Thought Translation

On No New Posts

2009-06-15T00:33:00.000-07:00

Been crazy busy with working from 9 am til 8 pm and all kinds of other crazy things. Freaking played 36 holes of mini golf today and drove around adventuring for the Sonics in Gilroy. Will post once something worthy emerges from the mind. Maybe something about music. Casey made a good beat the other day. Scared the crap outta me.

High School. Scattered thoughts.

2009-05-19T16:11:00.000-07:00

High School
oh how you are filled with debauchery
filled with joy and sadness
filled with wonder and despair
we must now leave you to journey to college
the land of the free, or so we think
yet when we arrive we will find the same
more kids, more classes, more teachers
Parties will be abundant, oh yes, but what will they accomplish?
drunken nights spend abroad? Hang overs that torment our mornings?
Choices will need to be made, but are we ready to make them?
In the end we are left with ourselves
why dwell on the past/embrace the future
Perhaps you have been wronged by high school
you have been cheated on?
Cheated of grades?
Cheated of college, of social life, of a "real" experience
we cannot change what has happened, but only change what will happen
Yet growing up is so hard
because maturity cannot be created over night
only developed over a lifetime
so as the summer begins we must look back upon high school to remember
remember the good times and bad
remember the pain and joy that was had
remember the friends and enemies, the loves lost
the warmness that came over you with your first kiss
the pain felt when you saw them together
the hatred felt of others
the friendships that will never be broken
the experiences never to be had again

Speed Racer: Crack for Kids and Thoughts on the Cinema

2009-05-05T12:12:00.000-07:00

The other day I watched Speed Racer and all I have to say is WOW. The movie is definitely not amazingly faithful to the original series, but the visuals are what you would get from mixing the new Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with the adrenaline of Fast and the Furious minus the hot girls of course. The visuals are cartoony and yet still maintain a slight realism with the characters. Overall I felt that it was a decent movie, despite the large changes in plot, but it brought to mind some very important aspects of new film making.

There are tons of movies out there like Speed Racer now that require millions of dollars in special effects, yet seem to be lacking in other elements. Many elements of the greatest movies of all time have been vanquished from the mix of these Hollywood marvels. We no longer have the slow, but meticulously constructed plots, the deep acting that can only be shown in those long shots, or the painstakingly constructed sets. Instead today we seem to rely on basically all the elements that can be shown in films like Speed Racer. The fast cuts, the simplistic plot, the acting that is cut up into chunks by the editing, and especially the computer generated effects that allow us to modify nearly everything.

Of course trying to rationalize Speed Racer as a mature movie would be unfair, due to the fact that it was specifically designed to cater to the younger audiences too and was basically a homage the the Wachowski's past influences. Yet can you honestly not say that you haven't seen a movie that falls into those general categories. Watchmen, 300, X-Men, Spiderman, Wanted, The Matrix Reloaded/Revolutions. I'm not saying these are bad movies, but simply that they lack the complexity that a movie should have. Most become a mere visual eye candy contest, yet lack the human elements that allow people to connect to the characters, rather than come out of the theater yelling about how they want to kick people into never ending pits.

Of course sometimes the movies are meant to be the visual eye candy, and that is fine for that genre. It is when they mix special effects and a movie that is meant to be taken as a serious work of art that the special effects often falls short. Take for example I Am Legend. The special effects do add to the movie's desolate setting, but don't the CG vampires seem too video gamey? Also Pirates of the Carribean 2 seems to have this problem because all the CG took away from all the physical acting of Johnny Depp and instead immersed us into a world of squid monsters. Though of course this is not bad for visuals, the emotion and often the acting is lacking when an actor is rendered in a different form. Of course there are some exceptions as I must admit I was quite surprised with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button which relies heavily on CG to allow Brad Pitt to play all stages of a character's life.

Though these new advances in technology are all good and provide us with some good amusement from time to time are they really necessary to make a truly riveting film? I mean think about Invasion of the Bodysnatchers. That film is now considered a classic and was made with pocket change basically. I guess what I really think we as a society should think about is whether or not these extravagant computer movies really satisfy us? Because the movies have come to reflect our society that has evolved, or should I say degraded into a kind of voyeuristic, thrill seeking, and fast paced adrenaline junkies. The movies nowadays move so fast that nothing can happen. Nothing can truly develop before something else comes and hits you in the face and diverts your attention. I mean it really makes one think what will happen years from now. Maybe the youth will think our movies move way too slow and will be even more wired up than we?

Deep thoughts for another time. Sleep is needed now that APs have begun. Peace.

Coast District Young Buddhist League Salinas YBA Workshop 2009

2009-04-26T22:11:00.000-07:00

After something like 6 months of filming, planning, and editing a movie about Buddhism's Eightfold Path, the workshop is over. The movie was created with the idea of relating Buddhism to the youth of today with scenarios that are more familiar to the young people than those ancient movies of education. I was the main editor of the project and was helped by the entire group and especially Kevin Yokota and Casey Kawahira of the Salinas YBA who were part of an initial story boarding committee and later filmed/acted in most of the video. As far as giving credit goes, all of the Salinas YBA was a part of the video in some way. Everyone helped in giving some ideas to polish the editing. As I mentioned I was the editor and I filmed the third video on Right Speech and the seventh video on Right Mindfullness. Casey and Kevin filmed all the other videos together. Kyle Gilbert provided all of the voice-overs except for Scott Kuramura's on the second video segment on Right Thought and Casey Kawahira's on the last video segment on Right Concentration/Meditation. Overall I would like to thank all of you who will probably Google your names someday and find this page, as well as some of those out there who watched the video and gave feedback. The video will be posted on youtube soon, and I will make sure to provide both a link and a embedded video for those who wish to enjoy as soon as possible.

(Update: Casey finally is uploading it. The video will be up today hopefully)

Teaching: The Future?

2009-04-26T09:39:00.000-07:00

Today I am going to teach teachers how to teach. A few months ago I helped create a video for a Buddhist Conference and then presented it to my fellow Buddhist youth at a conference. So today, a mere week or so before the AP testing, I must go journey to the land of Mountainly Views and educate Dharma School teachers on connecting with the youth and create interesting presentations that appeal to the younger generations.

I find this to be quite interesting because our generation has been force fed information. We are biproducts of a system based on teaching for tests and judging teachers by their student’s test scores. On a system more obsessed with the little numbers by one's name on an application than by their skills. How do we teach a generation that is labeled immediately by their standardized tests, by the SATs, by the GPA they got in high school?

I figure the only way to engage our generation of spoiled, video game playing, technophile, Ipod wielding, text messaging, adrenaline junkies is by adopting new forms of interaction. Those old 1980s education movies are great entertainment, but fail as sources of education. We should question the use of text books and writing exams because as shown by the great standardized testing of our generation they don't always work. How can we judge a person by their SAT score, or by their GPA? Some of the most talented people can't test well, or simply hate school.
What seems to be need to be done is the implementation of different types of schools. Not everyone is meant to go and become a CEO of a major company. Though we need our doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc. We also need hardworking people who want to make things. Of course America doesn't really make anything anymore, but we need to try to start again unless we want to be China's glutonous #1 customer forever. Because many of our social problems stem from the social classes that we have generated. All the major issues about drugs and violence emerge from the forgotten. Those poor souls that America has abandoned to live in their ghettos and fight for scraps.

So instead of pushing our standardized schools on everyone, why don't we create more schools or programs that aim at providing job training. Why would a lower class citizen want to learn about Calculus or Biology if they knew that they would just end up fighting for a low paying job later in life? We need to establish solid programs that offer alternatives to these people who know that school is giving them nothing. Because this despair often turns people to bringing entering the drug trade, or becoming a criminal. Hell I'm sure they might make better money that minimum wage like that and though I don't endorse their actions, it is hard not to understand why that path might be taken.

Open Source Programs is Happy

2009-04-15T12:16:00.000-07:00

Why should we pay for what we can get for free? I always ask myself this whenever I log onto a friend's computer and they have tons of bloatware and inefficient programs pop up on login. Of course not that many people seem to know about the various Open Source programs that exist on the internet as effective alternatives to the big corporate programs that find themselves in the limelight. When I bring these up, most just bring out derogatory terms like computer geek or nerd, while refusing to realize that I am basically an average user, just an incredibly cheap average user. If only many were to realize that these programs existed millions could be saved just getting the most basic computer running.

Of course reading this you may be wondering what exactly open source is. The name implies that the source code of the program is viewable/editable but that is not exactly all it is. Open source programs are programs designed and released under licenses (the most popular seeming to be GPU-General Public Use) often developed in a very public manner with the developers interacting with their target audience. These programs do not cost anything for the average user and must be released in a way so that it is modifiable by the users and legally redistributed/repackageable. This method of distribution usually relies on internet downloads, rather than actual physical copies. Because of this, these programs are ideal for students, schools, corporations (who may have to pay for a business license), and also any average users.

Because of this I am always surprised by how many people tend to see these options as "dangerous" or too much of a hassle to learn about. While there are large communities that seem to embrace the freedom from the mainstream companies, a large majority of the populace seems to reject the ideas of free software, often feeling way about the legitimacy of the programs. What this seems to indicate is a relative shift in the social structure of the world. The world is becoming more web literate obviously and its shift into the new internet age has spawned a internet culture that no longer listens to the Big Business figures. Of course the average user is still lost in a world of big business brainwashing that has existed for the past two decades. This open source alternative may never fully replace proprietary software, but it certainly will increase competition and may eventually offer a viable alternative to the those less technologically knowledgeable and light computer users.

Check for alternatives to mainstream programs with this site (Not all are open source): http://alternativeto.net/

I would recommend these good Open Source Programs:
Open Office- Microsoft Word/Powerpoint/Excel replacement
7zip- Winzip/WinRar replacements
Firefox- Internet Explorer replacement
Pidgin- Facebook, Aim, Yahoo, etc messenger replacements
Mozilla Thunderbird- Outlook Express replacement
VLC- Windows Media Player replacement
Handbrake- DVD Ripper
Audacity- Recording Software
Gimp- Photo editing
Inkscape- Vector Image creation

Privacy and the Internetz

2009-04-05T20:23:00.000-07:00

Twitter. The new rage of the internet world. A place where one can tell us about the important things in life. Like how much they hate something that happened to them, what a bad day they are having, where they are, or describing their surroundings all in a mere 140 characters. Oh and did I mention that people can become your followers and track every single thing you submit to Twitter?

Besides being incredibly creepy, and slightly stalkerish, Twitter has a nice service going. It allows people to follow people who want to know stuff about these people, including their mundane tasks/thoughts that they just feel like posting. However, it does bring up many questions about the ethics of privacy and also whether what these twitters really are.

I bring this up because I just recently saw an article about how some coach is getting sued by referees about his comments on their calls. Twitter does not have the privacy of Facebook and allows anyone who has a link to a user's page to view their twitters. So this basically makes any comments on the site public and easily accessible. However, does it make it right to sue someone based on their one off opinion? The site is meant to express random thoughts and that is exactly what the coach did. Of course the comments may have broken some kind of contract about sportsmanship, but this brings up a whole new idea on what can and cannot be used against oneself. Much like the Facebook and Myspace scandals involving comments, where people have been prosecuted for mere cheeky comments against someone else, these new lawsuits are bringing forth a big question for our generation of web junkies: What is private anymore?

In the pre-internet world, privacy was a much more black and white thing. We could do what we wanted and say things to others that were often not correct, but didn't hurt anyone and were often just stupid comments. In our new age, we leave a trail on the internet. Anything we say to others through our new online social lives are recorded in some way. We all leave some sort of path, whether it is through the pictures we post online, the blogs we write on ever so diligently, or even instant message conversations.

What this seems to suggest is that our society needs to shift. Though we already often insanely overly politically safe in our words we still seem to see some places as private, or at least not serious. However, recent cases, such as the ones mentioned earlier, seem to destroy this idea. Should the internet be a place where every statement becomes like a public statement? Or is it still just opinions that have no meaning? Because in most cases, the prosecution attacks opinions that were based on messages that seemed quite serious to the receiving audience. They were not posted news articles or serious blogs, but mere posts on a social networking site.

Just thought I would put that out there. Wondering what you think.

Rope by Alfred Hitchcock (Part I:The "Deeper Meaning" Part)

2009-02-23T22:13:00.000-08:00

Alfred Hitchcock made many films in his long career that spanned decades, from the early days of silent films to later movies that were uncensored by the association. He covered many topics, however his dark humor always seemed to go back to crime, corruption, voyeurism, and especially murder. In Rope Hitchcock seems to take a overwhelming joy in using many themes that brings one to question their own morals.

Rope is a story about two university students who commit murder. However, their murder is not for revenge or over a girl, but to prove a point. The smarter and more composed of the two, whose name is Brandon, kills merely to kill and assert his authority over a lesser being. As with all movies that tend to follow the higher road, the two students are caught in the end. However, their actions bring up a very interesting idea.

Can man really judge others? Who is to say that one is superior to the other? In the movie the idea that the superior man could kill off the lesser man is brought up as a discussion topic, which is good food for thought. Should we limit those who can live and those who cannot? Our current populations are all progressing towards a median due to our government which seems to stress passing tests which are designed for the middle road. Should we try to progress our nation by allowing the gap between the lower levels of intelligence to be pushed even farther away from those elitists? Personally I find this concept incredibly difficult to think of. I mean more smart people would always be nice because without people who have that drive to learn how can we remain a powerful nation? On the other hand, I know many people who are far more brilliant than any elitist I have ever met. They lack the memorized knowledge that many of the "smarter" people, but are more mentally sharp.

This brings up questions such as how can we measure worth? Is worth based on wealth? Is worth based on social class? Is worth based on influence? I mean I personally think we cannot truly measure worth because every person has their own special talents. I know that sounds cheesey, but is it not true? I mean no one can be amazing at everything. Every person is able to contribute something to the sick, twisted society that we live in. Whether that be through physical labor, mental labor, or some other form we all have some worth. Even the man who sits and does nothing, but get yelled at helped our overall society. Is he not acting as a target for the yelling man? Perhaps his nothing that allows the man to yell is essential for that man's day and it stops him from committing horrible crimes or giving into the pointlessness of his existence that he sees.

Hitchcock's Rope may cause none of this speculation in you, but it is certainly worth the watch. If you are not one for the "deeper meaning" stuff, I suggest you give it a watch anyway.

(One can see the scene that created these thoughts at about 6:30)

Zettai Kareshi

2009-02-07T23:27:00.000-08:00

Today I watched 7 hours, yes 7 damn hours, of Zettai Kareshi (Absolute Boyfriend) with my girlfriend. For those of you who don't know what it is, it is a Japanese Drama about a woman who buys the "perfect" boyfriend from this company that plans to mass produce a model. At first she hates him/it, but appropriately names her new "appliance" Night (as in night in shining armor hahaha). Over the course of 11 hour long episodes, she eventually grows to love her robot friend (in a "serious" way) and embrace his pure and sweet robot heart.

Overall, it was decently written. I would have to admit that the emotionalness of the drama could be incredibly awkward for those of the male sex, but girls (especially Japanese ones) will love it most likely. It does help that what I have heard described as the perfect Japanese male is in it (Mokomichi). Plus it is based around LOVE LOVE LOVE and BOYS BOYS BOYS. On a more positive note, for those who aren't into love or boys, they do have this whole plotline about COOKING and not just cooking, but DESSERTS, such as the most excellent creme puff. Though this serves as nothing more than a mcguffin, it certainly does make watching 7 hours of a J-Drama more bearable (worked for me at least).

What this really brings up though as a question is what is human. Because over time the robot appliance that the girl ordered managed to learn to love and became humanlike in both nature. Could we technically consider man's creation human? Though it was made of mechanical parts, it held may characteristics which we associate with humanity: the ability to love; emotions; jealously; rage; revenge; sadness; and a helluva lot more caring than most of the world. I know of course that this was part of the whole innocence healing people plot that many tend to use, but it still brings out many questions that I cannot even begin to write about because I could go on forever about it.

What is life anyway? How do we define it? Are we really one to judge? All seem to be legitamate questions that I cannot even begin to answer in this one blog about a little J-Drama that haunted my Saturday. What I can do, however is let you decide by posting this link. However, I must warn you. For many of you internet addicts this is basically like crack cocaine. Click and begin watching the emotionfest at your own discretion.

Robot Lovin

2009-02-07T23:06:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the random posts at random times. Lately I've been reading Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick and I was just dragged through 7 hours of Japanese dramas with my girlfriend. The weirdest thing about this all is that my girlfriends drama which seems to follow a fairly standard Japanese love story plot. However, this was no ordinary drama only because the male who is of course the perfect male is in fact a robot, which magically learns to defy its programming and learns to love.

Because of the book and the cheesy but decently written drama, my mind seems to be on android overload. Both tend to bring up the ideas of life and love, shamelessly ripping at one's emotions (especially female ones). What really constitutes life? In both of my sources for inspiration life seems to be less black and white, and more gray. While the androids are technically mere pieces of human creation, they too seem to be on the border of life. Their self awareness pushes the idea that they are indeed living and basically human, but their construction seems to work against them. However, who are we to judge life? Humanity in both cases seems to judge the very existence of a human in anything we create.

Its way too late to think about these ideas more and I really should probably go read more of my android literature, so I bid you farewell. Go watch Zettai Kareshi if you want a good cry or something.

Sketch

2009-02-02T12:26:00.000-08:00

With SNL and MAD TV dying who do we have to turn to? It is a dawning of a new age. A passing of power. All that jazz. Thankfully there are people like the "Lonely Island" and "Whitest Kids U Know" to pick up and refresh the sketch comedy. After Chappelle's Show passed on I was quite sad to see the absence of new talent, but thank god these guys showed up. While the "Lonely Island" Dudes tend to focus more on the ridiculous ideas, the "WKUK" seem bring satire to a new level in this age. I can't really describe the awesomeness that is the "WKUK" so watch some of their sketches below. I'm sure at least one will give you a good laugh

Lonely Island Dudes:

WKUK:

Quincying

2009-02-01T13:32:00.000-08:00

Few women tend to exist in the vast world of MMORPGs. It is for this very reason that many people get laughs from messing with the hordes of men who try to pick up on chicks through online avatars. If you too find this is true, I suggest you check out this guide to quincying. It gave me some good laughs. Check out the video below to see why.

The Source of All Evil

2009-01-27T14:21:00.000-08:00

My friends, today I share with you a theory of mine that has been discussed with many a wise man. No longer shall we lay in our beds at night, not knowing when the evil may strike, but we shall stand strong against this evil united. This evil of course is the female period.

Why are they the source of all evil you may ask? Well I am here to explain. Periods are a uncomfortable part of female life. They come at assigned times often bringing with it destruction and chaos, as well as emotional explosions. What man, or woman, cannot say that a period has not ruined some occasion. Everything will be going great then BAM, chaos, screaming, tears, beatings, etc etc. The scariest part of all this is that the PMSing is in fact a lie. Women do not PMS, so periods are a mere excuse for all the women out there to be as bitchy as possible. This bitchiness is passed onto their spouses, kids, students, and all those who come in contact with the affected. No longer is one's day filled with happy smiling glee. No longer can you eat that food with a smile on your face knowing that all is well. No longer can you sleep at night, no not with the affected roaming. We must all hide in corners, fearing for when the rage will come.

In order to simplify this idea I have come up with an equation one can use, a mathematical proof if you will, to prove this idea:

Period=Evil

Proof:
Period= PMS
PMS=Woman Bitchiness
So, Period= Woman Bitchiness
Woman Bitchiness= Time x Gifts
Time=$; Gifts=$
Period= $^2
$=Root of all Evil

.
. . Period= Evil

This equation can be further expanded upon if one were also to consider that babies are in fact nourished by the evil nutrients of the period. Though periods do not in fact fuel the baby, a woman is most likely to get pregnant right after having her period. Thus a period can be seen as a foreshadowing of doom. It is like a red river of death that warns the males of their impending slavery to the female. If one were to consider this, then babies could also be considered evil. Because babies arise from the evil, they are in fact evil incarnate. However, people are not pure evil because evil has a half life. This is because as one grows, one weans itself off of the evil nutrients. However, evil always exists in people in some form due to the trace amounts that remain inside. This explains many human actions such as the formation of the Jonas Brothers, Miley Cyrus, and High School Musical.

I hope this has been an informative post.

ROCK MUSIC IS DEAD

2009-01-27T14:04:00.000-08:00

Today while I was browsing the internet, I discovered that Lil Wayne may be making a rock album. While he certainly does have some writing talent, as seen by the disgustingly catchy single "Lollipop", rock is a genre he may wish to avoid. Many artists like to venture into genre's unknown and that has had some positive results, though I do still despise many rap rock bands. However, is a rock album really the best choice for a rapper such as Lil Wayne? I mean hes on fire right now with his Tha Carter III album, should he really try to do a Kanye West genre switch. Below I have put one of his better solos. The new single that leaked is not currently available on legit sites, so you will have to either way to find alternative means to hear that.

Bang Camaro

2009-01-21T20:39:00.001-08:00

Bang Camaro is a Rock n Roll Choir. Yes I know that sounds weird, but hey it works. I just listened to their music today and would have to say that their tunes are incredibly catchy. For those who haven't heard this newer band, Bang Camaro is a rock band with a drummer, bassist, 3 guitarists, and between 10-20 vocalists. Yes 10-20 vocalists. I have no idea how they deal with lead singer disease, but major props to them. Apparently the band was created by guitarists Bryn Bennett and Alex Necocheaas a sort of project to play 70s/80s based "anthem rock" as they call it. Whatever it is, it is catchy as hell. With a choir of lead singers belting out catchy choruses and guitar solos flying it brings back nostalgia for all that was lost in the great grudge boom of the 90's.

This of course brings up the question of if Bang Camaro can make it in the music scene of today. Though bands like Avenged Sevenfold have brought back some of the shred, the music scene in America is still very hip hop and poppy. I suggest checking this band out because though some may find its sound a bit dated for the modern airwaves, it does seem to successfully revive a lot of the rock and roll spirit.

Life is But a Dream (WIP)

2009-01-21T18:28:00.000-08:00

Lately I haven't been able to sleep much. I have no idea why. My first theory was that my friend Alicia infected me with her laziness, but I figure that laziness is not a real disease, and thus cannot be transferred. My second thought was that I may have some sort of insomnia, but after reading the typical causes (anxiety, stress, schizophrenia, mania (bipolar disorder), and depression) it seemed that I was most likely not an insomniac. Though I am slightly crazy, I doubt that I can be considered schizophrenic or bipolar. However, no negative aspect is completely negative as this lack of sleep, or more like gain in awakeness has let me think of many stranger things in my partially delirious, sleep deprived mind. Though most of the thoughts are pretty random and have basically no point, I have been thinking a lot about existence and lucid dreams.

Lucid dreams are dreams in which the dreamer is in fact aware of what is occurring and often can have some influence on the dream. Supposedly these dreams are usually incredibly realistic and can even cause one to be deceived into believing its a reality. With this in mind I began to think about life in general. I mean what is life? Could this all be some sort of illusion like a lucid dream? Of course one could argue that this is impossible as there are many different individuals in this dream. I thought of a few different scenarios where this could be true though.

Take for instance the Tom Cruise Vanilla Sky scenario which not only shows us that Tom Cruise was a pretty damn good actor before his Scientology craziness, but also that in his lucid dream state set upon him by a cryogenic company in a futuristic world makes the world seem incredibly real. The people in his dream even believe they are real. So could we all be figments of some random person's imagination? Though this could be incredibly interesting to pursue, I doubt this could be true. We are a much to diverse world for one man and his mind. There is always a chance for this to be true if a person were in fact one with many different personalities, but still very implausible. These thoughts of course led me to theories more like The Matrix.

The Matrix of course had a sort of illusion like a lucid dream set up. They had a giant network of human batteries hooked to a central computer system that projected a sort of dream into one's mind to create a new reality. The only flaw in this logic is that we lack the flying people/random transforming agents. But what if our reality is in fact a similar creation? What if we are all sleeping and our dreams are projecting into some sort of giant dream catcher that drives us to share dreams with others who are dreaming. We only remember our dreams because when we wake up for those six hours or so every night, we are in fact experiencing a drugged up reality where we are in fact adapting to drugs used on us to keep us as batteries or whatever else some alien force or magical being is using us for? Or what if we are mere spiritual beings floating in infinite space projecting our thoughts to a giant spiritual being, our "world", which then translates our thoughts and such into the rules of the world? ARE WE MERELY FLOATING BLOBS PLAYING A GIANT MMORPG?!?!?!? If this were the case, so many new questions would arise. Like do we have levels like in World of Warcraft and how the hell do you get to level 70?

I will now stop my crazy thought post, but will probably follow up on this in a more focused manner once all my thoughts begin to clear up. I hope you enjoys a tired man's rant on life as a dream.

Contemplating Humanity (a short thought)

2009-01-09T13:49:00.000-08:00

"People need Connectors

Writers, heroes, stars, leaders
To give life form.
A child's sand boat facing
the sun.
Plastic soldiers in the miniature
dirt war. Forts.
Garage Rocket Ships

Ceremonies, theatre, dances
To reassert Tribal needs & memories
a call to worship, uniting
above all, a reversion,
a longing for family & the
safety magic of childhood"

-Jim Morrison

As Inauguration Day draws near, I find myself questioning what makes this new presidency so "historic". Everybody seems to be boosting this event up to unrealistic standards, which seems to suggest that somehow the Obama presidency will cause massive healing of problems. It is as though people expect all the financial and social woes to disappear once Obama steps foot into the White House. Yet, what if Obama's very act of becoming president is what this nation needs? After all, humanity has never really been a dominant species because of its features, but rather its leaders.

If you think about it, what is humanity without it's leaders? Would we be like rats, scurrying around in anarchy? Would we be destroying ourselves for the very rush of destruction? Is a solid leader the only thing that unites us? America isn't like anywhere else in the world. It is a large, powerful nation that has somehow managed to remain united. So are Obama fanatics in a way very correct about Obama saving the world (or at least the world as they know it)?

Obama could be considered a key. A political figure that is in touch with the shifting community that demands something fresh. He connects with our nation. We see traits that we know and love. His blackberry addiction, basketball skills, and kids. This is his true power. True power is merely an extension of the people's power. Look at all the most powerful leaders. Though many of them may be considered poor leaders, or led in ways which are controversial they did in fact have given power. I think the best examples would be Hitler, Andrew Jackson, and Chairman Mao. These leaders led in very diverse ways, but all had one thing in common. They had the support of the up and coming generations.

The way they achieved this power seemed to vary, but they all seemed to be hip and with it. Pushing new agendas and pleasing the people was their main strategy. With a bunch of content people, anything can be pushed into law. Look at Hitler and Mao. Though not considered the best leaders by today's standards, they did create a sort of legacy. Hitler was even elected into this position of power. Mao on the other hand was very popular with the youth's for part of his tenure and was given power through their participation.

I'm not saying Obama is going to plunge us into a era of socialism, but that he holds potential for being the key thing America seems to be lacking. Obama can represent a more present America, motivate progress, and improve the overall American image. Because think about it, what do people most identify objects with? Figureheads sit above all else. Think Britain:The Queen. Think Terrorism: Al Qaeda. Think Guitar: Jimi Hendrix. Think Reggae: Bob Marley. Think WMDs: Bush Admin.

Think America: Barack Obama.

Food Log Thoughts: Updated

2008-12-08T23:16:00.000-08:00

A little while ago I posted a rambling writing about my food blog that discussed my strange food habits and diet on a general level. I felt that there was no other day to discuss my eclectic eating due to the strangeness of my diet and eating schedule which has varied from 2 AM snackage on Frosted Flakes in the past to steak breakfasts. This is all good and fun, but probably destroys any methods for eating that has been researched. It is for that reason that I began to think about what humans really should eat in our modern world, where in the United States almost everything can be found for a price. Should we go with the new wave neo hippie/hipster approach and veg out, or maybe be more primal and eat meats and more meats?

I thought about this for a really long time. Though we had an assignment to write about our food log in some detail, I felt that I really couldn't analyze anything once I had written my diet out. So I did what any bored, attempting to be creative teenage would do for an assignment. I started bsing about evil micky D zombies.

But I digress. Anyway back to the food. After thinking for a good week or so (on and off), I came up with a theory to why I eat so strangely. I figure that the human body needs a balance of everything and in the modern world where you are bombarded with advertisements about health drinks, newer health foods, cheaper greasy fake foods, etc etc how can one balance a diet? I found that I eat a ton of meat. But then on a later date I ate only vegetables the entire day. Also one day I ate a nice greasy tasty In N Out meal with animal style fries and a double double which was insanely unhealthy. Yet I ate only health foods on another date. What I am trying to get at is that maybe we don't need to be some sort of magical vegan/vegetarian, carnivore, or giant storage tank for preservatives. I mean vegetarian diets lack many of the essential things that meat brings and meat lacks many of the essential things that vegetables have. So how can we become a truly healthy person?

In a world where everything has dangers, what can we truly trust? I cannot truly tell you because I am no scientist, but I can explain my theory of eating. I figure that we will all die eventually, so we should eat what we want if we can. However, we must factor in health factors and other negative and positive possibilities with the food. Because of this I feel that humans should be responsible for themselves and eat things in moderation. Both the extremes of too much and too little seem to have a negative impact on the body. I find that this seems the least traumatic for people who want their super healthy hipster munchies and their occasional Big Mac splurge too.

I personally use this method and only find it disturbing when I go on meat eating rampages. I mean the health effects that come from that are truly dangerous, especially with the new "magical" medicines which are used to raise the animals. However, like I said what is safe anymore. When the fields are covered in pesticides, animals being injected with god knows what, and even water being contaminated with chemicals of all shapes and forms what is still pure? I mean even organic foods seem to have potential to have pesticides because these chemicals don't just stay in one place. They are like a freaking plague and can get into water supplies and the ground. Even organics are tainted, though maybe to a lesser level.

So what can we really do for food? Besides going on with our regular eating it seems like all we can do is try to improve the way we produce foods. Maybe new laws and regulations are needed in order to improve our food supply system. Legal business may take lots of lobbying and may take an incredibly long time, but won't it be worth it when you are able to cook up a nice tasty all natural meal that tastes insanely better than some of the garbage we eat these days? What really should be asked is what is better? Low price and low quality, or high prices and food that causes one's palate to lust for the next meal?

Baking=DEATH

2008-12-06T22:44:00.000-08:00

For English class I have to do an epic cooking assignment and of course i was stupid enough to try to bake something. Grilling, frying, nuking, etc etc is all pretty easy for me, but baking is a alien to me. If baking was a foreign language it would be Chinese because Chinese has many characters just like baking has many ingredients. Also, if one mixes these characters (ingredients) in wrong ways you just end up with nonsense (CRAPPY FOOD). I have new found respect for those who have epic baking skills. Our male dominated society should not look down upon those who bake our epic munchies, but cherish them. A world without baking people is a world without tasty pastries, breads, and cakes and stuff. For those who doubt the epic hardness of baking, try making castella in one try. I challenge you. This dude wrote a pretty good blog with a recipe and I suggest anyone who is bored, or feels like they can do epic cookingness try this recipe.

Food Log Thoughts

2008-11-29T20:17:00.000-08:00

My English teacher was a kind and cruel man this last unit. He was kind because we were assigned a project on food. However he made us also log our eating, which I found to be quite disturbing. For those who do not know me very well, I heart food. Not love. Not like. I freaking heart it. For all you obsessive compulsive myspacers and facebookers, you know what this means. To heart something is like the greatest heart a person can have. One can heart their girlfriend, wife, or dog, but I heart food. (Edit: In order to remain alive I must say that I also heart my girlfriend...more than food...yeah)

At the moment I have almost 20 days logged and I figured that I would be at least sort of healthy. I found that instead I have eaten large amounts of fish and meat. How much you might ask. All I can say is that some people would consider me a carnivore. Which is not necessarily bad I guess, but only a few days on this list did I eat things that could actually be qualified as salads or fruits. Also I found that even though I say that I don't like Japanese food that much ( at least to those around me who consider myself a food racist), I ate Japanese food at least half of the days logged. Mind you this is over Thanksgiving Break so half of the time I was eating the turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes mix (which ironically I have been preparing the way that my Japanese grandma showed me). Even more disturbing is that I found that most days I only eat 1-2 meals. These meals can range in size from a pack of natto to a giant feast that could probably feed at least 5 people. These feasts generally consisted of meat, fish, meat and fish, rice, and also a strange random thrown in item like a poptart or something similar. I doubt many people know what natto consists of and those who do know, I know you are incredibly freaked out right now. In fact, I found that one day I actually ate 8 packs of natto. It was my sustenance for the entire day and trust me, thats a hard thing to do with natto.

This information over a short amount of time has led me to wonder about 3 things. 1) Am I a food racist?, 2) How did I survive a day only eating natto, and 3) How am I not incredibly overweight. I find my current diet quite dissatisfying. Though I love Japanese food and most of it is quite healthy, I now feel that I should really expand my food comfort zone. Though I can eat basically anything that is edible, tastes good, and is either cheap or free, I feel like I am being limited by my current Japanese food spree. It has definitely made me consider eating salads, especially since I live in the freaking Salad Bowl of the World. Additionally, I figured that maybe I should lay off the natto because even though it is supposedly super healthy, it causes most people to freak out because of the look, smell, and texture. Not the best meal to bust out in front of some weak stomached people. Plus the natto tends to deprive my diet of anything but soy and salty soy sauce which probably isn't the greatest source of nutrition. Lastly, I haven't really figured out why I am somehow not super overweight. I eat tons of meat apparently and exercise not as much as I should in my opinion. Plus I lack sleep, which apparently can cause one to gain weight. After much thinking I figure that I should just not think about this subject too much because it just led me to images of a old grey me that resembled Jabba the Hutt.

Overall, I must thank Mr. English teacher man for his assignment because it has made me realize that I should probably eat something that isn't meat, fish, or Japanese food a heckuva lot more. Though I luckily had mostly either home made or restaurant made food that was pretty healthy in general, I can really improve my overall health by something as simple as making random epic salads that are basically 5 feet tall and contain every known salad ingredient known to man. Thank You Sir. Your food preaching ways have reached my mind and hopefully my short high school attention span will not destroy the progress that has been made.

What seemed to be even more important though was that this list made me realize that maybe if we were mandated to record our eating in order to get health insurance or something, that a lot of people would be pretty screwed with that. In our modern times we can survive of Mickey Ds and cup a noodles for basically our entire existence, though that existence might be kind of short if one tried that. I feel that people, especially America, really need to realize what they are eating. Maybe if they realized that soda is basically an acid for the stomach and that they've never really eaten a hamburger, food consumption will shift towards the better. Or maybe they might just say what the hell and munch on their big macs and slurp down that oh so tasty high fructose syrup of death. I have no idea. We cannot devolutionize our society in order to make people eat healthier. This would cause massive riots by corporations and unhealthy people alike. Can you imagine a giant riot of unhealthy Micky D slaves? It would be like a freaking zombie movie, except worse because zombies are already dead and just require a headshot. Living Micky D slaves like crack addicts would be freaking out, going through withdrawals, looking for that Big Mac that is just waiting to cause their brains to give them their dose of happiness. Whats even worse would be the after effects of this. I mean without that Big Mac to give that dose of happy people might go to drugs and sex to fulfill this addiction. Do you want to deal with a doped up generation of Big Mac babies? I sure don't.

Gameboy Music Creation

2008-11-21T12:47:00.000-08:00

Gameboys can create wicked good tunes. Yes, the ORIGINAL Gameboys in all their grey plastic with all its 1989 glory. Though an underground music scene, Gameboy music exists and thrives. One might wonder how exactly something so low tech compared to its more modern evolution the Nintendo DSi can do such a thing. Compared to the DSi which has a 2 LCD screens (1 of them a touch screen), 2 cameras, a microphone, and 256 mb of flash memory, the original Gameboy seems like a ancient ancestor. Below are detailed technical specifications from Wikipedia for both systems.

Technical specifications for Original Gameboy

CPU: Custom 8-bit Sharp LR35902[36] (Z80-clone) core at 4.19 MHz which is similar to an Intel 8080 in that all of the registers introduced in the Z80 are not present. However, some of the Z80's instruction set enhancements over the stock 8080, particularly bit manipulation, are present. Still other instructions are unique to this particular flavor of Z80 CPU. The core also contains integrated sound generation
RAM: 8 kB internal S-RAM
Video RAM: 8 kB internal
ROM: On-CPU-Die 256-byte bootstrap; 256 kb, 512 kb, 1 Mb, 2 Mb, 4 Mb and 8 Mb cartridges
Sound: 2 Square Waves, 1 programmable 32-sample 4-bit PCM Wave, 1 White noise. The unit only has one speaker, but headphones provide stereo sound (for further information, see Game Boy music)
Display: Reflective LCD 160 × 144 pixels
Screen size: 66 mm (2.6 in) diagonal
Color Palette: 4 shades of "gray" (green to (very) dark green)
Communication: Up to 2 Game Boys can be linked together via built-in serial ports, up to 4 with a DMG-07 4-player adapter. More than 4 players is possible by chaining adapters.
Power: 6 V, 0.7 W (4 AA batteries provide ~35 hours)
Dimensions: 90 mm (W) x 148 mm (H) x 32 mm (D) / 3.5" x 5.8" 1.3" (in)

Technical specifications for Nintendo DS
Mass: 275 grams (9.7 ounces).
Physical dimensions: 148.7 x 84.7 x 28.9 mm (5.85 x 3.33 x 1.13 inches).
Screens: Two separate 3-inch TFT LCD, resolution of 256 x 192 pixels, dimensions of 62 x 46 mm and 77 mm diagonal, and a dot pitch of 0.24 mm. The gap between the screens is approximately 21 mm, equivalent to about 92 "hidden" lines. The lowermost display of the Nintendo DS is overlaid with a resistive touchscreen, which registers pressure from one point on the screen at a time, averaging multiple points of contact if necessary.
CPUs: Two ARM processors, an ARM946E-S main CPU and ARM7TDMI co-processor at clock speeds of 67 MHz and 33 MHz respectively. The ARM946E-S CPU processes 3D rendering and the ARM7TDMI processes 2D rendering for DS games and Game boy Advance gameplay.
RAM: 4 MB of Mobile RAM
Voltage: 1.65 volts required
Storage: 256 kB of Serial Flash Memory
Wireless: 802.11 + Nintendo Original Protocol
Wi-Fi: Built-in 802.11 Wireless Network Connection (802.11b compatible with WEP encryption support only)[22]

Despite this enormous gap in technology, the original gameboy can make amazing music with the help of only two mods: a Flash Cartridge with Little Sound Dj or Nanoloop and a Prosound modification. Custom painting may also be desired in order to give it that extra "cool" factor. Luckily for all those technically challenged and lazy musicians out there Nonfinite offers pre-modded systems. These simple modifications make the Gameboy a viable instrument by adding a much higher quality 4-bit sound. The Prosound modification makes the output louder while reducing hiss and the Flash Cartridge with the music interface programs allows any musician to make music in no time. The Little Sound Dj is essentially a sequencer designed for the 4-bit processor, which can also be used with a variety of samples including the famed TR-808. Nanoloop on the other hand is a step sequencer that loops 16 1/16 notes with a incredibly easy interface. Gameboy musicians tend to use these two programs, though others do exist, and usually describe Little Sound Dj as having a slight learning curve. However, the program's both have their merits.

Though music can be made on other Gameboy systems, the original system is the best in audio quality and "retro" feel. This Gameboy artist's site probably has the best description of the different sounds that can be obtained. Hopefully, as this musical scene grows more excellent artists will experiment with the sonic possibilities that can be obtained. I have already heard one excellent band called Pornophonique. They describe themselves on the site as "gameboy meets lagerfeuer" and have a most excellent sound. I suggest checking them out and keeping your eyes open for any new groups utilizing the Gameboy as an instrument.

PETA Video Games?

2008-11-17T14:34:00.000-08:00

PETA made a video parodying Cooking Mama. It is basically a giant scheme to make people realize the horror of eating meat. I don't think I can make any politically correct comments on this so I'll just let you check this out.

Play the full size version on PETA.org.

Thoughts of High School

2008-11-14T20:52:00.000-08:00

During this last week I have gotten to miss school. Lots of school. The sad thing is that this time spent not at school sucked. Having a small allergic reaction cause autoeczematization on one's entire front side of the body is no bueno sir. However the good part of this is that I had tons and tons of hours to think about things. I thought about things that ranged from the random pointless things that emerge from the male mind such as why women are so difficult to topics that actually seem worthwhile to write about. The one that seemed to stick in my mind the most is the idea of identity and society in general from my view as a high school student.

Identity has interested me lately. As a high school senior, one must think about identity a lot when contemplating how to bs an essay to get into college, bs an essay to get an A in English, or bs to someone to pretend to know something you haven't the faintest clue about. Of course I am exaggerating a bit, but it really is quite interesting. What I find the strangest is that colleges actually base their entrance upon such essays that require the fragile high school mind to reflect upon their short lives and find meaning. I find this especially humorous due to the fact that they are asking people who have lived less than 20 years. Not to mention the fact that everyone changes over time, though it may depend on their situations and personality. What this leaves colleges with is an essay that may show how much someone wants to succeed now, or at least how good they are at pretending they do. Ah the fun of the high school essay.

High school is not meant to make a person magically enlightened. If anything it is a sort of system to supposedly prepare one for the world that exists outside of the sheltered high school community. This thought was strange because almost a year ago, I had an intense MySpace message chat going on about this very topic with my friend Rhea. We both were rather fed up with school, the concept seemed incredibly boring to us. However, through our messages we determined that in a way high school was a necessary.

We figured that high school is nothing more than a kind of microcosm of society that the older and supposedly wiser adult conspiracy had created to control and force feed us youngsters the rules they had put down. Everything that the real world has exists in high school, though in a lesser form. There are always stoners, overachievers, dealers, stealers, perverts, losers, winner, etc. Additionally, the high school government/student council was very much like our own ruling government and the ones who make the rules. In this sense, school was almost like a gauntlet. It didn't really determine what kind of person you were because there were plenty of good people in every clique, ethnic group, intelligence level, etc.

What high school did do was put everyone into a larger environment. This larger environment was very much like the world. It had all sorts of people from different backgrounds and different strengths and weaknesses. This gauntlet can best be described as the Battle Royale effect. These giant pools of maturing teenagers are given the chance to "learn". Those who can survive through the trial and make it to the real world, the ones who drop out cannot seem to handle the standard brainwashing that society has set in place and choose to remove themselves from the testing system to instead try their luck at the real world.

The ironic thing about this chat that went on for a while was that we were new high school juniors. We had been pointing these things out mostly from our limited experience and much was probably based on either emotion, or the need to feel like a rebel. Such strangeness, these high school days of self discovery. Such primitive animalistic instinct buried within our dated system of education.

Obama Aftermath

2008-11-05T17:43:00.001-08:00

Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To Realize How Empty Their Lives Are

The Onion documents the horrible tragedy of losing one's lives to Obama Mania. Watch and weep at the sadness that the supporters find when there is no more race left to run.

Social Networking Killing Socialness?

2008-11-03T22:36:00.000-08:00

I have always wondered why people have this weird sort of obsession with social networking sites. Recently Facebook seems to be the biggest and most addicting of them all. I have seen kids literally just sit on their ass and stare at the computer screen without blinking for over 5 minutes long. They stare at picture of their friends, comment, write on the walls, and of course use the pointless applications that seem to be a giant popularity contest. I fear for what Facebook is doing to the youth of the nation. Mainly because Facebook has become something more than a web application that allows one to keep in touch with friends and acquaintances. It has become a social phenomenon that allows people to gossip, rate each other, and talk to each other semi privately just like the real world. What sort of damage will this cause to the youths growing up in todays technological society?

First off, Facebook cannot replace the good old forms of communication that we have always relied on. Though some may find actually seeing people and making noises at each other to communicate primitive, it has always been essential to social development. By basically grunting, squealing, bickering, whatever you want to call it, we humans have developed out own society of rules. Social interaction is in some ways even more important than learning because it can be used in any situation. This is why I find this whole social networking obsession kind of creepy. When the youth of today are more into their Facebooks than actually meeting people, what will happen? Will we begin text messaging instead of talking to people right next to us? Will we slowly dumb down the society we live in until even novels are created in a language that is filled with abbreviations and colloquial chit chat? Whatever happens, it will forever shape the social landscape of the world. Maybe people in the future will refer to 2008 as the good old days when people actually talked to each other. Or maybe they'll just refer to it as the dawning of the new age of communication. An age of Facebook and text messaging. A cold new age of digital social ties.

The worst guitar soloist ever?

2008-10-22T22:36:00.000-07:00

The two videos above have, what I believe to be, some of the worst guitar solos that have ever been created. Weezy can rap decently, but when he picks up guitar my soul begins to die. I'm all for simplicity/stripped down sound because I love the blues and punk rock and all that jazz, but I have no idea what hes up to with this. I'm all down with the random improv that has no sense of direction and follows no rules, but these two videos above may change my mind. Have a watch and be amazed by Lil Wayne and his guitar skizzizzles.

To be or not to be?

2008-10-22T13:21:00.000-07:00

"To be or not to be- That is the question"

That was the first piece of writing that I had ever heard from Shakespeare. By now everyone should know that Shakespeare is a genius, whether you think that is your own personal opinion. Literature teachers around the world use him as a an example and all talk about how awesome Shakespeare is/was/and shall forever be. What I really want to know is what the hell Shakespeare meant by "to be or not to be". This small phrase alone seems to be the most quoted and frankly I have no idea what the true meaning is. Ever since I was young I have been hearing people quote this phrase and I am pretty convinced that they have no idea what this means either.

Out of the possibilities that exist, the literal meaning of this famous soliloquy from Hamlet seems to deal with the idea of suicide. Hamlet seems to be debating whether it is better for him to live or die. This could be the meaning, but I think it probably deals more with the very existence of man. Hamlet himself questions this as he mopes away after his father's death and his mother's marriage to his uncle. He comes upon this morbid thought because he realizes that no one really cared that his father died. They cared in the sense that they felt remorse because he was their king, but after all was done and through they just went to their everyday lives. His death had no true impact on how they lived and they seemed to forget about his death, instead focusing on the new king and his marriage.

If this idea was what the most famous of the famous Shakespeare writings was attempting to bring across, what is Shakespeare really forcing the reader/audience to think about? It seems to me like he was questioning the existence of man and man's very mortality. Though man can shape the world around him to an extent, after he leaves this earthly realm what will be left? What is left behind by man as he died off? Will our species eventually die out and be found by an evolution of our current form or by aliens, much like the fossils we examine? It seems like Shakespeare examines the idea of legacy.

Legacy seems to be growing increasingly important in a time of super celebrities and politicians. Every body seems to be trying to leave a mark on society, but why exactly do they have motive. Is it some sort of human social relic that forces us to want to pass our experiences and story down the generations through lore and legend? Perhaps it is to make one feel that they have contributed they have changed society in a positive, or negative, way.

Shakespeare has created a good little riddle with this one. Maybe he meant for it to be taken literally, maybe not. It doesn't change the fact that its some deep stuff and I still have no idea what it's saying.

Casey Loves Himself a lot

2008-10-12T01:12:00.000-07:00

I was what thoughts and comments come to mind when viewing this strange male I know.

Disneyland is the devil (ya rly)

2008-10-07T20:16:00.000-07:00

Disneyland. The world of magic. The world of cheer. The world of overpriced capitalistic corruption. Yes you read what you read. Disneyland is a great place (as I discovered when my girlfriend took me there for 3 days, yes 3 days), but it is not without its faults. For every happy girl who just received a stuffed animal, there is a sad male out there holding the receipt. For every cheerful child eating a Space Land hamburger and sipping on his cola, there is a sad parent out there mourning their $20. Yes, Disneyland is a source of pure evil capitalism. I was thinking about it from a stranger perspective the other day though (at like 2 am) and I figured that one could compare Disneyland to the most advanced nation in the world.

Disneyland is the an amazing creation. It is a place of pure revenue that uses other locations to generate goods and raw materials in order for it to expand its base of operations and get more money. Think of it this way, if Disneyland is the advanced nation among the 3rd world countries. It deals in deception (the place where dreams come true? I think not) and selling you overpriced goods which appear to have sentimental meaning (Eeyore stuffed animals are freaking $50). Much like illegal drugs, Disneyland hooks them when they are young (Hannah Montana?) and creates major revenue by scouting and marketing young children as we have seen in The Jonas Brothers, Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears, etc. Their little child labor pool brings in major cash by marketing to their younger audiences who are still stupid in the ways of life by hooking them onto a "role model" artist like Miley and making them worship her like some kind of 16 year old goddess (for all those mothers who had intense cat fights over Miley Cyrus tickets I salute you). I mean when I was at Disneyland Miley Cyrus had her birthday party in the park and I didn't see a happy little fanbase of Miley Cyrus. It was more like a giant purple and pink cult of preteens who were stupid enough to pay $250.

Now I guess Disneyland does have some admirable traits like the fact that those underpaid men and women who dress up in costumes and meet children. That must be the hardest job ever because they are basically paid to pretend like they love everyone and prance around in suits that must melt their skin off. I mean they are great, but when I really thought about it, they are merely puppets in the massive Disney dream drugs. What are the Mickey Mouses and Goofys? Dream come true characters, sure, but their more important purpose is to get kids to love them. They are merely the dealers of the Disney LIES. Much like the priests who convert people in 3rd world countries, they are like the priests of Disney. They make us all love their Mickeys and Minnies so much that we buy buy buy everything. I mean honestly if you go to Disneyland and can spend less than $500 dollars there you are amazing. The food there alone could cost that. These characters are the harbinger's of destruction. They are the horsemen of the apocolypse. They are the reason why all of us know about Disney, whether we like it or not.

I'm done with my delirious rant now so all of you go to Disneyland and junk. I know you all watch Hannah Montana and High School Musical don't lie. Space Mountain FTW.

How Pokemon teaches us everthing we need to know.

2008-10-07T20:11:00.000-07:00

Everyone knows of Pokemon, unless they've been in some type of coma for the last two decades. What most people don't know is that Pokemon is an anime, card game, video game, action figures, and was even previously a theme park and a musical. Its influence is widespread whether we realize it or not. Anyone who knows anything will have some sort of reaction to words like Pikachu, Pokeball, Ash Ketchum, or Team Rocket (if you've never heard of any of these things I pity your soul). Anyway I've been thinking about it and I honestly think that Pokemon is some sort of brainwashing from the Japanese government to teach the youth how to live in a proper manner. Here is a random list I've thought of:

1. LOVE: Pokemon teaches you love because if you don't LOVE your Pokemon they apparently turn out super lame and weaksauce. Take for example Ash Ketchum's Pikachu. It is basically freaking invincible because they LOVE each other. His Pikachu can basically kill any other Pokemon that is out there, except of course killing each other is BAD and doesn't show LOVE, so of course they never do.

2. Friendship: Pokemon teaches you that if you don't have a bunch of homies you will get pwned by evil people. I say this because in both the game and anime, the lonely dude with no friends is befriended by the main character and the "good" always wins. Plus that whole Gotta Catch 'Em All stuff is basically a mission from the Pokemon god saying make friends or die. Can you beat the Elite 4 without lots and lots of high leveled Pokemon? Heck no. Go make friends now kiddies.

3. Being Unique: Pokemon stresses that we get our own SPECIAL Pokemon and name them, give them accessories, enter them in contests, etc etc. It stresses making a "secret base" for your character which you can customize to your heart's content. Also there are "shiny" Pokemon which are rarer and obviously cooler.

4. Capitalism: If you don't buy in Pokemon, you have to live like a bum and scavenge for things. How can you get Pokemons if you don't have Pokeballs? You can't fool, so go buy stuff.

5. Not Hating on People: It seems like all the jerks in Pokemon have some sort of weird epiphany that makes them suddenly nice. The Pokemon Gods have spoken. Be Nice (or they'll make you)

6.Good Work Ethic: The Pokemon game is basically a game based on obsession. If you play the game a lot, then your Pokemon can get stronger. Additionally there are special ways to make the Pokemon stronger with things called EV points. Basically this is a game designed for future businessmen. The developers wanted to teach children how to be OCD workers who keep on working until they get that level 100 Pokemon. Its a valuable training tool to develop a generation of video game addicts into a hardworking business force.

7. Trade is Good: Pokemon now has a Global Trading Station. This allows people to trade their Pokemon all over the world. What this is meant to teach little youths is that trade is good. Thats how you get all the intense monsters fo sho. Plus this is meant to boost friendliness between other countries/people/etc. Don't be a stingy with your monsters. Sharing is caring.

RICK ASTLEY FTW!!!

2008-10-03T13:01:00.001-07:00

Everyone should use this site to help Rick Astley win an MTV Award

http://www.bestactever.com/

Stantonism

2008-09-29T21:57:00.001-07:00

(Image/info used with permission from the great one)

Matt Stanton is a great man and personal hero. People know very little about Stanton and his greatness, so I have compiled a list that illustrates his greatness:

1. Matt Stanton can bench 9000...and 1
2. Matt Stanton keeps it real
3. Matt Stanton's tears contain gold
4. Matt Stanton can fly, but chooses not to
5. Matt Stanton is asexual
6. Matt Stanton can pity Mr. T
7. Matt Stanton has enough brain energy to pick up large encyclopedias with his MIND
8. Matt Stanton poops bricks of pure platinum *AR
9. Matt Stanton can do calculus with his fingers
10. Matt Stanton once killed a man with his TI-83
11. Matt Stanton does not sleep, he calculates
12. Matt Stanton is made of dark matter
13. Matt Stanton can see into different solar systems
14. Matt Stanton lives long and prospers
15. Matt Stanton controls the economy
16. When Matt Stanton bleeds, the world bleeds
17. Matt Stanton can cure all diseases with his saliva
18. Girls can't kiss Matt Stanton because his greatness would cause them to implode
19. Matt Stanton once debated with God and won
20. Matt Stanton fought Chuck Norris. They tied.
21. By gazing upon Matt Stanton, there is a 5% chance of getting cancer from the epic beams of light that emanate from his glowing body
22. Matt Stanton solves the meaning of life...everyday
23. Every time Matt Stanton cries, God kills a antelope
24. Matt Stanton once played Crysis for 2 weeks...without blinking
25. Matt Stanton's hugs cause internal bleeding

*Contributed by Primary sources

If anyone else out there has knowledge of the great one, please contribute by commenting and adding them. If enough are added I'll add yours to the list. Additionally if anyone has any ideas about a Stanton religion please post. I think Stantonism would involve listening to an hour of metal everyday to purify ourselves. Thanks Much.

Carmel Ideas Fest.

2008-09-26T23:13:00.000-07:00

Today at school we went to Carmel to a writers/idea thing. I found it most interesting. You should check out this book. The dude who wrote it played some epic tunes.

The Practical Uses of Condoms (besides the obvious)

2008-09-25T18:46:00.000-07:00

I believe that all things can be used for many different purposes. Much like how we got microwaves out of military research, I believe we can get much more out of our latexy little friend, the condom. Now when someone mentions condoms, people automatically freeze or feel awkward. This is because America is one of the most sexually repressed nations in the world. A wise man once told me that about 90% of today's problems among people result from this sexually repressive society, and since he is indeed an older and wiser man than I, I cannot argue. However this is beside the point. What I really wanted to say was that condoms are incredibly useful. According to a book I recently read by Douglas Adams, the BBC even use that as makeshift mic waterproofing. Because of this I have compiled a list I have heard of/thought of that list practical uses (beside the obvious) for this underrated and demonized little gadget:

1. Waterproofing Microphones
2. Water Balloon Toss Games (they are designed to not break)
3. Emergency Water Carrier (not even joking)
4. Stylish Beanie (not sure how this would work)
5. Awesome Balloon Animal
6. A cheap sling shot
7. A cheap way to make a puppet
8. A weapon (fill it with heavy objects for weight)
9. Paperweight
10. Door Stop
11. Popsicle maker
12. Storing Spices/Candy/anything else
13. Spider Capturer
14. Art Supply
15. Jello Mold
16. Individual finger gloves
17. Pencil/pen holder
18. Waterproof Ipods
19. Waterproofing for rolls of money
20. Message in a condom?

Is Shakespeare legit?

2008-09-25T11:36:00.000-07:00

The other day I heard my friend describe Shakespeare as an "old dead English dude". I suppose he is correct in some aspects, but why does Shakespeare still exist in our society? If he was just some old dead dude, why are his plays still being produced and, more importantly, why does every school in the freaking world require Shakespeare for reading? I figured he must be more than some old dead dude, and at the very least he must be an old dead dude who could write. At the moment we are reading Hamlet in class, so I figured I might as well explore this idea while doing an assignment.

When I was reading Hamlet I noticed one thing at once. Shakespeare's play is incredibly detailed. Puns and references are scattered everywhere through the play. Also his writing seems incredibly poetic. At first I didn't pick up on it, but after reading the "to be...or not to be" speech in my best imitation of a dude who wants to kill his uncle but can't because he has the hots for his mom who is married to his uncle who killed his dad whose ghost came and told me to kill his brother voice. A most confusing voice indeed, but that's not the point. The point is that Shakespeare is a damned good writer. If he was in a rock band, he would probably play some epic music like Symphony X, Pink Floyd, or Coheed and Cambria. His words are not just snazzy words, but are meant to be heard echoing outward from a stage. The phrasing is amazing, quite confusing, and convoluting, yet it certainly isn't air polluting.

So if this is so, why are we taught in school to hate Shakespeare? Well not exactly taught, but pushed to view him as some sort of writing god. Since the readers are usually parochial minded teenagers or young adults, this is almost equivalent to teaching one to hate. From a teenage perspective Shakespeare just seems like some old dead dude who wrote a bunch of funny words. It's kind of sad really. Especially when prisoners (my English teacher made us listen to This American Life on a report about prison Hamlet productions) can relate more to Shakespeare's writing than most of the brightest high school students. Personally I think this is because as teenagers, we feel we cannot relate to a dude whose dad gets killed by his uncle who married his mom who he has the hots for. But if this character is really that hard to relate to why is he one of the most memorable characters in the history of the world.

I figure that it's because Hamlet is everybody. Not literally of course, but Hamlet's life is basically so messed up anyone can relate to him. I know that people who are like dude Hamlet is "lols", but it’s really not. Hamlet is basically a story of a dude whose life goes from super awesome straight downward. We should be able to identify with this because everyone has their ups and downs in life. We are told Hamlet's life from the deepest, darkest point of his life. Why do you think Shakespeare put it at this point of time in the young lad's life? It's because if he places the play in the time when it was all good in the hood, we would be more pissed off about reading the play because we would just have to read about how Hamlet and Ophelia want to make babies and how the King and his wife are all lovey dovey. Who would want to read about some rich dude and his awesome life? (but then again most people do listen to rap music nowadays...) Human beings like excitement and death. We don't admit it, but the fact that someone's life sucks more than ours makes us feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It's not that human beings are cold hearted emotionless slaughterers (though this could be debated), but that we don't usually like seeing someone brag about how awesome everything is and flaunt it in front of our faces. Maybe it has to do with survival instincts, or just the fact that we always want what we can't have. I have no idea, but the point is that: dude, Hamlet is one unlucky SOB.

Though his life basically sucks by the time we enter it, Hamlet is an amazing character. He is the character that anyone can project their own problems on. I know I already mentioned how we essentially enjoy watching people suffer, but part of Hamlet's appeal lies also in the situations he is put in. Because of this Hamlet really embodies the reader, the reader who has their own problems and experiences. Maybe Hamlet you when your girlfriend cheated on you and you had crazy plots to sabotage her new relationship. Or Hamlet can be you when a loved one died and you feel all alone. Hamlet can be every man. He can be the punk rocker who is fighting the system, the employee who got screwed over at work, the guy whose girl is taken, etc.

This is the magic of Shakespeare's plays. He is able to cover broad themes, yet create characters we can relate to. His characters are incredibly complex, yet are accessible for those who try. Not bad for an old dead English dude.

Why Pro Tools Sucks...and why it Rocks

2008-09-22T09:57:00.000-07:00

Most modern music is recorded digitally with Pro Tools and a USB, Firewire, or internal interfaces on either Mac or Windows computers. As a result, the music is recorded to an uncompressed audio file. This method of recording is used in basically everything dealing with audio, examples including popular music, film scoring, television, etc. There are many merits of this recording method, such as clearer sound, a much wider range of frequencies, easier editing, and "effects". However many argue that the "Pro Tools man" takes the skill out of music and find that even though the sound is much more accurately captured, digital can never compare with analog recording onto magnetic tape.

The modern recording artist does not need to sing accurately, or even know an entire song perfectly to record a sparkling, clean example of modern music. They don't even need to be in the same room, building, state, country, continent, or even hemisphere. Because of the internet, as well as modern recording that requires as little as a laptop and magic box as small as a pencil box, artists can roam freely, much like minstrels of the past, and create music wherever and whenever they want. The way I see it there are basic pros and cons.

The pros are that music can: basically be recorded ANYWHERE, eliminates the need for close contact with band members (which the Rock n' Roll world knows can cause horrible things such as Lead Singer Disease as well as many various intoxicated and non-intoxicated adventures), lead to amazing musical collaborations, provide good ways to write while touring, keep jams and ideas for music, etc etc. Another worthy thing to note is that almost anyone can acquire some sort of recording gear from stores at a fairly reasonable price compared to the old machines that required lots magnetic tape.

The cons are that music can be recorded ANYWHERE. This may seem like a strange problem, but it is a problem. Because music can be recorded anywhere, music loses a great deal of emotion. It can distance a musical entity and although it can be used to record great sounding tracks, much of the chemistry and spontaneity of the music is lost. The greatest why this natural energy, this natural chaos that surrounds the recording process is important is the album Appetite for Destruction by Guns N' Roses.

Guns N' Roses' debut album is considered by some as the last rock record of the vinyl age, which is backed up by its lingering popularity. It is the 4th best-selling debut album of all time, but by today's standards it sounds like crap. The drums, bass guitar, and rhythm guitar tracks were all made from basic tracks recorded live; the guitar work overall on the record is tastefully sloppy, but nonetheless quite sloppy at times; the drums are rough and bring a punk rock feel; and the vocals have been described to me as "a pissed off teenager's prepubescent scream".

How does a sloppy, raw album by 5 LA street urchins become one of the best loved albums of all time? The way I see it is that its sloppy and raw. The appeal of this raw sound is seen in many classic albums such as Killing Is My Business...and Business Is Good by Megadeth, Nevermind the Bollocks by the Sex Pistols, The Ramones by the Ramones, and Raw Power by Iggy and The Stooges. This rough sound brings a more human element to the music. However there are dangers to this raw sound too. Anyone who has listened to Metallica's St. Anger should know that. Their desire to make that album sound "raw" ended up with a irritating snare drum sound and no guitar solos. Quite a piece of blasphemy for the group who was partly responsible for bringing the world thrash metal.

Many feel that because Pro Tools makes it too easy to make music, the modern musicians are not as skilled as the past greats. Why use Pro Tools if it just creates a false image of an artist who, in reality, cannot play their music live without lip syncing? Fortunately for the rest of the music world who enjoys this new found ease in editing, the negative people seem to neglect to realize the other effect that this new precise method has had on the musician community. Though some may say the new generation lacks "feel" (such as the great Bob Dylan), they don't take into account that there are musicians out there that are virtuosos. The Pro Tools magic has created magic musicians who surpass the previous standards and can play music just as though it were edited. The most recent example of this that I saw was Avenged Sevenfold.

People can hate on Avenged Sevenfold as much as they want, but they can't deny that their live show is amazing. They recently released a live DVD called Live In The LBC and those guys can play. On the cover of the DVD they state that there are no overdubs, and if this is so, they are a prime example of this Pro Tools talent boom. Throughout the entire 2 hour show they played 12 songs and I can't honestly say they missed a note. Their playing was articulate and even the drummer was able to sing backing vocals while using using two kick drums. Their music was an amazing live interpretation of their albums.

This digital recording method also has its merit when coupled with the internet. On sites like YouTube and Myspace people are able to post music they have made and easily and quickly. This method has unlocked the potential of finding amazing artists and drawn musicians from all over the world to post videos of them playing. One example of this is the Taiwanese guitarist JerryC. His video is nothing special and was filmed in what appears to be a bedroom. It features only JerryC playing his adaptation of Bach's Canon in D and a slight backing track made of a stringed section. Though this sounds quite primitive, as far as technology goes, the video has spawns hundred of copycats on YouTube.
Here are FunTwo's and JerryC's videos:

So, overall one cannot argue that Pro Tools does indeed have its merits as well as problems. Some simply refuse to record digitally and stick with the tape, such as Jack White of the White Stripes, while others embrace the future with digital. The fact is that as more and more precise recordings come out, the future generations will be a need breed. Maybe they won't embrace the digital precision and play with their grooves, or else they might learn to play like the recordings they hear and become the next Steve Vai's and Joe Satrianis. We seem to be at a transition point in music, at least in America, so anything can happen. The industry is changing and with it the music. Pro Tools may degrade or enhance music depending on your standpoint, but the fact of it is that no matter what, the new wave of artists will find a way to record and whether they strive to stay away from the modern and stick with tape like Jack White of the White Stripes, or choose to use the state of the art Pro Tools rigs, the music continues to play. It'll keep playing until someone manages to create touchable 3D holograms or something. Then there might be a problem.

Punk Rock?

2008-09-15T18:07:00.000-07:00

The other day my friend mentioned a movie I had not thought of in a long time, Salt Lake City (SLC) Punk. SLC Punk, directed by James Merendino, captures the pain, confusion, and most importantly the difficulty of maturity. But most of all it captures the spirit of punk rock through two main characters, Stevo, the son of a rich Jewish lawyer/former hippie, and Heroin Bob, a strange character who contrary to his name is scared of any and all pharmaseuticals and is the son of a crazed war veteran. Though a bit dated (1998 release), I feel that this movie contains many elements that are essential, yet lacking in our current society. Also it provides a fairly accurate analytical depiction of today's world. This may seem like complete crazy talk, but once the stage is set it makes a lot more sense.

SLC Punk essentially is about a plan created by Stevo and Bob to fight the system by doing the only thing they can do to fight the system, wasting their newly college grad education by partying, veggging out, and of course participating in some illegal pharmaceuticals/alcoholic beverages. In the world of Salt Lake City that James Merendino creates there are several "tribes" that inhabit the adolescent world of a Salt Lake City teen. There are punks (punk rockers), mods (essentially wannabe British dudes who wear suits and ties), Rednecks (stereotyped blue jeans and flannel, etc), Nazis (white power skinheads), Heavy metal guys (long hair and flannel wearing metal heads), and New Wavers (described as people who dress like the New Romantics and are "the new hippies"). Also within these groups are "posers" who Stevo says are people who are "punk" just for the fashion aspect. The film follows Stevo's and Bob's punk rock ventures which include beating up bouncers at punk rock shows, fighting rednecks and Nazis, debating about anarchy, and eventually climaxes with the death of Heroin Bob. Stevo's best friend's death causes him to rethink his life and drives him to change his self destructive lifestyle to go to Harvard Law School to "fight the system from within the system"

Now you may ask how would a story about two suburban white kids who dress like punk rockers and want anarchy contain any elements that are needed in our current state of society. But by looking past all the "punk" fashion and stereotypical desire to cause chaos, one can see that this state of society contains many needed elements and is, in a sense, a social commentary.

The first element of society we find lacking is the questioning of authority/rebellious attitude. The current state of the youth is relatively depressing. Most focus more on getting into a college than what they really want to do. Our society has become somewhat of a repressive force, which stifles individuality and our voices. One might argue this case and say we have plenty of individuality and rebellion. There are emo kids, punk rockers, artistic indie rockers, etc. However what they fail to take into account is that most of these are not genuine. Like in SLC Punk, the world of today is cluttered with "posers" who do it for fashion, or money, or fame. A great example of this is the "emo" music scene which exploded onto the charts a few years ago. Kids started wearing eye makeup and black hoodies to try to imitate their new emo heroes. Soon everything became "emo", from hooded sweatshirts to even acoustic guitar music. Kids flocked to the scene with Hawthorne Heights' "emo" anthem, "Ohio is for Lovers" and started attempting to hurt themselves because they felt it would make them feel better and fit in. Essentially what I am trying to say is that the current society seems to me at least to be a mere shadow of a few. The few innovators are imitated constantly by others for their own motives.

Now this doesn't mean that no one questions authority or rebels, but the drastic drop in this element is rather sad. No longer do we have the rebels like Jim Morrison who want the world, or even the rebel acoustic rock of the sixties like Buffalo Springfield's "For What Its Worth". Though the current society does have some rebellion in music, such as John Mayer's "Waiting for the World to Change", it is far more subtle and not the Rebel Yell that is needed for this country. This shift that is easily seen in the music represents a change in the social dynamics of the country. In some ways this may be good and represent a sort of stabilization of society; however it also may represent a sort of dumbing down of the American. This time is fairly similar it seems to the time of American isolationism and can be seen starting again. We Americans may be smarter than some media portrays us, such as the video below, but there is an obvious shift towards a more docile common man.

SLC Punk also seems to have a lot to offer on our current state of America. One can look at the different tribes as the different nationalities, religions, social classes, etc. The current America is in a transition period from being a primarily Caucasian nation to truly multi-cultured mixing pot. However at the current time many spend their time fighting the other tribes rather than uniting behind a common background as Americans. Like the tribes, America’s different backgrounds are all linked by commonalities, but are disrupted by the differences that exist amongst the tribes.

There are many different conclusions that can be drawn from this movie, but I will stop there as there is little time for other tasks that need to be done. If interested in the “Poser Speech” from SLC Punk you can YouTube it, but viewer discretion is advised. There is much inappropriate language.

Shall I compare thee to a Scrubs episode?

2008-08-28T17:34:00.000-07:00

A while ago, I assisted my friend Alicia in writing a epic poem about scrubs for her English II class. Sadly the teacher did not like it (obviously failing to see the true genius of it). To keep this poem alive, and just for laughs, I felt like posting it here. In doing so Alicia can always remember that bad grade she got in English and the fun times it was writing such a literary masterpiece.

Scrubs: The Epic Poem
by Alicia and I

Sacred Heart is the place to be

Turk and JD Loving oh so manly

JD is the white lightning

To Turk's chocolate bearness

They exhibit their guy love

So prideful and fearless

They'll be with each other until they die

Like a black and white chocolate pie

They like their rap music and Eddie Murphy too

If you have a heart attack they might save you

Their love grows everyday

Just accept their new way

Matching bracelets is the way to go

Turk and JD forever fo sho

So don't gossip and stare

It's just Guy love between white lighting and chocolate bear

The Death of Music?

2008-08-28T16:52:00.000-07:00

Long has the audiophile waged war against the evil Steve Jobs and his iPod. The poor sound quality? The compressed music? BLASPHEMY!!! At least in the eyes of a audiophile. Audiophiles are, as urban dictionary defines, one who listens to the stereo rather than the music. Perhaps this is true, but one must consider their viewpoint. They figure that quality music=happy ears. This of course leads to happy audiophile and/or selling one's car to purchase a stereo which makes one ears happy. A truly vicious cycle indeed. I for one consider myself a semi-audiophile, or as I like to call it, an audiophile who has no money to buy a $5000 stereo system.

This debate about the quality of music has lead me to ponder deeply about music and its seemingly deep roots in the culture. With this my first thought was "man, new music has sucky sound quality". After reading Rolling Stone, I am glad that I am not the only one who believes that. Many people feel that today's music is just "too damn loud" and they are right. By analyzing the modern songs, Rolling Stone magazine has found that even the loudest rock from back in the day is nothing in compared to loudness. This so called "Loudness War" is meant to make the casual listener of today's music (ie the kid who turns his iPod to full and explodes his cheap plastic white iPod earphones, or the kid who has some crappy computer speakers) pay attention to the blasting sounds coming out and damaging their ears. Try listening to even rock intended to be loud such as Nirvana and compare it to some modern band. There is a distinct noticeable difference. The louder, newer modern music lacks the small nuances that makes the older music much more textured. This is partly due to the mastering of the audio, which like I said before is meant to catch one's attention by blasting out of lower end audio equipment.

After discovering these facts, I proceeded to think about how this shift in listening to music occured. Personally I think that the shift from actually sitting down and listening to music (yes back in the day people actually just sat and listened) vanished due to newer technologies and the speeding up of our society. Just like the railroads of the 1800s that sped up America, portable audio players were perhaps the beginning of the end. Apparently some editors at CNET.com share my ideas in a way. Steve Guttenburg feels that, "

...when CDs came out people immediately used the format's longer playing times to do other stuff, they were no longer tied to the music and stopped listening. Music was just there, filling up space.

Fast forward to the present and now they don't even have to think about the music they want to play. They hit shuffle and let the iPod program the music. And once music is relegated to the background sound quality is no biggie."

I have had personal experience with this. If anyone has ever played a LP vinyl record (yes they still make them), it completely changes the musical listening experience. An LP gets the listener involved in a way no CD can. There is no track skipping (totally serious here) and in the middle of it you actually have to flip the sides (yes way). This involvement in the actual playing of the music emerges the listener in a much more personal experience that cannot be had with the modern iPod.

Though sound quality and the times have changed, I am glad that we still have music. At least we haven't evolved to the point where all music would sound like this:

A Scanner Darkly

2008-08-25T16:42:00.000-07:00

In our society, we tend to try to categorize everything. Personally I think movies and music tend to have the most genres and labels slapped on them. Many people, especially those of the teenage variety, tend to associate people with music they listen to or movies they like. An example of this would be the assumption that someone who likes Cheech and Chong movies does drugs. Even if they do participate in the use of various illegal pharmaceuticals, many seem to judge them before they can get to know them better and find out that they actually do those things. The only good thing about labels is that it lead me to A Scanner Darkly, a 2006 film by Richard Linklater (also director of such great cult classics like Slacker, WAking Life, and Dazed and Confused). The film was introduced to me by someone stating it was a sort of indie stoner film, but it is much more than that.

A Scanner Darkly is not the average limited release film. A Scanner Darkly is a thrilling tale of drug addiction and conspiracy. For an independent film it also has a few heavy hitter actors, including Winona Rider, Keanu Reaves, and Robert Downey Jr. What really separates this film from the norm is the visuals. The entire film has a cartoonish visual that is created by taking every frame of the movie and using a method called rotoscoping. Rotoscoping creates a truly unique feel for the movie and goes very well with the futuristic setting of the movie. Though at some parts of the movie, the graphics feel a bit awkward the director seemed to manage to make it work. The use it to their advantage especially on the drug trip scenes when hallucinations occur. I would urge anyone interested in cult movies or animation to watch the film. The unique style is not easily forgotten and is a good escape from some of the duller more predictable mainstream films that have been coming out in the last few years.