I haven't posted in a while, mostly because I haven't really thought that there was anything that I have realized/ thought about that was really important. But I was going to do one a while ago on advertising, and that sort of fell to the wayside. And I just played Apples to Apples with my family, so I guess I can talk about that. Nothing much has happened in my life that warrants discussion, and this isn't a diary, so I guess we'll see what comes from this. Actually, I'll just let that be my first topic of discussion.
I'm beginning to think that I'm like J.D. from Scrubs, and actually like most people in the world, in that I only desire what I do not have. Once I get something, be it a present that I had wanted, music that I had been really eager to listen to, or even starting school, I very quickly no long want it. Not as quickly as J.D. does with Elliot, for those of you that have seen the show, but normally within a few weeks. That's why I'm partly glad that I don't have Guitar Hero, because I'd never want to play it if I did. I haven't wanted to play Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion since those first two weeks when I played it 10 hours a day after I borrowed it from Aaron. I was ready to get back to school and start senior year all during the summer, but about two weeks into it I couldn't wait to get out. I really hope that doesn't happen with Arrested Development, since I got all three seasons on DVD only a few days ago for Christmas. It seems like once I have obtained something, it instantly becomes part of my past. I guess this happens to everyone to some degree, and it's really frustrating isn't it? Oh well. I think it happened with this blog as well, I have always had lots of thought swirling around my head, but once I got this blog and had it for a few months I never really wanted to write in this.
So anyways, on to what I was going to write about about a month and a half ago but I never did (see above). It has to do with advertising and marketing. I've already talked to some people about this, most notably Priyanka, my dad, Kevin, and Mihir (those two just the first half). So anyways, about a month and a half ago Jason Huang, Mihir Sathe, Kevin Shimizu, Jamie Turley, Aaron Garg, and I all went shopping at Valley Fair to buy "hip" clothes for Austin to usher him into this decade (no offense Austin)(actually that along with my cd, which was and still is incredible [fusion of electronic and acoustic, talk to me about it to learn more/ if you want a copy {the ending is an emotional rollercoaster}]). We got like five shirts I think, and they were all pretty good, and as we were leaving I noticed the Puma store and insisted that we go inside. So we shopped around a bit, and decided that maybe Austin needed a cool belt to go along with his awesome shirts. We looked at the belts, and there were two styles: a $28 model and an $18 model. Now personally, I think it's a little ridiculous to buy any belt for more than like $12, but that's beside the point. As we looked closer, we noticed that the two models were strikingly similar. Hmm... In fact, they were the exact same. The only difference was that on the $18 model the buckle was a bit more cloudy, like there were small scratches all over it in a semi-unifrom way that made it not reflect as well. It's hard to explain, but hopefully you sort of get the picture. But, the only way you can tell the difference when someone was wearing it is if you conciously looked for it, or you were six inches away from it with the $28 belt to compare it too. But, there are only a few reasons you stand (or kneel) six inches away from a belt for extended periods of times, and we won't divulge into them. For the sake of this argument, the two belt models are the same. We even asked a salesperson what the difference was, and they were just like, "Well, this one has a different color of fabric. This one's green and this one's gray." First of all, color variation should not be a cause for a 50% increase in price. Second of all, we pointed out to the guy that there are green and gray colors of the fabric in both of the models, so clearly he has no idea what he's talking about. Which means it was up to Detective Andrew to solve the case, which is obviously the next step in this process. So I sat down and thought about it for a while. This was when we were trying to move, mind you, so in order for our house to look better we had packed up every single book and put them in the attic. Except one, "Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs", which was in my mom's car at the time. Composed of a collection of stand-alone essays and being the only book in the house, I promptly read each chapter a good seven or eight times, which allows me to bring up any part of that book in discussion, which I have frequently done (as many of you know). Once again, it would help. One large theme in many of his essays is the definition of "cool". One such essay discusses how kid's cereal ads on on TV create a character that is unable to obtain the cereal, making it excluesive, and therefore cool because not everyone can have it. A large part of coolness is having something that no one else has, but having it look like anyone could have gotten it if they had enough fouresight. Exclusivity is a big part of coolness, and cereal advertisers know it. See: Trix Rabbit (on a side note, the article said that a 1997 poll revealed that 99% of all those asked wanted the Rabbit to finally be given the Trix), Sonny (who's coo-coo[?] for Cocoa Puffs), that dog-man from Cookie Crisps, and a lot of others but I haven't read the essay in a while and I'm doing this from memory (remember, I was thinking of writing this a month ago, when I could remember all of this). So back to the Puma belts. I am pretty sure that the store was artificially gnerating coolness, just like MTV used to do when it was hip. By making one belt $10 more expensive than another, Puma is creating exclusivity. The $28 belt is more expensive, ergo it is more exclusive, thereby cooler than the other one. I don't really know if this is true, but most of the things in Puma are pretty expensive, and so if you're going to buy a belt from there rather than somewhere else like at Macy's or JC Penny's or somewhere, there's a better chance that you are looking for fashion and are willing to spend the extra ten dollars to be cool. Although, common sense would dictate you buy the $18 one and say you bought the $28 one. It's not an airtight case, but that's OK with me. I think I really am onto something with this artifiially generated coolness, and I'm sure a while back I had more arguments for this, but I can't remember them at the moment. So anyways, onto my next point, which I will put in a new paragraph so you can conveniently find it.
Here we are. So next on the list is Disney, most notably the Disney Channel. I'm sure many of you have noticed at this point that Disney Channel does not show outside advertisements, only ads promoting their own shows, a stupid thing on "special kids" (like the girl who collected pez dispensers... ahaha my sister and I had a good laugh with that one), or other arms of the Disney franchise (usually Disneyland/ Disneyworld). But no revenue from outside advertisers, which I'm pretty sure is where most TV stations get most if not all of their revenue. Which means that Disney Channel pulls their revenue from somewhere else. I mean, I'm sure they get some money from the Disney stores, and some extra money from theme parks and stuff. But the more I thought about it (and the more links I clicked on after googling "how does the disney channel make money?" [apparently other people want to know too]), the more I realized that was in fact exactly how they did it. Disney Channel is, in the broad spectrum of things, one large advertisement for other parts of Disney. They thrust the Disney name into every household that holds a child aged 7-13, give or take a few years. They make kids want to have everything Disney, because that is what is cool. Let's see how they do it.
I would consider the Lizzie Mcguire series as the turning point of Disney Channel, from an under performing arm of the Disney Corporation to one of the most profitable parts of it (Disney Channel and products from it now account for like 45% of Disney profits or something). Most of us still remember the Disney Channel shows that were on back then, with classics like Smart Guy, Boy Meets World, and Recess (oh the good old days). But Lizzie McGuire seemed like a new show, one that tailored to the late middle school/ early high school girls and the boy problems they faced. Maybe shows on that channel had done that before, but they either weren't very good or didn't focus on the boy problems (oh Gordo... you lovable goofball). This show caught kid's attention due to its quirky, accident-prone lead character and her mildly funny (and even that is stretching that) animated inner-thoughts persona. It quickly became Disney Channel's highest rated show and spawned movies, books, dolls, cd's, manga (?!), McDonald toys, furniture themes, and various other things. All in all, it is estimated that this merchandise garnered Disney $100 million. Wow. And I'm pretty sure that's not including the $55.6 million grossed by The Lizzie McGuire movie. That's a lot of money for a show that had a minscule budget compared to most primetime shows. And therein lies a large part of Disney Channel's ability to suck up the cash like a vacuum. They sign obscure, unknown children into contracts that are almost carrer-binding. As it turns out, Hilary Duff produced her first cd with Disney Channel, but the contract did not stipulate that she needed to stay with them for cd's, or movies, and she quickly realized that she could make more money herself than she ever could with Disney. She took off to Hollywood Records, making three more cd's (two of which have gone platinum) and has made numerous movies, most of which have naught to do with Disney. And they do not get a cent of anything she makes. They have been sure not to do that again. With the huge numbers of Lizzie McGuire, Disney Channel realized that they had found the gem, and sought any way possible to continue the trend. It would appear the formula is: Sitcom with sporadic main character who is by no means perfect, but is still lovable (Raven, Zach and Cody, Alex [Witches From Waverly Place]), add in a stupid friend who never seems to understand what is going on and throws in spontaneous phrases (Arwen [Suite Life], Chelsea [That's So Raven], Oliver [Hannah Montana], Newt [Cory in the House], Ron [Kim Possible]), have another friend the main character is close to (Eddie [Raven], Lily [Hannah Montana], Miranda/Gordo [Lizzie McGuire]) , and use the same 50 or so plotlines over and over again in each show. What does that equal? Pure success.
It does not matter that I could write the script for every single one of these shows, it does not matter that I know how the episode is going to end three minutes into it, it does not matter that every single show is essentially the same show with a twist (live in a hotel room, have psychic powers, be a witch, be a pop star [actually, this can be said for almost every sitcom on television, and most dramas, they're all mostly the same formula just with a twist, and then it's up to the writers to distinguish the show from the others {the exception being Seinfeld, which had no twist, it just had the four characters and their lives (perhaps this was the twist?); thankfully the characters and the writing in that show allowed it to be so great]}). The only thing that matters is that children continue to watch the shows, and continue to tell their parents to take them to Disneyland and buy them Hannah Montana tickets. Even Disney's Head of Television Anne Sweeney knew this; according to Wikipedia, "Sweeney's successful strategy was to discover, nurture, and aggressively cross-promote teen music stars whose style and image were carefully targeted to the preteen segment of 10-year-olds in the period between childhood and adolescence." So... yea. Two-thirds of all American preteens regularly watch Hannah Montana, if that's any indication of how well they are doing. Disney Channel has discovered the secret formula to making money: Target the kids, not adults, and make them need the stuff; what parent is going to turn down their kids crying request for a Hannah Montana doll? The one thing that puzzled me for a long time was that Disney Channel just became a huge enterprise over the last few years, with the advent of Lizzie McGuire. Does that mean that before that they were just operating in the red, waiting for a hit? That seems like a really long-term investment, to have a channel lose money for twenty years before it starts turning profits. But then again, Disney Channel Original Series are a relatively modern thing. They always had a few, but much of the channel's programming throughout the 1980s and 1990s were reruns of previously-aired shows on ABC or other channels. There has always been the children's section, with the likes of Winnie the Pooh, Mickey Mouse, and Playhouse Disney. "Modern" Disney Channel Original Series probably started with around 2000, with Even Stevens. But before that, there was probably not a very large cost to make shows, as they were creating very few new ones, just reshowing episodes already creating by another arm of Disney. And even now, Disney Channel does not have a large operating cost, since they make these career contracts with future stars when they are very young, and the salary they receive is not high (at least much lower than a primetime actor). Disney then makes a profit on everything having to do with that person, be it movies, music, or TV shows (see: Raven, Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez). These people are walking talking money-makers; whatever they make will make kids from around the country flock to get it. This has set up Disney Channel for years to come, and I don't see it ending anytime soon.
Ok, enough with Disney Channel. I skipped around a lot, and probably repeated myself frequently, but in my defense I did write that over a span of two days. So my other topic is much shorter; all I really wanted to say was that I am beginning to see major improvements with my culturing. If you don't know what I'm talking about, I've been embarking on a mission over the lsat year and a half or so to become more knowledgeable on the likes of music, books, television, movies, current events, technology, politics, and assorted others. This requires me devoting a rather large part of my life to finding new bands, watching TV (lots of TV...), reading a lot of magazines, and daily (or two or three times a day) checking various websites. I've been seeing major improvements with both my understanding of jokes and my ability to have a relevant topic from a TV show or book or article to whatever someone is saying to me. Which is probably why my stories take so long... It probably also helps that I like to talk. Anyways, we were playing Apples to Apples, and I was really proud because I knew most of the people that were on the cards, whether they were classic authors or famous historical figures or old movie stars. It's starting to pay off! Although, I'm pretty lacking in the book department. I really need to read Animal Farm, 1984, Catch-22, Fight Club, and other books that have been extremely influential in society today. I've been listening to some older stuff from Radiohead (stuff from "Hail to the Thief" and "OK Computer", so not really that old, but not their most recent album) and a lot of it has references to these books. Also, did you know that every title in Panic! at the Disco's album "A Fever you Can't Sweat Out" is a reference to Fight Club? I am really ahead of most people when it comes to television and music, but I lag far behind with books and movies. There are all these great movies I need to see, perhaps some of you guys would like to watch them with me second semester? And tell me any other books you think I need to read. With your help, we can make this blog more interactive! Anyways, that's about it. I think soon I'm going to put a list of my favorite albums of all time, but I don't want to yet because I need to listen to a lot of them more and there is still a lot of music I want to get and listen to. So, stay tuned for more sooner or later.
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
On Intolerance
I'd like to share with you an English journal entry i wrote last year during first semester. It was a response to the "Sinners at the Hands of an Angry God" article and tape. For those of you who are not familiar with this, it is a sermon given by preacher Johnathon Edwards (no relation to the other one) during the Great Awakening. It essentially preaches on the principle that the only reason people are not in hell is the pleasure of God. Satan stands ready to pounce on almost all of humanity, save those few are saved (for lack of a better word). If you really want to learn more about it, just wikipedia it or something. Anyways, this is my response to it. Just remember my constraints: this was a journal write, so I was only able to write about a page and a half before running out of room, and I was supposed to stay on topic, so I wasn't able to stray too far (also, I turned this in, so swearing was strictly prohibited). I was not even closely able to express my full views on this topic, and I move around quite a bit, but hopefully it is an accurate representation of some of my views.
I think the way that Edwards is trying to convert people is completely inappropriate. One does not come to Christ because of the fear they have of going to Hell; they come because of His love. Edwards is acting the same as the people on street corners with bullhorns yelling about how all the adulterers and fornicators and homosexuals in the world will go to Hell unless they convert to Christianity. Jesus taught about love during his life, not about the damnation of all non-believers. If you turn to a page in the New Testament, chances are you will find some verse about how God and Christ love us. You will probably not find it condemning homosexuality as a sin. And yet Christians today are taught that homosexuals "choose" to be the way they are and will become straight once they find Christ. They are not taught that Jesus loves everyone, only that Jesus loves Christians. Also, some religious tolerance in this world would be nice. In July, a Hindu priest opened a Senate floor meeting (Congress sessions always begin with a prayer), only to be booed multiple times. The comments below this article proclaimed how it is unacceptable that a "pagan prayer" was said before the Government Under God. They said that even though the Constitution proclaims freedom of speech, the founding fathers never would have thought anything other than a Christian prayer would be said. Does no one else see the hypocrisy? Just because the pledge of allegiance says "one nation under God" doesn't mean that it is acceptable to condemn another religion. Leaders of the free world indeed. When did "religious tolerance" come to mean "Christian tolerance"? Another comment exclaimed how Christians are the most intolerated minority. Oh, so I guess it's ok to boo another religion because they really just don't know how good they have it. Give me a break. And since when did God recognize countries? It's a good thing thing California was taken from Mexico in 1847, or God never would have known to bless us. This is ridiculous. Stop using our Lord and Savior to pursue your personal agenda by condemning all others as wrong and heretical. Maybe, if you practiced what you preached, you would realize how stupid you sound. And Edwards shouldn't talk about everyone going to Hell, that's not going to attract too many people. If he talked about the Lord's grace and the wonders of Heaven, people may actually be drawn into Christianity rather than put off by Hell.
Many of you can tell that I get more and more frustrated as the entry goes on. If Chris Rea is reading this (shout out!), this was a few weeks after we watched the video on bullhorns in youth group, so that's where some of this is coming from. As i typed this into this post, there were so many things that I wanted to add, but I tried to stay true of what I wrote in the journal entry. The only thing added was that Congress opens with a prayer session, because that information was needed to understand what I was talking about. I wish I had more time and space to write the originaly entry, but maybe it's succinctity is a good thing.
To those directly affected by Prop 8's passage, there is nothing I can say that can ease the pain you are suffering. I know it is much easier for me to say to fight on than it is to carry that out, but that is all there is to be done. My favorite quote of all time is "It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees". Continue fighting, for they will never bring you down.
If I can endure for this minute
Whatever is happening to me,
No matter how heavy my heart is
Or how dark the moment be-
If I can remain calm and quiet,
With all the world crashing about me,
Secure in the knowledge that God loves me,
When everyone else seems to doubt me-
If I can but keep on believing
What I know in my heart to be true,
That darkness will fade with the morning
And that will pass away, too-
Then nothing in life can defeat me
For as long as the knowledge remains
I can suffer whatever is happening
For I know God will break all of the chains
That are binding me tight in the darkness
And trying to fill me with fear-
For there is no night without dawning
And I know my morning is near.
-Helen Steiller Rice, "This Too Shall Pass"
I think the way that Edwards is trying to convert people is completely inappropriate. One does not come to Christ because of the fear they have of going to Hell; they come because of His love. Edwards is acting the same as the people on street corners with bullhorns yelling about how all the adulterers and fornicators and homosexuals in the world will go to Hell unless they convert to Christianity. Jesus taught about love during his life, not about the damnation of all non-believers. If you turn to a page in the New Testament, chances are you will find some verse about how God and Christ love us. You will probably not find it condemning homosexuality as a sin. And yet Christians today are taught that homosexuals "choose" to be the way they are and will become straight once they find Christ. They are not taught that Jesus loves everyone, only that Jesus loves Christians. Also, some religious tolerance in this world would be nice. In July, a Hindu priest opened a Senate floor meeting (Congress sessions always begin with a prayer), only to be booed multiple times. The comments below this article proclaimed how it is unacceptable that a "pagan prayer" was said before the Government Under God. They said that even though the Constitution proclaims freedom of speech, the founding fathers never would have thought anything other than a Christian prayer would be said. Does no one else see the hypocrisy? Just because the pledge of allegiance says "one nation under God" doesn't mean that it is acceptable to condemn another religion. Leaders of the free world indeed. When did "religious tolerance" come to mean "Christian tolerance"? Another comment exclaimed how Christians are the most intolerated minority. Oh, so I guess it's ok to boo another religion because they really just don't know how good they have it. Give me a break. And since when did God recognize countries? It's a good thing thing California was taken from Mexico in 1847, or God never would have known to bless us. This is ridiculous. Stop using our Lord and Savior to pursue your personal agenda by condemning all others as wrong and heretical. Maybe, if you practiced what you preached, you would realize how stupid you sound. And Edwards shouldn't talk about everyone going to Hell, that's not going to attract too many people. If he talked about the Lord's grace and the wonders of Heaven, people may actually be drawn into Christianity rather than put off by Hell.
Many of you can tell that I get more and more frustrated as the entry goes on. If Chris Rea is reading this (shout out!), this was a few weeks after we watched the video on bullhorns in youth group, so that's where some of this is coming from. As i typed this into this post, there were so many things that I wanted to add, but I tried to stay true of what I wrote in the journal entry. The only thing added was that Congress opens with a prayer session, because that information was needed to understand what I was talking about. I wish I had more time and space to write the originaly entry, but maybe it's succinctity is a good thing.
To those directly affected by Prop 8's passage, there is nothing I can say that can ease the pain you are suffering. I know it is much easier for me to say to fight on than it is to carry that out, but that is all there is to be done. My favorite quote of all time is "It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees". Continue fighting, for they will never bring you down.
If I can endure for this minute
Whatever is happening to me,
No matter how heavy my heart is
Or how dark the moment be-
If I can remain calm and quiet,
With all the world crashing about me,
Secure in the knowledge that God loves me,
When everyone else seems to doubt me-
If I can but keep on believing
What I know in my heart to be true,
That darkness will fade with the morning
And that will pass away, too-
Then nothing in life can defeat me
For as long as the knowledge remains
I can suffer whatever is happening
For I know God will break all of the chains
That are binding me tight in the darkness
And trying to fill me with fear-
For there is no night without dawning
And I know my morning is near.
-Helen Steiller Rice, "This Too Shall Pass"
Friday, October 10, 2008
Ramblings: Major-Minor, Real-ity
so i wrote this a couple of weeks ago around 2:30 AM while taking a break from homework. i pretty much just took all the thoughts swirling around my head and wrote them down. i haven't changed anything since then, so my ideas are constantly interrupted by others, only for me to get back to my other points. but a lot of points that i start making sort of just fall to the wayside when i think of something else. kind of like my stories, eh? (note: although it says this was posted on October 10, 2008, that was actually when i wrote all of this. this was actually posted on monday, october 20th)
do you ever have those moments where you just know that the results of your actions are going to cause ripples in every area of your life? and it's not even a big thing, just something small like waving to someone or helping a friend. But you know that by doing this, somehow other things will be altered. You have some ambiguous idea of how, but you're not quite sure, so you just go along for the ride. This could be a post about self-awareness and how consciously ironic it is (postmodern ftw!), but it isn't. I'm not sure what this post is about. Everyday I wake up, and I take the same long shower, and go to the same room and put on essentially the same clothing and then go to the same school and the same classes where teachers teach the same thing they have taught year after year. After that is lunch, which is usually the same; finish up homework, go to a club meeting, walk around aimlessly waiting for something miraculous to happen, on good days go off campus... to eat at the same few fast food places around the high school. Then it's home, to the same tv to watch an episode of the daily show, then the colbert report, then eat a snack and up to check facebook, espn, engadget, cnn, popsci, and e-mail. Then onto homework, which usually ends in bitter frustration as I wonder when we ever learned this in class. Then perhaps a chat with someone on AIM, and then off to bed around 12:30 or 1. Every day, basically the same schedule. Only a few variables change, and is that what makes your life worth living? The hope that perhaps this day will be different than the next, maybe something good will happen; maybe you'll catch up with an old friend or get a good grade on a test (still waiting for that) or you'll get an extra dollar back in change for lunch, and suddenly you don't know what to do with all the excess cash. Why is it that such unimportant things are valued so highly by everyone? Why do we put so much effort and time into things if these unimportant things are what make life worth living?
When I was a sophomore, we watched a series of films called "The Great War" or something like that in World History. It was an 8-hour long documentary on World War I, and episodes 3-7 or so all detailed the deadliest battles. Seven-digit casualties would be thrown out by the narrator like the time of day. The battles that were skimmed over by the videos were the ones with less than 100,000 deaths. 100,000? How can this be? How many people have died in Iraq? In Vietnam? I'm not saying that it's ok for 4,000+ soldiers to be killed, indeed it's a great tragedy, but imagine that many dying every day. After those videos, especially the ones recounting battles with casualties of a million or more, I would walk out of the class in a daze, wondering how I can exist in the same world that this war was in. Why don't more people talk about this? It was as if my reality had come crashing down. Here I was, worrying about how I was going to do on my next quiz or trying to find time to spend time with my friends or rushing home to see a new episode of The Office, and not even 100 years before this there were battles that would wipe out the population of San Jose in a matter of weeks. Has society really changed this much? Was reality now different now than it was then? Was it OK for so many people to die because it was seen that by dying now they are saving more from dying later? Reality never changes, just your perception of it. I know I'm taking that saying out of Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, but it strikes me as something that bears repeating. reality does not change. History is not subjective, things happened, and the only subjective thing about it is how you perceive the information. Gravity was there before we knew about it. You cannot change reality, but so many factors (everything in your life) affect how your perceive the piece of reality given to you. That is the fundamental difference between your reality and actual reality. I guess you could say yours is virtual reality. Reality is a concrete, definite thing, with a finite size. Only that size is too large to fathom, so I guess it's infinite. But there is a definite reality. So what? Definite reality does not make anything, it only says if you're right or wrong. And right and wrong matter less than almost anything else. What if I were to tell you that there was no such thing as gravity, that there is no God, that calculators really have little pepole inside them working them? You probably would think I'm crazy and go on with your day. But what if everything I said is complete truth? It still wouldn't matter to you, because you don't believe it. Your life is not based on reality, it is based on your perception of reality. If you believe that gravity exists, then gravity might as well exist. It doesn't matter if it does or not, the fact is you believe it exists and in your reality it does. And no one's reality matters except yours. Have you ever been driving in your car and seen everyone on the highway and realized that every single one of them has as complex a life as you? And that everyone is going somewhere to do something, and have initiative and have an idea of what the world should be like. I've never understood that; if billions of people are always going around with a purpose of doing something in the hopes of bettering their lives, then why does the standard of living take so long to go up? You wouldn't ever do anything unless it bettered the life of you or your family or your friends or someone you don't know. Why would someone ever do anything that is purposefully backwards? The incentive is not there. Or is this just a game of give and take, where "life points" are only transferred? Then it would stand to reason that the best way to better life would be to add to the cumulative life point pool. This can be done by adding life points to places where there is none. Everyone started out with zero life points, and America has been the first to one thousand. At least that is what it is like in my perception of reality. Why do we even need concrete reality? By believing something, it becomes reality. Reality is really a wikipedia sort of operation. It is decided by the agreement of most people. This is how language is created, a certain sound is taken to mean a certain thing and it then becomes a part of every person's life. Reality has nothing to do with language, but laguage was made into reality by it's creation. And history actually is subjective, because people's reality influenced their behaviors, and their behaviors created the history. Which means that all of reality can be considered subjective, because its creation was dependent on the creator's reality. But then what really is reality? Dicitonary.com defines it as "something that exists independently of all other things and from which all other things derive." But nothing exists independently of everything else. Except for the very beginning, before there were people to perceive what reality really means and shape it into their own meaning. Which means that absolute reality is only created when no one is around to influence and shape it. So reality is the inverse of trees falling. Does this mean that true reality can no longer be created and it will always be corrupted by perception? If this is so, then it would appear that reality is much smaller than we thought. Reality would be everything that the big bang did, or everything that God made. But what if God and the big bang were just created to explain what happened around us? By that standard, nothing is reality. Everything is just the perception of what we see. But then what is that which we see? The reality of it (no pun intended) is that we will never know.
do you ever have those moments where you just know that the results of your actions are going to cause ripples in every area of your life? and it's not even a big thing, just something small like waving to someone or helping a friend. But you know that by doing this, somehow other things will be altered. You have some ambiguous idea of how, but you're not quite sure, so you just go along for the ride. This could be a post about self-awareness and how consciously ironic it is (postmodern ftw!), but it isn't. I'm not sure what this post is about. Everyday I wake up, and I take the same long shower, and go to the same room and put on essentially the same clothing and then go to the same school and the same classes where teachers teach the same thing they have taught year after year. After that is lunch, which is usually the same; finish up homework, go to a club meeting, walk around aimlessly waiting for something miraculous to happen, on good days go off campus... to eat at the same few fast food places around the high school. Then it's home, to the same tv to watch an episode of the daily show, then the colbert report, then eat a snack and up to check facebook, espn, engadget, cnn, popsci, and e-mail. Then onto homework, which usually ends in bitter frustration as I wonder when we ever learned this in class. Then perhaps a chat with someone on AIM, and then off to bed around 12:30 or 1. Every day, basically the same schedule. Only a few variables change, and is that what makes your life worth living? The hope that perhaps this day will be different than the next, maybe something good will happen; maybe you'll catch up with an old friend or get a good grade on a test (still waiting for that) or you'll get an extra dollar back in change for lunch, and suddenly you don't know what to do with all the excess cash. Why is it that such unimportant things are valued so highly by everyone? Why do we put so much effort and time into things if these unimportant things are what make life worth living?
When I was a sophomore, we watched a series of films called "The Great War" or something like that in World History. It was an 8-hour long documentary on World War I, and episodes 3-7 or so all detailed the deadliest battles. Seven-digit casualties would be thrown out by the narrator like the time of day. The battles that were skimmed over by the videos were the ones with less than 100,000 deaths. 100,000? How can this be? How many people have died in Iraq? In Vietnam? I'm not saying that it's ok for 4,000+ soldiers to be killed, indeed it's a great tragedy, but imagine that many dying every day. After those videos, especially the ones recounting battles with casualties of a million or more, I would walk out of the class in a daze, wondering how I can exist in the same world that this war was in. Why don't more people talk about this? It was as if my reality had come crashing down. Here I was, worrying about how I was going to do on my next quiz or trying to find time to spend time with my friends or rushing home to see a new episode of The Office, and not even 100 years before this there were battles that would wipe out the population of San Jose in a matter of weeks. Has society really changed this much? Was reality now different now than it was then? Was it OK for so many people to die because it was seen that by dying now they are saving more from dying later? Reality never changes, just your perception of it. I know I'm taking that saying out of Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, but it strikes me as something that bears repeating. reality does not change. History is not subjective, things happened, and the only subjective thing about it is how you perceive the information. Gravity was there before we knew about it. You cannot change reality, but so many factors (everything in your life) affect how your perceive the piece of reality given to you. That is the fundamental difference between your reality and actual reality. I guess you could say yours is virtual reality. Reality is a concrete, definite thing, with a finite size. Only that size is too large to fathom, so I guess it's infinite. But there is a definite reality. So what? Definite reality does not make anything, it only says if you're right or wrong. And right and wrong matter less than almost anything else. What if I were to tell you that there was no such thing as gravity, that there is no God, that calculators really have little pepole inside them working them? You probably would think I'm crazy and go on with your day. But what if everything I said is complete truth? It still wouldn't matter to you, because you don't believe it. Your life is not based on reality, it is based on your perception of reality. If you believe that gravity exists, then gravity might as well exist. It doesn't matter if it does or not, the fact is you believe it exists and in your reality it does. And no one's reality matters except yours. Have you ever been driving in your car and seen everyone on the highway and realized that every single one of them has as complex a life as you? And that everyone is going somewhere to do something, and have initiative and have an idea of what the world should be like. I've never understood that; if billions of people are always going around with a purpose of doing something in the hopes of bettering their lives, then why does the standard of living take so long to go up? You wouldn't ever do anything unless it bettered the life of you or your family or your friends or someone you don't know. Why would someone ever do anything that is purposefully backwards? The incentive is not there. Or is this just a game of give and take, where "life points" are only transferred? Then it would stand to reason that the best way to better life would be to add to the cumulative life point pool. This can be done by adding life points to places where there is none. Everyone started out with zero life points, and America has been the first to one thousand. At least that is what it is like in my perception of reality. Why do we even need concrete reality? By believing something, it becomes reality. Reality is really a wikipedia sort of operation. It is decided by the agreement of most people. This is how language is created, a certain sound is taken to mean a certain thing and it then becomes a part of every person's life. Reality has nothing to do with language, but laguage was made into reality by it's creation. And history actually is subjective, because people's reality influenced their behaviors, and their behaviors created the history. Which means that all of reality can be considered subjective, because its creation was dependent on the creator's reality. But then what really is reality? Dicitonary.com defines it as "something that exists independently of all other things and from which all other things derive." But nothing exists independently of everything else. Except for the very beginning, before there were people to perceive what reality really means and shape it into their own meaning. Which means that absolute reality is only created when no one is around to influence and shape it. So reality is the inverse of trees falling. Does this mean that true reality can no longer be created and it will always be corrupted by perception? If this is so, then it would appear that reality is much smaller than we thought. Reality would be everything that the big bang did, or everything that God made. But what if God and the big bang were just created to explain what happened around us? By that standard, nothing is reality. Everything is just the perception of what we see. But then what is that which we see? The reality of it (no pun intended) is that we will never know.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Why I Will Never Be Able to Own an iPod Nano
So I was going to write one huge blog about my dementia when it comes to music, and I spent about three hours writing it before I just decided to give up and write the whole story in smaller chunks (sorry Danny...) that are less boring to read . So here's the first part:
I think I listen to music differently than other people. A lot of my friends seem to believe that each song holds a story in its own, and after listening to a song you should be able to draw out a message. I believe this too, but I like to take it a step further. I believe that the entire album is one big epic, and each song is just one part of it. Now this is not always true, but I don't care. I'm still going to try to find an overarching theme. I'm not talking about concept albums; they are made with the direct purpose of telling a story over a multitude of songs. I'm talking about the reason an artist made a song, and why he put it before one song and after another. There has to be a reason why the order is in the arrangement that it is. Maybe the producer put it there because that's the order that would best sell cd's? But that still doesn't make sense to me, because you don't know how the songs sound until after you buy the album. And yet even with this, a lot of albums end up having the same type of song order. You usually start out with an intro song (this is not entirely true, and this is what the second "music post" is on), then two or three songs that seem to fit the mold that the first song set (again, second post), and then the "breakout single" from the album comes a little before the middle. Then a few songs after that that are usually more experimental (as in it doesn't seem to fit the mold that the first few songs fit), and then it starts winding down with either a last shout of excitement or a continuous slowdown, depending on the genre of music.
Now, I know that outline is completely generic and is probably wrong at least half the time, but that's ok with me. As my brother's senior quote states, "Never let a few facts stand in the way of a good story". I take that to heart with many of the things I say. Anyways, I believe that each song has a connotation to it, and probably all of you agree with me. At the end of each song, you are feeling a different emotion, whether it's excitement, heartbreak, or just relaxation. A good album to me will transition each emotion to the next, which is why I think the order of a cd matters a lot. I can't understand how people are able to have only about 50 songs, all of which are singles, on their mp3 players and just listen to them over and over again. I don't see how that can be fun. Maybe that is the point of music, to just relax and listen to the music and to not think so much about it. But I can't do that. Actually, that's a lie. I can do that, and I have done that, but not for very long. I don't want to just sit there and mindlessly listen, I want to figure out what is going on in the head of the artist when they wrote this. Why do The Shins have a tambourine come in at 0:55 of "Sleeping Lessons" and then never bring it back in? Why is the last minute of "Hold Me Down" by Motion City Soundtrack a synth piano melody when the instrument had not been played the entire album? Am I the only one who cares about this stuff?! Music is a medium for artists to express themselves, and so if they put something on a song, there must be something they are trying to convey. In concert band. there is always a legitimate reason as to why a part is in the piece. I think there is too for songs. Am I just crazy? Maybe artists do just add things because they sound cool. But I refuse to believe that, because I have to think that artists are people just like you and me, only they are more apt at putting their emotions and expressions into words and sounds. I wouldn't throw in a tamborine at the intro to a song (and an album) and then never put it back in for no reason, and I refuse to believe that an artist would too.
After dissecting a song, you have to put it back into the whole cd to really get a feel for what the artist is trying to say. This is perhaps the hardest thing to do, because you are essentially getting into the artist's head for his deepest, perhaps even subconscious, thoughts. Maybe he did just play a bunch of random songs and put them onto an album. But they have to be all connected, because he wrote all the songs at around the same time period, so they are all coming from the same viewpoint. If the lead singer goes through a tough breakup, even the happiest songs will have a taint of sadness, even if he doesn't realize it. I won't go into too much detail about that, and I'm sure a lot of you don't feel that way, but again, I'm ok with that. Anyways, song order matters a lot to me, because it provides an insight into that larger message that the artist is trying to convey. I think this is why I spend so much time on cd's that I give people.
It is well-documented (mostly by myself) that the cd I gave Ray-Young Tsao took me over 20 hours to make. Now I know that sounds ridiculous, but trust me, it isn't. It only took about 45 minutes to pick all the songs, but I then had to determine the connotation of each song and then decide what order they should go in so that the cd would flow. On the surface, my cd's are only about songs; below that is a journey that takes you through a spectrum of emotions (somewhat like Aladdin's magic carpet). I tried to stay relatively light with Ray's cd, because he is a jovial chap (ala Tejas). Anyways, I still decided to take him down one short path of seriousness, which I like to do with cd's. The song needs to be powerful, and it helps if it talks about something intense. You know, I just came to a realization. I think I don't care that much about lyrics because the tone of the music is much more important to me than what the singer says, at least on an album or my cd's. A song's connotation isn't usually brought about by what the singer says (although it often is indirectly, because the sound of the song usually revolves around the message of the lyrics). In my cd's, good lyrics are excellent, but how a song sounds is more important. I grew up on classical music, so that might be why I feel this way. And by the way, when I say "my cd's", I mean "the cd's that I make for other people", not "cd's that are in my possession". Just thought I'd clear that up. Anyways, back to Ray's cd. I brought in the sober moment by stringing together "Last Night" by Motion City Soundtrack to "Lions Roar" by The Hush Sound. This set the mood perfectly for "Hide and Seek" by Imogen Heap, as the apex of intensity on the cd. After that, I brought the mood back up rather abruptly with "The Electric Version" by The New Pornographers. The connotation of "Hide and Seek" is really an ending note, and I think it's better to pick the album up with a quick jerk rather than gradually bringing it back to speed. Ok, I can go over Ray's cd all night, but I'm just using it as an example. My point is, it can take so long to figure out exactly how one song should transition into another song. Even if Ray never figures out consciously that each song flows from one to another, hopefully he will like the album more because it just seems listen-able. There is a certain pride to be had in picking a random group of songs and arranging them into an order that is aesthetically pleasing. I guess it's just a gift. (oh modesty...)
Ok, so this post is a lot longer than I expected. But this is important stuff that needs to be said. I think it would be so much more pleasing to make my own music and put it into an order that conveys a message rather than take other people's songs and arrange them. Although doing the latter is like crack, so I don't know. But back to my original point, and the title of the post. I can't just sit there and listen to the same songs over and over again. I want the artist's entire album and figure out how each song relates to the others. There is also the reason of me being unable to have a favorite song for more than a few weeks, but that is for another day. I need to be able to get inside an artist's head and figure them out. More about music in the coming weeks.
Notes: After rereading this post, I need to amend a few things:
1) I do care about lyrics, but not when I am making a cd for someone. Lyrics are really important when I'm analyzing a song by itself, which I do before I piece the whole cd together, but when I'm making a cd for someone else, I don't really take them into account. Although at the same time, perhaps they are indirectly important because I like a song more because it has good lyrics and therefore am more inclined to put it in a cd. But I digress.
2) The way I talked about Ray's cd sounded like I spent 19 hours moving songs around on a playlist. I am taking into account time that I put the playlist on my iPod and then listened to it to figure out if something is missing. And I made a lot of changes to the playlist, at least 25, so I don't know if saying that it took 45 minutes to pick the songs is really true (see: my brother's senior quote).
3) To all the people i've made cd's for in the past (most notably: erica chan, aaron garg, vera lee), i know those cd's weren't all that good (with exception to some of aaron's classical cd's... those were incredible). I didn't really have a large collection of music when I was making you those, and none of the songs were really that good. But, I thought they were good when I made them, but my musical tastes are constantly changing (more on that on another post). So I'll probably think the cd I made Ray and the one I just made Austin about three days ago (note: writing this way after I posted the original) weren't very good either in about 3 months. But seriously guys, sorry for the bad cd's.
I think I listen to music differently than other people. A lot of my friends seem to believe that each song holds a story in its own, and after listening to a song you should be able to draw out a message. I believe this too, but I like to take it a step further. I believe that the entire album is one big epic, and each song is just one part of it. Now this is not always true, but I don't care. I'm still going to try to find an overarching theme. I'm not talking about concept albums; they are made with the direct purpose of telling a story over a multitude of songs. I'm talking about the reason an artist made a song, and why he put it before one song and after another. There has to be a reason why the order is in the arrangement that it is. Maybe the producer put it there because that's the order that would best sell cd's? But that still doesn't make sense to me, because you don't know how the songs sound until after you buy the album. And yet even with this, a lot of albums end up having the same type of song order. You usually start out with an intro song (this is not entirely true, and this is what the second "music post" is on), then two or three songs that seem to fit the mold that the first song set (again, second post), and then the "breakout single" from the album comes a little before the middle. Then a few songs after that that are usually more experimental (as in it doesn't seem to fit the mold that the first few songs fit), and then it starts winding down with either a last shout of excitement or a continuous slowdown, depending on the genre of music.
Now, I know that outline is completely generic and is probably wrong at least half the time, but that's ok with me. As my brother's senior quote states, "Never let a few facts stand in the way of a good story". I take that to heart with many of the things I say. Anyways, I believe that each song has a connotation to it, and probably all of you agree with me. At the end of each song, you are feeling a different emotion, whether it's excitement, heartbreak, or just relaxation. A good album to me will transition each emotion to the next, which is why I think the order of a cd matters a lot. I can't understand how people are able to have only about 50 songs, all of which are singles, on their mp3 players and just listen to them over and over again. I don't see how that can be fun. Maybe that is the point of music, to just relax and listen to the music and to not think so much about it. But I can't do that. Actually, that's a lie. I can do that, and I have done that, but not for very long. I don't want to just sit there and mindlessly listen, I want to figure out what is going on in the head of the artist when they wrote this. Why do The Shins have a tambourine come in at 0:55 of "Sleeping Lessons" and then never bring it back in? Why is the last minute of "Hold Me Down" by Motion City Soundtrack a synth piano melody when the instrument had not been played the entire album? Am I the only one who cares about this stuff?! Music is a medium for artists to express themselves, and so if they put something on a song, there must be something they are trying to convey. In concert band. there is always a legitimate reason as to why a part is in the piece. I think there is too for songs. Am I just crazy? Maybe artists do just add things because they sound cool. But I refuse to believe that, because I have to think that artists are people just like you and me, only they are more apt at putting their emotions and expressions into words and sounds. I wouldn't throw in a tamborine at the intro to a song (and an album) and then never put it back in for no reason, and I refuse to believe that an artist would too.
After dissecting a song, you have to put it back into the whole cd to really get a feel for what the artist is trying to say. This is perhaps the hardest thing to do, because you are essentially getting into the artist's head for his deepest, perhaps even subconscious, thoughts. Maybe he did just play a bunch of random songs and put them onto an album. But they have to be all connected, because he wrote all the songs at around the same time period, so they are all coming from the same viewpoint. If the lead singer goes through a tough breakup, even the happiest songs will have a taint of sadness, even if he doesn't realize it. I won't go into too much detail about that, and I'm sure a lot of you don't feel that way, but again, I'm ok with that. Anyways, song order matters a lot to me, because it provides an insight into that larger message that the artist is trying to convey. I think this is why I spend so much time on cd's that I give people.
It is well-documented (mostly by myself) that the cd I gave Ray-Young Tsao took me over 20 hours to make. Now I know that sounds ridiculous, but trust me, it isn't. It only took about 45 minutes to pick all the songs, but I then had to determine the connotation of each song and then decide what order they should go in so that the cd would flow. On the surface, my cd's are only about songs; below that is a journey that takes you through a spectrum of emotions (somewhat like Aladdin's magic carpet). I tried to stay relatively light with Ray's cd, because he is a jovial chap (ala Tejas). Anyways, I still decided to take him down one short path of seriousness, which I like to do with cd's. The song needs to be powerful, and it helps if it talks about something intense. You know, I just came to a realization. I think I don't care that much about lyrics because the tone of the music is much more important to me than what the singer says, at least on an album or my cd's. A song's connotation isn't usually brought about by what the singer says (although it often is indirectly, because the sound of the song usually revolves around the message of the lyrics). In my cd's, good lyrics are excellent, but how a song sounds is more important. I grew up on classical music, so that might be why I feel this way. And by the way, when I say "my cd's", I mean "the cd's that I make for other people", not "cd's that are in my possession". Just thought I'd clear that up. Anyways, back to Ray's cd. I brought in the sober moment by stringing together "Last Night" by Motion City Soundtrack to "Lions Roar" by The Hush Sound. This set the mood perfectly for "Hide and Seek" by Imogen Heap, as the apex of intensity on the cd. After that, I brought the mood back up rather abruptly with "The Electric Version" by The New Pornographers. The connotation of "Hide and Seek" is really an ending note, and I think it's better to pick the album up with a quick jerk rather than gradually bringing it back to speed. Ok, I can go over Ray's cd all night, but I'm just using it as an example. My point is, it can take so long to figure out exactly how one song should transition into another song. Even if Ray never figures out consciously that each song flows from one to another, hopefully he will like the album more because it just seems listen-able. There is a certain pride to be had in picking a random group of songs and arranging them into an order that is aesthetically pleasing. I guess it's just a gift. (oh modesty...)
Ok, so this post is a lot longer than I expected. But this is important stuff that needs to be said. I think it would be so much more pleasing to make my own music and put it into an order that conveys a message rather than take other people's songs and arrange them. Although doing the latter is like crack, so I don't know. But back to my original point, and the title of the post. I can't just sit there and listen to the same songs over and over again. I want the artist's entire album and figure out how each song relates to the others. There is also the reason of me being unable to have a favorite song for more than a few weeks, but that is for another day. I need to be able to get inside an artist's head and figure them out. More about music in the coming weeks.
Notes: After rereading this post, I need to amend a few things:
1) I do care about lyrics, but not when I am making a cd for someone. Lyrics are really important when I'm analyzing a song by itself, which I do before I piece the whole cd together, but when I'm making a cd for someone else, I don't really take them into account. Although at the same time, perhaps they are indirectly important because I like a song more because it has good lyrics and therefore am more inclined to put it in a cd. But I digress.
2) The way I talked about Ray's cd sounded like I spent 19 hours moving songs around on a playlist. I am taking into account time that I put the playlist on my iPod and then listened to it to figure out if something is missing. And I made a lot of changes to the playlist, at least 25, so I don't know if saying that it took 45 minutes to pick the songs is really true (see: my brother's senior quote).
3) To all the people i've made cd's for in the past (most notably: erica chan, aaron garg, vera lee), i know those cd's weren't all that good (with exception to some of aaron's classical cd's... those were incredible). I didn't really have a large collection of music when I was making you those, and none of the songs were really that good. But, I thought they were good when I made them, but my musical tastes are constantly changing (more on that on another post). So I'll probably think the cd I made Ray and the one I just made Austin about three days ago (note: writing this way after I posted the original) weren't very good either in about 3 months. But seriously guys, sorry for the bad cd's.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Senior Year Goals
Ok, this one is pretty self-explanatory. After watching "How to Achieve Your Childhood Dreams " by Dr. Randy Pausch (the guy who wrote "The Last Lecture") during Youth Group last Sunday, I've decided that I'm going to make some goals for myself to accomplish by the end of Senior Year. Some of them seem random, and that's because they are. I find that it is sometimes easiest to achieve abstract levels when you're reaching for concrete goals. So here is the list, subject to change, and I will continually update it throughout the year with other goals or completion of goals. I might re-post it later so that it stays on the first page
My Goals (in no particular order and to be achieved before graduation):
1) Get at least a 90% on a calc quiz/test
2) Ace a chem quiz/test (subject to change depending on how hard the quizzes get)
3) Play a high C on mellophone
4) Get into college
5) Begin learning how to play guitar
6) Ride a roller coaster
7) Get into County Honor Band on French Horn
8) Compose an awesome song (might be done automatically with the music theory final)
9) Read at least three Lit books in a row without using Sparknotes
10) Start participating actively in online forums
11) Ask a girl to Senior Prom
12) Tell my Mr. Zarco jokes in front of Mr. Zarco (some of you know what I'm talking about)
13) Register to vote
15) Have an incredible dream
16) Ditch a class
17) Watch all episodes of Dragonball
so that's the list right now, but I'll probably end up adding stuff when I remember it and putting updates when I reach a goal. If you want to suggest any goals just leave a comment.
UPDATES
3) Play a high C on mellophone: Complete! I hit it today during sectionals, and then proceeded to hit it again. And it was an actual note, not just a squeak or something. One down... (10/8/08)
9) Read at least three Lit books in a row without sparknotes: Finished, actually a long time ago. I read The Odyssey, Oedipus Rex/ Antigone (I'm going to count that as one book since they're pretty short) and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, all done through classic reading and taking notes. (12/13/08)
7) Get into County Honor Band on French Horn: Success! And I got third chair! This goal was one of farther-reaching goals I set for myself, and I really did it to motivate me to practice. I didn't really expect to got in, but thankfully I had a good audition and not too many people tried out. Now, I need to learn the rest of the solo so I can play it for my church... (12/13/08)
5) A couple of weeks ago, I had my first guitar lesson wih Danny Lulu, and so i'm about halfway to becoming a virtuoso. I can play about two-thirds of the opening chord progression of Dispatch"s "Questioned Apocalypse". Jimi, here I come. (3/2/09)
10) Well, I started a youtube account, and I've commented on a few videos (I even got into a discussion about Bush's prior knowledge [or lack therreof] of 9/11 before it happened... sweet!]), so I'm going to go ahead and cross this one off the list. Side note: I have had my youtube account for a few days less than 3 months, and I am at 1,680 views. Which is about 500 a month. That's probably not good. (3/2/09)
1) DONE! It took me approximately 22 weeks of taking calc to get at least a 90% on a quiz or test, and finally, the day has arrived. I got a 51.5/57 on the chapter 9 test, which is a 90.35%. Look, I didn't sy it had to be a lot above 90%... anyways, this semester I am doing a lot better, which is really frustrating because I'm really not trying. I've gotten A B+ and an A- on our two tests and a B+ on our one quiz. I would have an A- in the class on the six weeks, except that my homework grade is about a 70%, so i'll probably have a B. But if I had those test/quiz scores last semester, I would have an A- because I had like a 97% in homework last semester. But I'm not going to complain. Now the only thing I want to do in that class is make 3-D graphs on my TI-89 (haha 83s and 84s, maybe if you got a real calculator you could do the same...muahaha)... I've already spent the last 2-3 weeks doing this, and so far I've made Zorro's trademark slash "z" thing, a waterfall, a cabbage field, and eyebrows. More to come on the 3-D graphs most definitely. (3/10/09)
My Goals (in no particular order and to be achieved before graduation):
1) Get at least a 90% on a calc quiz/test
2) Ace a chem quiz/test (subject to change depending on how hard the quizzes get)
3) Play a high C on mellophone
4) Get into college
5) Begin learning how to play guitar
6) Ride a roller coaster
7) Get into County Honor Band on French Horn
8) Compose an awesome song (might be done automatically with the music theory final)
9) Read at least three Lit books in a row without using Sparknotes
10) Start participating actively in online forums
11) Ask a girl to Senior Prom
12) Tell my Mr. Zarco jokes in front of Mr. Zarco (some of you know what I'm talking about)
13) Register to vote
15) Have an incredible dream
16) Ditch a class
17) Watch all episodes of Dragonball
so that's the list right now, but I'll probably end up adding stuff when I remember it and putting updates when I reach a goal. If you want to suggest any goals just leave a comment.
UPDATES
3) Play a high C on mellophone: Complete! I hit it today during sectionals, and then proceeded to hit it again. And it was an actual note, not just a squeak or something. One down... (10/8/08)
9) Read at least three Lit books in a row without sparknotes: Finished, actually a long time ago. I read The Odyssey, Oedipus Rex/ Antigone (I'm going to count that as one book since they're pretty short) and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, all done through classic reading and taking notes. (12/13/08)
7) Get into County Honor Band on French Horn: Success! And I got third chair! This goal was one of farther-reaching goals I set for myself, and I really did it to motivate me to practice. I didn't really expect to got in, but thankfully I had a good audition and not too many people tried out. Now, I need to learn the rest of the solo so I can play it for my church... (12/13/08)
5) A couple of weeks ago, I had my first guitar lesson wih Danny Lulu, and so i'm about halfway to becoming a virtuoso. I can play about two-thirds of the opening chord progression of Dispatch"s "Questioned Apocalypse". Jimi, here I come. (3/2/09)
10) Well, I started a youtube account, and I've commented on a few videos (I even got into a discussion about Bush's prior knowledge [or lack therreof] of 9/11 before it happened... sweet!]), so I'm going to go ahead and cross this one off the list. Side note: I have had my youtube account for a few days less than 3 months, and I am at 1,680 views. Which is about 500 a month. That's probably not good. (3/2/09)
1) DONE! It took me approximately 22 weeks of taking calc to get at least a 90% on a quiz or test, and finally, the day has arrived. I got a 51.5/57 on the chapter 9 test, which is a 90.35%. Look, I didn't sy it had to be a lot above 90%... anyways, this semester I am doing a lot better, which is really frustrating because I'm really not trying. I've gotten A B+ and an A- on our two tests and a B+ on our one quiz. I would have an A- in the class on the six weeks, except that my homework grade is about a 70%, so i'll probably have a B. But if I had those test/quiz scores last semester, I would have an A- because I had like a 97% in homework last semester. But I'm not going to complain. Now the only thing I want to do in that class is make 3-D graphs on my TI-89 (haha 83s and 84s, maybe if you got a real calculator you could do the same...muahaha)... I've already spent the last 2-3 weeks doing this, and so far I've made Zorro's trademark slash "z" thing, a waterfall, a cabbage field, and eyebrows. More to come on the 3-D graphs most definitely. (3/10/09)
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Cultured Indeed
So I guess it's time to update... senior year has definitely been taking up a lot more time than I expected, and I haven't really even gotten to college apps or studying for the SAT II in October. But those will wait until at least tomorrow. I've had a number of things in my mind that I've wanted to talk about, but they're all pretty long. Perhaps tomorrow? Perhaps the weekend? Perhaps later tonight when I get bored of doing homework? Only time will tell. But to tide you over (since so many of you depend on this blog to make your day), I will put up a paragraph that I wrote in Literature after an Odyssey quiz a few weeks ago. Some background: After staying up reading The Odyssey for four hours late last Thursday, I came into Lit expecting to ace the reading quiz, only to fail miserably. As i dishearteningly filled in guesses to questions that I should have known, but could not remember, Mrs. Head told the class that after finishing we will be writing a personal essay, which is like a practice college essay. Here is how I write after giving up on school.
Prompt: Describe three aspects that define you.
My 3: intelligent, cultured, faith (this paragraph is just on "cultured")
I like to think of myself as a cultured man. Politics, the economy, satire; all are things I have become acquainted with. I like wry humor with my lox bagel, thank you very much. A touch of sarcasm with the world news is greatly appreciated. "As the man sits yonder, sifting through the memories of the life he once led, but now follows, a golden eagle flies overhead, but to no unsuspecting eye. 'Tis indeed the life of the modern farmer." True, True. But alas, often times my wit abruptly comes to a close when those near me fail to comprehend it. It is in these times I come to see myself as above my peers, and yet oddly below them, for they are not weighed down by the troubling thoughts of reality. A paradox indeed. But fear not, for in a scant 300 days I shall find myself in a university, the gated community of education. The place where books are written, not read. Where discoveries are made, not modeled. I shall suckle the teat of wisdom, waiting for the milk of knowledge to refresh my parched throat of curiosity. For it is here that I receive infinite amounts of time to dedicate towards such paramounts as writing awkwardly vivid metaphors and conceiving made-up quotes.
Prompt: Describe three aspects that define you.
My 3: intelligent, cultured, faith (this paragraph is just on "cultured")
I like to think of myself as a cultured man. Politics, the economy, satire; all are things I have become acquainted with. I like wry humor with my lox bagel, thank you very much. A touch of sarcasm with the world news is greatly appreciated. "As the man sits yonder, sifting through the memories of the life he once led, but now follows, a golden eagle flies overhead, but to no unsuspecting eye. 'Tis indeed the life of the modern farmer." True, True. But alas, often times my wit abruptly comes to a close when those near me fail to comprehend it. It is in these times I come to see myself as above my peers, and yet oddly below them, for they are not weighed down by the troubling thoughts of reality. A paradox indeed. But fear not, for in a scant 300 days I shall find myself in a university, the gated community of education. The place where books are written, not read. Where discoveries are made, not modeled. I shall suckle the teat of wisdom, waiting for the milk of knowledge to refresh my parched throat of curiosity. For it is here that I receive infinite amounts of time to dedicate towards such paramounts as writing awkwardly vivid metaphors and conceiving made-up quotes.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Oba-a-a-ma and His Sheeple; or, The Grass is Always Greener
Hooray for the first post! Yaaay. Ok, time to do some serious writing down of thoughts while i don't do homework. Senior year, i blame you. Anyways, so how many people know that the democratic national convention is going on today? And tomorrow? I'm sure at least four of you do (out of zero readers... don't ask me how that works). As we all know (in this case, we = me until i tell people that i wrote this), Barack Obama is the democratic nominee for president. But how did he get to be that? He was elected to the Senate in 2004, so does that really give him enough time to figure out how to lead the free world? Many people (at this moment, 42% of the voting population) seem to think so. And exactly what makes everybody love him? Has this school always been ridiculously democratic (party) and i just haven't been here long enough to know that? I know most people don't like/ hate/ plan for the glorious demise of the Bush Administration, but I would have thought that would just increase the dislike of McCain. Just because someone really hates pepsi dosn't mean they swear by Coca-Cola (although maybe they would if they were running for president, so I don't know). But whenever I ask people why they like Obama, they don't say that it's because they dislike McCain so much that they would vote to keep him out of office. They don't say it's because they're part of the Democratic Party and they're just voting for their party leader. Considering about 85% of the school will be under 18 at voting time, and probably only about 50% of those 15% will be registered, and only about 75% of those people will actually vote, we are looking at a school-wide voting population of what, like 50 kids? I didn't do the math, so sorry if that's wrong. But it seems that everyone who is crazy about Obama is underage, and most aren't even self-proclaimed democrats. It all has to do with this revolutionary idea. What is it called again? Oh yea.
Ok, change. Sweet. Change. What does that mean? Who knows. Change. Just saying makes me want to get up and go start a rally for Obama. Well, not really. But for some people I guess it does. What is it with young people and change? is the present really that bad? Haha I'm listening to the song "Belong" by Remy Zero and right as I wrote that the word "change" was sung. Coincidence? Well, yes, but it's still pretty cool (but the whole line is "all these things I hoped would never change", so not really at all. One day, I'll have a profound coincidence). Anyways, back to change. Why do the youth love it so much? Is it just the embodiment of our culture, the thought that it is our place in the world to right every wrong (also: to write every wrong. Foreshadowing for "'Don't Taze Me Bro!': How to Invigorate Millions of Americans Without Leaving Your Computer"), to go out and find injustices and bring them to justice (for lack of a better word)? Is it that people, especially young people, will always believe that there is something better around the corner, and that if the world can just struggle through the present time then they will be rewarded? If you don't think this applies to you, then think about what Heaven is. I'll wait to let that sink in. ...... ok. Apparently in that sense, the entire world is the Bush Administration and death would be January 21, 2009. Hahaha I guess that would mean Obama is Jesus. But back to my point. We are brainwashed as children into believing that change is almost always a good thing, because no one can be perfect and change will always bring someone closer to perfection (math analogy: life is an Tan^-1 graph, and perfection is the asymptotes. The more changes you make (the higher the number), the closer you will be to perfection. But perfection can never be reached! [guess who reviewed trig today?]) Ok, maybe that last statement was a little extreme, but I often feel like I have to make hard-lined statements these days, but I don't really have any. Speaking of "hard-lined", let's talk about Obama's platform. Or lack thereof. Maybe it's better now, but most people I ask have no idea how Obama feels on most issues, except that he's going to change them. Case-in-point: Sandeep last year.
Sandeep: I'm definitely for Obama. We gotta change politics and get Bush out!
Me: Sandeep, if Obama was elected president, what would he change?
Sandeep: Politics!
Me: .... Ok, well how would he do that?
Sandeep: Uhhh... I don't know, but he will.
Me: What is his plan for the economy?
Sandeep: ...
Me: What about for developing alternative energy?
Sandeep: ...
Stephen Lee: *laughs*
I know, people, that Obama now has plans for these things. But do you know them? Do you really care about how Obama is going to make the economy better? Or do you just care that he is going to change it into a better economy? Think about it.
That comes to another point: Since when has becoming a presidential supporter become such a bandwagon activity? Is it really that exhilarating to have Obama stickers on you facebook profile? I guess people are just really excited about Obama? But I still feel like I'm missing some link in the chain that would make everything sensible. At least some people feel the same way that I do, but I don't want to reveal names due to potential political sensitivity (you know who you are). But it seems the overwhelming consensus is that being an Obama supporter is the right thing to do, because it means you are taking a stand against all the bad things the Bush Administration has been doing. It has now become cool to be an Obama follower. Which really means it is uncool, because so many people are doing it. You should want to be someone who goes against the crowd (which is now focused on doing everything non-mainstream), because then you're doing something that no one else is doing, which is considered cool. Become anti-non-mainstream, the new sign of coolness! Now that's change I can believe in.
So, what have we learned? I'll tell you. Not much. I'll write this, and people will read it, but will it really change any one's opinions? If anything, it'll make people start researching Obama more. Perhaps the greatest tragedy for McCain is the ridiculous amount of media coverage given to Obama (in this instance, I consider myself part of the media... I love subjective words). Or perhaps it's the fact that he's like 150. Or that he is trying to succeed a universally hated President with whom he shares many views. Or that he mixes up words a lot. Or that many of his policies make no sense at all (I'm looking at you, gas tax holiday). For whatever reason, most people seem to not like him. And yet, he's tied with Obama in the polls. How is the even possible? Can the Midwest seriously be that racist? (Did that cross a line? Sorry, all you Midwestern readers [note: in the future I expect this to be read by everyone in the world, so I might as well start planning for it now{side note: can Midwestern people even read? Oops, another line}]) I guess when it comes down to it, an old white protestant man is all the change we are ready for.
And for many of you that support Obama because you agree with his policies, not because he represents change, this article isn't intended for you, so sorry if this offended you. Although at least a few of you who think that you do probably don't, so maybe think a little more about why you support Obama.
Also, I don't support McCain. Sorry if you guys thought that. I just watched the South Park where the voting for the new school mascot came down to a race between a Giant Douche and a Turd Sandwich, and Stan kind of represents my view when he says "I just don't see the point in voting if you have to choose between a giant douche and a turd sandwich". Although I don't actually feel this way about the candidates. Just about the not really liking either of them. Oh well. It doesn't matter. How are you supposed to end these? Like this I guess.
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