I was riding the skytrain to school this afternoon. I was really tired, as usual. I think I was in some kind of zone of thought where the rest of the world took on a second reality, it was there, but only by coincidence perhaps. I'm just trying to explain how out of it I was when the train started leaving the station before my stop. As soon as the doors close I absentmindedly reach up for the cord thing that I would normally pull for my stop on a bus. This is not a bus though so my hand finds nothing. My hand somehow keeps searching and finds something to push, which happens to be the emergency silent alarm strip. I think it was almost immediately after pushing it that I came back to full consciousness. My hand was still raised when I realized that I had pushed the silent alarm and I kind of freaked out. I was looking around the train at everyone else to see if anyone had seen me push it. Sure enough there were a few people who were kind of watching my raised hand with a kind of curious disapproval. When they noticed me looking at them they quickly looked away, they must have been afraid that I was looking for trouble or something. I didn't know what to do. It had been such a distant action that I wasn't even sure anymore if I had pushed the strip anymore.
The train pulled into the next station and much to my annoyance there were some transit people waiting outside the doors, I don't know if they knew exactly which car had triggered the alarm or if it was a coincidence but they were right there. I was ready to get off the train as soon as the doors opened but they kind of stopped me with raised hands like they wanted me to wait for a second. They looked into the train and I looked with them. There was some guy sitting behind where I had been sitting and he was just pointing at me, not saying anything. I don't know what his deal was, I think he must have just been a complete tool idiot jerkwad because I have never seen anyone act like that. The transit people took the hint and asked me if I had pushed the silent alarm. I had to explain that I had just been so out of it that I had pushed it by accident, thinking I was on a bus. They didn't look convinced but they gave me a warning that I could be fined for pushing the alarm without reason and then they told me to go. I was pretty embarrassed. I was mostly still burned by that guy pointing me out. I cannot believe that someone would do that. It didn't get him anything and it just put me through an uncomfortable dialogue. Some people just don't know when to ignore stuff.
I went to a 7-11 after that to get my new bus pass. In front of me in the line was a really old looking dude who was buying a jumbo slurpy. I thought it was really funny to see. He was your typical old man, but here he was sipping on this huge cup of frozen sugary syrup. I didn't even know old people could handle that kind of thing, let alone enjoy it. The look on his face when he sipped it was priceless too. I would describe it as serious contemplation combined with joyful nostalgia.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Sunday, March 30, 2008
I Laughed, and then I Laughed But Didn't Smile
My brother told me I had to see this video today. He always says that kind of thing to me, but today it was actually true. He found it because it was featured on the main page. I think I can say it is the best youtube video I have seen in a long time, it is extremely funny. You can watch it here. Everything about it is hilarious. You have to watch it. I won't say anymore.
I also saw a video on youtube today of a giant octopus fighting a shark. I won't say who the winner was but I will say it was surprising to watch. If you're curious you can check it out here. Animal fights can be exciting and educational.
I shot a video project today. It was really funny. I realized quickly into the shoot that it would have been awesome to have an extra person shooting the making-of. A lot of the behind the scenes happenings were even better than the movie we were making. We decided that we would have to write more simple shorts and then shoot making-ofs while making all of them. I think it would be hilarious to see that kind of work when it is done by a group of friends that aren't too organized or concerned about wasting time. A comedy short shoot is just a fun place to be.
When I have to do something the next day and it involves being ready by a certain time in the first half of the day I usually don't sleep so well. I usually dream about needing to wake up to be ready and then everything usually doesn't work out anyways, either I completely missed what I needed to do or I'm not organized enough to do it when the time comes. I think I suffered from a bit of that last night but I know I also had some fun dreams too. I'm pretty sure I did a bit of freestyle walking. I would say the best thing about being a freestyle walker is being able to dream in freestyle walking. I haven't done any real freestyle walking in a very long time because it isn't fun alone and I'm also out of shape and I don't want to hurt myself doing anything extreme. I still have enough of the mindset though to dream about it. Physics can be ignored and I can jump around and slide and defy gravity in the most fun ways possible. If I were to recommend freestyle walking to someone the main reason would be to open up freestyle walk dreaming. I don't know if dreams get any better than that.
I also saw a video on youtube today of a giant octopus fighting a shark. I won't say who the winner was but I will say it was surprising to watch. If you're curious you can check it out here. Animal fights can be exciting and educational.
I shot a video project today. It was really funny. I realized quickly into the shoot that it would have been awesome to have an extra person shooting the making-of. A lot of the behind the scenes happenings were even better than the movie we were making. We decided that we would have to write more simple shorts and then shoot making-ofs while making all of them. I think it would be hilarious to see that kind of work when it is done by a group of friends that aren't too organized or concerned about wasting time. A comedy short shoot is just a fun place to be.
When I have to do something the next day and it involves being ready by a certain time in the first half of the day I usually don't sleep so well. I usually dream about needing to wake up to be ready and then everything usually doesn't work out anyways, either I completely missed what I needed to do or I'm not organized enough to do it when the time comes. I think I suffered from a bit of that last night but I know I also had some fun dreams too. I'm pretty sure I did a bit of freestyle walking. I would say the best thing about being a freestyle walker is being able to dream in freestyle walking. I haven't done any real freestyle walking in a very long time because it isn't fun alone and I'm also out of shape and I don't want to hurt myself doing anything extreme. I still have enough of the mindset though to dream about it. Physics can be ignored and I can jump around and slide and defy gravity in the most fun ways possible. If I were to recommend freestyle walking to someone the main reason would be to open up freestyle walk dreaming. I don't know if dreams get any better than that.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Solo Silent Darkness Dance Party
So today I think everyone was supposed to turn off all their electricity from 8 to 9. I didn't think it was too important to do, but I didn't want to be the asshole that didn't do it, so I went along with it. No one else was home so I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do with no electricity. I decided that I should load up my ipod with a bunch of awesome dance tracks and just dance for an hour with no lights on. It was great. I was so pumped when it started up with 'We Are Scientists', I almost slipped several times on the wood floor in my socks. I danced all over the house, dancing like crazy. No one could see me so I could do the most wild ridiculous moves without feeling too stupid.
My cat was there and she wanted to go out a few times but when I opened the door she didn't want to go out anymore, I guess because it was wet. The second time this happened I was walking by her and she suddenly batted at my leg and hissed at me. It kind of freaked me out, but I was also listening to Chuck D and Anthrax playing 'Bring the Noise' at the time, so I actually snapped at my cat with the loudest "Hey!" I could make. I think the music must have influenced my reaction.
Considering I was listening on headphones the whole time and dancing like crazy, it was a small wonder that I didn't yank the cord off by accident more than once. It happened during 'Romantic Rights', if it was going to happen for any song it would be that one. By the time 9 o'clock rolled around I was thinking about stopping. I loaded more than an hour onto my ipod but the songs had been slowing down a bit. After all, the power off hour thing was over. Then just after 9 the next song started and it was 'Little Sister' by Queens of the Stone Age. I had to keep going. The music stayed good so I just kept going. I knew there wasn't too much more so I thought I'd wait until everything had played.
I couldn't quite recall if I had put on an Oneida song because I figured that if I had I would probably stop if it came on. My reason being: the song only has one part that basically repeats every two seconds for a total length of 14:13. I'm not sure why I included it in the playlist. Anyways, this song 'Sheets Of Easter' starts playing and almost immediately I feel reinvigorated to dance the whole 14 minutes of it. It was so intense. You have to listen to the song. I've listened to it in its entirety twice now. You need to be in the mood but it is great. I had to take a phone call in the middle of the song so I kept listening with one ear and dancing while talking. I had to explain to a friend that I had been dancing alone in the dark for the past hour and a half when he asked me what I was doing. He didn't get it. The song was so long, I had no idea where it was in the time line either. It finally finished and the last song, which I knew was still left played. It was the Sammy Danger Remix of 'Black History Month' by Death from Above. It was a good final song. I guess it finished around 9:40. I think I could do that every night. I had a nap earlier but I don't think I'll have trouble falling asleep after dancing.
What did other people do for their hour of no electricity?
I also went running with my brother this morning. I pushed myself until I felt like I might be sick and then I had to stop and walk. The worst part was the back of my throat tasted like blood because of all the cold air I had breathed in. I had tried to breath in through my nose but after a while it wasn't good enough and I needed my mouth. Comparing the running with dancing, I would say that dancing is much better.
My cat was there and she wanted to go out a few times but when I opened the door she didn't want to go out anymore, I guess because it was wet. The second time this happened I was walking by her and she suddenly batted at my leg and hissed at me. It kind of freaked me out, but I was also listening to Chuck D and Anthrax playing 'Bring the Noise' at the time, so I actually snapped at my cat with the loudest "Hey!" I could make. I think the music must have influenced my reaction.
Considering I was listening on headphones the whole time and dancing like crazy, it was a small wonder that I didn't yank the cord off by accident more than once. It happened during 'Romantic Rights', if it was going to happen for any song it would be that one. By the time 9 o'clock rolled around I was thinking about stopping. I loaded more than an hour onto my ipod but the songs had been slowing down a bit. After all, the power off hour thing was over. Then just after 9 the next song started and it was 'Little Sister' by Queens of the Stone Age. I had to keep going. The music stayed good so I just kept going. I knew there wasn't too much more so I thought I'd wait until everything had played.
I couldn't quite recall if I had put on an Oneida song because I figured that if I had I would probably stop if it came on. My reason being: the song only has one part that basically repeats every two seconds for a total length of 14:13. I'm not sure why I included it in the playlist. Anyways, this song 'Sheets Of Easter' starts playing and almost immediately I feel reinvigorated to dance the whole 14 minutes of it. It was so intense. You have to listen to the song. I've listened to it in its entirety twice now. You need to be in the mood but it is great. I had to take a phone call in the middle of the song so I kept listening with one ear and dancing while talking. I had to explain to a friend that I had been dancing alone in the dark for the past hour and a half when he asked me what I was doing. He didn't get it. The song was so long, I had no idea where it was in the time line either. It finally finished and the last song, which I knew was still left played. It was the Sammy Danger Remix of 'Black History Month' by Death from Above. It was a good final song. I guess it finished around 9:40. I think I could do that every night. I had a nap earlier but I don't think I'll have trouble falling asleep after dancing.
What did other people do for their hour of no electricity?
I also went running with my brother this morning. I pushed myself until I felt like I might be sick and then I had to stop and walk. The worst part was the back of my throat tasted like blood because of all the cold air I had breathed in. I had tried to breath in through my nose but after a while it wasn't good enough and I needed my mouth. Comparing the running with dancing, I would say that dancing is much better.
Terrible Transit Reading Material
First off, this is friday's post. I'm going to say right now that 6 am is going to be my official new day time. After midnight is not the next day as far as I'm concerned. It's six hours after that.
Another transit story today, not a great one though. I thought it was funny though. I know it's not nice to make fun of fat people but I'm just going to make some observations. There was a really fat guy in the back of the bus today. I looked at him a few times and noticed that he was quite large. When I looked at him again about a minute later he was leafing through a collection of coupons for mcdonald's. I could just imagine him thinking about whether he wanted to get two big macs or a two can dine meal deal. He may have also been cursing the fact that breakfast was only offered until 11am. Most people read books or newspapers on the bus, this guy reads coupons.
I don't think reading newspapers is much better though. I have something more than a strong dislike for the 24 and metro papers. I think they are just about the most mind-numbing words that anyone could feed to their eyes and mind. I'm biased against the news as it is, but if I do care to read up on current events I usually check out the bbc, they seem to have it together, and also have the atlantic ocean between them and the US. I can still remember when there was no such thing as the 24 or metro. It seems strange how easily it has been accepted. I don't know what their agenda is, but I don't trust whoever is producing those waste-of-tree publications.
Only a few more weeks of school left. I really need to get serious about my stuff, I've been putting it off way too much. As it is, I think some of my grades are going to suffer. I do hereby state that at no time before April 18th will I play any video games without the company of another person playing the game with me. I figure that if I write it down here it's harder to ignore. I think I can stick to that. I'm sure I'll have other distractions as it is anyways.
Two dreams from what I think was a very busy night of dreaming. There were tons of details so I'm going to try to only include things that make sense or are funny.
The first dream, I'm in prison with a couple friends. I don't think I know why, but it may very well be political because it is in the states. My friends and I have to do labour as part of our prison term, and we all have specialized jobs. I realize that the three of us, with the tools of our jobs, are perfectly equipped to break out of jail. I know one of us had wire cutters or something and I became surprised that the prison would be stupid enough to give us such tools. We plan an escape from the prison and make a run for it. The prison was right on the US/Canada border and we want to get back to Canada. The border looks more like the US/Mexico border though and there is a big river between the countries. My friends and I jump into the river and begin swimming as fast as we can. We know we only have so much time before they notice we are missing. The river is filled with a strong bleach-like chemical and we are all burned by it but keep going. I switch into a fierce backstroke so I can keep my face out of the water. We get across the river fairly quickly because our swimming is unrealistically fast. On the other side is another prison, a Canadian one I guess. We can't go around the prison for some reason so we have to go through. We scale the wall and sneak in. We don't want to be seen because we know the guards will not recognize us. We're also worried about being seen by other prisoners because they might rat us out. Nothing really happened after that, I don't think we ever got out of the prison in the dream.
In my second dream I had to shoot a video for a class. I don't think I was really aware of what was going on a lot of the time. I think I had been planning to shoot the video on my own time but the instructor had given me time in class to do it and I wasn't sure what to do. I was all over the place trying to plan things and I had never organized anything because that wasn't my style. My instructor, whom was not from real life, started getting really mad about my lack of preparation. She wanted me to come back to the class because I was somewhere else just doing what I wanted to. I said I didn't need to plan anything really and would not go back to the class because she had given me time to work, even though I was not working. She got really mad and grabbed me by the elbow or something. I then got super angry that an instructor would use physical force when I refused to cooperate. She was old but had a mean grip on my arm and was kind of twisting it. I yelled at her that she had no right to touch me at all in any circumstance. She retaliated by explaining that it had once been her job to touch people. Somehow I knew what she meant, and she meant that she had worked in the movie business and she had been really good at calming actors by simply touching them. She dragged me back to the class and I was still furious, saying she would not get away with her forceful ways. She reminded me again that it had been her job to touch people. I had had enough so I yelled fully in her face that she sucked at touching people, a harsh comment, and then I took off again, breaking free of her grip. That dream went on for a while but I thought that was the most interesting part because of the super intense confrontation. That's the second dream now where I have had a major disagreement with an instructor. It must mean something. My guess at a meaning would probably be that I don't agree with my instructors.
Another transit story today, not a great one though. I thought it was funny though. I know it's not nice to make fun of fat people but I'm just going to make some observations. There was a really fat guy in the back of the bus today. I looked at him a few times and noticed that he was quite large. When I looked at him again about a minute later he was leafing through a collection of coupons for mcdonald's. I could just imagine him thinking about whether he wanted to get two big macs or a two can dine meal deal. He may have also been cursing the fact that breakfast was only offered until 11am. Most people read books or newspapers on the bus, this guy reads coupons.
I don't think reading newspapers is much better though. I have something more than a strong dislike for the 24 and metro papers. I think they are just about the most mind-numbing words that anyone could feed to their eyes and mind. I'm biased against the news as it is, but if I do care to read up on current events I usually check out the bbc, they seem to have it together, and also have the atlantic ocean between them and the US. I can still remember when there was no such thing as the 24 or metro. It seems strange how easily it has been accepted. I don't know what their agenda is, but I don't trust whoever is producing those waste-of-tree publications.
Only a few more weeks of school left. I really need to get serious about my stuff, I've been putting it off way too much. As it is, I think some of my grades are going to suffer. I do hereby state that at no time before April 18th will I play any video games without the company of another person playing the game with me. I figure that if I write it down here it's harder to ignore. I think I can stick to that. I'm sure I'll have other distractions as it is anyways.
Two dreams from what I think was a very busy night of dreaming. There were tons of details so I'm going to try to only include things that make sense or are funny.
The first dream, I'm in prison with a couple friends. I don't think I know why, but it may very well be political because it is in the states. My friends and I have to do labour as part of our prison term, and we all have specialized jobs. I realize that the three of us, with the tools of our jobs, are perfectly equipped to break out of jail. I know one of us had wire cutters or something and I became surprised that the prison would be stupid enough to give us such tools. We plan an escape from the prison and make a run for it. The prison was right on the US/Canada border and we want to get back to Canada. The border looks more like the US/Mexico border though and there is a big river between the countries. My friends and I jump into the river and begin swimming as fast as we can. We know we only have so much time before they notice we are missing. The river is filled with a strong bleach-like chemical and we are all burned by it but keep going. I switch into a fierce backstroke so I can keep my face out of the water. We get across the river fairly quickly because our swimming is unrealistically fast. On the other side is another prison, a Canadian one I guess. We can't go around the prison for some reason so we have to go through. We scale the wall and sneak in. We don't want to be seen because we know the guards will not recognize us. We're also worried about being seen by other prisoners because they might rat us out. Nothing really happened after that, I don't think we ever got out of the prison in the dream.
In my second dream I had to shoot a video for a class. I don't think I was really aware of what was going on a lot of the time. I think I had been planning to shoot the video on my own time but the instructor had given me time in class to do it and I wasn't sure what to do. I was all over the place trying to plan things and I had never organized anything because that wasn't my style. My instructor, whom was not from real life, started getting really mad about my lack of preparation. She wanted me to come back to the class because I was somewhere else just doing what I wanted to. I said I didn't need to plan anything really and would not go back to the class because she had given me time to work, even though I was not working. She got really mad and grabbed me by the elbow or something. I then got super angry that an instructor would use physical force when I refused to cooperate. She was old but had a mean grip on my arm and was kind of twisting it. I yelled at her that she had no right to touch me at all in any circumstance. She retaliated by explaining that it had once been her job to touch people. Somehow I knew what she meant, and she meant that she had worked in the movie business and she had been really good at calming actors by simply touching them. She dragged me back to the class and I was still furious, saying she would not get away with her forceful ways. She reminded me again that it had been her job to touch people. I had had enough so I yelled fully in her face that she sucked at touching people, a harsh comment, and then I took off again, breaking free of her grip. That dream went on for a while but I thought that was the most interesting part because of the super intense confrontation. That's the second dream now where I have had a major disagreement with an instructor. It must mean something. My guess at a meaning would probably be that I don't agree with my instructors.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
10 Times More Exciting (At Least)
Some friends and I developed a new way of greeting your friends that makes the whole affair at least 10 times more exciting. With one friend we somehow started hiding whenever we saw each other. We would then try to sneak up on each other for no real reason, even though we both saw each other already. That's been happening for a month or two, but today it was taken to the next logical step up. I was walking towards two friends and waved to them. Then when I got close to a short wall I ducked down and disappeared behind it. I wasn't sure what they were doing but I could hear them whispering. I peeked around the corner after a brief wait and had to duck back again when I saw my friend pointing his imaginary gun at me. I prepared myself and whipped back around the corner letting of my own imaginary shot and it got him. I crouched up over the wall to see where my other friend was at and he tossed a grenade my way. Since the grenade was imaginary I couldn't find it and it exploded before I could scramble away. It was awesome. We decided that it should happen more often. Now, whenever we see a friend that we know is playing the game we need to either be quick on the draw or find good cover fast. There aren't really any rules, just point your fingers and make some kind of imaginary gun sound and hope the other person admits that they had no chance against your quick reflexes. I'm a little worried that maybe I'm just being a stupid guy and that the game is pointless and also violent. I don't think I've discussed it with any females yet, I'm sure they wouldn't approve. I guess I do know that it is a stupid, violent, guy thing to do, but the truth is it is fun enough to outweigh those cons. Maybe it will get old fast, but until then I will have a great time every time I run into a friend.
Leaving my backpack in the trunk of my friend's car has turned out to a great break. I hate carrying around more than I need to, and wearing a backpack makes me feel restricted, (I'm not sure exactly how), yet I wear a backpack everyday without thinking about it. This week I have not had a backpack and it made me realize that I don't actually need it. I regret that my ipod is in my backpack right now, but other than that it has been sweet liberation. I think I will most likely continue using it less once I get it back.
I was sitting next to a really loud breather today in a lecture. It was very distracting. Worse than that I was a bit worried that my friends sitting with me might think that I was making all the noise. I usually try to breath quietly and I actually do have to try because my nose is just noisy. This woman was super loud though. It also sounded really forced. I'm glad I didn't think it was funny at the time because I could have started laughing which would have been bad sitting in the front row right in front of the speaker. If you don't already, consider your breathing volume the next time you are sitting around. If it's really loud figure out why it is and maybe find a way to reduce the effect. That's my advice for today.
I was yanked out of my dreams this morning by my alarm and lost all memory of the night. It was really difficult to get up. I think I am genuinely exhausted. I would consider getting more sleep if I wasn't having so much fun being awake.
Leaving my backpack in the trunk of my friend's car has turned out to a great break. I hate carrying around more than I need to, and wearing a backpack makes me feel restricted, (I'm not sure exactly how), yet I wear a backpack everyday without thinking about it. This week I have not had a backpack and it made me realize that I don't actually need it. I regret that my ipod is in my backpack right now, but other than that it has been sweet liberation. I think I will most likely continue using it less once I get it back.
I was sitting next to a really loud breather today in a lecture. It was very distracting. Worse than that I was a bit worried that my friends sitting with me might think that I was making all the noise. I usually try to breath quietly and I actually do have to try because my nose is just noisy. This woman was super loud though. It also sounded really forced. I'm glad I didn't think it was funny at the time because I could have started laughing which would have been bad sitting in the front row right in front of the speaker. If you don't already, consider your breathing volume the next time you are sitting around. If it's really loud figure out why it is and maybe find a way to reduce the effect. That's my advice for today.
I was yanked out of my dreams this morning by my alarm and lost all memory of the night. It was really difficult to get up. I think I am genuinely exhausted. I would consider getting more sleep if I wasn't having so much fun being awake.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
The Time Stamps Mean Nothing
I noticed recently that all my posts are time-stamped with the time that I opened the 'new post' window. This means that I can keep a window open from any particular time and submit that post whenever I feel like it. I've been doing that for the past few posts because I haven't gotten around to writing them until after midnight, and it is always annoying when it displays being the wrong day, even though it is technically right. The time stamp on each post really means nothing though. I could have a window open from last week and publish a post in that window today and it would be stamped with last week's date, at least that's my theory. It definitely works on smaller time scales and even carries over from one day to the next. Also, I'm pretty sure I can go back and edit any post and it will not give any updated time or date for when any changes were made. The lesson of this pointless observation is the time stamp means nothing, but if you want to write your post after midnight but want it listed from the day before, just open the window before midnight and write that post whenever you feel like it. Also, unless you check this site regularly, I could be constantly going back over everything I write and you would never know. Somehow I feel like these observations were a waste of everyones time but I already wrote them all so it would just waste more time to go back and delete them.
Now for a mystery. Today, while walking to a friend's house, I encountered a piece of dog poop on the sidewalk. There were several strange things about this poop. Firstly, the poop was right in the middle of the sidewalk. Maybe that's not strange because I suppose it's possible that someone is just that much of a lazy ass that they won't even push the poop to the side of the walk. Or maybe they thought that it would be easier to notice and therefore avoid if it was in plain isolated view. Anyways, the strangest thing about the poop was something I did not notice at first, and for good reason. As I continued down the sidewalk I encountered another piece of the same poop, I'm guessing it was the same because it looked the same, I did not taste it to find out for sure. This was about half a block past the first piece. I considered it odd that the poop could have travelled so far down the sidewalk. I didn't think it likely that someone would kick a piece down the sidewalk until they realized what it was, nor did it seem very likely that the dog had been pooping on the go and the owner had let it happen everywhere. The real puzzler came when I crossed the street at the next block. There was more of the same poop. How did it get there? How did a piece of poop manage to travel half-way down one block and then cross the street? I have no clue. I'm going to have to label this one 'The Mystery of the Roaming Poop" and file it under 'unsolved'.
I decided that April will officially be poll month. I'll try to have as many great polls going as possible. I'm not sure how many people actually visit this site daily, or even at all, but I was thinking of making the polls only last for a few days each. In preparation for this I'm putting up a new poll to find out a bit about visitors here. Please participate. The superior fruit poll is almost over, and apple is winning by one vote. If you don't agree that apples are superior to oranges you'd better vote now or forever hold your peace (piece? which one is it?).
Some amusing dreams that clearly show again that I have been playing too many video games. The interesting thing about these ones is how I incorporated the video game format into real life. Often when I dream about video games from playing them too much it is just about the game itself and trying to complete difficult parts. Not in these dreams.
In the first part I had to fight the boss, who was actually the evil female boss from Ugly Betty and my boss in the dream. I guess it didn't matter that she was my boss because I had to defeat her. I had to run around this pond while stomping on guitar effect pedal type switches that would launch balls or something at the boss. The first one I launched was a good hit but then it got difficult to aim and time properly. I was getting scared about being caught by the boss but then she walked by me while I was running around and I noticed she didn't try to attack me so I felt safer. She was only a normal human after all. I think in the end I gave up and she didn't care that I had tried to defeat her.
In the second part I was in my oma's house and Ridley from the Metroid games was flying outside the windows. Ridley is a giant dragon type monster thing. Me and a group of people all had to run up and down the stairs to hide. The way it worked was that if Ridley saw us for longer than a few seconds he would attack us. We didn't really have any way to attack back so we would run upstairs until we saw his eye out at the window and then we would run back downstairs until we saw his eye down there and we'd have to run back up again. At some point I stopped worrying about Ridley and noticed a guy outside the front door. I was pretty sure that he was working for Ridley somehow, and I was also pretty sure that he was french. In my best french accent I told him to get lost and that nobody wanted him around. I was with a bunch of friends and they thought my accented verbal assault was awesome. Another friend got really into the attack and said the guy's clothes were really bad or something. The guy was clearly offended by this and started walking back to us to explain to my friend who had made the comment that my friend's clothes were actually much worse. He also explained that women were attracted to his clothes which he demonstrated by getting his female friend who was suddenly there to nod in approval. That's all I remember.
Now for a mystery. Today, while walking to a friend's house, I encountered a piece of dog poop on the sidewalk. There were several strange things about this poop. Firstly, the poop was right in the middle of the sidewalk. Maybe that's not strange because I suppose it's possible that someone is just that much of a lazy ass that they won't even push the poop to the side of the walk. Or maybe they thought that it would be easier to notice and therefore avoid if it was in plain isolated view. Anyways, the strangest thing about the poop was something I did not notice at first, and for good reason. As I continued down the sidewalk I encountered another piece of the same poop, I'm guessing it was the same because it looked the same, I did not taste it to find out for sure. This was about half a block past the first piece. I considered it odd that the poop could have travelled so far down the sidewalk. I didn't think it likely that someone would kick a piece down the sidewalk until they realized what it was, nor did it seem very likely that the dog had been pooping on the go and the owner had let it happen everywhere. The real puzzler came when I crossed the street at the next block. There was more of the same poop. How did it get there? How did a piece of poop manage to travel half-way down one block and then cross the street? I have no clue. I'm going to have to label this one 'The Mystery of the Roaming Poop" and file it under 'unsolved'.
I decided that April will officially be poll month. I'll try to have as many great polls going as possible. I'm not sure how many people actually visit this site daily, or even at all, but I was thinking of making the polls only last for a few days each. In preparation for this I'm putting up a new poll to find out a bit about visitors here. Please participate. The superior fruit poll is almost over, and apple is winning by one vote. If you don't agree that apples are superior to oranges you'd better vote now or forever hold your peace (piece? which one is it?).
Some amusing dreams that clearly show again that I have been playing too many video games. The interesting thing about these ones is how I incorporated the video game format into real life. Often when I dream about video games from playing them too much it is just about the game itself and trying to complete difficult parts. Not in these dreams.
In the first part I had to fight the boss, who was actually the evil female boss from Ugly Betty and my boss in the dream. I guess it didn't matter that she was my boss because I had to defeat her. I had to run around this pond while stomping on guitar effect pedal type switches that would launch balls or something at the boss. The first one I launched was a good hit but then it got difficult to aim and time properly. I was getting scared about being caught by the boss but then she walked by me while I was running around and I noticed she didn't try to attack me so I felt safer. She was only a normal human after all. I think in the end I gave up and she didn't care that I had tried to defeat her.
In the second part I was in my oma's house and Ridley from the Metroid games was flying outside the windows. Ridley is a giant dragon type monster thing. Me and a group of people all had to run up and down the stairs to hide. The way it worked was that if Ridley saw us for longer than a few seconds he would attack us. We didn't really have any way to attack back so we would run upstairs until we saw his eye out at the window and then we would run back downstairs until we saw his eye down there and we'd have to run back up again. At some point I stopped worrying about Ridley and noticed a guy outside the front door. I was pretty sure that he was working for Ridley somehow, and I was also pretty sure that he was french. In my best french accent I told him to get lost and that nobody wanted him around. I was with a bunch of friends and they thought my accented verbal assault was awesome. Another friend got really into the attack and said the guy's clothes were really bad or something. The guy was clearly offended by this and started walking back to us to explain to my friend who had made the comment that my friend's clothes were actually much worse. He also explained that women were attracted to his clothes which he demonstrated by getting his female friend who was suddenly there to nod in approval. That's all I remember.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Some Musical Discussion
I had a new idea for making music. I really like making both mellow acoustic songs and energetic electronic songs. What if I recorded the same song in both styles? I think it would be fun and would work well. I always like hearing covers and remixes when both songs are good. It would save me the trouble of writing new songs but the arrangements and instrumentation could be radically different. Maybe that's lazy, but I think it could be effective. I know I'm always coming up with ideas for music and never follow through with them so there's no guarantee that this will ever happen, but for now it will be my goal.
I know I said it before and I will say it again, Blonde Redhead's newest album '23' is so good. If you take one thing from reading this blog let it be that album. I find the songs so powerful and the sounds are so rich. I love it. I haven't listened to it too much, which is good because I usually listen to my favorite albums over and over and then lose interest. I'll try to savour this one.
Speaking on that topic, we listened to Bach's Mass in B Minor the other day on Easter. We're not religious but my Dad wanted to play it anyways. He's said it on several occasions now that it is on a lot of desert island lists. What I mean by desert island lists is that if you were stranded on a desert island, the list would say what you would want to have with you. Apparently Bach's mass is so deep and complicated that you could probably listen to it over and over again without ever getting bored of it. While that might be true and the typical pop album might not hold up too well on a desert island I don't think I would want to listen to a mass, (I believe that's a funeral piece), everyday if I was stranded on a desert island. I was trying to think of something better to listen to, that would still not get boring and I realized I would just write an algorithm on a computer that could compose new songs that would always be changing and always be awesome. They'd probably have to be minimalist electronic music because I imagine it wouldn't work to use real instruments if it was all on computer. I think I could definitely get by on a desert island with a soundtrack like that.
I'm thinking I'm going to try to learn some PD, (pure data). It's a visual-based computer language that lets you do awesome things with music. It might take a while but the possibilities are endless. It would be cool to use a computer as an instrument. They are difficult to learn but their capabilities are stunning, and they can also maintain full performativity which is sweet. For example, I could use a camera capturing my motion on the computer to control the sounds it creates. The best part is that PD is free to download and use and is open source and runs on basically every operating system.
The dreams I'm going to describe from last night both contain similar shocking and graphic violence. You have been warned.
My cat hates it when other cats walk around just outside the back door. They walk by fairly often. We always have to chase them away. In my dream there was one cat outside that I was trying to scare away. My cat was sleeping on the rug by the door and I didn't want her to get upset. I knocked on the door to scare the cat but it did nothing. I then opened the door and barked at it and it ran a short distance away. Then it looked at me with curiosity and walked back to the door. I closed the door but somehow this weird cat ghosts half way through the door so that its front paws and head are inside the house. I'm kind of freaked out but I'm mostly concerned about my cat sleeping right there. I think the other cat might try to attack her. I try to stop the cat somehow and my mom tells me to scratch its eyes. I am completely revolved by the idea of scratching the cats eyes out and do a gross out dance in disgust. Meanwhile my mom gets a small dust brush and starts smacking it across the face to try to get its eyes. I'm still doing the gross out dance.
The second dream was even stranger. I think I was at some amusement park and some huge family comes up to me with their camera and asks me to take a photo of them. They are standing in a group but I can't seem to frame them properly. I feel like I need to move farther back. Somehow I end up shooting them from around a wall and all I get is a picture of the father and his son, which is an awesome picture, just not a full family shot. The details get blurry here for a second but I think that the entire family was killed or something by being shot with guns. I think it was some gangsters. I run into the gangsters nearby and they decide they need to kill me. I have a gun from somewhere, maybe it was theirs, and I try to shoot them. There are only two of them. I think I kill one right away but the other one is difficult. It's because the gun sucks. It shoots large cork bullets which aren't very strong, and the gun isn't very accurate. I'm running from the gangster the whole time and right when he catches up with me I manage to get a good shot right up in his neck. The cork bullet goes in and he is temporarily stunned by the shot. By this point I am standing right next to a waterfall observation deck and I throw the gangster over the railing. He rolls down a chainlink fence roof for a short distance and then disappears over the edge of the cliff. I'm relieved that I took care of the gangsters. Very shortly after that I am suddenly grabbed from behind and it is the gangster. He climbed back up from the bottom and he is wet. I am freaked out because now he is really pissed and he is definitely going to kill me. He is super tough and he has huge muscles. I try attacking him and he basically lets me because he knows I can't hurt him. I punch him in the face several times with what I would consider good hits but he just ignores them. I'm wondering why he's dragging it out. I'm also kind of mad about it. I get him on the ground somehow and start going for his eye. I don't know if he was still letting me do this but I don't think he wanted me too. All I know is I have to kill him before he gets bored of me trying and just kills me. I push my fingers into his upper and lower eyelids on one eye and his eyeball starts bulging out. I can basically rip it out at this point but I don't know if I want to because it is seriously disgusting. I think the dream stopped there.
I know that I've always said I would do anything to defend myself if someone was trying to kill me but now I don't think I could. I have never been so close to taking out someone's eye and it felt very wrong. That kind of hands-on gruesome violence is tough to handle, even in a dream. I hope I never get into a real life or death situation where I have to rip someone's eyeball out.
I know I said it before and I will say it again, Blonde Redhead's newest album '23' is so good. If you take one thing from reading this blog let it be that album. I find the songs so powerful and the sounds are so rich. I love it. I haven't listened to it too much, which is good because I usually listen to my favorite albums over and over and then lose interest. I'll try to savour this one.
Speaking on that topic, we listened to Bach's Mass in B Minor the other day on Easter. We're not religious but my Dad wanted to play it anyways. He's said it on several occasions now that it is on a lot of desert island lists. What I mean by desert island lists is that if you were stranded on a desert island, the list would say what you would want to have with you. Apparently Bach's mass is so deep and complicated that you could probably listen to it over and over again without ever getting bored of it. While that might be true and the typical pop album might not hold up too well on a desert island I don't think I would want to listen to a mass, (I believe that's a funeral piece), everyday if I was stranded on a desert island. I was trying to think of something better to listen to, that would still not get boring and I realized I would just write an algorithm on a computer that could compose new songs that would always be changing and always be awesome. They'd probably have to be minimalist electronic music because I imagine it wouldn't work to use real instruments if it was all on computer. I think I could definitely get by on a desert island with a soundtrack like that.
I'm thinking I'm going to try to learn some PD, (pure data). It's a visual-based computer language that lets you do awesome things with music. It might take a while but the possibilities are endless. It would be cool to use a computer as an instrument. They are difficult to learn but their capabilities are stunning, and they can also maintain full performativity which is sweet. For example, I could use a camera capturing my motion on the computer to control the sounds it creates. The best part is that PD is free to download and use and is open source and runs on basically every operating system.
The dreams I'm going to describe from last night both contain similar shocking and graphic violence. You have been warned.
My cat hates it when other cats walk around just outside the back door. They walk by fairly often. We always have to chase them away. In my dream there was one cat outside that I was trying to scare away. My cat was sleeping on the rug by the door and I didn't want her to get upset. I knocked on the door to scare the cat but it did nothing. I then opened the door and barked at it and it ran a short distance away. Then it looked at me with curiosity and walked back to the door. I closed the door but somehow this weird cat ghosts half way through the door so that its front paws and head are inside the house. I'm kind of freaked out but I'm mostly concerned about my cat sleeping right there. I think the other cat might try to attack her. I try to stop the cat somehow and my mom tells me to scratch its eyes. I am completely revolved by the idea of scratching the cats eyes out and do a gross out dance in disgust. Meanwhile my mom gets a small dust brush and starts smacking it across the face to try to get its eyes. I'm still doing the gross out dance.
The second dream was even stranger. I think I was at some amusement park and some huge family comes up to me with their camera and asks me to take a photo of them. They are standing in a group but I can't seem to frame them properly. I feel like I need to move farther back. Somehow I end up shooting them from around a wall and all I get is a picture of the father and his son, which is an awesome picture, just not a full family shot. The details get blurry here for a second but I think that the entire family was killed or something by being shot with guns. I think it was some gangsters. I run into the gangsters nearby and they decide they need to kill me. I have a gun from somewhere, maybe it was theirs, and I try to shoot them. There are only two of them. I think I kill one right away but the other one is difficult. It's because the gun sucks. It shoots large cork bullets which aren't very strong, and the gun isn't very accurate. I'm running from the gangster the whole time and right when he catches up with me I manage to get a good shot right up in his neck. The cork bullet goes in and he is temporarily stunned by the shot. By this point I am standing right next to a waterfall observation deck and I throw the gangster over the railing. He rolls down a chainlink fence roof for a short distance and then disappears over the edge of the cliff. I'm relieved that I took care of the gangsters. Very shortly after that I am suddenly grabbed from behind and it is the gangster. He climbed back up from the bottom and he is wet. I am freaked out because now he is really pissed and he is definitely going to kill me. He is super tough and he has huge muscles. I try attacking him and he basically lets me because he knows I can't hurt him. I punch him in the face several times with what I would consider good hits but he just ignores them. I'm wondering why he's dragging it out. I'm also kind of mad about it. I get him on the ground somehow and start going for his eye. I don't know if he was still letting me do this but I don't think he wanted me too. All I know is I have to kill him before he gets bored of me trying and just kills me. I push my fingers into his upper and lower eyelids on one eye and his eyeball starts bulging out. I can basically rip it out at this point but I don't know if I want to because it is seriously disgusting. I think the dream stopped there.
I know that I've always said I would do anything to defend myself if someone was trying to kill me but now I don't think I could. I have never been so close to taking out someone's eye and it felt very wrong. That kind of hands-on gruesome violence is tough to handle, even in a dream. I hope I never get into a real life or death situation where I have to rip someone's eyeball out.
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