Small Parts: Choking Hazard

La Vie en Blu

2008-10-15T20:02:00.000-07:00

So I bought a blu-ray player about a week ago now and it is amazing. Ridiculously amazing. The best item I have purchased in a long time. "It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up." That's right Ferris Beuller, blu-ray is the 1961 Ferrari GT250 California of home video entertainment. You don't understand, I never watch it, I just rub it with a diaper. Okay, that last part isn't true. I do watch it, though my new blu-ray disc collection is still in its blastocyst stage. I picked up a copy of Iron Man and Scorcese's The Aviator with it because it was on special. Sort of ironic when you think about it: Tony Stark was created to be a Howard Hughes-esque character. That's the one downside to blu-ray: the price of the discs. Can't really afford to voraciously expand my collection like I had been doing with my dvds over the past few years.

A few factors led to me finally sacking up and laying down the dough for the blu-ray player. The biggest was the coincidence of a price-drop from $400 to $300 on a specific Sony model and my possession of Best Buy gift cards. The second reason was the quality of films that have come out in theaters in the past 18 months. Some of them are out on blu-ray, such as There Will Be Blood, which will probably be my next purchase (if I get the job I interviewed for today and will therefore have an enhancement in my capital supply), and Iron Man. But frankly, I knew I was going to have a blu-ray player before The Dark Knight comes out on Dec. 9th, so now was a good a time as any. The 2-disc Iron Man is quite exceptional as well. Even if you don't have a blu-ray player, the special features on the second disc are excellent. It has a behind-the-scenes documentary that is longer that most feature films, and I eat that stuff up. Plus it's fun to see Jon Favereau go from Orca fat during pre-production to decently fit by wrap. The third reason I decided to invest was the announcement that Criterion is going to start releasing blu-ray discs. It looks as if their plan is to release a couple of new additions to the catalogue and a couple blu-ray editions of previous releases a month. I'm just pissed that I already own the dvd version of The Third Man and now it's coming out on blu-ray. But blu-ray Criterion is giving me a film-nerd boner just thinking about it. The greatest films ever made, remastered frame by frame in 1080p resolution. Total. Film-nerd. Boner.

But the true 24p cinema and uncompressed audio is like heaven. I only have a modest speaker system in my room, but I can still tell the difference in the sound. But just the technology behind it is impressive. Blu-ray disc writers are out now with the ability to triple the storage capacity on standard-sized disc. I can't wait to see how things change when blu-ray becomes more prevalent and universal in things like laptops and stuff. Then I'm sure the price of discs will drop as well.

Speaking of laptops and nerd boners, the new Macbooks are out, and man are they hot. I don't like how they switched back to the black keyboard from generations past, but I'm definitely intrigued by the new Unibody design and the button-less, multi-touch trackpad. That'd certainly be something I would have to get used to, because I never did like the double-tap click feature that can be toggled on and off on current Macbooks. I'll have to get to the Apple store sometime this week to play around with one of them. But, going just off the website, I want one. It's too bad that my current Macbook is only coming up on his 1st birthday, so I'm certainly not in the market for one, per se. And I don't have any money, much less 2Gs to drop on one. But I want one. Hopefully I'll get a job soon and a graduate school acceptance letter so I can get that student discount. I hope they'll do the free ipod touch promotion as well to replace the one that I had stolen recently.

I can dream, can't I?

Obligatory Political Blog Post

2008-10-12T13:48:00.001-07:00

Of the many important things that go on in this country and around the world, there are very few that you, the individual have any kind of say in. The most important of any is your role in local, state, and federal elections. With so little that you can actually do in most cases, it's important to aggressively be involved in the things that you do. Now, if you're not registered to vote by now, it is most likely that the opportunity to do so for this upcoming election has come and gone. But you shouldn't have waited until the last minute to register. Why the government doesn't have automatic registration yet, I don't know, but registering is so easy that everyone should do it on or around their 18th birthday. Some places even allow you to pre-register as young as 16, so your registration will kick in when you turn 18 automatically. I first voted in the 2004 elections at the age of 18 and I'll be voting once again in November. It may sound corny, but there's an extremely gratifying feeling that comes from handing in a ballot for something more important than the homecoming queen.

I don't want to make a post presenting my own political opinions because, frankly, they shouldn't matter to anyone but me. I've been known to discuss politics from time to time and I'm an ardent consumer of political news, talk radio, and television outlets, but for the most part, I keep to myself. It's my opinion that everyone should have their own opinion and do their best to get educated about candidates, policies, and whatnot. This is vital because you're going to find that no candidate satisfies you on every level. It's in the best interest to go towards an election with a mind of an Independent. That's not to say that you need to vote for a third-party candidate, but that you need to keep yourself from being mired in bipartisanship. George Washington warned against bipartisanship in his farewell address (Sec. 20-25) 212 years ago and still, 212 years later, nothing has changed but the party names (bring back the Whigs!). Bipartisanship still sucks big time to this day. It's the reason that very little gets done in the federal government. In every senator and representative's mind, their main job is to get re-elected. Even though we're told that the Senate term is 6 years so they don't have to bow to the fluctuating whims of their constituency, a Republican senator is voted in by Republican voters (mostly) and the same for a Democrat senator. So the bane of the Legislative Branch is party-line voting. And it will never stop. There was big news recently that this election could potentially give democrats the "Magic 60" in the Senate. Read the whole article and consider that the Democrats want 60 senators simply to make sure all of their legislation goes through and as little Republican legislation gets through as possible. It's ridiculous. Groin-grabbingly ridiculous. So few Congressmen vote against their party line that John F. Kennedy wrote a book about it before he was elected president. It's actually a really good book if you're into politics and it did win a Pulitzer Prize, after all.

The most basic thing that you have to understand about elections is that politicians suck. All of them do. One may suck for a different reason than another guy, but they all suck just the same. Every public election is essentially a lesser-of-two-evils situation. You have to find the guy or gal that sucks the least, vote for them, and hope they don't suck it up too bad in office. The people running this year suck. McCain sucks because he's old enough to be my grandfather and admits that he doesn't use the internet. Who the hell doesn't use the internet?! It's nearly the equivalent of a person running for president 20 years after indoor plumbing was invented who doesn't use toilets and prefers an outhouse. Barack Obama sucks because he's a terrorist and he hates America. Wait, no, that's not it. Sometimes I catch myself repeating opinions I hear on conservative talk radio a facts, because that's how they present them on the air. Actually, I personally find Obama to come off as a bit arrogant, which makes him suck. And both their wives suck. No one cares to listen to what a potential first lady has to say about anything. And Cindy McCain looks like the Cryptkeeper and Michelle Obama has horse teeth. Joe Biden and Sarah Palin suck because...well, did you watch the exceedingly pointless VP debate? Both of these parties have to be holding their breath every time one of them opens their mouth. And one note to Sarah (and every other gun-toter, military-rah-raher, and girlfriend of a soldier) foreign wars do not uphold my constitutional rights. The only people who can threaten those are elected officials in Washington.

So your next question must be, "Well, gee-golly-shucks. Who am I supposed to vote for amongst all these sucky candidates?" The point is that no one candidate is the saint or the devil that the various media outlets make them to be. If you note above, nothing I said had to do with any of the candidates' policies, which is what the media does to them as well. They try to tell you why Barack Obama's humble upbringings make him a good candidate or how McCain's years in congress make him a good candidate, while disregarding what their actual policies are. Or they misconstrue quotes or plans to make them seem like a bad candidate. You have to look past all that crap and get down to the bare bones of the candidates' proposed plans. It's your job as a voter to make an informed decision. The simplest way to do that is to get a piece of paper and write a list of the 10 or so issues that are most important to you in this upcoming election (try to get as many issues as possible on the paper, because only ignorant people vote based on one issue). Then do reasearch into what each candidate's stance or plan for that issue is. Then decide which one is more appealing to you and write that person's name down next to it. Go down the list and see which candidate's name appears more times. Consider third-party candidates as well. None of them will ever win, but at least you can cast your vote for who you want.

So go forth and be an informed voter.

American culture, for worser or worse

2008-10-06T19:27:00.000-07:00

Before I get into discussion, I've finally caved and started a blog. It doesn't have an overarching theme, just a place to pass the dull hours of my day. I've been reading the blogs of a few friends, and it's time that I returned the favor for them to read. So here we go.

Unfortunately, my first post has to be an angry one. I promise to try to be positive later on, but it was what I overheard tonight that infuriated me and pushed me to start writing. Strap yourselves in, because this will be a long one.

Those of you who know me know that I like to read and unfortunately, I don't read as much as I should or would like to. Really, almost no one reads as much as they should. Even if you read a lot, you should read more. More diverse literature, more newspapers, more everything. And stop reading bestsellers. There's hundreds of years worth of superior literature that was written before the New York Times started tracking sales. But this isn't the point. The point is that I like to read and that I prefer to get out of the house to read, so I usually go to my local Borders bookstore, get a cup of coffee, sit outside, and crank out a couple of chapters. There's always other readers there, it's nice and quiet. My little ritual. This evening, however, it was raining, so I was forced to go to Starbucks to read because they have a portico there. Their coffee's good, but there tend to be more people there talking, so it can get a little distracting. It's not my first choice, but no big whoop, just a mild inconvenience on most nights. On most nights. Not this night.

On this night, a group of girls chose to sit by me, 8 girls to be exact, at a small table that comfortable will sit 3 people. After only mere minutes, these girls placed themselves at the top of the list of the most shallow, small-minded people I have ever seen/heard that didn't have their own "reality" show. They were all in their early 20s, from what I deduced in from the conversation. They talked so loud in such close quarters that it was nearly impossible for me to get any reading done and for me to not hear what they were talking about. Here's a quick rundown of things that were said, followed by commentary. Like I said, this will be a long post. It's staggering how many offensive (to my and anyone else with half a brain's sensibilites) things were said in a span of no more than 30 minutes.

One girl started talking about a guy she had been seeing, I think his name was Brian. This girl said that he was "on paper" a great guy. Her general description: his parents were big into oil in Texas and his father was an early investor in Dell computers. He has several houses and several cars. He's pretty well off, needless to say. Now, not to denigrate people of wealthy upbringing, but people with those kind of lives as young people tend to miss out on some of the nitty-gritty that the lower 90% of the economic ladder have to go through in life. Things like changing a tire or working a washing machine. This girl made a similar observation about Brian. The problem with her observation was that, she thought, that because he has been rich his whole life, he didn't formulate his own opinions on things. She didn't like how he "latched on" to bands that she liked and bought a dSLR like she had because "that was her thing." She thought because he was rich and had 5 cars, that he was incapable of having a personality. Or maybe he was just really into her and wanted to share common interests with her. Frankly, that's not really the way that you should be with a girl. You really should be yourself and let her like you for who you are, but that's neither here nor there, it's just a weak personality trait. The problem that I had was that "on paper" he was the perfect guy. In this girl's mind, being rich and having 5 houses and 5 cars is the perfect guy "on paper." Fuck personality in this girl's mind. The only way that that conversation can go that doesn't make this girl, or anyone sound awful is: "On paper, he's the perfect guy. He's funny and smart and he treats me great. He's so wonderful with kids and loves cats, just like me. The only problem is that he has a debilitating heroin addiction." So, for all you girls, and guys I guess, personality is the "on paper" part. Those are the aspects of another person that you should be putting on paper and judging them by, not their wealth or lack of it.

Another thing that was said: some story was being told, that involved a girl named Chantell (or Shantel, I don't know how to spell it, but you get the idea). The girl telling the story was quick to point out that Chantell was white, not black. The story about Chantell never came to fruition because another girl at the table (the only one's whose name came up) said that she had recently started to go by Krissy because her given name, Krystal, sounded "too ethnic". This blatantly racist comment was uttered loud enough for me and anyone else withing a 50 foot radius to hear. And no one at the table gave a damn that their friend was a racist. No one said, "C'mon Krystal, don't say things like that." They just rolled with it. I've only ever know one person that I would call a friend that was blatantly racist like that. The difference is that he knew it, he knew that he was an asshole for it, and if he ever said anything racist, someone would call him on it. I don't really ever see him anymore, we don't have much in common now. But it's your duty to call your friends out on stupid shit that they say.

If you thought it couldn't get much worse, you were wrong. Probably the worst thing I've ever heard came next. It took a tremendous amount of self-control for me to not get up and say something. In short, the same girl who talked about Brian was at it again. She was laughing off a story about how it was "kind of her fault" that her sometimes-on sometimes-off boyfriend got arrested and held in jail in Nebraska. I didn't get every specific detail of the story because I was struggling to read, but she somehow came into possession of a large amount of mushrooms, the illegal color-enhancing kind, not the portobello kind. However, this girl only liked smoking pot from time to time to get high, and didn't want to have that many shrooms around because she knew she'd want to eat them too much. Why she took them off the hands of whoever gave them to her then is beyond me. So she asked this guy to take them for her, so he did. "You know, he's in a band, so they like to get high a lot." Cut to Nebraska of all places. Her details were spotty, but this guy get's pulled over, his car gets searched and he's found to have a shit-ton of mushrooms in his bag, so he gets arrested. According to her he spends a couple of weeks in jail there. That's where the story ends. No part about trying to help him out, no remorse. Just wanted to let her friends giggle at the tale. And from what she said, this is actually a guy she really likes and "they'll be together someday," but she doesn't want to settle down yet, so she's dating other guys. I really can't find the words to explain this person.

Later on comes more shit from these people's mouths. A lot of little small things that give glimpses into what kind of people these girls were, and even worse, completely comfortable being. One such comment was "how depressing it was seeing a 22" on her birthday cake. Because when you're 21, you can still party all the time because you're 21, but when you're 22, you have to start being an adult and stuff. That's a paraphrase of what one actually said. These are people that believe that adulthood doesn't officially start until you're 22. Another story that one told involved the phrase "when I was in a sorority at USF," if you couldn't have guessed that about them by now. Other tales involved stops at every trendy bar in town and how some guys were "totally creepy" there. To be fair, one guy from the story was actually creepy, but the others were just guys who wanted to talk to you or dance with you at the bar/club. These girls think that you're "totally creepy" if you're into them and what to pick up on them at the bar. Just warning you. Not like that stuff is supposed to go on at a bar anyway.

I guess the overall thing that offended me about these girls was how blasé these girls were about what horrible people they and their friends are. Clearly, this is the product of our culture. The media today promotes this shallow, irresponsible behavior. Television shows targeted at this audience, such as The Hills or America's Next Top Model vindicate the people on the screen for being wholly self-involved and judgmental of the people around them. Magazines like OK! or US Weekly make people slaves to fads and more concerned with what celebrities are doing than what's happening in the world around them. I would have loved to asked those girls their opinions on the Wall Street bailout or which presidential candidate's foreign policy as it relates to Iran is most appealing to them. They'd probably say Obama's because that's who the celebrities like, and not because they know anything about important issues. Some of you think I may be way out of line in making these inferences, but I don't think that these are outrageous conclusions to draw. I just think that this country's culture is going straight down the shitter and sadly, it's probably not going to change.