Hi! Back so soon?
Yes, well... It was a really long time between my last post and the one that preceded it, so I have lots of stuff that I have meant to discuss, or at least mention. Here's a quick list, in no particular order:
Speed dating, my most recent Stacy related meltdown, flashback scenes, blogs vs twitter, writing in general, I should move to Boston, XKCD, and some more of my social failings.
I don't know how many of these things i'll get to today, or if I'll ever end up discussing all of them at all.
Let's start with the Stacy thing for today. I forgot to mention it in the last post like I meant to. I'm not going to devote a lot of time to it, because, seriously... I'm pretty pathetic. But I wanted to mention it.
So, I thought that ever since a year ago I had actually moved on. It finally registered fully to me how Stacy had never really treated me particularly well, and sometimes outright poorly and mean. Turns out, I'm okay with all of these things being in the past and have moved on--emotionally if not like... In actuality--but I'm not okay with the idea that Stacy is still... You know... Alive and in existence. Emily mentioned to me that she was the maid of honor at the wedding of a mutual acquaintance and I did not take it well.
So, I afforded myself a day of being mopey and exceptionally unhappy, and that, for the most part, was that. Though since then she has been, most unwelcomelym closer to the forefront of my thoughts.
And that's that. Moving on.
I think XKCD next. Have you seen this comic? I've known it existed for years, but never bothered to look ionto it. Thenh a litt le bit algo there was a Captre the Flag FPS comic from it listed in the Hoystiq Weekly Webcomic Wrapup, and I thought it wuas just really clever. So I started to look at some of the streips by sing the random button, and it contined to be really clever. I've since read throgh all of the archives. Twice.
If you haven't given this strip a look, you should. It's routinely insightful and incredibly smart. It has a lot to say about the way we deal with relationships from time to time... And it's in this vein that I sort of bring it up.
Sometimes there's a strip that's just incredibly sweet, and it gives me a very melancholy/lonely feeling. It's not incredibly easy to find these sorts of strips mixed in with the complex math equations and frequent yor mom jokes, but they're there. And even when there's a your mom joke, it will often be a heel to the setup of some incredibly sweet imagery on the ideals of relationships. I just eat this shit up. Here's a few sample comics:
http://xkcd.com/570/
http://xkcd.com/44/
http://xkcd.com/45/
http://xkcd.com/128/
http://xkcd.com/150/
http://xkcd.com/249/
http://xkcd.com/357/
http://xkcd.com/572/ <------- My favorite
The art is, obviously, not the focus. Also, remember to mouseover each comic for the mouseover comment thingy. It's often better than the comic itself.
Alright... Next up is speed dating. I'm thinking of giving it a try. I don't like that i'm thinking of giving it a try. I'd like to think that I can deal with just being alone and waiting for someone to come along who I develop a crush on and then a relationship to mature organically (read: I wear her down into dating me) But it's painfully obvious that this scenario is not coming into fruition with anywhere near the speed to satisfy me. I havena't met anyone new that i've been remotely interested in for like for years now. Maybe five. I lost count.
So, speed dating seems like an... Option, I guess. Except I'm pretty sre it'll just be a waste of time. If for no other reason than the only event I'm aware of has an age limit of 25-35. I'm right at the bottom of that. I don't expect there to be too many girls of my preferred age bracket at one of these things. Emily mentioned a while back that she and Michelle had wanted to do one of these things... Maybe I should ask her about it. Maybe she'd go to one with me. I probably won't bring it up with her though. Also, I think she's currently mad at me. Oh well. Moving on.
Let's do "I should omove to Boston" next. Lior's been bugging me that I should pick up and move up North with him for a few years. I probably should. I'm pretty stagnant down here.
Problem is, it's comfortable here. I think I would be pretty much equally stagnant in Boston, but down here at least the rent is free.
It might be easier to find a job in a sort of office settig that I would prefer in an area like Boston. But, I really don't have the first clue how to effectively look for a job. That wouldn't change drastically by changing location, I don't think.
Also, I don't know that Boston would be the best idea for me. Not that I wouldn't like to be closer to Lior again. Thhat wouyld be nice. Bt moving p to live with Lior I would sort of jutst be adopting his friends instead of being forced ot of my little hole and making some new friends and forging relationships. So, in that respect, maybe a new city where I don't have any ties would be better.
Except I don';t bel'ieve in my ability to meet people and form relationships, which is the whole point, in that sort of situation. I'm sure I would movle to a new city, live off the meager money I have savevd up, not find a job, not make friends, be miserable, and move back home. So, were I to do this, I suppose it should be Boston with Lior.
But, who are we kidding? There's little to no chance of me taking myself up on this.
I think thins one's gonna be the last topic, and I've saved it for last becase, while I wanted to mention all the other things, this is the one I realley actally want to write about. Flashback scenes.
What's up with them lately?
Maybe "lately" is a misleading term. I think going back about a decade now. Maybe 15 years. But still, in the scheme of things it's lately.
A flashback can be a very effective tool in storytelling. While it was incredibly boring, Citizen Kane used the concept of flashback incredibly well. Guy dies, says Rosebud. Why did he say that? Movie attempts to figure it out.
There are some other really good examples of this approach, but none spring to mind immediately. Fight Club was alright, but maybe not incredibly necessary. There's a particular episode of the West Wing where it's used really well. The one where Toby's brother almost dies in space. And lots of other stuff happened too.
Actually, Aaron Sorkin has sed flashback effectively a number of times, now that I think about it. And the way he does it is very remeniscent of the last episode of MASH, which also did a good job of starting at the end with a purpose.
But television shows, particularly I think moreso than movies, have been abusing the shit out of this techniqe. If a story starts at the end, and then flashes back to the beginning before working its way back to the starting point--read: the end-- then there needs to be a damn good reason for it. There needs to be some sort of impetous... Some amont of mystery in that first scene that's staying with th=e viewer throgh the rest of the story until we get back to it and it all comes together.
If the story works just as well when told in linear fashion, then tell it that way.
A lot of the ti me, I think the purpose is to give a story the illsion of complexity where there really isn't any. A scene cshown out of context can be really confsing and leave the viewer with a feeling of "what's going on?"
But then the episode proper will start, and ten mintes minutes after that jarring "X amount of time earlier" screen, there's a story going on that is independent of the opening scene. None of the things that happened need be going through the viewer's mind.
It just frustrates me that this techniqe has been so overdone senselessly. I really like the techniqe, and when sed properly it can aid in telling a really compelling story. And the blatant overuse of it when it's wholly unecessary only serves to weaken the impact it has when used properly.
I want to asay that JJ Abrams is the most egregious practitioner in this. But, while it is very likely true, it's maybe not entirely fair. The stories he tends to be telling (namely Lost and Alias) are just so incredibly convoluted and ridiculous that the added "story being told out of order for no good reason" meme almost has a place.
Heroes does it a lot too, but those guys are Abrams' buddies, so I'm lumping them in with him.
But it's not just shows like that. Regular, non-incredibly-convoluted-more-like-soap-opera shows like Brothers and Sisters overuse the technique as well. How I Met Your Mother is founded on it--sometimes, to be fair, effectively. Sometimes, like that episode a couple weeks ago where the girl with the mbrella turns out to be what's-her-name from Scrbs, obnoxiously.
Actually, to be fair... That was a good use of the technique, in more technical terms. The episode proper really wasn't about the main storyline. It was a cheap way to tell a series of uuninteresting anecdotes. It just annoyed me because it was purposefully and unabashedly jerking the audience around.
Anyway... I think I 've, more or less, eclumsily made my point. Next time you're watching something and it flashes back to some time in the past after the first scene, really pay attention and ask yourself it it was necessary. Chances are, it wasn't.
On a side note, before I stop swriting because my phone battery is dying and I also don't want to write anymore, I was thinki ng of going back and watching all of Lost again from the beginning and recording the major plot points as they happen. I think it would be interesting, if not amusing, to look at a list of the shit that's happened and see what things were dropped completely and such. Aside from that... Ever tried to explain Lost to someone who doesn't watch it? Yeah, you know how that conversation goes. A list of sthe plot points like that would just be ridiculous.
Kim had missed an episode of Lost recently, and I sort of glibly summarized the things that happened in the episode, saying them, admittedly, in as ridiculous a manner as possible. She rolled her eyes at me like I was just making fn of the show. Which I was. But all of the things I said had happened pretty much the way I said them. The show's retarded. So I think presenting this sort of stuff in a master list wold prove hilarious.
Then I realized that in order to do this, I would have to watch Lost from the beginning and really pay attention and stay engaged enough to be recording things as they happen. I wouldn't so much mind watching the series again... It's stupid, but entertaining... I just don't want to have to pay real attention to it. For the most part, that's not how I choose to partake in my video media. I like to lay in ybed and just let shows happen to me withot having to be alert. I often faltl asleep and have to watch things more than once to finish the episode.
Okay... Time to go back inside and post this. If I didn't get to one of the listed topics that I said I was going to, and that was the one you were really looking forward to reading about, chances are I'm not gonna get to it. But ifyou tell me which it is, then I just might tdo it special for you.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Friday, May 8, 2009
Brought to You by: Djarum
I like Twitter, and I think it has its uses... But it's just not the same as writing a good old lengthy rambling blog. I've missed it. And there have been things that I've been wanting to, but neglecting, to write about. So, when I was at the mall I picked up a pack of cloves to be used for writing purposes.
There have been a bunch of things I've wanted to discuss here, but I can only really remember three of them: D&D, Rush Limbaugh, and How I Met Your Mother. So, let's discuss these three topics in reverse order.
Lior told me How I Met Your Mother was good. So, I downloaded the entire series and watched it. It's alright... If you like generic sitcoms, then you'll like it. It's basically a generic sitcom plus... Well... Plus Neil Patrick Harris, basically. The plan a while ago when I wanted to devote an entire entry to HIMYM was to go into specifics about what is good and bad about the show, but it's been a few weeks since I watched it and it honestly wasn't memorable enough for me to do a decent job of pros and cons.
Laterally though, I wanted to briefly discuss, once again, meeting people.
You know what? I was going to go into the bar scene, and how television presents an unrealistic version of bars and clubs, for the most part, and how I don't understand how to in any actual way take advantage of that scene, or how to turn a chance encounter into something more... But I realized I've discussed all of these things ad nauseum in the past. So I'll just say this... I could really use a good wingman. As much as I think I wou ld hate it as iit was happening to me, like the dynamic between Barney and... Uh... The main character, whatever his damn name is, towards the beginning of the series, it's the sort of thing that I think would be ultimately positive. And that's all I'm going to say about that. Moving on to Rush Limbaugh.
A few weeks back, Mike posted a blog discussing Rush Limbaugh's opinions on... Well...I don't really remember. Something to do with cars and the Obama administration's hostile takeover of GM. The specifics are less than important. The point is, he said he listens to the guy and that the podcasts are posted on demonoid.
So, I decided that I wanted to read his blog with the knowledge of what had actually been said on the radio show. So I downloaded the podcasta and listened to it, and then read Mike's blog.
Then I decided, "you know what? All of the media and pretty much everything i'm exposed to from friends and family tends to have a left wing slant. How much of my ideals are shaped by that, and how much of that is shaped by my ideals? What if I started to regularly listen to a persuasive and persistent account from the other side? Would I starte to mirror those ideals? Or is Rush Limbaugh just a big fat idiot, as has been posited through literature in the past?" And thus the experiment began.
So, I've been listening to all his shows since. I download them and listen to them while I'mj working. I have to say... There are some things that genuinely surprised me. I 've always known that the differences between liberal and conservative rhetoric is largely cosmetic, but sometimes it's not even that. Hearing conservative callers and such spouting the exact same rhetoric was surprising. I never would have thought that conservatives also felt that they had the market sewn up in terms of sense of humor, for instance.
Aside from the mild dose of culture shock, Rush has some pretty good points. Or he's just very persuasive. Either way, I find I agree with a lot of the things he has to say about specific intents of political PR moves. Certainly not all of what he says about them... He seems to think that the current administration is genuinely evil and selfish, but I can see his point on a lot of things.
That said; the guy's a nutball.
The best thing about listening to Rush Limbaugh is telling people I'm listening to him and watching them react. Jim's mom was particularly fun.
I decided that I wanted to nfind an equally batshit insane liberal radio show and listen to that, so I can get a simultaneous crazy ass liberal take on the same issues as the crazy ass conservative Rush Limbaugh take I'm currently getting. But there aren't any good liberal talk shows I know of. nI looked into Al Frankenr, but he quit his radio show on Air America to run for senate or whatever he's in his legal battle about. So I downloaded some of his books... They're alright, but not exactly what I was going for.
Jeanine Garrafolo's show is off air too.... She's busy acting on a conservative TV series that is broadcast on a conservative television station. Crazy bitch...
You know who needs a radio show for me to listen to? Bill Maher. Or Michael Moore... Or even like a John Stewart, if he dropped the "centrist comedian" guise and just did a radio show. But no... Liberal crazies control the television and movie mediums, while the radio waves are ruled by the right wing lunatics. These lunatics need to get together and decide on one medium and then just compete fairly.
Anyway; D&D.
So, Brian wanted to try it out. And Jim wanted to play. So we got some people together to play, and I was tasked with the job of GM. If not me, then who?
Well, someone else. It's not my thing. I'm just not very good at it. I would have thoght I would be better, but as it turns out, no.
Maybe it's not entirely my fault (it's at least mostly my fault.) Maybe 4th edition is just not the venue for the game I want to run.
I don't think that's it. I'm just not cut out for being a good GM.
The problem is, a dungeon crawl just isn't a lot of fun. And that's really all 4th is; a dungeon crawl mechanism.
That's not really the problem. The beauty of D&D is that you can use the rules as much or as little as you'd like. My problem as a GM is threefold. I'm not creative enough, I'm not quick enough on my feet, and I get frustrated too easily.
When I write a story, I struggle over how to get from one thing to the next. WHat should the next event be? I could have characters sit around and talk about nothing forever. My problem comes when I have to make my characters do things. Story points are the hard bit for me. If I coul d map out a good story, I could write it no problem. It's the initial planning that's the huge bitch for me. And when writing acampaign, all you have is the initial planning
So, because I'm so bad at it, my plots hinge on certain things happening. And if they don't happen, then the plot kinda falls to shit. And the players don't always want to do the thing that you need them to do to make the story move forward.
A good GM takes that, and works with it. A good GM has an idea of what is happening in the world, and then adapts that to what the players decide to do. I get frusrtrated and try to force myplayers lto do what I want them to.
So, it's a little sadldening to me that my GMing debut didn't turn out well. I'm fine rnning a prebpuilt campaign, btu writing my own thing just doesn't look good. And the prebuilt campaigns aren't very fun. They're just dungeon crawls.
You know? I kind of enx-ected this to be longer... But I'm tired, and I sort of glossed over things instead of delving into them with my customary zeal. Also, I'm not really enjoying the cloves so much. Hopefully I'll be back again soon. We should do this again sometime. Can I get your number?
See how desperately I need a wingman?
There have been a bunch of things I've wanted to discuss here, but I can only really remember three of them: D&D, Rush Limbaugh, and How I Met Your Mother. So, let's discuss these three topics in reverse order.
Lior told me How I Met Your Mother was good. So, I downloaded the entire series and watched it. It's alright... If you like generic sitcoms, then you'll like it. It's basically a generic sitcom plus... Well... Plus Neil Patrick Harris, basically. The plan a while ago when I wanted to devote an entire entry to HIMYM was to go into specifics about what is good and bad about the show, but it's been a few weeks since I watched it and it honestly wasn't memorable enough for me to do a decent job of pros and cons.
Laterally though, I wanted to briefly discuss, once again, meeting people.
You know what? I was going to go into the bar scene, and how television presents an unrealistic version of bars and clubs, for the most part, and how I don't understand how to in any actual way take advantage of that scene, or how to turn a chance encounter into something more... But I realized I've discussed all of these things ad nauseum in the past. So I'll just say this... I could really use a good wingman. As much as I think I wou ld hate it as iit was happening to me, like the dynamic between Barney and... Uh... The main character, whatever his damn name is, towards the beginning of the series, it's the sort of thing that I think would be ultimately positive. And that's all I'm going to say about that. Moving on to Rush Limbaugh.
A few weeks back, Mike posted a blog discussing Rush Limbaugh's opinions on... Well...I don't really remember. Something to do with cars and the Obama administration's hostile takeover of GM. The specifics are less than important. The point is, he said he listens to the guy and that the podcasts are posted on demonoid.
So, I decided that I wanted to read his blog with the knowledge of what had actually been said on the radio show. So I downloaded the podcasta and listened to it, and then read Mike's blog.
Then I decided, "you know what? All of the media and pretty much everything i'm exposed to from friends and family tends to have a left wing slant. How much of my ideals are shaped by that, and how much of that is shaped by my ideals? What if I started to regularly listen to a persuasive and persistent account from the other side? Would I starte to mirror those ideals? Or is Rush Limbaugh just a big fat idiot, as has been posited through literature in the past?" And thus the experiment began.
So, I've been listening to all his shows since. I download them and listen to them while I'mj working. I have to say... There are some things that genuinely surprised me. I 've always known that the differences between liberal and conservative rhetoric is largely cosmetic, but sometimes it's not even that. Hearing conservative callers and such spouting the exact same rhetoric was surprising. I never would have thought that conservatives also felt that they had the market sewn up in terms of sense of humor, for instance.
Aside from the mild dose of culture shock, Rush has some pretty good points. Or he's just very persuasive. Either way, I find I agree with a lot of the things he has to say about specific intents of political PR moves. Certainly not all of what he says about them... He seems to think that the current administration is genuinely evil and selfish, but I can see his point on a lot of things.
That said; the guy's a nutball.
The best thing about listening to Rush Limbaugh is telling people I'm listening to him and watching them react. Jim's mom was particularly fun.
I decided that I wanted to nfind an equally batshit insane liberal radio show and listen to that, so I can get a simultaneous crazy ass liberal take on the same issues as the crazy ass conservative Rush Limbaugh take I'm currently getting. But there aren't any good liberal talk shows I know of. nI looked into Al Frankenr, but he quit his radio show on Air America to run for senate or whatever he's in his legal battle about. So I downloaded some of his books... They're alright, but not exactly what I was going for.
Jeanine Garrafolo's show is off air too.... She's busy acting on a conservative TV series that is broadcast on a conservative television station. Crazy bitch...
You know who needs a radio show for me to listen to? Bill Maher. Or Michael Moore... Or even like a John Stewart, if he dropped the "centrist comedian" guise and just did a radio show. But no... Liberal crazies control the television and movie mediums, while the radio waves are ruled by the right wing lunatics. These lunatics need to get together and decide on one medium and then just compete fairly.
Anyway; D&D.
So, Brian wanted to try it out. And Jim wanted to play. So we got some people together to play, and I was tasked with the job of GM. If not me, then who?
Well, someone else. It's not my thing. I'm just not very good at it. I would have thoght I would be better, but as it turns out, no.
Maybe it's not entirely my fault (it's at least mostly my fault.) Maybe 4th edition is just not the venue for the game I want to run.
I don't think that's it. I'm just not cut out for being a good GM.
The problem is, a dungeon crawl just isn't a lot of fun. And that's really all 4th is; a dungeon crawl mechanism.
That's not really the problem. The beauty of D&D is that you can use the rules as much or as little as you'd like. My problem as a GM is threefold. I'm not creative enough, I'm not quick enough on my feet, and I get frustrated too easily.
When I write a story, I struggle over how to get from one thing to the next. WHat should the next event be? I could have characters sit around and talk about nothing forever. My problem comes when I have to make my characters do things. Story points are the hard bit for me. If I coul d map out a good story, I could write it no problem. It's the initial planning that's the huge bitch for me. And when writing acampaign, all you have is the initial planning
So, because I'm so bad at it, my plots hinge on certain things happening. And if they don't happen, then the plot kinda falls to shit. And the players don't always want to do the thing that you need them to do to make the story move forward.
A good GM takes that, and works with it. A good GM has an idea of what is happening in the world, and then adapts that to what the players decide to do. I get frusrtrated and try to force myplayers lto do what I want them to.
So, it's a little sadldening to me that my GMing debut didn't turn out well. I'm fine rnning a prebpuilt campaign, btu writing my own thing just doesn't look good. And the prebuilt campaigns aren't very fun. They're just dungeon crawls.
You know? I kind of enx-ected this to be longer... But I'm tired, and I sort of glossed over things instead of delving into them with my customary zeal. Also, I'm not really enjoying the cloves so much. Hopefully I'll be back again soon. We should do this again sometime. Can I get your number?
See how desperately I need a wingman?
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Dana is Six Months Pregnant
I got a new camera the other day. It's an okay camera, I guess. But I probably shouldn't have gotten it.
I really like having pictures. Pictures are neat. You get to look back at pictures and say "Hey look! That's me!"
I think other people say other things about pictures.
Anyway... the point is I like pictures, but I don't have too many because I don't have a camera. And the camera on the phones just doesn't cut it, really.
But I probably won't be taking any more pictures now that I have the camera, anyway. Because, while I like pictures and while I like taking pictures, I don't like having to take them.
That might not make sense, because I said that I both like and don't like taking pictures. Well, deal with it.
I enjoy actually shooting the picture and then having that picture, but, for one thing, then I don't get to be in the picture.Which I like. For another thing, taking the pictures changes the activity and makes it something else. Instead of having fun doing something, now you're looking for capturable moments.
There was a movie that Cherry had me watch at some point. I don't remember what it was called, but it had Adam Goldberg in it. I just looked it up, and it was called Two Days in Paris.
It wasn't good. It was the sort of movie Cherry makes me watch. But it had one line that I really liked and still remember. Or at least I remember it in paraphrase form. Goldberg's character said that he didn't like the other female lead's character's love of taking pictures all the time because it made her an observer. It's a way of being purposefully disengaged with the goings on around you, while appearing fully engaged. And I'd rather be either engaged, or an observer, but not try to straddle the line.
So, that's that. This entry is feeling really forced, and I'm pretty much done with it now. I guess that's what happens when I try to write something on the actual computer instead of outside on the phone. I imagine my blog production is going to fall even further down now that I'm not smoking anymore.
Oh, and if you've been waiting for some sort of reference to this blog's title.... doesn't look like your waiting has paid off, does it?
I really like having pictures. Pictures are neat. You get to look back at pictures and say "Hey look! That's me!"
I think other people say other things about pictures.
Anyway... the point is I like pictures, but I don't have too many because I don't have a camera. And the camera on the phones just doesn't cut it, really.
But I probably won't be taking any more pictures now that I have the camera, anyway. Because, while I like pictures and while I like taking pictures, I don't like having to take them.
That might not make sense, because I said that I both like and don't like taking pictures. Well, deal with it.
I enjoy actually shooting the picture and then having that picture, but, for one thing, then I don't get to be in the picture.Which I like. For another thing, taking the pictures changes the activity and makes it something else. Instead of having fun doing something, now you're looking for capturable moments.
There was a movie that Cherry had me watch at some point. I don't remember what it was called, but it had Adam Goldberg in it. I just looked it up, and it was called Two Days in Paris.
It wasn't good. It was the sort of movie Cherry makes me watch. But it had one line that I really liked and still remember. Or at least I remember it in paraphrase form. Goldberg's character said that he didn't like the other female lead's character's love of taking pictures all the time because it made her an observer. It's a way of being purposefully disengaged with the goings on around you, while appearing fully engaged. And I'd rather be either engaged, or an observer, but not try to straddle the line.
So, that's that. This entry is feeling really forced, and I'm pretty much done with it now. I guess that's what happens when I try to write something on the actual computer instead of outside on the phone. I imagine my blog production is going to fall even further down now that I'm not smoking anymore.
Oh, and if you've been waiting for some sort of reference to this blog's title.... doesn't look like your waiting has paid off, does it?
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Are We Really All Like That?
A moderatrely attractive man is driving down the street in a Porsche. He sees a woman on walking down the street. He stops and tells her he thinks she's cute and points to a very nice apartment building and asks if she wold come up to his place and have sex with him. Nine out of ten times she'll tell him to take a hike.
A fairly attractive woman is driving down the road in a beat up Civic. She sees a man walking down the street. She stops and tells him she thinks he's cute and points to a ramshackle apartment above a convenience store and asks if he would like to come up to her place andhave sex with her. Nine out of ten times, they're headed upstairs.
I stepped on the delivery a bit there, but that's more or less a "joke" that they told on Las Vegas, which is the show I'm currently watching. I'm not going to debate numbers or anything with the joke, but for our purposes we're going to say that the joke is more or less true. I think we can agree to that.
Of course, the fact that we're agreeing to that sort of steps on the point of my entry. I'd rather not agree on it just yet, and rather just use it as an intro into the conversation. So, let's pretend we haven't agreed on it just yet.
Now then, the question: Are all guys really like that? I mean, really?
The numbers posited in the "joke" suggest that no, not ALL guys are like that. But it also doesn't go into the mitigating factors for why the man would reject the woman. Maybe he's on his way to an important meeting. We'll assume he's not just being faithful to his wife, because that sort of screws up the point of this exercise. Maybe the woman falls shy of his standards. It isn't standards that I wish to discuss.
Now, before I delve too far into this, I need to admit that the "evidence" i'm basing this post on is flimsy at best. Some gross generalization combined with some only-mostly-related real world observation, combined with a whole lot of fiction. But, forging ahead.
Let's start with Las Vegas, since that's the show I'm currently watching and what made me think to write this post, which is something I've been brooding on for a long time now.
So, the main character's a pretty smooth guy. Second in command for security at a prestigious Las Vegas Casino. He's your basic suave main character. Really smart, physically fit, attractive, infinitely capable, etc. But, when faced with the prospect of sex he's a complete moron. "I'm in love with my best friend who I've known my whole life. But you're hot and want to have sex with me? How can I get my pants off fast enough."
Now, like I said, granted this is more or less just a crappy TV show. And, one that takes place in Las Vegas to boot. So, there's a degree to which we can just throw this show out of our evidence entirely. And if it had been just this show, and not something that I've been ruminating about for, well, ever, then this post wouldn't exist. But it's certainly not relegated to this show. Or even to low quality fiction in general.
Aaron Sorkin, who I consider the pinnacle of intelligent and high brow writing for the screen, shows the same male tendencies in his characters. It's not quite as overt as the characters running off and screwing everything in a skirt, but it's definitely there.
To start with, all of the characters in an Aaron Sorkin show are infinitely intelligent and dedicated. That's important to this discussion, because we're talking about a facet of humanity related to the reptillian part of the brain, which is more suppressed in the sorts of people that these characters emulate. (that's sort of a judgement call on my part. Just roll with it)
So why is it that a nice pair of legs is all that's needed to distract these men from their infinitely important (sometimes not so important except in their minds) task at hand? I know these are just fictional characters and all, but the fact that they are written by a real man lends at least some amount of credibility to the way that they think.
An attractive woman who is either stupid, or mean, or both, is often given a sort of pass on those less redeaming qualities, and will still find herself surrounded by guys who ant to spend time with her, ostensibly with the prospect of sex in mind. This statement is made through no specific instance, but rather general observation of both real world and fiction.
There's a podcast that I ilisten to every week about movies. It's three guys, and basically they just talk about whatever movies were released that week and what they thought of them. Often, very often... I'd say at least once per show, there's mention of some horrible movie starring some moderately to untallented hot actress, and the conversation goes something like this: "Yeah... That movie was awful. The direction was horrid, there was no story. ::Inster actress's name here:: can't act for shit. But man she's hot. And you see her boobs! Hur hur hur. So, that made the rest of the movie worthwhile. Hur hur hur."
So, the point of all of this is: Really? I mean... Really? Am I the only guy that isn't like this? Sure, physical attraction's a big deal. But lewd comments are really never necessary. In fact, I don't really even find it necessary to point out someone who I think is attractive if the conversation hasn't specifically somehow warranted that discussion. A good looking girl never makes me all of a sudden turn into a bumbling idiot. Being cute doesn't mean you can be stupid, and if you are then you don't get a pass for it.
But, am I just being hypocritical? Does everyone think that they're "better than that" and then just aren't? Is it a conscious thing in, what seems to be, every other guy in the world? Or does everyone think that they're above that and then just fail utterly when it really comes down to it?
I've gotta say no. I think, that while the evidence put forth doesn't show that the initial premise is necessarily correct, if we assume for the moment that it is then it's a conscious thing. It's written into fiction, consciously. And the comments are certainly made purpsefully in a sort of spirit of "male comradery."
This is frustrating to me for a number of reasons. For one thing, I just don't like seeing it or hearing it or observing it with some other sense. For another thing, it's a big part of the "all males are jerks" attitude that, while isn't entirely true, is pervasive and not false enough to fault girls for thinking it. So, if I do find an attractive girl who I like, now I have to work agains the notion that has been imprinted upon her that I'm first and foremost trying to get her into bed. This propensity in guys to hit on anything in a skirt causes girls to naturally have defenses up when anyone new is approaching them, and so ow the first instinct for pretty much anyone that I would be interested in talking to anyway is to blow off the unwanted advance. So now I, or guys like me, aren't going to even bother talking to them because it's just not worth the rejection. So now only the majority of guys, who are jerks, are going to be approaching her and thus reinforcing the stigma. It's a vicious cycle.
And this is where the entry sort of peters off. I have no real conclusion. But then again, I never really do. I suppose that's the problem withg making posts and calling them, and treating them like, "conversations." There's no real back and forth. No input from someone else. So, it just sort of ends.
A fairly attractive woman is driving down the road in a beat up Civic. She sees a man walking down the street. She stops and tells him she thinks he's cute and points to a ramshackle apartment above a convenience store and asks if he would like to come up to her place andhave sex with her. Nine out of ten times, they're headed upstairs.
I stepped on the delivery a bit there, but that's more or less a "joke" that they told on Las Vegas, which is the show I'm currently watching. I'm not going to debate numbers or anything with the joke, but for our purposes we're going to say that the joke is more or less true. I think we can agree to that.
Of course, the fact that we're agreeing to that sort of steps on the point of my entry. I'd rather not agree on it just yet, and rather just use it as an intro into the conversation. So, let's pretend we haven't agreed on it just yet.
Now then, the question: Are all guys really like that? I mean, really?
The numbers posited in the "joke" suggest that no, not ALL guys are like that. But it also doesn't go into the mitigating factors for why the man would reject the woman. Maybe he's on his way to an important meeting. We'll assume he's not just being faithful to his wife, because that sort of screws up the point of this exercise. Maybe the woman falls shy of his standards. It isn't standards that I wish to discuss.
Now, before I delve too far into this, I need to admit that the "evidence" i'm basing this post on is flimsy at best. Some gross generalization combined with some only-mostly-related real world observation, combined with a whole lot of fiction. But, forging ahead.
Let's start with Las Vegas, since that's the show I'm currently watching and what made me think to write this post, which is something I've been brooding on for a long time now.
So, the main character's a pretty smooth guy. Second in command for security at a prestigious Las Vegas Casino. He's your basic suave main character. Really smart, physically fit, attractive, infinitely capable, etc. But, when faced with the prospect of sex he's a complete moron. "I'm in love with my best friend who I've known my whole life. But you're hot and want to have sex with me? How can I get my pants off fast enough."
Now, like I said, granted this is more or less just a crappy TV show. And, one that takes place in Las Vegas to boot. So, there's a degree to which we can just throw this show out of our evidence entirely. And if it had been just this show, and not something that I've been ruminating about for, well, ever, then this post wouldn't exist. But it's certainly not relegated to this show. Or even to low quality fiction in general.
Aaron Sorkin, who I consider the pinnacle of intelligent and high brow writing for the screen, shows the same male tendencies in his characters. It's not quite as overt as the characters running off and screwing everything in a skirt, but it's definitely there.
To start with, all of the characters in an Aaron Sorkin show are infinitely intelligent and dedicated. That's important to this discussion, because we're talking about a facet of humanity related to the reptillian part of the brain, which is more suppressed in the sorts of people that these characters emulate. (that's sort of a judgement call on my part. Just roll with it)
So why is it that a nice pair of legs is all that's needed to distract these men from their infinitely important (sometimes not so important except in their minds) task at hand? I know these are just fictional characters and all, but the fact that they are written by a real man lends at least some amount of credibility to the way that they think.
An attractive woman who is either stupid, or mean, or both, is often given a sort of pass on those less redeaming qualities, and will still find herself surrounded by guys who ant to spend time with her, ostensibly with the prospect of sex in mind. This statement is made through no specific instance, but rather general observation of both real world and fiction.
There's a podcast that I ilisten to every week about movies. It's three guys, and basically they just talk about whatever movies were released that week and what they thought of them. Often, very often... I'd say at least once per show, there's mention of some horrible movie starring some moderately to untallented hot actress, and the conversation goes something like this: "Yeah... That movie was awful. The direction was horrid, there was no story. ::Inster actress's name here:: can't act for shit. But man she's hot. And you see her boobs! Hur hur hur. So, that made the rest of the movie worthwhile. Hur hur hur."
So, the point of all of this is: Really? I mean... Really? Am I the only guy that isn't like this? Sure, physical attraction's a big deal. But lewd comments are really never necessary. In fact, I don't really even find it necessary to point out someone who I think is attractive if the conversation hasn't specifically somehow warranted that discussion. A good looking girl never makes me all of a sudden turn into a bumbling idiot. Being cute doesn't mean you can be stupid, and if you are then you don't get a pass for it.
But, am I just being hypocritical? Does everyone think that they're "better than that" and then just aren't? Is it a conscious thing in, what seems to be, every other guy in the world? Or does everyone think that they're above that and then just fail utterly when it really comes down to it?
I've gotta say no. I think, that while the evidence put forth doesn't show that the initial premise is necessarily correct, if we assume for the moment that it is then it's a conscious thing. It's written into fiction, consciously. And the comments are certainly made purpsefully in a sort of spirit of "male comradery."
This is frustrating to me for a number of reasons. For one thing, I just don't like seeing it or hearing it or observing it with some other sense. For another thing, it's a big part of the "all males are jerks" attitude that, while isn't entirely true, is pervasive and not false enough to fault girls for thinking it. So, if I do find an attractive girl who I like, now I have to work agains the notion that has been imprinted upon her that I'm first and foremost trying to get her into bed. This propensity in guys to hit on anything in a skirt causes girls to naturally have defenses up when anyone new is approaching them, and so ow the first instinct for pretty much anyone that I would be interested in talking to anyway is to blow off the unwanted advance. So now I, or guys like me, aren't going to even bother talking to them because it's just not worth the rejection. So now only the majority of guys, who are jerks, are going to be approaching her and thus reinforcing the stigma. It's a vicious cycle.
And this is where the entry sort of peters off. I have no real conclusion. But then again, I never really do. I suppose that's the problem withg making posts and calling them, and treating them like, "conversations." There's no real back and forth. No input from someone else. So, it just sort of ends.
Monday, January 5, 2009
The Jesus Fairy Tale (and other bedtime stories)
I had one of those really lucid moments the other day where I was just thinking about stuff and they seemed like really good ideas. It was when I was just drifting off to sleep. As I was thinking about these things I decided that they would make good topics for a few blogs. It's now a few days later, and as is the way with these things, I now realize the ideas were either lame, done to death, or farfetched. So, now you know what to expect from this entry.
I can't recall what it was I was watching, but whatever it was that was playing in the background got me thinking about religion and how silly it really is. I saw Religulous a few days ago, and it touched on the same sorts of ideas I have in mind. But in a poorly articulated and failing to be funny assholic Bill Maher sort of way.
The thing is, most of religion is really undocumented. I'm going to be discussing primarily, if not entirely, Western religion, because I just don't know enough about Eastern religion to have anything meaningful to say. But I think that I'm going to be making broadly sweeping enough generalities that a lot of Eastern religions could be included as well.
So, let's look at Christianity and its pillar of beliefs. We'll ignore, for the moment, the Old Testament. Even though it is the more important Testament, it's somewhere in the back in terms of importance in the mind of the average Christian.
Now, I'm far from a biblical scholar, so I could be way off base with my characterization of a lot of this, but it seems to me the entire religion is based off of a belief that there was once a virgin in a faraway place who one day found that she was pregnant. As far as I know she wasn't visited by God himself, although that would probably make the story better. She was just pregnant one day. I a assume she thought she was just getting fat for a while there, because EPT had not yet released their tests.
So, she gives birth to the kid, we'll say in December even though historically it wasn't. Three intelligent men bring the child presents for his day of birth. Then nothing important happens for thirty years.
Thirty years later we pick up the story and Jesus is a great fellow. He has magical abilities the likes of which have never before been seen except in other religious texts that predate Christianity. He heals the sick and he walks on water. He turns bits of himself into food and drink to feed the hungry. The Romans don't like him because he preaches a different religion than they believe (that was why, right? I'm admittedly a bit hazy on this point) and so they torture him with whips and spikes, and he is forced to carry the cross on which he will be crucified.
Which he does! For he is the foretold Messiah, and his death will cleanse the world of its sin, and bring about a period of Heaven on Earth.
If we delve a little deeper into the mythology, it turns out that Jesus is the physical incarnation of God on Earth. So there's God, and then there's God on Earth, who is the same person (for lack of a better term) and also his son. Then there's the Holy Ghost, which completes the Holy Trinity, and at that point I'm just completely lost. I don't really know what the Holy Ghost is, or where it really fits into the story.
I think it has something to do with the resurrection, which is the next fantastical part of the story. So they bury The Christ in a cave and seal it with a big rock, and a few days later they find that the rock has been moved and Jesus is alive. Another feat that has never before been achieved except in prior, eerily similar religious texts!
I'm not sure what happens after that. Maybe Jesus resurrected into the Holy Ghost and floated up into Heaven where the three entities meld back into the one all-powerful God that Moses had warned us about oh-so long ago. Back in the good old Smiting Days.
So, that all makes a good story. You want to believe in that, fine. I'm just saying, really, how much crazier is it to believe in Lord Xenu (Zenu?) and his alien fighter jet Volcano version of history? Or really, any other science fiction novel for that matter.
Okay, so maybe Scientology is crazier than most, but no one at all believes in Roman/Greek mythology anymore. And why not?
No, really. I'm seriously asking. Why is it easier to believe in the Jesus myth than it is in the various Zeus myths? Zeus came down to Earth in the guise of animals and impregnated humans all the time. At least in the Greek Mythology, it adds a bit of realism in that his wife was always super pissed at him about it. Is it the multiple gods thing? Is there something in the modern Western Psyche that intuitively believes there should just be one guy at the top who is in charge of it all? I don't think it's that. The Catholics have all their various saints, so how is that really different from having loads of gods? Does it matter that the person in the sky who you pray to for a good harvest is a dead human instead of a god? Wouldn't it make more sense to be praying to a god anyway?
I know it seems like I was picking on Christianity almost exclusively here, but that's just because the Jesus story is the easiest to relate, and really the most widely known and referenced. All of the same things could be said of the Old Testament, or as it's less commonly known "The Torah." I've a feeling, though I don't know for sure, that it is also known, in certain circles, as the Quran. Although the stories probably diverge fairly significantly around the Kane and Abel bit.
There will always be radicalists who believe in the absolute truth of the Bible, but I'm not really talking about those people here. They are beyond reason. But why is it so widely accepted to believe that thousands of years ago God presented himself as a burning bush to some schlub and led his people out of persecution? If you want to believe that really happened, okay. But why wouldn't that sort of thing happen in more modern times? Is there any possibility that someone could claim to have spoken to a burning bush that didn't burn and be taken seriously today? Maybe by some crazies off in the woods somewhere who would later commit mass suicide, but not by society in general. Or is society's closed-mindedness the reason those things don't happen anymore?
That seems at odds with the god that we worship. When writing a code of laws by which to live, the first thing he thought important enough to include was "I am the Lord, your God. You shall worship no god other than me." Seems kind of ego maniacal to me. Maybe he got a little older, a little wiser, since then and decided "well, if they want to worship me they can, and if not then screw them." and so he stopped presenting definitive signs of his existence. But he helped the Jews from persecution in Egypt. Why not during the Holocaust? Because they didn't believe that some random guy was really him two thousand years ago? That's the supreme being of supreme kindness? I suppose he's also spiteful. I think that's somewhere in the Bible too.
I don't mean to be inflammatory here. I don't mean o say that none of these things are true. A lot of them probably are. Hell, it's just as likely that there is a god as it is that there isn't. I just don't think it's likely that any of the religions have "got it right." The stories all probably happened, in some respect, and then were glorified. Most major religions have some important facets in common with each other, and they originate from extremely different geographic locations. So that either means there's something to those ideas, or just that humans all over the place think in similar ways.
But you have to admit, taken at face value, these stories are pretty farfetched. The bit about the whale? Why believe in Jonah and not Pinocchio?
The one thing about the film (Religulous, remember?) that I agree with is the overarching message that it was supposed to, but failed, to carry. It's not that these religions are wrong and that the people who believe them are stupid. It's just that, well, there's a better chance that these religions are wrong than there is that they aren't. And maybe it's a good idea to put some thought into what you're believing instead of just believing it. Chances are, whatever you believe isn't going to be right. It's a big crazy world out there, and in my experience there has been no evidence of any sort of absolute truth since the advent of modern science. Once we discovered a way of testing things and figuring out why they really happened, the need to invent reasoning and mysticism has decreased. All of the things that we believe as "religion" stem from an age where accurate recording was not possible, and once it became possible the miracles ceased. So, maybe take a moment to pick out your favorite sci fi universe, think of its gods and its religions, and see if believing wholeheartedly in those things feels any differently than believing in the absolute truths you are accustomed to from your religious text of choice. That's really the only point I'm trying to make. Really. The ideas out of modern fiction are not that more radical or silly to believe than the ideas present in religion. And if your answer is that those things are new and not handed down from God like the stuff you believe, then why wasn't Judaism, or your religion of preference (except Christianity, which stemmed from Judaism) the original religion? I f Adam and Eve had this personal relationship with God, and handed it down through the generations, where did all these Greek, Roman, Chinese, Egyptian, etc. Ideas come from until Abraham got there?
I'm not trying to specifically attack Christianity here. Trust me. If I were I would bring p things like Original Sin and the time it took between Jesus’ life and the recording of Jesus’ life.
Anyway, now that that is out of the way, a little bit of housekeeping:
Another topic I wanted to cover was going to be a renewed fervor in wanting to create. Dr. Horrible has, in some of my sleepier moment, instilled in me a belief that I could write something and produce it to a point where it could generate a big enough following that I could leverage a career out of it. If you haven't seen or heard of Dr Horrible, it's a three acts short created by, basically, three brothers and a group of friends with a smallish (a few million) budget. It's what they did during the writers' strike. Oh, and it’s a musical. You know what? Here:
Watch it. You'll enjoy it. Or, you already have. It’s in six parts, but all told it comes out to roughly the length of one episode of an hour long TV show. Minus commercials. And better. Well worth the time it takes to watch. Then, go buy the DVD and support alternative methods of television/movie production.
Lastly, this post is a late birthday present to Emily. She likes to read these things, and the plan was going to be to actually write and post it on her birthday. But then I went to see her and give her a proper present instead. I was gonna put this paragraph at the top, but I didn't want to bog down my intro with a "shout out." So, Happy Birthday a few days ago, Emily.
evan out.
I can't recall what it was I was watching, but whatever it was that was playing in the background got me thinking about religion and how silly it really is. I saw Religulous a few days ago, and it touched on the same sorts of ideas I have in mind. But in a poorly articulated and failing to be funny assholic Bill Maher sort of way.
The thing is, most of religion is really undocumented. I'm going to be discussing primarily, if not entirely, Western religion, because I just don't know enough about Eastern religion to have anything meaningful to say. But I think that I'm going to be making broadly sweeping enough generalities that a lot of Eastern religions could be included as well.
So, let's look at Christianity and its pillar of beliefs. We'll ignore, for the moment, the Old Testament. Even though it is the more important Testament, it's somewhere in the back in terms of importance in the mind of the average Christian.
Now, I'm far from a biblical scholar, so I could be way off base with my characterization of a lot of this, but it seems to me the entire religion is based off of a belief that there was once a virgin in a faraway place who one day found that she was pregnant. As far as I know she wasn't visited by God himself, although that would probably make the story better. She was just pregnant one day. I a assume she thought she was just getting fat for a while there, because EPT had not yet released their tests.
So, she gives birth to the kid, we'll say in December even though historically it wasn't. Three intelligent men bring the child presents for his day of birth. Then nothing important happens for thirty years.
Thirty years later we pick up the story and Jesus is a great fellow. He has magical abilities the likes of which have never before been seen except in other religious texts that predate Christianity. He heals the sick and he walks on water. He turns bits of himself into food and drink to feed the hungry. The Romans don't like him because he preaches a different religion than they believe (that was why, right? I'm admittedly a bit hazy on this point) and so they torture him with whips and spikes, and he is forced to carry the cross on which he will be crucified.
Which he does! For he is the foretold Messiah, and his death will cleanse the world of its sin, and bring about a period of Heaven on Earth.
If we delve a little deeper into the mythology, it turns out that Jesus is the physical incarnation of God on Earth. So there's God, and then there's God on Earth, who is the same person (for lack of a better term) and also his son. Then there's the Holy Ghost, which completes the Holy Trinity, and at that point I'm just completely lost. I don't really know what the Holy Ghost is, or where it really fits into the story.
I think it has something to do with the resurrection, which is the next fantastical part of the story. So they bury The Christ in a cave and seal it with a big rock, and a few days later they find that the rock has been moved and Jesus is alive. Another feat that has never before been achieved except in prior, eerily similar religious texts!
I'm not sure what happens after that. Maybe Jesus resurrected into the Holy Ghost and floated up into Heaven where the three entities meld back into the one all-powerful God that Moses had warned us about oh-so long ago. Back in the good old Smiting Days.
So, that all makes a good story. You want to believe in that, fine. I'm just saying, really, how much crazier is it to believe in Lord Xenu (Zenu?) and his alien fighter jet Volcano version of history? Or really, any other science fiction novel for that matter.
Okay, so maybe Scientology is crazier than most, but no one at all believes in Roman/Greek mythology anymore. And why not?
No, really. I'm seriously asking. Why is it easier to believe in the Jesus myth than it is in the various Zeus myths? Zeus came down to Earth in the guise of animals and impregnated humans all the time. At least in the Greek Mythology, it adds a bit of realism in that his wife was always super pissed at him about it. Is it the multiple gods thing? Is there something in the modern Western Psyche that intuitively believes there should just be one guy at the top who is in charge of it all? I don't think it's that. The Catholics have all their various saints, so how is that really different from having loads of gods? Does it matter that the person in the sky who you pray to for a good harvest is a dead human instead of a god? Wouldn't it make more sense to be praying to a god anyway?
I know it seems like I was picking on Christianity almost exclusively here, but that's just because the Jesus story is the easiest to relate, and really the most widely known and referenced. All of the same things could be said of the Old Testament, or as it's less commonly known "The Torah." I've a feeling, though I don't know for sure, that it is also known, in certain circles, as the Quran. Although the stories probably diverge fairly significantly around the Kane and Abel bit.
There will always be radicalists who believe in the absolute truth of the Bible, but I'm not really talking about those people here. They are beyond reason. But why is it so widely accepted to believe that thousands of years ago God presented himself as a burning bush to some schlub and led his people out of persecution? If you want to believe that really happened, okay. But why wouldn't that sort of thing happen in more modern times? Is there any possibility that someone could claim to have spoken to a burning bush that didn't burn and be taken seriously today? Maybe by some crazies off in the woods somewhere who would later commit mass suicide, but not by society in general. Or is society's closed-mindedness the reason those things don't happen anymore?
That seems at odds with the god that we worship. When writing a code of laws by which to live, the first thing he thought important enough to include was "I am the Lord, your God. You shall worship no god other than me." Seems kind of ego maniacal to me. Maybe he got a little older, a little wiser, since then and decided "well, if they want to worship me they can, and if not then screw them." and so he stopped presenting definitive signs of his existence. But he helped the Jews from persecution in Egypt. Why not during the Holocaust? Because they didn't believe that some random guy was really him two thousand years ago? That's the supreme being of supreme kindness? I suppose he's also spiteful. I think that's somewhere in the Bible too.
I don't mean to be inflammatory here. I don't mean o say that none of these things are true. A lot of them probably are. Hell, it's just as likely that there is a god as it is that there isn't. I just don't think it's likely that any of the religions have "got it right." The stories all probably happened, in some respect, and then were glorified. Most major religions have some important facets in common with each other, and they originate from extremely different geographic locations. So that either means there's something to those ideas, or just that humans all over the place think in similar ways.
But you have to admit, taken at face value, these stories are pretty farfetched. The bit about the whale? Why believe in Jonah and not Pinocchio?
The one thing about the film (Religulous, remember?) that I agree with is the overarching message that it was supposed to, but failed, to carry. It's not that these religions are wrong and that the people who believe them are stupid. It's just that, well, there's a better chance that these religions are wrong than there is that they aren't. And maybe it's a good idea to put some thought into what you're believing instead of just believing it. Chances are, whatever you believe isn't going to be right. It's a big crazy world out there, and in my experience there has been no evidence of any sort of absolute truth since the advent of modern science. Once we discovered a way of testing things and figuring out why they really happened, the need to invent reasoning and mysticism has decreased. All of the things that we believe as "religion" stem from an age where accurate recording was not possible, and once it became possible the miracles ceased. So, maybe take a moment to pick out your favorite sci fi universe, think of its gods and its religions, and see if believing wholeheartedly in those things feels any differently than believing in the absolute truths you are accustomed to from your religious text of choice. That's really the only point I'm trying to make. Really. The ideas out of modern fiction are not that more radical or silly to believe than the ideas present in religion. And if your answer is that those things are new and not handed down from God like the stuff you believe, then why wasn't Judaism, or your religion of preference (except Christianity, which stemmed from Judaism) the original religion? I f Adam and Eve had this personal relationship with God, and handed it down through the generations, where did all these Greek, Roman, Chinese, Egyptian, etc. Ideas come from until Abraham got there?
I'm not trying to specifically attack Christianity here. Trust me. If I were I would bring p things like Original Sin and the time it took between Jesus’ life and the recording of Jesus’ life.
Anyway, now that that is out of the way, a little bit of housekeeping:
Another topic I wanted to cover was going to be a renewed fervor in wanting to create. Dr. Horrible has, in some of my sleepier moment, instilled in me a belief that I could write something and produce it to a point where it could generate a big enough following that I could leverage a career out of it. If you haven't seen or heard of Dr Horrible, it's a three acts short created by, basically, three brothers and a group of friends with a smallish (a few million) budget. It's what they did during the writers' strike. Oh, and it’s a musical. You know what? Here:
Watch it. You'll enjoy it. Or, you already have. It’s in six parts, but all told it comes out to roughly the length of one episode of an hour long TV show. Minus commercials. And better. Well worth the time it takes to watch. Then, go buy the DVD and support alternative methods of television/movie production.
Lastly, this post is a late birthday present to Emily. She likes to read these things, and the plan was going to be to actually write and post it on her birthday. But then I went to see her and give her a proper present instead. I was gonna put this paragraph at the top, but I didn't want to bog down my intro with a "shout out." So, Happy Birthday a few days ago, Emily.
evan out.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Happy Belated Birthday
I just wanted to take a moment to wish me a belated Happy Birthday. It's alright though... I forgive me for being a week behind.
I don't tend to make a big deal out of my birthday. Last year, Cherry insisted on taking me out to dinner. This year she did a whole birthday day. It was nice, and it's nice that I have friends who care that it's my birthday, but the actual events of the day aren't really what I choose to focus on.
It's more that birthdays aren't a big deal to me. I'm not quite sure when this happened. I remember counting down the days to my birthday and then being all excited about the presents and such. But now I count down the days to the next Rock Band related release and am all excited about the new drumkit that I'm going to get sometime. Whenever they start shipping the damn things. But that's another topic.
I took off of work this year because... Well... I don't know really. I guess just in case all of a sudden I started to care that it was my birthday and I wanted to do something? But then when it was actually the day it was just like every other day. Nothing felt different.
Birthdays used to feel magical. It used to feel like it was really my day and everything for the day was about me. It doesn't really feel that way anymore. It's just a day. Oh sure... The day's events were up to me and we could have done anything I wanted, but really that's sort of like any other day. I could probably get a few friends together to play racquetball or go out to eat or play Rock Band with me. These things are fun and nice and all that, but they just don't feel necessarily special.
I don't know... I had planned to write this thing up all week, but have just been tired because of the new work schedule so this is really the first opportunity I've had to sit down and write it. And now I'm not really sure of exactly what I meant to say.
The main point is just that birthdays used to seem special and magical and that they don't anymore. I kind of miss it. I appreciate that Cherry and Emily cared enough to do what they could to make my birthday special for me, but it didn't really work. And it's entirely not their faults.
I think if I had a girlfriend who decided to give me an extra special day it would be more meaningful to me. I don't know how I feel about thinking that. I don't know that I like thinking that a girlfriend planning a special day around me is more meaningful than good friends doing it. I think all throughout the day I felt like it was just another day and that there was really no need for my friends to regard it as anything else, and so a lot of the reason that I didn't feel like the day was successfully special was because I resisted it becoming so.
Ah well, this is an uncharacteristically short entry, but I just don't have as much to say on the subject as I thought I did... Or maybe as I did a week ago when I decided to write this whenever I got a chance.
Basically, I miss caring about special days... Birthdays and holidays. Well, I guess this is growing up.
I don't tend to make a big deal out of my birthday. Last year, Cherry insisted on taking me out to dinner. This year she did a whole birthday day. It was nice, and it's nice that I have friends who care that it's my birthday, but the actual events of the day aren't really what I choose to focus on.
It's more that birthdays aren't a big deal to me. I'm not quite sure when this happened. I remember counting down the days to my birthday and then being all excited about the presents and such. But now I count down the days to the next Rock Band related release and am all excited about the new drumkit that I'm going to get sometime. Whenever they start shipping the damn things. But that's another topic.
I took off of work this year because... Well... I don't know really. I guess just in case all of a sudden I started to care that it was my birthday and I wanted to do something? But then when it was actually the day it was just like every other day. Nothing felt different.
Birthdays used to feel magical. It used to feel like it was really my day and everything for the day was about me. It doesn't really feel that way anymore. It's just a day. Oh sure... The day's events were up to me and we could have done anything I wanted, but really that's sort of like any other day. I could probably get a few friends together to play racquetball or go out to eat or play Rock Band with me. These things are fun and nice and all that, but they just don't feel necessarily special.
I don't know... I had planned to write this thing up all week, but have just been tired because of the new work schedule so this is really the first opportunity I've had to sit down and write it. And now I'm not really sure of exactly what I meant to say.
The main point is just that birthdays used to seem special and magical and that they don't anymore. I kind of miss it. I appreciate that Cherry and Emily cared enough to do what they could to make my birthday special for me, but it didn't really work. And it's entirely not their faults.
I think if I had a girlfriend who decided to give me an extra special day it would be more meaningful to me. I don't know how I feel about thinking that. I don't know that I like thinking that a girlfriend planning a special day around me is more meaningful than good friends doing it. I think all throughout the day I felt like it was just another day and that there was really no need for my friends to regard it as anything else, and so a lot of the reason that I didn't feel like the day was successfully special was because I resisted it becoming so.
Ah well, this is an uncharacteristically short entry, but I just don't have as much to say on the subject as I thought I did... Or maybe as I did a week ago when I decided to write this whenever I got a chance.
Basically, I miss caring about special days... Birthdays and holidays. Well, I guess this is growing up.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Because Emily Bitched...
Women. Am I right?
It occurs to me that, inasmuch as anyone reads this at all, my readership is probably mostly women. So let's, you and me, just pretend that I wasn't just being purposefully offensive there. Good. There's a good girl.
While you're at it, why not pretend that I wasn't just being condescending in that last paragraph. There. Now if we just ignore all of my obvious and varied faults, I'm not such a bad guy after all, eh?
Seriously though... This, like the candidates not telling us the whole truth most of the time, is Emily's fault.
I've somewhat been meaning to write up a little bloggy thing. But I really have nothing of consequence to talk about. And then Emily made some sort of snide comment or other when I was ranting to her about how Kurt Cobain was a douchebag that I should be blogging it instead.
So, fine. Now I'm blogging. And I have nothing of consequence to say. So this is going to be probably primarily about Rock Band. And you have Emily to thank for it.
So, Rock Band's good. I approve. There are lots of things about it that frustrate me, sure. But those things can sort of be ignored... Or vast amounts of money can be spent to fix them. I do a combination of both.
The thing that annoys me the most is that there are drumkits out there that people are using RIGHT NOW with the proper amount of cymbals and drums and stuff. And I don't have one. Well, that will hopefully change. I'm not positive how it's gonna work, but eventually I will have a drum kit that works, more or less, the way I want it to. I might eventually end up going all out and putting together an electronic kit. I believe Rock Band is set p to accept midi, so I would have a real kit that also plays my video game. Neat.
The other thing that bothers me a little bit is that my drums keep turning themselves off currently. I put in an RMA order for a new set, but they're backordered at the moment. No matter... It works more or less. And if Aelsis ever releases the Ion for PS3 like they're supposed to I'll be getting that anyway.
The main thing, though, is that I'm not very good. Oh sure, I play on expert and can make my way through most of the songs. But I can't drum my way through the Dream Theater song on the new game. As well as one or two other songs. Painkiller's a bitch, but I can get through it from time to time. This annoyance can be avoided by avoiding the songs that are too hard for me, and sticking to the ones that are just hard enough to be fun and make me feel like I'm better than I am. But damn if John Myung, Mike Portnoy, and John Petrucci aren't all better at their instruments than I am at even their fake counterparts.
Oh well... I'm sure I would be able to play the Wii Music version of Panick Attack just fine. Haha! Man, that was a geeky joke.
Also, I ordered a little dongle thing that would allow me to se a second pedal as a double bass pedal. It doesn't work though. It's more or less cheating, since the note chart is mapped out with only the primary foot because Harmonix knows you're only supposed to have one pedal. But I'm not good enough for one pedal, and painkiller hurts. So hopefully customer service will send me a new one or something.
So, that's more or less that. In other news, I'm working at Kohl's. It's going alright, I suppose. It's not fun or anything, but it's a job. And I seem to be advancing. I 'm working in the shoe department currently, but pretty much any of the supervisors I've worked with have said nice things about me, and it's gotten back to the Asst. Manage, so she wants to move me to customer service. But I think she wanted to do that anyway, because I'm pretty sure she would have had nice things to say about me even if the various supervisors hadn't said anything to her. So, I think that's sort of a promotion. I don't know if it comes with a pay raise or anything, but it's more responsibility and that's always good.
But the praise seems to also have gotten to my General Manager, and I had an interview with him the other day about an administrative assistant position that was opening up that I applied for. He liked me in the interview, even though he hadn't really noticed me much up until then... Or probably more accurately hadn't thought about me because he didn't know I cared at all about moving up in the company. So he said that I shouldn't take that new position, even though it would be a pay raise on what I am currently making, because it's more or less a dead end job. Instead, he enrolled me in a sort of fast track managerial program inside the company. There should be some new stores opening up in the area in the next few years, and he says he wants to try to get me and a few other people in the store that he likes into managerial positions in those stores. So, that's somewhat promising. Except it means that I'll be working at Kohl's. But, I suppose one job's basically as good as another. I don't HATE being there. So, we'll see how this thing pans out. He's got me scheduled for a conference call on Thursday with someone who is in Central Standard time to go over the program details.
So, that's that for the time being. This was a pretty worthless blog update. Maybe I should have expounded on why Kurt Cobain was such a douchebag. But I didn't.
Oh. And I need to find a girlfriend. I'm getting really tired of this being single for years at a time thing. Just thought I'd throw that out there..
Toodles.
It occurs to me that, inasmuch as anyone reads this at all, my readership is probably mostly women. So let's, you and me, just pretend that I wasn't just being purposefully offensive there. Good. There's a good girl.
While you're at it, why not pretend that I wasn't just being condescending in that last paragraph. There. Now if we just ignore all of my obvious and varied faults, I'm not such a bad guy after all, eh?
Seriously though... This, like the candidates not telling us the whole truth most of the time, is Emily's fault.
I've somewhat been meaning to write up a little bloggy thing. But I really have nothing of consequence to talk about. And then Emily made some sort of snide comment or other when I was ranting to her about how Kurt Cobain was a douchebag that I should be blogging it instead.
So, fine. Now I'm blogging. And I have nothing of consequence to say. So this is going to be probably primarily about Rock Band. And you have Emily to thank for it.
So, Rock Band's good. I approve. There are lots of things about it that frustrate me, sure. But those things can sort of be ignored... Or vast amounts of money can be spent to fix them. I do a combination of both.
The thing that annoys me the most is that there are drumkits out there that people are using RIGHT NOW with the proper amount of cymbals and drums and stuff. And I don't have one. Well, that will hopefully change. I'm not positive how it's gonna work, but eventually I will have a drum kit that works, more or less, the way I want it to. I might eventually end up going all out and putting together an electronic kit. I believe Rock Band is set p to accept midi, so I would have a real kit that also plays my video game. Neat.
The other thing that bothers me a little bit is that my drums keep turning themselves off currently. I put in an RMA order for a new set, but they're backordered at the moment. No matter... It works more or less. And if Aelsis ever releases the Ion for PS3 like they're supposed to I'll be getting that anyway.
The main thing, though, is that I'm not very good. Oh sure, I play on expert and can make my way through most of the songs. But I can't drum my way through the Dream Theater song on the new game. As well as one or two other songs. Painkiller's a bitch, but I can get through it from time to time. This annoyance can be avoided by avoiding the songs that are too hard for me, and sticking to the ones that are just hard enough to be fun and make me feel like I'm better than I am. But damn if John Myung, Mike Portnoy, and John Petrucci aren't all better at their instruments than I am at even their fake counterparts.
Oh well... I'm sure I would be able to play the Wii Music version of Panick Attack just fine. Haha! Man, that was a geeky joke.
Also, I ordered a little dongle thing that would allow me to se a second pedal as a double bass pedal. It doesn't work though. It's more or less cheating, since the note chart is mapped out with only the primary foot because Harmonix knows you're only supposed to have one pedal. But I'm not good enough for one pedal, and painkiller hurts. So hopefully customer service will send me a new one or something.
So, that's more or less that. In other news, I'm working at Kohl's. It's going alright, I suppose. It's not fun or anything, but it's a job. And I seem to be advancing. I 'm working in the shoe department currently, but pretty much any of the supervisors I've worked with have said nice things about me, and it's gotten back to the Asst. Manage, so she wants to move me to customer service. But I think she wanted to do that anyway, because I'm pretty sure she would have had nice things to say about me even if the various supervisors hadn't said anything to her. So, I think that's sort of a promotion. I don't know if it comes with a pay raise or anything, but it's more responsibility and that's always good.
But the praise seems to also have gotten to my General Manager, and I had an interview with him the other day about an administrative assistant position that was opening up that I applied for. He liked me in the interview, even though he hadn't really noticed me much up until then... Or probably more accurately hadn't thought about me because he didn't know I cared at all about moving up in the company. So he said that I shouldn't take that new position, even though it would be a pay raise on what I am currently making, because it's more or less a dead end job. Instead, he enrolled me in a sort of fast track managerial program inside the company. There should be some new stores opening up in the area in the next few years, and he says he wants to try to get me and a few other people in the store that he likes into managerial positions in those stores. So, that's somewhat promising. Except it means that I'll be working at Kohl's. But, I suppose one job's basically as good as another. I don't HATE being there. So, we'll see how this thing pans out. He's got me scheduled for a conference call on Thursday with someone who is in Central Standard time to go over the program details.
So, that's that for the time being. This was a pretty worthless blog update. Maybe I should have expounded on why Kurt Cobain was such a douchebag. But I didn't.
Oh. And I need to find a girlfriend. I'm getting really tired of this being single for years at a time thing. Just thought I'd throw that out there..
Toodles.
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