Don’t pick your nose while peeing. Your peeing apparatus will slip back in your pants mid-pee. You officially piss your pants. You smell like pee.
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I am slowly being reminded of how much shit I have bought over the past two years, and didn’t need.
I’m done with DVD’s, because I’ll just want to replace them all with Blu-Rays or HD-Downloads, whatever comes first. Netflix is awesome. In fact, I won’t be surprised if I stop buying movies for the rest of my life. If Netflix’s online streaming service hits incredible HD quality straight to my digital projector in my home theater (a dream), then I will have no need for the clutter of DVD’s.
I’m done with CD’s. I finally accepted the fact that they are worthless pieces of plastic shit. The music is not shit. The pieces of plastic that have been forced upon us are. I want the music for free, and then I want the artist to sell me a treasure to represent that music i.e. book, vinyl (it’s coming back), t-shirts, posters. I will buy those things if the music warrants it. Instantly all the best bands survive and Gym Class Heroes can disappear forever.
Books and magazines I will find hard to let go of, I probably won’t. I don’t buy many, so the ones I do buy are pretty important.
I discovered this band by watching Merlin Mann’s “Most Days” videos on Vimeo.com. They are an acoustic band, and I love the fact that I couldn’t put a label to the sound if I tried. Labels (i.e. Rockabilly, Emo-Punk Acoustic, Heavy Metal Bluegrass) need to die, and they are dying thanks to bands like this. They play acoustic instruments and make good songs and that’s all you need to hear from me.
I am back in school now and our next assignment is for Corporate Media. We have to film a How-To video. Over the past two days I have watched three films by Guy Ritchie (once I watched Snatch twice I had to watch the others): Snatch, RocknRolla, and Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. So my How-To video MUST be shot and edited in the style of a Guy Ritchie film.
My How-To is on how to order a pizza. So think Guy Ritchie movie, plus pizza, and you have my new project. Fuck yes.
About six months ago I heard about a documentary coming out about the electric guitar and rock music. Titled “It Might Get Loud”. What drew me to it was that Jack White (White Stripes, The Raconteurs) was going to be in it. I just read news over at The Movie Blog that it opened at Sundance this weekend and got picked up by Sony Pictures Classics.
I hopped over to the official website for “It Might Get Loud” and read a bit more about it. They locked up Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin), The Edge (U2), and Jack White in one soundstage and filmed the magic. The three guitarists collaborated and discussed their influences and experiences as well.
This is going to be my favorite documentary of all time!
I had two unusually vivid dreams last night. I know I have many dreams, but most of them I don’t recall until I think hard about what they were. But the two dreams I had last night stuck with me.
The first dream was just agonizing to watch. It relates to nothing going on in my life, nor does it take place in any familiar place I have been to. It was a hospital operating room, and a man stepped out of the elevator. He explained that a baby tarantula had gotten into his head. There was a clear hole on his forehead that was bleeding down his face.
The doctors got to work immediately and took a saw to his skull. They sawed off the whole top of his skull and left it on a side table. During the whole process the man on the table was screaming in pain. Then the weirdness started to occur. For no apparent reason the doctor was trying to place a larger skull over his head and had hit his brain. The man screamed even more. Than I blinked and the man’s skin had disappeared and all that was there was a skull. The doctor touched the jaw and the whole top of the skull jerked back and made a horrendous noise that sounded like when someones joints get dislocated. Then I blinked and the man’s face was back, and he was screaming.
Then it got really nuts. His brain simply fell out of his skull and blood dumped out of his head. The man screamed again, and the doctor shoved the brain, which looked like it was filled with liquid, back into his skull.
Then I woke up from complete amazement, and horror, at how vivid and real it all looked. This dream just makes no sense to me. I assume dreams come from your own brain, but I have never seen or heard of anything like this at all. My brain just got bored and wrote and produced a well done horror scene.
The other dream was a very vivid sex dream that lasted for far too short a time, and I will not discuss it. But it involved your mother.
So a couple months ago I realized that I tend to get very creative in the night hours. When things really calm down and the air gets quiet, I can think. I sit down at my desk and write on paper, or type on the computer, or quietly strum the guitar. I get work done while people are ending their day. It feels great.
Then a couple days ago I realized I tend to get very creative in the morning if I jump out of bed. I’ve got so much energy and if I make my creative ventures the first task of the day, they get done quickly and efficiently, and they are good.
So, basically, I have found out that creativity comes when you decide it does. There’s no waiting for when you “feel creative”. There is just waiting for yourself to say “let’s get to work.”
It’s about time I learn this, and start acting on it.
I went to see a movie tonight. The process I went through to decide between The Reader and Gran Torino went something like this: The Reader is about a woman, and Gran Torino is about a grumpy old man. I feel like a grumpy old man right now, Gran Torino it is.
I don’t know if Clint Eastwood set out to make a comedy, but he just made a heck of a dark (racist) comedy.
Walt Kowalski (Clint Eastwood) tells a joke:
A Jew, a Mexican, and a Gook walk in to a bar. The bartender says, “Get the fuck out!”
Walt then laughs his ass off.
If you are feeling grumpy, then, surprisingly, this movie about a grumpy guy will leave you happy and inspired. It does cover serious themes, most obvious: Life and Death. The life of Thao: Walt’s neighbor that becomes Walt’s apprentice of sorts, and the approaching death of Walt: A Korean War veteran approaching the end of his life.
The title, Gran Torino, comes from Walt’s prized Ford Gran Torino. As part of an initiation into a gang, Thao tries to steal it. He gets caught by Walt, and Thao’s family insists he repay a debt to Walt and work for him. Walt eventually takes him under his wing and helps him on the path to become a man. Thao had previously grown up without a role model or father figure.
This is a great film, and something that Clint Eastwood should be proud of in retirement.
I also recommend that nobody eat an abundance of Taco Bell prior to sitting for 90 minutes.
I was thinking about stories today. Just the nature of the story and the story teller. The first forms of storytelling were spread among small groups of people, villages, or whatever they had. Then as time went on there was the traveling storyteller, who spread his stories across the lands and perhaps became the first famous person. Then time went on and we have rock stars, writers, film makers,painters, etc. who are known globally for their work and their stories.
But anyone can tell a story, and many can tell great stories. And with the evergrowing resources to tell a great story to millions (i.e. Internet) the nature of the story is getting back to it’s roots. Soon there will be so many stories that nobody will be able to be truly, globally, famous.
They will all have what we call a niche. And that is essentially where storytelling started, the only difference being that in the ancient times, a niche was very physical. It was people all in the same area, and one or two storytellers who were well known in that immediate area.
Now we will have a niche that is less physical, and measured in the minds you have captured. The minds will be spread across the world possibly. It seems like this is a great thing. Someones great influence reaching fewer minds, but being spread out they can go out and share with those around them. It still amounts to a larger sphere of influence than the initial birth of the story.
By positively influencing those immediately around you, physically, and then using tools like the internet to influence globally, you can give to the greater collective mind. Something that is very valuable in these times, when the collective mind is flooded with so much darkness and ignorance. When you feel like we are lost as a people, just know that if you realize that, then we realize that too. We aren’t giving up.
I raced to the theater on Christmas night to see “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”. I wasn’t entirely familiar with the story before seeing the trailers, but the second I saw them I had to see this film. The film follows Benjamin Button as he is born physically old, and then grows younger. What I loved so much about this film was that it didn’t matter how long it was. The running time was about 2 hrs and 40 mins. In films of that length, you tend to start feeling the time stretch at about 1 hr and 40 mins when you realize the film isn’t close to being over. But in the curious case of this film(I had to), the length didn’t bother me. Not at least until the last 10 minutes, but considering the entire film I can let that slide.
The supporting cast was also fantastic. Cate Blanchett is insanely hot in this film, and should always be a redhead. Tilda Swinton is also superb in absolutely everything she is in. The film was written by Eric Roth who also wrote Forrest Gump, and you can tell just a little bit every time a historical event intertwines with whats on screen.
It seemed that David Fincher, the director, had a little extra fun in this also. There was a character who would show up throughout the film and would recall the 7 different times he was struck by lightning, each story was accompanied by a 3 second classic film clip of that event, providing a laugh each time. It broke up the somberness in some places quite nicely. There was also a sequence that I found quite amazing, one in which Benjamin is narrating a chain of events that lead up to a certain event. It was just a small pearl to add to the treasure chest of this film.
I Couldn’t Stop Loving
There are a handful of films that can pull a feeling out of me throughout the duration. Benjamin Button held such a constant mood, constant tone, constant feeling throughout. While watching it I was filled with the strong…unexplainable feeling. It wasn’t energetic, but it definitely wasn’t tiring, just comforting. While watching Benjamin Button go through his life, learning, and accepting, and taking in life regardless of his condition, I was thinking of everyone that gives me these feelings. I was in a whole different place, falling in love with the people in the film. There are certain things that I think should qualify a good film, and one of them is the ability to take you places and then leave you better off than you were at the start of it. I love this film for that fact.
The Curious Case of Brad Pitt
Seeing Brad Pitt in a film like this makes me think back to when I was a little 3rd grader. There was a book fair that used to come to school, and they would have tons of shitty unauthorized biographies on the heartthrob actors of the time. Brad Pitt was the subject of many. Years later, I saw Fight Club and all of a sudden I was a Brad Pitt fan. Then Snatch came about and I changed my mind a little, thinking that he was just going to keep playing the muscly hot guy in every movie. The turning point that got me on the fan side of Brad Pitt, The Actor, was in “The Assassination of Jesse James by The Coward Robert Ford”. That is one of my favorite films, and one of my favorite performances by an actor, ever. Then he threw a curve ball with his great portrayal of an amazingly dumb fitness trainer in “Burn After Reading”. The dude can act, and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” just exemplifies that fact.
Christmas came, saw, and conquered…and tormented a little…just a little. But I find the moments throughout the day that save it for the memories. I won’t get into some “too much commercialism” rant, but c’mon it’s true and that’s why it is repeated into cliche’ form. I do believe in Christmas gifts though, but I just have one rule: If you don’t know that the person will absolutely love it, and that they will think of you when they look at it, then don’t get it for them.
I’m sure everyone can talk about the onslaught of pointless gifts they receive. Clearly the result of someone who cared more about just getting ANYTHING instead of getting something worthwhile. There were a few people I had in mind when I went shopping, and I ended up getting nothing for some because I would rather not have that scratch on our relationship. When I get my own computer and copy of After Effects, everyone can expect Christmas animations.
In other news, I went to my friend’s aunt’s house on Christmas Eve to see him and his family. They had this DVD playing that was basically 45 minutes or so of a fireplace. Some guy set up a camera, lit a fire, and walked away. Then he came back 45 minutes later and burned it to a DVD, printed a cheap cover, and made money off of old ladies. I thought, “No way more than three people have bought this thing.” I can’t tell you how many times at different places I have seen that thing playing. Mostly different shops, but I’m pretty sure I walked by a house and saw through their window that it was playing on the TV. I can’t believe somebody made money off this.
I can’t wait to see what the competition for this thing is like. I want to meet the guy who says, “HA! You call THAT a fire? You just wait!”. Then I want to meet the old ladies who walk down the “Fireplace DVD” section and decide which to buy. I want to see them read the back of the case for the description, and I want to see the descriptions for a fire. These people worked really hard on theirs.
November was a bad time for me to realize all these things I want to do. I absolutely have the will to do them and plan on carrying them out. But then good ol’ St. Nick reminded me that December is his month, and I have no time to do anything that I want. So instead of being grumpy and what not at not being able to start certain projects, I have accepted the Christmas time and just THINK about my upcoming projects. Keep them busy in my mind.
Since I decided to put off projects until immediately after Christmas, I conveniently have extra time on my hands. Funny Or Die has filled in some awesome time. Between Two Ferns
I also did a little bit of Christmas shopping and hit up the local Comic shop that is literally a 2 minute walk from my house, literally, literally. I haven’t been in there for years, and thought I would never have time for comics, and then I bought a LOT. I have found a new something to waste time on.
My Dream
I sit around a lot and watch movies, or go on the internet, read magazines, and soon will be reading comics. I plan to keep doing all these things. But I don’t want to become a fat slob doing it. I wish to set up a room that has a large TV/Projection Screen, and a treadmill, maybe some weights for good measure. I hate exercise, however, I have noticed that I can turn such a mundane activity into awesomeness if I just combine with my movie watching/reading/podcast listening etc.
My motivations for doing so are as follows:
1. I love to read comics/magazines/some books, and watch a LOT of movies. But I do not wish to be a fatass.
2. I feel that one day I will be in a situation in which athletic abilities will need to be on my side. Say my town gets overrun by aliens, or crazy people with guns. The people of this town will need a hero. After all of my adventures in my mind from reading comics and watching The Matrix while keeping in tip top shape I am the perfect hero. I would have the stamina of a race horse, or a horny race horse. I just thought of a third reason:
3. I would have the stamina of a race horse….laaaaaadies.
Alright I’m gonna go back to my comic book heroes. (Currently: The Amazing Spider-Man #581)
I went to see a movie tonight. The process I went through to decide between The Reader and Gran Torino went something like this: The Reader is about a woman, and Gran Torino is about a grumpy old man. I feel like a grumpy old man right now, Gran Torino it is.
