. Think about it. It makes sense.

Monsterbeard Comic Con

2006-03-20T18:28:00.000-06:00

After a wonderful trip home which featured a birthday, an anniversary, and green beer, I returned to Chicago armed with a refreshing sense of "this will work out." And I have to say it is working out for some people already. Congrats to both Katie and Jess for the great jobs they have secured. It's nice when things fall perfectly into place.

Upon returning I discovered a package for me that contained, specifically, a graphic novel called Daisy Kutter: The Last Train, by Kazu Kibuishi, a really talented artist whose work I really like. Daisy Kutter takes place in a scifi old west where robots are as commonplace as horses. The main character is a retired (for the time being) legend who is drawn into one last job (that very train). It has a great atmosphere and I highly recommend checking it out at your local comic shop. I'm really getting into a lot of different webcomics that I'm really impressed with. I'll post a bunch of ones I like soon. But one I'll link to right now. I saw this in the Chicago Reader today and I thought it was hilarious, but I wouldn't recommend the comic (Perry Bible Fellowship) because it might be mostly bad.

While I was at Kazu's site, I discovered two things. First of all, Marvel and DC Comics have made an attempt to trademark the word "Superhero." From my perspective it's a completely ridiculous notion and I sincerely doubt it can stand up to the law, mainly because it's just a word, just like any other word, which cannot be trademarked, but also because even if Marvel and DC (together, coming up with the word 70 years ago) did create it, it's become a part of culture, like band-aid or robotic. I can't back all this up, but I've studied some entertainment law in my day (hem hem), so I'm right and Marvel and DC are dumb. Remember when Fox News tried to sue Al Franken? Same diff.

Anyway, the other (and much cooler) thing I saw at BoltCity.com was a link to a site called Flipbook, an amazing Flash site that lets you create your own flipbook animations. They're fun to watch, but more fun to play around with. Check it out. If I actually make one that I like, I'll post a link to it.

In Limbo

2006-03-10T03:46:00.000-06:00

For some reason, a curious state of limbo has surreptitiously swept its way across everyone I know. Whether it be school, or jobs, or any other sort of major life-change, we are caught in an uncertainty which leaves us all, from my own experience, extremely frustrated. I know I’m preaching to the choir, because the people who read this blog are the people I’m relating to. Why have we suddenly been put in this situation? Why isn’t anyone getting what they want? Is it because we’re trying to get what we want?

Wait, stop, go back. Is this what God wants? For us to want what he wants but we don’t. And I do what I don’t want to do, Paul. Maybe I’m (and I can only speak for myself) receiving a lesson that means “maybe you aren’t as righteous as you think you are,” which is probably always true in some ways. But Jesus told me that I was righteous despite my flaws, so how could I be paying for them now in the way of not getting what I want? Can God punish me for my disobedience when my debt is no longer my own (thank God)? It sounds preposterous, but then I look at Isaiah 58 and I can’t help but see myself in some of the accusations. However, that could just be my guilt complex.

Or is this a test? Are we being taught patience and faithfulness? My hope is that in a week I can look back at this moment and laugh, because everyone will have gotten what they wanted, and feel satisfied with the direction their life will now take. The best comfort is the easiest to hear and the hardest to accept: God has a plan, and it is better than any plans we could make, because he has our best interests at heart. “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him” -Romans 8:28.

But for now we wait with the hope we can manage, because Sarah had a son at the age of ninety, and everyone laughed till the day he was born.

Flat Iron Babies

2006-03-08T01:45:00.000-06:00

I wasn't going to do this because I have laundry to fold, but now I'm here and I can't stop myself. Slef. I read an interesting article the other day about the concentration of wealth in the US. From the article:

"The richest 1 percent of Americans now get about 15 percent of total US income, close to the 18 percent the same small group had in 1913. In a way, the days of the robber barons, the tycoons, and the Gilded Age are back - after the Great Depression, World Wars I and II, and progressive taxation had trimmed their share to 8 percent in 1963."

If that sounds bad, it got up to 20% in 1928, so I guess we're still ok. Anyway, if you want to check it out, you can.

Talya and I had a conversation a while ago about Modernism and Postmodernism, and what they both were. She briefly explained it to me and then I quickly forgot. Trying to figure the two out is a lot like trying to drink water from the opposite side of the glass (hiccuppers, you know what I'm talking about). Generally, Modernism seems to be a rejection of something and an embrace of something else. On the other hand, Postmodernism tends to embrace something while rejecting something else. Either way you slice it, I don't get it.

But Wikipedia is always there to give you more information that you could have ever wanted. And that's a good thing, because it only reaffirmed my love of Art Deco, and specifically Art Deco architecture. It might stem from watching Batman: The Animated Series, or from... well, that's the only place I remember it in my past. Sleek, industrial, beautiful. Examples would be the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, the Flat Iron building, and for those of you in Athens, the outside of the Athena. I know what I'm naming my baby.

The Pumping of My Heart

2006-03-02T00:58:00.000-06:00

If I could delve into spiritual matters (it is Ash Wednesday, after all), I am currently experiencing spiritual growth in the form of "Dear God, why is my life in this state right now?" Although my private version contains a lot more use of the f-word and a lot of frustration you can't see here. Basically, I can't see a clear purpose for being in Chicago, and every one of my attempts to make something happen here end up in failure.

And I'm not saying it's His fault. And I don't know how it could be my fault, mainly because the woman who didn't hire me didn't call me back like she said she would when I asked her if she had any advice for me. Do you see my frustration? But, is it just circumstance? Coinciding failures that go from being heartbreaking to comical to irritating? I have trouble believing that.

So, we are having a fight, He and I, and the end result on my side is a blank stare. Okaaaaayyyy, You can do something now! So I was looking on Craigslist tonight, and I was wondering: is he pushing me here or here.

I know, I know. I have already heard your answer a thousand times in my own head. The thrilling thought of helping someone to achieve is only equaled by the terrifying thought of learning about a different plane of economic existence.

But what about me? We've had fights like this before, about the direction that my life could take, and the direction that I wanted to take (not necessarily zombie movies), and the direction I was supposed to take. I thought we had settled that, but maybe some things were left unfinished. I just feel like the teaching route is an end to other opportunities. Are people allowed to get Graduate degrees and then not use them? Because I thought that was just for Bachelors.

When you listen to Coldplay's "The Scientist" do you think of The Fall or something less dramatic?

Instability is the Word of the Day

2006-02-25T11:13:00.000-06:00

There seems to be a fair amount of general upheaval going on throughout the world right now. Perhaps now is a good time to talk of quagmires, defined as a difficult or precarious situation; a predicament. I'm sorry sir, I'd have to disagree. A predicament is when I eat too much chinese food and experience the ramifications of my actions. This, however, is somewhat beyond that definition. Typically I think that asserting a curse with another word would do a fair job of describing the situation, such as "shitstorm" or "clusterfuck," but in this situation the curses almost trivialize a situation of unexplainable severity.

At this point, it looks like Iraq as a country has passed up the crossroads of Civil War v. Stable Shithole and opted to just keep on keeping on toward the natural end of a country with three different ethnic groups who fundamentally hate each other (if shiites and sunnis can be considered opposing ethnic groups). If you aren't aware of what is going on there, I would suggest going to cnn.com or csmonitor.com or any news service at all because I'm certain that any article I might link to here would be long rendered inaccurate by the time you clicked the click.

I actually don't care about the "port flap" in any major way. It seems that the issue should be that no one was aware that it was taking place, not that we're handing our ports over to "the enemy." Democrats being upset is no surprise, but the fact that most Republicans are against the deal is a strange twist, especially because it's hard to find anything wrong with the deal besides a prejudice against Arab countries.

Britain had roughly $87 million stolen earlier in the week, and Yoweri Museveni has been reelected President of Uganda for a 3rd term after already being in power for more than 20 years.

If things continue, next week we should see Hamas declare war on Israel (officially), and China will declare Martial Law (officially) and execute several thousand peasants, continuing a long-standing tradition.

Should Be, Could Be, and Would Be Movies

2006-02-19T03:36:00.000-06:00

I have to show you something. Actually, this is another one of those posts that is mostly about things other than me. But I have to show you something before any of that. Ladies and Gentlemen, the greatest Doctor/Crimefighter sinces Dr. Seuss, I give you Dr. McNinja.

I'm excited to say that I am working on two different screenplay projects right now, in a round robin fashion. I'm helping Katie with a project of hers and Talya is helping me with a project of mine (primarily in the form of constant encouragement, but soon critique as well). All that's left is for Katie to help Talya on a project and the circle will be complete. Or you could add more and more people to the circle and it would still be complete then. Anyway, I'm excited to share this with you all and I hope to be at that point soon (within the month, hopefully). And then the round robin will feel more like a dip where everyone puts the part they bit off back in. You know I don't even know what round robin means. Ok, now I know.

I use Wikipedia to find out a crazy variety of information. The other night I went from reading about a Polish officer in WWII and by the end of the night I had ended up at a Timeline of Fictional Historical Events, which started with references to The Fantastic Four and Futurama, and ended with the year 2004 and information on Napoleon Dynamite, Cadillac Beach, and ER. I wish I were kidding. A conglomerate of things that happened in fictitious worlds.

Anyway, over at Apple Trailers there are a bunch of movie trailers that I really like and wanted to share. You should definitely check out Nacho Libre, which stars Jack Black and comes from School of Rock writer and Napoleon Dynamite director. It's about a man and his dream to become a spanish wrestler (A Luchador?). Jack Black uses a hispanic accent through the whole movie.
Dave Chapelle's Block Party- Dave is back from Africa and put together a party in Brooklyn featuring Kanye, The Roots, a bunch of other bands and a Fugees reunion! It looks great and is directed by Eternal Sunshine man.
Friends with Money features Frances Mcdormand, Jennifer Aniston, Joan Cusack, and Catherine Keener. 'Nuff said.
I thought Why We Fight would be a reissue of the classic WWII propaganda film from Frank Capra, but it's actually an interesting looking documentary about the American military industrial complex.
Brick features the guy from 10 Things I Hate About You and 3rd Rock from the Sun in what looks to be a great thriller.
American Dreamz looks poised to mock the President, American Idol, and terrorists all in one movie. It looks great and full of good performances.
Click, a new Adam Sandler movie, is predictable before the trailer starts, but at least it'll probably be funny.
And Inside Man is the new movie from Spike Lee that simply looks outstanding. His movies always have more to them than you can understand at first, and this looks no different. Is Clive Owen getting sexier as he ages? Am I allowed to ask that?
Two that you don't have to see, but I'll mention are Miami Vice and Slither. Slither is a horror comedy that will probably suck, but it's got my man Nathan Fillion in it, so I have to give him props. Miami Vice has a lot of bad press because supposedly Jamie and Colin didn't get along. However, Michael Mann brought us Heat and Collateral, both of which are amazing. it also looks to have a great "COPS" feel to it, which is good for what it is.

Any movies looking good to you?

The Depression Prison

2006-02-15T02:24:00.000-06:00

Thanks to the inspirational Jess Meyer, yesterday I began The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman, the first book in a fantasy trilogy. And luckily, after 100 pages, I began to have an idea of what was going on. Several months ago, Jess' enthusiasm for the His Dark Materials trilogy made me promise myself that I would check it out. I am almost to the point (I assume) where I can share her delight for the panserbjørne that for now remain my distant imagination.

I made the switch away from Bury My Heart because I just couldn't bring myself to read things that could only get more depressing. Because lately, having no actual responsibility in Chicago, I have been having trouble finding a reason to get out of bed, and making the unconscious decision to simply sleep for far longer than necessary for no reason whatsoever. Some of the people around me think that it's depression, a chemical disorder in the brain. It certainly is likely, but I resisted, and continue to resist, because I hate the idea of giving up control to a drug, or even another person or Persons, if you understand me. So I find myself going from a self-congratulatory good day of getting up at 1pm, to a self-destructive bad day of finding no way out of bed before 3 or 4pm. It doesn't make much sense, my stubbornness. I am too stubborn to seek any sort of medical treatment for the sinkhole I'm in, but at the same time, I am too weak-willed to pull myself out of it on my own.
Part of it came from finding out that I wasn't even being considered for the only job in all my life that I've ever been really excited about. And when you can't get yourself out of bed till the afternoon on a consistent basis, you aren't able to get out there and get things done. And then, sadly, you begin to think that you simply can't get things done, and out comes a stream of self-pity that builds and builds and then the next day why get up at all if you're such a useless person?
But, with determination and patience, friends and family are good at pulling you out of such nonsense, and so you take a step up and realize that if you're not so useless, then you must be just incredibly lazy oh how shameful, but friends and family again, you can make something of yourself if you believe! You can do it!
So, step one begins where you try to make your day start better, in the hope that it will end better. And pretty soon, looking on the bright side, you turn your Starbucks application in to several locations and you get to speak to a manager, and how about that, she schedules an interview. Maybe you're not so useless after all.
And today was actually quite a nice day. And I assure you that it's not my intention to bring heaps of compliments and comforts upon myself, but just to examine and document how I've been feeling the past few days, to better understand the process. For me more than for you.

My dad gave me some nice words when he helped me realize that I wasn't in Chicago to get a job. If I needed a job, I could have stayed home. My real purpose in Chicago is to figure out what I want for myself, and I don't really know what that is, to be honest. But it made me feel better, because even though a job is very important right now, it isn't the ending of the story. And that's what makes the story so much better when we finally get there.

Valentine's Day

2006-02-14T00:54:00.000-06:00

This is for Talya for Valentine's Day.

At one point when we were in Chicago, I'm pretty sure either one or both of us were mad about something or other, and Talya saw this street name and for some reason started laughing, which got me laughing, and when you say the name outloud, you can't help but laugh. I have no idea why, but it's funny and we saw and said it numerous times on the trip and each time it was still funny. Talya, Happy Valentine's Day. And another one:

And everyone else, whether single or coupled, I hope you have a Happy Valentine's Day too, because it's a day of love, no matter what kind.

The Animals in Unison

2006-02-09T13:35:00.000-06:00

Right before I discovered Lyndsey's fascination with the occult, I stumbled upon some alarming rhetoric of the opposite. I cannot yet say if these are real, but I think they are. Pets in Uniform? And then what originated as a Craigslist post turned into something far more sinister. The video at the bottom is transcendent. The links at the bottom, however, may lead to greater horrors of which I dare not speak.

UPDATE: One more thing, which is not about animals or horror. I can't stand the thought of megachurches. I hate the idea of churches so big that people don't know each other or that they use a stadium as a congregation point. I started out reading this story full of irritation, especially because of the picture of the preacher and the enormous stained glass mural behind him. But I was actually quite impressed, although still wary.

Awww Yeah!

2006-02-09T02:16:00.000-06:00

When you're rocking threads like this:

Doors open up all over the place.

Is it getting hot in here?

Aww, hells yeah.

Motorways and Tramlines

2006-02-06T18:50:00.000-06:00

After returning to Chicago, I realized that leaving home for the second time was much harder than the first time, in part because my parents were there to see me off. But also because now I have no idea when I'll be back again. Before I had my birthday homecoming to look forward to, but now nothing in the near future will bring me back again. And it probably shouldn't. It's harder to get used to this place if I retreat back home as often as possible (Freshman year of college, anyone?). And still no job. Starbucks, am I on my way to you?

Cat has a really nice commercial to watch posted at her blog. I don't know what the commercial was for because I didn't get to see the end, but it was really nice in the 3/4th that I saw. And I was going to post a Lexus commercial that I really like, but I couldn't find it. It has a car and an SUV smash into each other and all the pieces of both cars fly out and they're all shiny and nice looking and then they collapse back together to create some SUV hybrid or something. It's really cool to see just because it looks so good, not because I love driving luxury cars.

In reading Bury My Heart (still working through it, less than 100 pages to go), I came across the trial of Standing Bear v. George Crook, which resulted in the first decision that an Indian was a person, and, therefore, a citizen born into the priviledges guaranteed by the Constitution, namely habeas corpus, the right of my lawyer friends to explain such matters. Or google. Anyway, it meant that Standing Bear, the Indian in question, earned citizenship under the law, and the opinion of Judge Elmer S. Dundy is supposed to be a great read. And for the curious: General George Crook was not a bad man. In fact, he organized the entire affair for Standing Bear's benefit, and was the first to congratulate him on the outcome.

Once, Bob posted a meme to take the book nearest you, turn to page 123 and post the fifth sentence here. But I will post the only sentence on page 123 of the book nearest me.
"And so was born 'The Fantastic Four!!' and from that moment on, the world would never be the same again!!"

Birthday Links

2006-02-02T22:42:00.000-06:00

Well, I had a great weekend (5 days) at home. Thanks to everyone I saw for making it so wonderful. It was a great way to celebrate the birth of me. And I got some nice things. Dances with Wolves anyone? I'm on this Old West/American Indian kick and it doesn't seem to be leaving any time soon. And Band of Brothers with my dad. If there's anything a father and son should watch together, it's probably that. Or Frequency. Frequency is very father/son. Band of Brothers is just... historic. The hardest part is knowing that we aren't watching a movie, but something that is based on real history. And I'm willing to bet we're seeing the lighter side of the war. But anyway. My Old West thing has gone so far that I plan on renting The Magnificent Seven, a western adaptation of Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai (That's a great movie, Hoi!).

I don't have much else to update about, so here are some cool things I found around the internet, although Bob has some amazing links himself.

This is a fan site for Captain Picard. Please have the sound on.
And there's a cool site trying to compile old video game endings.
And here's a great Nintendo fan movie, that might have you in tears.
And then this is mainly for Catherine and Bob, and then anyone who has played Halo and seen The Lord of the Rings. It's nice.

And, read the articles that Bob links to, because they are always great to read.

A Variety of Information

2006-01-25T20:07:00.000-06:00

A big news event took place today as Disney announced the purchase of Pixar. It's huge because it makes Steve Jobs the largest individual shareholder in Disney, putting him on the board of directors and making him about $3.5 Billion. It also means that Pixar might suffer creatively from the Disney mega-empire and that other media conglomerates might be scared away from working with Apple on iTunes content (because Steve Jobs is also the head of Apple). Ironically, John Lasseter, the creative head of Pixar, left Disney years ago so he could work on experimental animation at Industrial Light & Magic, which would become Pixar.

Sorry. Nerd alert. It's amazing what you discover through Slashdot. Like that an independent production company is attempting to produce an on-demand second season of the TV show Firefly. If you think this is a good idea, support them by hitting the website and taking the short survey (no email required). A related sad note: I'm down to the last two episodes of Firefly, and after that I'm done with the series. The hardest thing isn't just seeing it end, but knowing how much each actor and producer believed and fought for the series. If only Nathan Fillion wasn't so cute.

And, there are two things I have vowed to do upon getting a job. The first is join Netflix and rent every season of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (collective groans aside). I got really interested after I began reading about the complex, Season spanning storylines, and now I want to experience it all first hand.
The second thing is to give a monthly donation to Save the Children, the second largest children's charity in the world. The reason is that some of their volunteers stopped me on Michigan Ave. the other day and made me explain why I couldn't donate (I don't have a job). I then promised them that when I got a job, I would. I gave them my word, accompanied by a handshake, so I must ablidge.

As far as my Starbucks letter is concerned, it turns out that there is quite a bit of information that I need to uncover before I can effectively write the letter, and all of that information is in a variety of places. For instance:
The Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Report is found here.
While the Financial Report is found here.
Then the information on the Coffee and Farmer Equity (C.A.F.E.) program can be found here.
Then their supplier code of conduct is here.
Another problem is that the 2005 CSR report isn't out and the woman I talked to said she expected it in a month but couldn't be sure.
But I did find some news so far. Unfortunately, it's bad. It turns out that only 1.6% of purchased coffee from 2004 was Fair Trade. I thought this wasn't as bad of a number because of C.A.F.E., Starbucks own system of preferred buying from suppliers who score highest on an economic, social, and environmental scorecard. It turns out that only 14.5% of all coffed purchased was under that system. So very little, 16.1% of Starbucks coffee can be considered fair if the C.A.F.E. system is just at all. This was disheartening. And their charitable giving for the year was only 2.3% of their pre-tax earnings.

Is my blog turning into something more or something less?

Roomy Room

2006-01-23T18:40:00.000-06:00

So, here you'll see my room. I tried to make it as clear as possible. It's quite a small room and you might say that it's more like a closet. When you look at the desk, ask yourself: Is it too big, too small, or just right? This is a lot less interesting than you think, but some people want to see it, so here we go.

Everything is labeled for easy understanding. What you see here is probably the "Activity Center" of the room, the central hub of my activity in Chicago.

The desk on the left is the same desk in the first picture, and the door is my only exit. And the lamp... Well, you'll understand that in a moment.

This is the full extent of the room. both the rug and the blanket are new and from Ikea (just like the shower curtain, desk, and bookshelf. Great deals). I can't take the tour much further without being repetitive, but you'll have to trust me when I say the parts you missed are worth missing.

Lyndsey made me think about my favorite Over the Rhine songs, and I'd have to say they are Give Me Strength, from Films for Radio; Ohio, and Changes Come, both from Ohio; and then a song from Good Dog, Bad Dog that I only heard once. And I have to say I love the line from Changes Come that goes "This ol' world's too fucked up for any firstborn son." Just the way she spits out the f-word, like Alanis Morrisette on You Oughtta Know.

Today I finally opened up Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee after a significant break from reading for no good reason at all. The problem with reading this book is that the ending of every story is relatively the same: the Indians lose. Either they lose their lives or their land or their dignity, every time, it's something that is less than satisfactory. Today, I had the unfortunate experience of reading what has to be the worst of the stories in the book.
In summary, a guy named Captain Jack, leader of the Modocs, holds out from making peace with the US because his friends, who murdered settlers, beg him not to. Then they call him a coward and demand that he kill the General at the peace conference, which he then does. Then they desert him and ask for amnesty in exchange for hunting him down. Eventually he was captured and hanged. He was betrayed by the friends he had refused to betray. That sucks.

But, it got me thinking in a Social Justice way, and I realized that I had wanted to write a letter a week, like Jess had proposed as a New Year's Resolution. But I haven't done that. So I made a list of people I wanted to write to. You have lots of time when you don't have a job. First up is Starbucks, to say congrats on a good job, but also, why aren't you doing a better job? I'm going to try and figure out who exactly to address it to and will probably post it either tonight or tomorrow. Is posting my letters a bad thing? Why or why not? Is it irritating that I'm trying to force my convictions upon you?

Links for the Ladies

2006-01-22T18:45:00.000-06:00

Well, it's been one week. And my report at the end of the week is mostly positive. Nothing bad has happened in any way and the only downside of this move so far has been the loneliness, which is to be expected given the circumstances.

In the meantime, Seth was able to preempt me on two internet finds I had wanted to share with you. First the Chuck Norris facts, and then the Punch-Out video. But, now I can show him up with three amazing videos that go beyond the possible to the impossible!

First, supposed test footage from the upcoming Transformers movie.
And then the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny. Did you see the Arrested Development reference?
But true nirvana comes in the form of Nintendo characters battling Michael Jackson.

I might have more important things later. Stay with me.

Almost to Something

2006-01-19T23:13:00.000-06:00

I am an Advocating Experiencer. Does that mean wallflower? I think what is more interesting are the individual ratings. I'll share mine. What is wrong with my confidence? And I am more feminine than masculine. Great.

I want to share my room and shower curtain (yes I'm serious) with you. I finally feel like the room is mine instead of just a place I'm living. The only problem now is that there is nothing on the walls because I didn't bring those things with me at first (with the idea of protecting them).

Ok, I have to share the shower curtain now. I really like it. Here.

Day Two and Day Zero

2006-01-17T19:46:00.000-06:00

I got a bed today. Picking out a mattress is a surprisingly daunting task, despite what you might think. There are so many things to consider. And how can I really know without taking off my clothes and getting under the covers? Well, as it turns out, you have to know without doing those things "They" frown upon. But hooray. Dear sweet Ikea, why must our love be hidden for all time? You, a unique and prosperous multinational corporation; and me, a lonely boy wanting to become a man.

I'm sorry about that. Please, if you have never been to Ikea, make an effort to visit. You will be delighted by the lowest prices possible free of the guilt of abused workers the world over (and Swedish meatballs!). But that is about all I did today. As far as productive things go anyway. And who can blame me? Ikea is a day-long event. Oh, and I put my bed together. And now I am laying on it, using it and the internet at the same time. Who could have imagined?

Anyway, here is my journey to Chicago in a series of pictures:

I really like this picture, but more because of the full image it brings to mind. This is just a raised section of a very old rail bridge crossing this river. I only had a few seconds to take the picture, but it turned out so very modern or post-modern, don't you think?

The wind to our backs, mates. A beautiful wintry day.

And then, hours later, when the journey still isn't over. Miles to go before I sleep.

This is what Chicago looks like when you are trying to take a picture at night on the expressway. Suffice to say it is a very bad and dangerous idea to begin with.
I arrive to my abode. This happened at night of course, but I didn't take a picture then. I live on the first floor. I have roommates who live on the basement floor, but I don't know the people above. If only they knew about my bed!

Chicago- Day One

2006-01-16T22:26:00.000-06:00

Here I am friends, and it turns out that there is a wireless connection running through the building, but I don't know who it belongs to, so I am stealing it for now.

I'd like to tell you about my journey here, but I can't now because I wanted to use pictures, only it was too dark to take the right picture last night and I forgot to take the picture today. So instead you will get the details of what happened after I arrived.

Things I did not know before my arrival: 1.) The trains (my backyard) shorten their intervals during the rush hours. At least it is a good wake up. 2.) The person I am replacing ("this person") did not clean before I arrive. Right. So I spent the afternoon cleaning. Dusting and vacuuming with a very old vacuum and trying to feel more comfortable. I have never thought of myself as a clean person. I just thought of myself as a normal person in terms of cleaning habits. In fact, a bit less than normal thanks to my parents constant insistence that the house was fithy or my room was disgusting. But I am finding that I might just be a bit cleaner than most.
Now, to be fair, the areas I am living in were probably not much dirtier than yours or mine are right now. However, when guests are coming over, we all get a little more conscientious of mess and make an effort to make the place look nice. So, it is a bit of a stretch to imagine the person who does not even do that for the guest who will be living in that space. Now imagine that person's bathroom. Yes, that's right. That is what I spent the evening cleaning. I can understand why he is still single.

And earlier in the day, I helped this person move extra boxes and other things that he needed to get to storage. And I did that A) because I felt guilty saying no, B) because I still needed a set of keys from him, and C) To pay for all the mean things I am saying here.

Somehow, during our time together in my car, he was frequently able to offend me. Let's be frank here. I don't know how to politely correct someone who "warns" me about the gay areas of town. I am an avoider of conflict. I don't know how to deal when someone compares two kids beating up a homeless man and Brokeback Mountain as equal signs of the destruction of our society. But this person did this. I can't comprehend that. And there was more, regarding the impoverished and a variety of minorities.

Continuing our frankness, I did not correct him once. I am ashamed of that, but I don't know how to treat those things delicately. And he didn't say it all in the easily condemable voice of hatred and bigotry. No, he said it in the more sinister and less obvious and more defendable voice of generalizations and "you know what I mean." Those slippery words, the driving force of prejudice in our nation, are so removed from true negative feelings that they can't be directly condemned. Because the person is not being hateful, they are being ignorant. And yet I still failed.

Some of you are outraged by all this, I hope. I am. Looking back, though, I still don't know what to say or do in that situation. How did I get like this? And why doesn't mainstream Christianity bat an eye? Then again, why didn't I?

I did my first real round of shopping at Trader Joe's today. It was nice but I may never buy natural peanut butter again. It's just so much work. Besides, choosy moms never chose natural peanut butter. They always choose Jif. And I discovered a really great job opportunity here that I am really excited about. They're a children's media company that looks really cool. Wish me luck, I apply tomorrow.

The City of Wild Onions

2006-01-14T13:51:00.000-06:00

My dad and I have been watching Band of Brothers. Wow. If you haven't seen it, you really should. It's like watching an extra 10 hours of Saving Private Ryan. Emotionally riveting and a terrifying glimpse at the horrors facing men younger than I.
So I guess I gave in and took the Pocky quiz. How fun. And Katie- "More or less 'normal.'" is a polite way of saying "less normal," and funky is never a compliment when it comes to food.

Pock(re)marks aside, Tomorrow I am leaving this land for the city of Chicago. Are you surprised? I am too. I held off on telling you because... I didn't know how. And I don't know how soon I will be able to update again. My thought is pretty soon, because I will be so lonely and frightened that I will seek out the nearest "hot" spot so I can be the least bit closer to you. The good news is I will return to Ohio to spend my Birthday with my family and... friends?

But fear not, Monday is Ikea Day, a day of waking in a new place and smelling new smells, and using a new shower, and wondering how it will all turn out.

Dear friends,
I am excited for the day when we can support each other's achievements, and give each other much needed advice on our specializations, and work together on social or business ventures. My vision of the future shows the successful confederation of all our dreams into something that is tangible and delightful, and actively bringing betterment to ourselves and others around the world. I want to see you succeed. I want to succeed also. But we have been stuck in the mud at the bottom of the hill, trying to make dreams come from crappy jobs and slow transitions, and endless schooling, and dead ends of uncertainty.

I think this move is my coming out of the slough of the journey, and I am imagining the crest of a hill up ahead. Pray that I don't give up the fight. That we continue the race. Because we all know that we have not yet taken hold of it. But soon. I promise, so soon. Give me courage.

Fine

2006-01-13T17:22:00.000-06:00

what flavor pocky are you?

[c] sugardew

And then the next one:

You Are Green Tea Pocky

Your attitude: natural and zen
Peaceful yet full of life. Deep and thoughtful.
You're halfway to tantric bliss!

What Flavor Pocky Are You?

Hurry up!

2006-01-08T13:48:00.000-06:00

The last post was my 50th on this new blog, which I should have pointed out then, but it doesn't seem like something to celebrate since this has been running for about 7 or 8 months now.

This is going to be a shitty post. Mainly because I am feeling cranky already, but also because I'm in a public place. Sorry. Bob- Freakonomics was really easy to read. But it feels incomplete, in the sense that I want the guy to move past the data like all the people who make poor generalizations do. But it was really nice thinking about things people don't think about very easily. My two favorite parts were probably the story about the guy who lived with and studied a gang and the chapter on names. Everyone, you have probably already heard of Freakonomics, but it is by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner, and I don't know how to explain what it's about. It's about how the cause of things is more complex and less complex than people think. It is on the bestseller list, so check it out. I'm off to a great start for the year in reading, I guess.

I'm having trouble moving, because I'm having trouble getting into communication with the right people. Phone tag is a lot more frustrating than I thought, despite the cute name. But now my goal is to move in by January 15th. That is a week from today. I think I can do that.

Katie- I never want to eat something called "Pocky." "Pocky" is the nickname of the kid who doesn't bathe in 3rd grade. "Pocky" is the name of the raccoon on a kid's nature cartoon. "Pocky" is not something you put in your mouth.

Don't see "Fun with Dick and Jane" in the theaters. The sole reason being is that it is a scant hour and change of a movie. I will be generous and say an hour and 20 minutes. It is a good movie, but with a time like that, we are all getting short-changed. Even you, Jim Carrey, because you can be even funnier with a little more time.

This Year is Getting Different

2006-01-03T06:05:00.000-06:00

Hello in the 2006. Does that sound more futuristic than "happy new year"? Guess what, I am writing this in bed while watching Serenity on DVD. Quite a delight. I was going to actually go to sleep but I couldn't because I started thinking about updating and now here I am.

As of the end of the year, I didn't reach the goal of reading three more books like I said I would. However, I did complete Wild at Heart by John Eldredge, and I am about 200 pages into Bury My Heart. So, I got halfway there? I don't know. I still can't believe that Steve doesn't like Chinua Achebe, although I have to admit my only experience with him is an unfinished copy of Things Fall Apart.

I got three books for Christmas. Books that I am excited to start. The Golden Compass, the first in the His Dark Materials trilogy; Let My People Go Surfing, a business memoir by Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard; and The Narnian, which is about C.S. Lewis.

I also got, among other things, Half-Life 2, for the Xbox. Let me tell you: it is more amazing than I thought possible during this generation of video games. The graphics outweigh almost any other xbox game, and the physics outweigh any game I have ever even heard of, anywhere. The storyline is also extremely polished, but something that you have to discover by listening and looking at the game playing out around you.

Having what might be the last gathering of old friends in a long time was nice, but too short. It's hard when everyone is so busy and dedicated to a variety of things. But right now it looks like I might make it to Chicago by the middle of the month, a bit later than I'd like, but necessary given the spotty communication my future roommates and I are having. I think it feels a lot like how the kicker in a football game feels when the other team keeps calling time-out and icing him. Nice analogy.

Most of the links from the last post came from a gaming site called Kotaku, just to give credit.

A Montage of Entertainment

2005-12-21T19:01:00.000-06:00

November 2005 will probably go down in the history of my blog for most posts in one month. Did you know I could consistently post on a daily basis and, while I would feel like I was talking too much, I would find everything I have to say immensely interesting. I'm sure that feels like a waste to most of you. And I'm lazy, so I don't post nearly as often as any self-respecting blogger should. But, in an effort to make amends, and to post all the links I have been meaning to get to for a few months, here are a bunch of things that you will either find interesting, hilarious, disgusting, or a mixture of the three. If you'd like an update about my life instead, skip to the next entry.

Here is a video that takes the core concept from video game Katamari Damacy to illustrate the human cost of AIDS in Africa. It starts out comical and ends sorrowful. Fight AIDS.
Another socially concious video is making big news. The French Democracy is an Arab look at recent riots there using a video game called The Movies. I warn you, the subtitle translation is a bit spotty in most places.
Definitive Nintendo Revolution Speculation is an amazing website that attempts to unearth the secrets of Nintendo's next console by examining both patents and internet hearsay. Very tech oriented and usually difficult to read, but exciting in its well thought out prose on the subject.
Along Nintendo lines, I am hoping you have had the pleasure of seeing a Super Mario speed run, which involves rushing through one of the various Mario games in the time it takes to drive to the grocery store. The original is done in 5:15. The first I ever saw, and still the most impressive is for Super Mario 3. The guy gets to level 8 in 2 minutes and then things get really crazy. I have heard that these speed runs are fake, done with a game genie or some such, but I don't really care. Their level of stupendous amazement goes beyond that.
This family guy sketch is beyond hilarious, but some might find it beyond gross. It involves copious amounts of vomit.
This is a disturbing recording of a kid playing Xbox Live with his headset on while he fights with his mom. It goes from rude to "if my kid did that..." A sad look at a lack of discipline and respect.
And one more I forgot is from the Daily Show, satiring the Xbox 360. Why can't I get that guy's job?

I hope you enjoy these links because I found them all entertaining for one reason or another. I've been listening to Transatlanticism, by Death Cab for Cutie. I bought it for Talya but I get to keep it while she's in Seattle (Yes! She is in Seattle!). I really like it, particularly the title track and the line "the rhythm of my footsteps crossing flatlands to your door have been silenced forevermore."

Chicago's Past and Futures

2005-12-21T18:29:00.000-06:00

Two weeks ago I was in Chicago looking at places to live and places to work. I chose Chicago because A) it has more opportunity than anywhere in Ohio, and B) it is a really nice city. I suggest you visit. You might even be able to stay with me.

Of the places I looked at, three suited me quite nicely. The first, where I will probably end up, is a few blocks from Wrigley Field, the home of the Cubs. I would be living with three conservative Christian fellows age 25, 31, and 39 (baby me). The price started at $500 (a good deal for that section of town) but got dropped to $400 when I said that it was a bit too high. I had no intention of bargaining my way in, but I'll take what I can get. The room is quite small but that's to be expected anywhere. The problem: no girls overnight. While this would rarely effect me, I still like the occasional visit.

The second place is home to three like-aged girls and a cat. It is a ways North of the city (near Northwestern) and a 15 minute walk to the El(evated train station). But, it's a steal at less than $350 a month with a relatively enormous room all to myself. The problem: Don't I have enough friendships with women? The ratio is already like 4:1.

The third place is located in Wicker Park, which was described as being Chicago's version of New York's Village. The tenants were straight out of a movie, one gay black man and one straight white man. They were a lot of fun and Talya and I got to have a half hour conversation with them, which was quite enjoyable. The room is reasonably sized and at less than $400, I could get comfortable. The problem: They are picking someone, not me. And the "young christian kid who grew up in white suburbia" doesn't exactly sell itself.

So, as of now I am going with the first pick because the other two haven't returned my phone calls. My new obstacle is jumping the hurdle of actually leaving. Ideally I would move in on the 6th and 7th of January, which is an uncomfortable two and a half weeks away. And now all the fear in my body is coming to bear as I face sleepless nights and strange dreams that haunt me throughout the day. The reasons I can dream up for being afraid are varied and unlikely, but they are still there, pushing at me, warning me to flee. I'm not sure if the worst part will be that first night alone in a city of strangers, or the days that come after, as I seek out a job without the confidence to turn in resumes.

I have some applications pending, and I continue to search Craig's List, one of the best uses of the Internetron I have ever seen. Here is my goal for my time in Chicago: to find out if I want to do film and video production for a large portion of my life. Is that allowed? Is it ok to not know? That is my goal. But, I am also looking into teaching and non-profit jobs, because I value those professions above most others. The most exciting thing about moving to Chicago is the ability to work on a variety of film projects with a variety of like-minded people. And, after I live there, if anyone wants to come see Oprah, you have to let me know several months in advance.

That is my life up to this point. My Christmas shopping is half-finished. Does anyone know what I could get my 19 year old sister? Let's hope our gifts to each other don't make the Christ King cringe.

I am not overly concerned

2005-12-10T18:09:00.000-06:00

I saw a movie today called Edge of America which is about a Black man who ends up teaching a girls basketball team on an Indian Reservation. It was surprisingly good.
The only notable actors were a surprising role for Tim Daly of Wings fame, and Wes Studi, whose name you don't know, but whose face will be familiar. Among his credits are Heat, Dances With Wolves, and his most memorable portrayal of Magua in The Last of the Mohicans. You know, the guy who drank the blood of his enemies? "Magua Agua" we called it, because it rhymed and that's Spanish for water.

It makes me want to read Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, which is "An Indian History of the American West."

I'm discovering memes, which are used to attract attention to your blog because the subject is carried over from other blogs, so you get a bigger audience. Basically like a set of questions that all different people will answer, and then you can read them all and see all the different anwsers. Go to The Daily Meme if this sounds at all interesting.

Kindness falls like rain.

X3

2005-12-08T17:15:00.000-06:00

I'm back from not posting and from a trip to Chicago. More on that later. For now, I just saw the new X-Men 3 trailer and I just about shit myself. Go Here and poop at the excitement of the final film in the X-Men trilogy. Originally, I was quite worried about this film being at all worth it. It has gone through 3 directors (first Bryan Singer, who understandably left to do Superman, and then Brett Ratner, who left, then some other guy, until Brett Ratner came back and did the film) and usually that is a sign that a movie isn't well put together. But the trailer makes me want it so much. Many people (in other words, me) consider The Phoenix Saga to be one of the most amazing miniseries in Comics history, and seeing it happen, including some other amazing storylines, will hopefully be a wonderful experience.

I will have less about the X-Men and more about my trip later.

Just Another Manic Monday

2005-11-28T22:56:00.000-06:00

Can we speak of the Bible again? For just a moment? Before, when I engineered this hope of revival for myself, I was dedicated to a daily reading of the Bible. But it hasn't worked out the way I wanted it to.

For one, I have not been as disciplined as I'd like to be. In fact, I've been far from it. But more importantly, I was only looking at the Bible as a source of wisdom, not as a source of the everlasting God. I have had more readings of the Bible in the past month than in the past 4 or 5, but in all that time, I have probably felt God once. It stayed a chore, a duty to fulfill. Even though I took the time to read a chapter or two, I didn't take the time to hear. It's almost like Secret of the Easy Yoke, only I'm not the only one. And I pray half-hearted, if I pray at all. And if no one answers, it's because I hung up before they could respond.

And, then, to be honest, even as I'm writing all I can here is "peace, be still." It's like learning that I can't carry the burden I've set for myself. The problem comes when I still see and feel sin, but I don't let someone else carry the weight of my crimes. I accept it as my own and now I'm buckling under it. But I don't know how to give it up.

The problem isn't realizing the need. The problem is not becoming complacent again. This has happened before. But I don't want it to happen again. Let's face facts, part of it is not having a job, not having a daily goal. And part if it is the luxury of no one forcing you to address these things, or giving you an example. I don't know. I am shitting on the page, making excuses. And if you were to talk to me, or try to keep me accountable, I would say "yeah, yeah, whatever." I am asking for comfort, not dedication. What am I getting at?

I don't have more to say. All I have done is expressed a set of ideas as to how I am in relation to God, which is to say, not good.

Here it is expressed in a Relient K song, saying exactly what I want/need to hear, like an optimistic Pedro the Lion:

"It's 3p.m." she said,
I said "You're crazy"
She said "Get out of bed, why are you so lazy? Why waste the day away?"
I said, "Because I'm tired"
"Wendy's called by the way, they told me that you're fired."

Woah oh oh, Woah oh oh
So wreckless for all these years
Woah oh oh, woah oh oh
I crash into a wall
Woah oh oh , Woah oh oh
there's a ringing in my ears
Woah oh oh, Woah oh oh
and it's my wake up call
Jesus gave me a wake up call
oh
take this world with a grain of salt
Jesus gave me a wake up call

"It's 3 a.m." she said,
"Who are you, Matchbox 20?"
She said, "Are you getting rest?"
Sarcastic, I said "Plenty."
"Don't be a hypocrit."
I asked "What are you saying?"
"When you praise God, do you meant it?
Are you sleeping when you're praying?"

The second verse hurts more than the first. It makes me scream "this is me, this is me, please God, bring me peace." And now I am done. And if I haven't made sense, I can take comfort because "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express" (Romans 8:26). And then go read Romans 8:37-39, and together we will weep with joy.

All About Reading

2005-11-25T15:54:00.000-06:00

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today I got up incredibly early and drove home from Athens, where I had Thanksgiving with Talya, her sister, and Colleen. And we watched Friends. And we ate food. And I felt sick.

And now I'm avoiding taking a nap because I feel unjustified in being tired. The truth is that I got enough sleep last night, I just got up several hours earlier than I normally would and I'm not used to it. So I'm trying to stay awake by blogging. But first, read this and remember several months ago. Keywords are Vioxx and Katrina.

Colleen showed us a list of books she had read for the year and it was pretty cool so I decided to make my own list, which I will now share with you. However, I may have forgotten a few at the beginning of the year. Anything that happened more than 3 months ago is hard for me to pin down.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, by Michael Chabon
The Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S. Lewis
The Thrawn Trilogy, by Timothy Zahn
Harry Potter books Four, Five, & Six, by J.K. Rowling
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, by Jonathan Safran Foer
A Continent for the Taking, by Howard French
The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
On Writing, by Stephen King
I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson

There are 19 books in the list. Is this a big number? Is it surprising? Why or why not? In On Writing, Stephen King says he reads 50 to 70 books a year, which is kind of insane. That's more than a book a week, and the man is going freaking blind.
I just finished I Am Legend yesterday and it is hardly a novel at all, only about 150 pages. It's about a man who is surrounded by vampires after a terrible plague sweeps the Earth. Not scary, but full of terror in the sense that you hope it never happens to you. I'd like to read 3 more books by the end of the year, but I have so many choices I'm not sure what to pick up next. I'd also like to try and read one fiction and one non-fiction at the same time, but I'm not sure how that will turn out.

This is what I'm thinking of reading:
The Stand, by Stephen King
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, by Dee Brown

I'd also like to eventually read The Dark Tower Series by Stephen King, but that's like a half a million words at least, and I don't know if I can do that. And I've never read anything by him except On Writing, so I might hate it.

In Bible news, in the past week I have read James and 1 Peter. However, I have missed several days of time with the Lord because I suck. James 4:17 says "Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins" (NIV). Ouch, that burns white-hot. Guilty. I'm also trying to not swear as much, because of James 3 (Taming the Tongue).

Now pretend I'm on NPR and I close by saying "This has been 'All About Reading'" in a smooth radio voice.

Watch as this goes nowhere

2005-11-16T02:12:00.000-06:00

Do you know what is a really creepy noise? The creaking of a metal playground on a windy night. I have no idea where the closest playground is from my bedroom window, but let me tell you, right now it sounds like there's one hanging off the window sill, waiting to slip into my room and kill me... with secret playground powers.

Remember that website I talked about? The one where people could share their movies or whatever? Well, it already exists. Actually, I'm sure it already exists in many forms, but here is the form I found today: uPressPlay.com. It's actually really nice because it's free and there is a wide variety of media to examine. I'm not saying if you go there you'll find a great supply of underrated cinema, but you might find something to bring a few laughs. For instance, one of the shorts I found was called "Roni vs. Lincoln" which involved a battle with a zombie Lincoln. I won't judge originality, but any time you get zombies and Lincoln, things are looking up.

Does anyone remember the band Starsailor? They were supposed to be big and then it never happened. I guess the industry can only support so many Coldplayish bands. I am listening to their song "Alcoholic." It is kinda sad.

Let me ask a question of those with iPods. Have you ever encountered adding music to iTunes through either CD or the Music Store, then syncing your iPod with iTunes, only to end up losing songs on both?

Here's what happened. First, all my music was on my iPod, so I downloaded a program called PodUtil which allows you to transfer music from your iPod to your computer (iTunes doesn't allow this). I also added music to iTunes with CDs. Thinking that my iTunes was all set, I used the auto-sync to copy all the music on iTunes onto my iPod, thereby erasing all the music that was previously on my iPod. Then I discovered that a few songs from a few albums had somehow disappeared.

As far as I know, the songs were from all possible locations: CD, Music Store, and mp3. They were, interestingly enough, Tracks 3 and 5 of Sigur Ros's ( ) album, "Low" on Coldplay's X&Y, "Which to Bury, Us or the Hatchet", by Relient K from the iTunes Music Store, and a Caedman's Call song I got off the internet. But I have no idea why they disappeared the way they did.

It might be limited to the PodUtil program, or it might be that Apple sucks, which may become more and more true as their music empire continues to dominate.

Sorry this update sucks. Yesterday when I was going to read my bible, I ended up falling asleep. But today I already did, and I found out that Jesus died, then rose from the dead, then told the disciples they had some serious responsibility coming up. Also, you know the controversial moment when "All the people answered, 'Let his blood be on us and on our children!" (Mt. 27:25 NIV)? Well, the New Jerusalem Version makes a point of who said it by reading "And the people, every one of them, shouted back..." Isn't that interesting? Also, what kind of Christian is going to be mad at the people who killed Jesus? That's like being mad at someone who saves you from drowning because they hit you in the face with the floatation device. Am I right? We're glad He died! That's why we call it Good Friday. Can I get an amen?!

The Rabbit Hole

2005-11-14T20:14:00.000-06:00

Today I thought: Wouldn't it be great if there was a way to be notified when all the blogs you read were updated? Well there is, but it seems trickier than I can manage. But then I realized, none of us update only a daily basis. Forgive me, I have had my share of binges and purges in blogging, certainly. But it is with disgusting regularity that I check blogs multiple times each day, to no avail. I can manage to click through ten or so links in a 15 minute timespan, but I can't manage to read my bible consistently.

You heard it here first. It has been since thursday, when I read almost to the end of Matthew's journey, that the book was opened before me. Instead, I have been laboriously reading Stephen King, a man whose fiction I have never had the daring to even consider, and yet his nonfiction has my rapt attention.

That is the boring part of this story. This is the exciting stuff:

Over a gnocci dinner tonight, I told my parents how much I hated living at home with them. It mainly consisted of "I hate living here." I certainly don't hate them. I love them, and they have provided me with more needs than I even...well, need. But it's like I was saying before. Living at home lays the foundations of thinking that I am a failed adult.

I am planning on moving somewhere else. Right now my eyes are set on Chicago, America's second city. What I'd like to do is find a job there that somehow involves the creative endeavors of either producing, writing, or editing films on a paid basis. However, I am willing to settle for a paying job in another field if I can also accept a non-paying job in this field. But this is the kind of opportunity I'm talking about. Kind of.

So what does everyone think of Chicago? More opportunity, more people, less people I know, less people I love.

"A chicken in every pot" was originally said by King Henry the IV of France. However, most people today attribute it to Herbert Hoover during the 1928 Presidential Campaign. This is incorrect. King Henry, a champion of the people, supposedly once said "If God allows me to live, I will see that there is not a single labourer in my kingdom who does not have a chicken in his pot every Sunday," only he said it in French.
Herbert Hoover presided over the Stock Market crash that began the Great Depression, which lasted from 1929 until America's entry into WWII in 1941. To be fair, it wasn't his fault. He also had a dam named after him, which was originally called Boulder Dam.

bleep!

2005-11-12T17:49:00.000-06:00

I am beyond tired right now. You know the exhaustion where you don't have a center of balance to stabilize yourself? That's me. I am rocking because I don't realize i'm slowly sinking to one side.

I raked leaves for 8 hours today. there were breaks, but not enough. my body hurts.

i am reading steven king's On Writing and it is without a doubt amazing. he is funny and real. the reason i'm reading it is because i once read a quote from it on a blog and i really liked the quote. I'll share it later. shit i feel gross.

goodnight you kings of new england. you princes of maine.

I'm not asleep yet. I can't sleep yet. Do you want to know why? Because it's only 9pm. But soon. Do you want to know what I did between raking leaves and my first post? I took a bath. Baths are great. I really think it's baths and not bathes. Right? I listened to music and read more of On Writing.

Did you know Stephen King is/was an alcoholic? Or should I say substance abuser? I didn't know that. But he is recovering, and as far as I know, has been sober since 1986. And many of his works between 1970ish and 1986 were his inner self dealing with the trauma he was causing. The Shining being the closest echo of his own life.

Speaking of which, I just had a large Maker's Mark and Coke, which was really nice. But only a bit of the Maker's, mostly Coke.

Here is the quote I once read and now want to share with you:
"There were times...when it occurred to me that I was simply repeating my mother's life. Usually this thought struck me as funny. But if I happened to be tired, or if there were extra bills to pay and no money to pay them with, it seemed awful. I'd think This isn't the way our lives are supposed to be going. Then I'd think Half the world has the same idea."

That seems so poignant to me, because it is a way of expressing how I feel, only in a parallel dimension. I have no bills that weigh on me, on my survival, my wife, my two kids. I have no job in a laundry where I make $1.60 an hour. In a million ways I am a million times better off than he was at that point. But that thought, that feeling of our lives not going the way they're supposed to. It's so unexaggerated and so real. It echoes the feeling when I turn 24 and I still live with my parents, unemployed. I can have all the "plans in motion" in the world, with more encouragement than a birthing mother, and it still feels like failure.

I don't mean to bemoan my sorrowful lot in life. I just mean to express the ache when our idyllic dreams end up deferred (That poem is by Langston Hughes).

I am trying to take the leap. I promise.

A Drunken Punch-Up at a Wedding

2005-11-10T01:44:00.000-06:00

Sorry it has taken so long to continue. Here's the thing: I went to Dayton and on Friday night I had the luxury (and I truly mean that) of reading Matthew 23 to my former housemates while we were preparing for sleep. That was a great moment. Then I missed Saturday and Sunday (again!) but hit the bible up Monday and Tuesday. However, today isn't happening. I'll say that now. I'm tired.

Have you ever been in a wedding? Have you ever been a groomsman? Let me tell you a secret: easy-pie. Easy freaking pie. Do you know what you have to do? Show up. That's it. You get to wear a nice suit, be treated like one of the most important people of the weekend, and then party as much as you want. The hardest part is just standing up in front of all those people for the wedding. It is certainly hard to stand for such a long period of time, and try to look good through it all (not that anyone is looking at the groomsmen. They aren't.). So anyway, drunk at the reception. Drunk at bowling after the reception, and drunk into the late-night donut shop trip as well. You know the best part? It was a great drunk. No throw-up, no blackouts, and a minimal number of people offended (hopefully not an exaggeration). And it was fun! Drunk with friends. Old friends, new friends, and people I'll never see again. At a wedding, it is easy to get pressured into doing another shot of tequila.

Did you know that the Manchester Terrier looks like a miniature version of the Doberman Pincher? Don't believe me? See for yourself.

In Amber Clad

2005-11-02T23:53:00.000-06:00

Tuesday: whatever chapters came after Monday. I've been going in two chapter increments. Actually, I might have only read 20 for Tuesday. Let me tell you something: The first section of 20 pisses me off. I mean, it's just irritating in the way that things that aren't fair are irritating. These guys agree to work a vineyard for a denari, and they're going to work all day. But throughout the day, the owner goes and gets guys, more guys every 3 hours or so. And the guys who end up only working one hour still get paid a denari. And the first guys are like, what the heck? Why do they get more? That's not fair. And then the owner says, Didn't you agree to work for a denari? How is it unfair? Or is it that you're jealous of them getting the same as you for less work. Dang it! I hate that. It makes total biblical sense, but absolutely no world sense, which is what makes it so frustrating. I don't want what I agreed to, I want what I earned compared to what the other people earned.

Oh sweet irony, how you never yield.

I'm going to Dayton for a wedding this weekend. You know what that means? Drunkeness. People were talking today and I thought about how hilarious it would be if the ring bearer was just a trained bear. But then Talya said it would be funnier if it was a little kid in a bear suit. Or it may have been that I said the bear suit and she said the bear. I have memory issues. Why don't people make weddings more ridiculous? That's what makes those Star Wars and Star Trek weddings so great. Although, I suppose they don't think about how ridiculous it is. Hmmm. This seems to be a track to nowhere.

This week's Time Magazine has an Op-Ed by Bono in the back. It's not exactly enlightening or anything. It's hardly inspiring. But, some people love their Bono. The cover story is about global diseases, and the map insert is much more interesting than Bono's piece. But that's just me.

I'm going to buy a book called "Naked Economics" by Charles Wheelan, which is supposed to make Economics understandable for those of us without a subscription to the Wall Street Journal. I secretly hope you crack up at that last line. Or should I have said "without a job at the Federal Reserve"? Or "those of us who aren't Allen Greenspan"? Is it Allen? Or Alan? Maybe we should have a contest, where you fill in the blank with the funniest line to finish "which is supposed to make Economics understandable for those of us..." Ooooh, how about "those of us who don't have shit for brains." Hmmm. I think this needs to end.

Oh yeah. I read for Wednesday too, but the funny thing is, I fell asleep after reading chapter 21. So I only read one chapter today too. But at least I read, right? How is everyone else doing?

Crap: Episode One

2005-11-01T01:52:00.000-06:00

I failed to read on Saturday or Sunday. Can you believe it? I can. However, after guilt for the weekend, I successfully read my bible for Monday. Matthew 18 and 19. It's really sad when, after Jesus says that you shouldn't divorce except for unfaithfulness, the disciples say "If this is the situation between a husband and wife, it is better not to marry." (19:10) That makes marriage sound scary.

All the Phonies Gather 'Round

2005-10-29T11:14:00.000-05:00

I didn't win the lottery yesterday. I bought a ticket. Big money. But no one else won either. It's the small victories.

Is playing the lottery silly? People call it the idiot tax, but somebody has to win, right? And it's not like I play it every week. Maybe once every few months I play it. It's only a dollar. At least that's what I tell myself.

Last night I read Matthew 16 and 17. Want a taste? "And when they raised their eyes they saw no one but Jesus." (Mt. 17:8). In the New Jerusalem translation, they say prophecy of the passion when Jesus predicts his death. Isn't that funny? And to be honest, if it weren't for the movie ("The Passion of the Christ"), I wouldn't know what passion was referring to. Isn't it crazy how words change so completely? No one uses passion to describe a suffering these days.

It happened in The Catcher in the Rye too. Someone (Sally Hayes) used the word "fantastic" to describe something as unrealistic, not as great. The 1950s sure were a strange time. Which reminds me of George Clooney's new movie, called Good Night, and Good Luck which is about Edward R. Murrow's battle against Joseph McCarthy and his Red Scare. But here's a quote I like from the book:
"Anyway, I'm sort of glad they've got the atomic bomb invented. If there's ever another war, I'm going to sit right the hell on top of it. I'll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will."

Updating every day gives me the chance to waste a lot more time with things that aren't important. Listen, if you're a dork/nerd like me, and you haven't played Escape Velocity: Nova, you should do yourself a favor and check it out.

Suffer the Little Children

2005-10-28T13:35:00.000-05:00

Since reading my bible typically happens at night, and not in the morning, it is unlikely that each post will end with my having read the bible for the day. Instead, each post should look at whether I read the bible the previous day, or in this case, the previous two days. Fortunately, I did.

On Wednesday I read Matthew 12 and 13. And on Thursday I read Matthew 14 and 15. Forgive me for being so linear. I am currently carrying the New Jerusalem Bible translation, which is a bit different from the NIV or NASV, or what have you. But it leads me to questions about passages I thought I understood.

Probably the most striking thing I read was in Mt. 15 v. 1-9. in which Jesus accused the Pharisees of breaking the commandments for the sake of tradition. The example he gives is denying honor to your father and mother by using the excuse that "anything I might have used to help you is dedicated to God" (v. 5). It made me think about the ways that I can become indifferent to people's suffering because I am too busy trying to be righteous about other suffering. In reality, I am being self-righteous about suffering that I have foolishly deemed more worthy of God.

Especially with my parents, who I take for granted for the most part. I can blame them and their opinions for all the problems in the world, but I don't take the time to love them and appreciate them for who they are, or to realize that no problem is a one person affair.

Sorry if I got too far into it there. I don't want to start Chris's Bible Hour here. But I am trying to give account, I guess.

Is this self-righteous in itself? Is it encouraging? Is there a chance we can speak of what we learn and become something more than the rambling of strangers? Am I alienating you?

I would like to emphasize that I am focusing on me for this. I don't aim to hold you accountable to anything unless you ask me. But when I am here, in my own blog, I am speaking of my own highs and lows. If ever there is a time when I speak in "you"s and "your"s, I do not mean you specifically. I mean the general of how people tend to be. But I will try to refrain from that also. So, I am not giving you the right to criticize my beliefs here. I am giving you the right to read about my efforts to bring myself closer to my beliefs. If you would like to criticize or be offended or lose respect, you are free to do it to yourself, or in small circles of like-minded people. But I am not looking to be debated or to prove myself right. Just to show you where I succeed and where I fail.