“I’ll Take ‘The State of Humanity’ for 500, Alex”

Alex Trebek: “The answer is: the institution lowering expectations for humanity”
Sean Connery: “What is Your Mother”
Alex: “no that is incorrect”
Me: “what is the ratings-hungry media”
Alex: “correct response for 500, back to you”

sigh.

It’s so sad to see how much sensationalism is accepted and even promoted in the media today. For quite some time now I just refuse to watch the local news, much less the 24 hour news networks like CNN. What truly saddens me is the fact that all they seem to televise are human beings at their worst. When was the last time you heard of a breakthrough in science. Or stories of the crazy amounts of selfless service being done all across the world. Chances are incredibly slim those will ever make headlines or Top Stories because they don’t sell. Not like drugs, sex, rape, crimes, murders, or diets do. And it just keeps getting worse and worse as time goes by. They try to feed you with heavy loads of information. Like those crazy tickers that scroll by on the bottom of the screen giving you all this other news while the people on the bigger square talk forever about something else. And all they really have is like 20 minutes of news that they keep looping over and over again. It’s like we’re sinking further and further into the Rabbit hole…of DOOM. But seriously, i don't even watch the news anymore. All the information about the world that i obtain come from the genius minds of Jon Stewart, Conan O'Brien, and the people at SNL who tell it like it really is.

There's another insane craze I just can’t grasp: diets. More specifically, people’s unhealthy obsession with them and all the different packaging they come in. You got Atkin’s, low carb, high carb, all-liquid, no liquid, south beach, all juice, low residue, high residue, vegetarian, protein, seafood, and let’s not forget all those magic pills that supposedly allow you to fit completely into one of your pant legs within 2 weeks. And of course, all the celebrity endorsements that go along with each and every one of those. What the general public can’t seem to understand is the importance of exercise that MUST go along with any diet you choose to go on. It’s always in the extremely fine print of every diet ad. Maybe that’s why. It really saddens me to see people who are not happy or comfortable with how they look. The saddest part is that most of these people look just fine and healthy. BUT, obviously health comes second to “beauty” to many people. What IS “beauty” anyway? It truly is in the eye of the beholder. And I think the only beholder whose opinion anyone should care about is God…and I don’t think He cares much for things of the physical world. Do what you will with that. Those are my two cents.

...i think we should skip the whole courtship thing and just get married

Ab. Fab. - Abbreviation Fabrication

Has anyone else noticed an influx in abbreviations and acronyms making their rounds? Specially within the world of internet chatting. As if instant messaging wasn’t instant enough, people seem to feel the need to abbreviate everything they say and create new acronyms out of the blue at their leisure. What’s the rush people?! Aside from the fact that it’s completely unnecessary in daily conversations, it’s destroying people’s skills in English grammar and semantics.

The other day I had someone use “IMO” while we were chatting. It was a strange sight I had never seen before. Upon further inquiry, I discovered it stands for “in my opinion”. To which I replied, “IMOITIPAHYKUATIHTAYTSOA”. In case you’re not abbreviation savvy, that stands for “In My Opinion I Think It’s Pretty Annoying How You Keep Using Acronyms That I’ll Have To Ask You To Spell Out Anyway.” sigh. I take a certain amount of pride in the fact that I have never once used “lol” whilst chatting. The only abbreviation I do use is “brb” and that’s only because I tend to use it for bathroom breaks, and when I really gotta go, there’s no time to lose.

I think it all comes back to something I briefly touched upon on a past post. Society is like the White Rabbit: always in a rush to get somewhere, yet never quite able to get there. And it’s not just the abbreviations. Something else that I’ve always just laughed at are people at the front of red lights who keep inching closer and closer, as if by gaining 3 inches on everyone behind them, they’ll be able to get to their destination that much faster. The way I see it is if you’re late, then you’re late. Deal with it, cause if you get there 3 inches sooner, you’re still late…minus 3 inches. Life is short people, make the best of it. All of which bring to mind something The Merovingian once said: “if we never make time, how can we ever have time?”

...before my time is done, i will look down on your corpse and smile

Marketing Campaigns

Marketing campaigns are fascinating. Doesn’t matter what the product is. It’s incredible how effective or ineffective they can be. I’d love to sit in on one of those meetings where some huge company just came up with some brand new product it thinks no other company will ever be able to copy like a bread slicer as they try to come up with ways to package it for their presumably unsuspecting and complacent consumer. I bet it would go something like this:

- So we’ve got a bread slicer.
- Yessir, a bread slicer is what we have.
- What kind of adjectives can we place in front of it to make it sound unique?
- How about, “The Amazing Bread Slicer”
- Hmm…that’s a start, but something’s missing.
- I’ve got it! Let’s just say it’s new and improved.
- Improved from what? This is our first one.
- Well…improved from the original prototype.
- …I’m sold. But I still want more.
- I know! “The New and Improved Amazing Bread Slicer Deluxe”
- Eureka! Remind me to give you a raise. Now get a celebrity to add their name to the product and we’re guaranteed to make millions! Millions!!!!!

End scene.
It’s ridiculous. But I’ll admit I fall for celebrity endorsements too. Most recent of which was the Antonio Banderas Cologne. I’m really not picky about colognes. But Antonio Banderas is awesome. Therefore, so must be his cologne. And I gotta say, it DOES smell pretty fargin good.

But what really can be fun to follow are the way movies are packaged and sold to the audience. The marketing campaign they decide to go with can have a HUGE impact on how well the movie does. One great example is the 1994 Danny DeVito movie Renaissance Man. After failing to bring in audiences as a comedy under the original title "Renaissance Man", the movie was re-released a couple months later marketed as a drama with the alternate title "By the Book", and made much less money the second time around. Isn’t that crazy? I submit that it is.

Anyway, I got to thinking about all this the other day after watching Spanglish. It really turned out to be a completely different movie than what I was expecting from the way they had the previews put together. I mean it was still a great movie, just not exactly what I expected to see when I sat down to watch it. Anybody else feel that way about the movie?

...you are the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world

Soundbytes

What is sound? According to the folks at dictionary.com sound is defined as:

“vibrations transmitted through an elastic solid or a liquid or gas, with frequencies in the approximate range of 20 to 20,000 hertz, capable of being detected by human organs of hearing”

I don’t think anyone could have put it so succinctly.

I speak now of sounds because…well, because they’re amazing really. Just the whole concept of it and all the things that affect it like acoustics and reverb and all that jazz. Especially if you start thinking in that whole “we’re in the Matrix” point of view; which I gotta say, is really fun to do every now and then. I mean there are some things that sound so beautiful to me and are just so priceless. They don’t even last very long. I’m talking about things like the sound of the cue stick at the instant it strikes the cue ball with a perfectly executed bottom spin. sigh. I can see it now; and it is beautiful. Or the sound of an ice-cold glass bottle of Coca-Cola. But just for those very short seconds when you pop open the lid and hear the cool steam flow out of its bottley lair. Or the melting and boiling of butter in a pan as you toss a slab of beef on it and hear that sizzle and bubbly sound that makes your mouth water just as much as the smell itself. Mmmmm…beeeeeef.

By the same token, there are some sounds that feel like a knife being jammed straight through your heart. Alright, so that may be a hyperbole, but it gets the point across. And to keep with the pool hall example: there are very few sounds more painful than the crackle of a miscue. There is almost a millisecond before it happens where you know it’s gonna happen before it does. And when it does…it sucks. Or that constant high pitched sound that TVs emit when they’re on but on mute. That is a killer, especially when you’re in the middle of a test and no one around you seems to be able to hear it. And then you ask the teacher if you can turn the TV off and she denies that it’s even on until you convince her to allow you to get up and turn it off, at which point you do. And then proudly return to your seat to complete the examination at hand.

I like sounds. Don’t you?

...Silly Caucasian girl likes to play with Samurai swords

Marla's Revenge

So Marla decided to engage another sneak attack just as everything was going fine, sending me to the hospital for yet another week. Which just so happened to be the week my cousins came to town. So that kinda sucked, but we still managed to have fun in the hospital. Besides, I think they had a good time here, so that most definitely rocks. Hopefully once things settle down here again, I’ll be able to go visit them, along with all you other peoples up in MN whose visit is waaaaaaaaay overdue…for like a month!

Anyway, before I got sent back to the hospital, I was going to talk some more about Sin City. So here goes. Sin City was incredible. Today I talked to a friend who asked me what I thought of the movie. I said it was amazing. She said I’m the only person she’s talked to who liked it, cause every single person she knows who’s seen it, hated it. I could see why people might not like it. Actually, I can understand if people hated most it. It’s not exactly your conventional movie. All the voice overs tend to turn people off. And if you aren’t aware of the genius of its original form, you really won’t be able to appreciate it as much. But even if you don’t like the incredible stories, the awesome actors, or the spectacular dialogue, you gotta admit the technology behind it is just bar none. I don’t like it when people completely bash a movie and don’t even want to give any aspect of it a chance. I like to look at everything in there. Case in point: I can say that Queen of the Damned was a bad movie. In fact, the words you’re likely to hear me say are “Queen of the Damned was the worst movie I have ever seen”. However, at the same time, I will acknowledge the fact that Stuart Townsend did a better job with certain aspects of Lestat’s character than Tom Cruise. And that the music was amazing. Basically my point is this: if you watch Sin City and then tell me that you hated everything about it, I will call you a liar. And if you swear upon everything on this earth and in the heavens that you really did hate everything about it…well then…you’re just an idiot…and a liar.

By the way, I enjoy comments. I really do. In fact I encourage it…just not anonymous ones. So please leave your name. Or at least a pseudonym I’d know. Thanks.

...she smells like angels ought to smell

Movie Review: Sin City

wow.



...hell of a way to end a partnership