The Daily Adventures of Mercat

It was much better than I anticipated. I remember seeing a preview last year and thinking "man, those costumes look like shit." So I had low expectations. And the costumes did bother me, a little, not not to the extent they did last time I saw them, which must have been pre- postproduction. (...Production?)

Anyway, I spent way too long thinking, "Who is that actor, is that Mac?" and finally I had to whip out imdb and I realized no, omg, it's fucking Bootstrap Bill. Skarrrrrrsgarrrrrrrd

Fabulous.

Although the writing on that felt kind of weird to me, like they just kind of jammed his character and the younger girl (intern? family? wtf?) in there to provide comic relief and insight to the mythology. They didn't really do great justice to Natalie Portman's role, either, I feel... I mean, yes, this is a movie about Thor. But these are the Earthlings (feels weird to say that) and they were kind of... too much relegated to side-story? Idk.

The costumes still bother me, btw. The "Vikings" at least. (Viking gods? I really don't know what to call them.)

Although I do like how they dealt with them being "gods", because, let's face it, that really bothered me and admittedly I have never read the comics, but I could just not wrap my head around why the fuck a god was hanging out with mutated and superpowered humans.

Liked the nod to Stark, I laughed my ass off. And the note to Banner, nice touch. Felt odd to me they left out Captain America, though-- although maybe I just missed it.

Mad props to Chris Helmsworth, who gave much more depth to a character than I expected, and made him look noble in the process (Thor, that is). Loved the whole "vikings clearly not in the right time period and not knowing how to deal with modern society" issues (the cup bit, the horse bit, no pun intended).

Did not really like how they treated Loki. He is a trickster god, is he not? Chaos for the sake of chaos and trickery for fun? His jealousy was 1) not ragey enough, 2) not rationed well (blame the writers? idk), and 3) just out of place at any rate. That bothered me.

Also, interesting to see, despite the fact that magic alien Vikings had asians (Japanese?) and blacks, women are still relegated to a lesser class . Ironic that these are then "gods". MODERN ANALYSIS, I HAS IT. (In fact, going by numbers alone it seems the visible women might have been better off on Earth than in Asgard-- here we had two [I'm guessing] astrophysicists, and Asgard had one woman fighter and Odin's wife, and then a bunch of pretty women fawning over the victors at the end. Although I also did just realize I don't think there was a single visible female agent in all of SHIELD's shenanigans, either.)

Also, LOVED Stan Lee's bit in this one. So awesome.

Rainbow Bridge, fucking high-tension foot thick labradorite shit? FUCKING LOVED THAT. Can I have that as a real life design material? PLEASE?! And the Futurist buildings on Asgard were neat for the most part. Stiiiiiill super hate their fashion sense, though. (Seriously though, what was that labradorite stuff? I hope they had some mad set for the close-ups and it wasn't all CGI, because it was BITCHIN'.)

Um, and, yeah, at least one scene with a fucking eight-legged horse goddamn fuck yes Viking mythology! No ravens though, I was sad.



AND OH MY GOD I SAW THE FIRST FULL-LENGTH TRAILER FOR COWBOYS VS. ALIENS FUUUCCCKKK YEESSSSSSS I AM SO EXCITED NOW. IT LOOKS AMAZING. I KEEP FORGETTING HOW MANY AMAZING PEOPLE ARE IN IT. DANIEL CRAIG AND HARRISON FORD OBVIOUSLY BUT ALSO OLIVIA WILDE AND SAM ROCKWELL AND DIRECTED BY JON FAVREAU AND OMG. CAN'T. WAIT.

(Also, I know even though Favreau is done with Iron Man stuff-- sadface-- the fact that Kenneth Branagh did Thor-- love him, ever since I saw his Hamlet-- and Joss Fucking Whedon is doing the Avengers, and I finally saw the newer Hulk and it was not bad by any means, and Thor surpassed my expectations so I have a little higher hopes for Captain America, and I kind of want Wolverine to be in the Avengers even though I don't think that's happening, oh my god, I kind of love the whole Avengers thing now. Can you imagine sitting down for a marathon of Hulk and Iron Man and Iron Man 2 and maybe Wolverine and Thor and Captain America and FUCK YES. Damn.)

Also-also it was really nice to just get out of the house after all the earlier shit and hang out with Johnny. And do some Waffle House philosophizing also, always good. (Not to mention always being our own MST3K...) Trading shockingly relevatory gossip back and forth (on both ends! he hadn't heard Downie was married and I... got other stories I cannot pass on, sorry... I'm not even supposed to know, and admittedly I'm a little sad my other friend didn't think he could come to me? oh well, I'm over it, I'm more happy for him than upset at all). BUT YES. Also found out he's been a redditor for a while and I am admittedly slipping into its grip. For about the past month or so... Don't even know how I ended up there initially. But. Time marches on.

THIS IS A LARGE POST, I AM WARNING YOU.

HOLY SHIT I SUCK AT POSTING. This thing has been sitting on my desktop for a month and a half, christ, shame on me. Anyway. I'm trying to make better habits for myself... Some are getting better (I keep a real schedule on my ipod! I'm under 100 firefox tabs consistently!) and some not (I don't check my calendar, I forget things, I haven't organized many piles of files on my new computer... from a year ago...)

Shia says Indy V will be crazy. idk what to think. I'm excited but hesitant at the same time? Eeengh. Like I said after Indy IV, I mean, at least they can't do that one anymore. (Also, I told you so. Also-also, I am kind of sick of hearing about your stereotypical MacGuffins: the spear of Longinus, Noah's Ark, all that stuff.) GO TO HAWAII, PLEEEEASE

But, uuuuhhh, if Spielberg pitched a script, I'm guessing this is happening. So... yay?

...I'm depressed that that last sentence has a question mark attached to it. :(

HOLY SHIT YOU KNOW WHAT'S DEPRESSING?! WHY ON EARTH IS THIS A MOVIE. WHO ON EARTH THOUGHT THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA. SHANE VAN DYKE WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU ATTACHED TO THIS, YOU WERE AWESOME ON DIAGNOSIS MURDER AND NOW YOU ARE VERY NOT-AWESOME. AUGH.





Um...yes.

Also--ADORABLE KITTANZ:




While we're doing videos, this time-lapse-experiment-turned-art-video is absolutely fantastic:

ANTS in my scanner > a five years time-lapse! from françois vautier on Vimeo.

I hope this is just some lawyers having fun, and were not actually hired over legitimate offense.

I didn't even know they had finished the script for this, shit. Three months away was apparently a COMPLETE NEWS ISOLATION, much moreso than usual. (Nobody famous died.)

This movie looks awesome! That hat looks awful. (Short crown + extra-wide brim = grossnasty.)

Ghostbusters/AC/DC mashup:




Lady Gaga kidnaps Comissioner Gordon. Guys, I was about to say "I want to live in that world", and then, you know, I remembered that Lady Gaga is a real person and kicks major ass.

A good essay on Iron Man 2, which I am still excited about. The awesome thing about disappearing from the world for three months to memorize a metric assload of numbers until you've lost 15 pounds is that, when you get back, all the movies you just watched in theatres (and loved) are about to come out on dvd. Fuck. Yeah.

Some awesome shots from the filming of Star Wars.

So, "mad science", you say?!



That is the kind of awesome shit I'd like to do with my life. (I must say, though, that the closest I've ever come was destroying an antique rusted oven with a sledgehammer. Also fun, except for the part where the paint chips were popping off the bent metal everywhere...)

WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT HOLY CRAPCAKES. NIGHTMARES. NIGHTMARES BEYOND BELIEF.

Jesus, it's about time! They better make these. Not that I'm planning to buy any, but, yeah...

Oh, James Cameron. I thought I couldn't hate Avatar any more, but I was wrong. You think you're God's gift to cinematography when really it sounds like you're just a rich bully. I kind of want to go see Pirahna 3D, even if I hate it, just to fucking spite you. Goddamn.

BUT THE GOOD NEWS? Rick Moranis may come out of retirement for Ghostbusters 3. HELL. FUCKING. YES. As long as this shit is better than the game (a bit repetitive story-wise, in relation to the movies). Also, I thought we were already clear that Oscar is Venkman's? There's some banter toward the beginning of the second one that that is what I took away from it.

OH HEY THERE BLACKBEARD. Why the fuck don't you have cannon fuses in your beard?! Jesus, the man should look MUCH more epic than that. For god's sake his body circled his ship seven times before sinking after he was beheaded! (Fuck yeah pirate lore.)

Chewie: not nearly as adorable as Winnie. But still hilariously adorable.

Here! Have a picture of Viggo the Carpathian.

Okay, now, look. I am all about crazy costumes but I don't even know what's going on here.



So adorable.

If the world is making you feel weary (although I don't see how that's possible after all those adorable kitties), I prescribe this.

Next video: An apparently sanctioned-by-Lucas video about the dumping of Jabba's cargo. With a creepy animation of Han Solo. (BUT I SAW THAT RAIDERS REFERENCE. I SAW IT.)

...Definitely thought it was going to be something like River Tam in the box though, the shape was eerily similar.

Heheheh kitty parkour.

HOLY SHITBALLS this woman has completely missed the point of feminism. Oh my god this article is rage-inducing. OH. MY. GOD.

Good news, videogamers! Playing video games enhances decision-making skills. That is, it enhances your ability to make choices faster.


Oh! An antibiotic-resistant superbug. Awesome. This may be our downfall. However, if you're worried about the apocalypse, I just thought you'd like to know that science seems sometimes straight-up fictional. I know a lot of zombie movies/novels/etc. lately have been leaning on diseases like ebola, mad cow disease, or other things to explain the basis for the disease. So here's a crazy fact: mad cow disease causes cattle's eyes to glow. WTF.

Rechargeable cars are less hurtful to the environment than gas, even if charged using "dirty fuel". And it's crazy, if it could charge using renewable sources--solar, wind, etc.--it's FORTY PERCENT cleaner than a gas-using car. Holy shit. Why is the world so resistant to changing how we use our resources? :(

(Answer: laziness, greed, but it still pisses me the fuck off.)

I read an article the other day about how an old solar panel from the White House was rediscovered, and some students, led by Bill McKibben, took it to the White House to see if they would take it back as a symbol of good faith and an attempt to move conservation forward in the eye of current US politics. Some of the statistics were incredibly impressive--like the fact that seed sales increased by 30% the year Michelle Obama was promoting her White House garden. But the kids were taken into a "war room" and basically told no. The whole thing made me so sad, particularly because I remember McKibben speaking to my freshman class on his book we all read, and because we were stuck in a hot, sweaty gym with a rather heavy book (as in, the material, not the book itself), he kind of got ignored by most people. And trying to sort out the fifty interested students in a room of 1000 or however many it was is not really a simple task. Anyway. The whole thing just makes me depressed for the state of our politics. I don't understand why people want to spend so much money on stuff and on keeping things the way they are instead of helping people who need help, helping the WORLD that needs help. I don't know. Maybe that's my bias of too many years of marianist catholic education speaking. I'm too hopeful, I suppose.


Cats drawn as Marvel characters! Adorable. And hilarious. Particularly Spidey and the Sandman.

OKgo's new video to encourage the adoption of shelter pets. Amazing as usual.

Surprise! Facebook is fucking with you again. And this is why I keep all my info private except to people I know.

NEWSIES IS GOING TO BROADWAY, hilariousyesfantasticyesssss.

If superheros were hipsters. I particularly like PBRman. Also I feel like Spiderman isn't that far from Tobey McGuire Spiderman because DEAR LORD DO I HATE HIM. (Also, LOL at Aquaman--Northwesterners are a silly people. I learned that this summer.)

Mysterious civilization hidden in the Amazon--I think this is the same thing (SPOILER ALERT!) Lost City of Z talks about. BUT NOBODY KNOWS. It's fascinating.

Carnivorous plants dwndling across US; I wonder if this might have anything to do with all the bugkiller sprays we use? (No idea, just a thought.)

Shark attack survivors team up to save sharks.

ATHLETE'S FOOT MEDICATION COULD CURE WHITE NOSE SYNDROME! Finally, a hint of good news on that front.

Bug people are crazy. So are geologists.

Some foreign memes for you. I particularly like Makmende, for some reason. I suppose it's like Chuck Norris, but cooler, because Chuck Norris has kind of turned out to be a douche. (Clint Eastwood = cooler than Chuck Norris.)

A really good article about building the mosque. It sums up my feelings on the subject pretty well.

Where can you find Ned and Chuck, Henry Jones (Sr.), and (old school!) Zaphod Beeblebrox? Cons, of course. (Those PD outfits are fantastic, though, seriously.)

Interesting bit of Raiders trivia.

Oh my god, remember the ad for Iron Man 2 where Pepper smooches Tony's helmet, and it wasn't in the movie, and everybody got upset? I present to you--THE ALTERNATE OPENING:



(Fan. fucking. tastic. Why did they not do this one, now?)

And another fantastic short.


Star Wars yoga, absolutely hilarious. And rather clever.

Obscure Taco Bell trivia! A.k.a. the random shit I will bring up in conversation that may eventually lead to me singing the Gordita Anthem. This, in fact, happened this week despite me finding the article months ago, although it did not lead to Gordita-anthemizing, which is a shame.

Here is a fantastic interview with Patrick Stewart, and within it is a fantastically creepy tidbit of their interpretation of Macbeth, ( which I am cutting for the rare case of spoilers )

Is that not fantastically Halloween-y in the best manner? It absolutely is.

First of all, this article is rather old. Second, I doubt it is more than tongue-in-cheek coincidence, and three, Hex of the Hydra sounds godawful. Like the books series.

OH MY GOD. So I was watching the new Sherlock Holmes (not for the first time), but I also decided to watch the bonus material. Apparently they decided Jude Law was more of the ladies' man than RDJ, so they took to calling him Hotson on set.

omg. Hotson.

I can't even. It's hilarious. Anythus.


Much like Rule 34 of the internets, I surmise there must be a similar rule about blogs and personal interests. If you have thought of it, someone, somewhere, has already posted about it online. There is a cool blog called Strange Maps that posts, well, non-generic maps. This particular post has some interesting material on worldviews. It's rather fascinating, but my main point of this whole thing is that the Bulgarians think Poles are all sexy fembots.

I. Don't. Even. Know.






What I do know is that I need to post things more often because I have AT LEAST this many more links piled up in my Google Reader waiting for me to take action. And FIVE MORE old posts on my desktop from before I left this summer! Luckily those posts actually have some real content, like some book reviews.

So, real stuff now, we went to the Yellow Springs Street Festival today. I got an awesome monster shirt, a necklace for my medusa costume, and a beaverfelt antique collapsible tophat! The sad part is I got home and realized the tophat is too small :( BUT I refuse to get rid of it for the time being. I also walked RIGHT PAST Dave Chappelle without even noticing at first, who was saying that the street fair was "like Yellow Springs normally, but gayer". Which... I don't know what that means? Because it's almost the opposite. All the out-of-town people come to visit for the day, so the percentage of hippies is decreased by at least some...

Also my sister finally found the CORRECT version of the Taco Bell Gordita Anthem (thank you, 1998) and I downloaded it for the sake of posterity. POSTERITY I TELL YOU.



(begins at 1:40ish if it doesn't play correctly.)

[EDIT] If I had been paying attention or had any creative/organizational method of linkspamming (Captain Obvious Hint: I don't) I would have posted the Ghostbusters/Rick Moranis thing followed by the carnivorous plants thing followed by the Newsies thing. Points to you if you know how those three are related.

Alas, I did not, and I also need to post this in the case I missed posting it before:



Also-also, tomorrow is 42 DAY as in, the date is binary for 42 (101010), and it happens only once every hundred years, and tomorrow we are getting together to watch the Hitchhiker's Guide movie, probably have a Vogon poetry reading, and get our brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick. Coincidentally that is the name of my ipod and there will be no citruses anywhere near my electronics, thankyouverymuch. (I've taken to naming my electronic devices after science fiction things, or other related items; this new lappy is HELPeR486.)

Also-also-also, I am very afraid for this Pan-galactic Gargleblaster recipe, which is, essentially, take Everclear, cut with liquors:

...er, scratch that. I may be looking at the wrong recipe. Anyway, there's a lot of alcohol, plus a little bit of mixers, add olive, et voila.

If I weren't so convinced I'll be smashed rather quickly, I'd throw in a gin & tonic to boot. Maybe I'll pour one out for my gpa who seemed delighted about the affair but clearly can't make it (and probably shouldn't be consuming high levels of alcohols).

It could thusly be argued that Indiana Jones fought "aliens" in Raiders of the Lost Ark. It is also a sad thing that the freaking Lego Flying Wing costs like $70. I think I have the Micro Machine version, though, SWEET ACTION.

New favorite slang: qu'est-ce que fuck?

Inherited from my dad, I am sure, I will take any opportunity to butcher French for the greater humorous good.


GOOD FUCK THIS IS HORRIFYING. It reminds me of the Splicer episode from Batman Beyond. Fffffuuuuuccccckkkkkkkk~

Hahaha "Mathsputin". Looooove iiiiit.

You know, while I appreciate the characterizations, that logo is just... incredibly detestable. I am so sick of steampunk being OMFGGEARS! (heh heh heh, I would go for a good Disney "g-ears" pun, though.) Seriously, yo, technology, in general, has to do something. And this is more the aestheticist than the engineer in me saying this. Just... bleh. Anyway, I think this means it's Old Hat if Disney did it and is no longer Scene and maybe it will lose some of its steam no pun intended. (Okay, totally intended afterthefact.) The sooner you can boot scenesters from any scene, the better. Please move to the Next Big Thing and mind the gap as you disembark, I'd like my functioning technology in relative peace, please and thankyou.

Also, Daisy is a fucking badass, check that shit out yo, she is AMELIA FUCKING EARHART-ing it up in that shit!


So I found out that Crystal Skull has a Star Trek tribute, of all things. During the rocket-sled fight scene there is a wall dubbed "numbersnumbers-GNDNnumbers" which apparently is reference to Goes Nowhere, Does Nothing. I also started reading the imdb trivia page for the movie and discovered this gem:

Harrison Ford was adamant that he got to wield Indiana's famous whip. Paramount executives wanted the weapon to be computer generated because of new film safety rules, but the actor branded the rule "ridiculous".

Dear Harrison Ford, you are my hero, thank you for being awesome. Dear George Lucas, you're still crazy as fuck, but at least this time you had Spielberg and Ford willing to tell you sometimes that you're a little bit off your rocker.

Also, this has always goddamn bothered me:

The Akator throne room designed by Guy Dyas keeps up an Indiana Jones tradition by having C-3PO and R2-D2 etched into one of the yellow titles, and E.T. into another. According to the book "The Complete Making of Indiana Jones", the characters can be found somewhere in all four Indiana Jones pictures.

They're easy to find in Raiders but WHERE THE DAMN HELL ARE THEY IN ToD and LC?

Also, I just ~can't wait~ until the original Star Wars trilogy gets re-released and re-remastered on BluRay and George Lucas decides to digitally add these Other Dimensioners to the celebration scene at the end. I mean, ET's already there, it's bound to happen at some point.

Originally Henry Jones, Sr., Short Round, Sallah and Willie Scott were to make an appearance at Indiana's wedding.

WHY DID THIS NOT HAPPEN FFFFFFFUUUUUU~

In the "making of" on the Back to the Future (1985) DVD, one of the original ideas of the time machine was as a refrigerator that Marty would climb into. Furthermore, the way Marty was to come back from 1955 was via the power of a nuclear bomb at a test site in the desert. Back to the Future was produced by Steven Spielberg. The idea was scrapped because filmmakers were afraid children would shut themselves inside of their home refrigerators to imitate the movie.

Pure. Excellence. I DON'T REGRET THAT SCENE FOR A MOMENT.


...Anyway. Speaking of GNDN, I kind of need these in my future house, somewhere. In my super-futuristic Tony-Starkish tech lab.

(Seriously though I still want his drafting table. Rich motherfucker.)


Heh heh heh, stormtroopers.

( OLD LINKSPAMS AND STUFF THAT MAKE ME A HORRIBLE BLOGGER RIGHT NOW )

So that's what I've been up to for the past MONTH or so. Also did I mention I downloaded the Force Unleashed Lightsaber App for my iPod touch? I totally did and it's PURPLE ALL THE WAY, baby. Now I need someone to duke it out with.

...You know, the sooner Nerf makes Nerf Lightsabers, THE BETTER.

[EDIT] ALSO-ALSO, anyone play Spore or Sims 3 online? I got a code from Taco Bell and I play neither.

I've been thinking about a lot of things lately. This may be partly due to psych 101; much like philosophy courses, I end up having a great deal to think about that impacts my normal everyday already large-topic-encompassing thought process. As such, this post is all over the places and contains both shallow and ponderous (omg, "pond"erous, get it? pun not intended, but fully enjoyed by this mercat) artifacts.

I freaking love crazy fan theories. I've read a few great ones lately, that Fight Club is grown up Calvin & Hobbes, Pokemon is a coma dream Ash is having to deal with his issues, Ferris Beuller is all in Cameron's head, it goes on. Some of them are crazy-awesome but completely unncessary (like these), others more legit (the r2d2 theory, which sort of retcons the plot holes added by the new trilogy). ANYWAY, I was directed to this fantabulous page of crazy fan theories about Iron Man. My personal favorites are:

1) The quantum moustache theory

Tony's facial hair exists in a state of quantum entanglement
This theory is an attempt to reconcile how Tony can appear in separate comics with either the modern goatee or the retro 'stache. In a similar situation to Schrodinger's Cat, Tony simultaneously has a goatee and a mustache until the artist "observes" him.

* Screw the laws of physics, I have money!

2) The Tesla theory

Tony Stark is a clone of Nikola Tesla.
Minus the madness, of course.

The man builds an arc reactor (in a cave with a box of scraps no less), plugs it into his chest, builds the iron man suit and hunts down the people who got access to his weapons without him knowing about it and you're trying to tell me he's not crazy?

3) Rhody's recasting

Rhody is going to get severely injured between films and require skin grafts
The recovery process will result in Rhodes getting thinner and his skin getting darker.

4) The Iron Man theory

Tony Stark is really Iron Man.
I've got it! Iron Man is supposedly an employee of Stark Enterprises but no evidence of this has ever been really seen - he's never seen following Stark even though he's supposed to be Stark's bodyguard, and on the rare occasions they are seen in the same room, Iron Man never speaks, so it could easily be anyone wearing the same armour. Stark has numerous times supposedly fired Iron Man but it doesn't stop Iron Man from appearing even though he should be out of funding and Stark always welcomes him back with open arms in the end. What more evidence do you need?

* Dude, where have you been? He claimed so in that one meet the press thing the military did about Iron Man.
* No, that press thing was just a stint to throw us off it was just like that time Harvey Dent said he was the Batman but he wasn't! But maybe you're on to something with the jerkass billionaire playboy idea... Hmm. Have we ever seen Bruce Wayne and Iron Man together?

o And Peter Parker can never get photos of Superman! It's all so clear.

+ Yes, of course... BRUCE WAYNE IS TONY STARK!
+ Obviously, they agreed to a corporate merger. It was cemented by Stark and Wayne by using the Dragon Ball Z fusion earrings. Ladies and Gentlemen: Toby Stayne!

5) All of Stan Lee's characters are the same guy (just plain epic)

6) ALL OF THE CROSSOVER THEORIES

Seriously, this page, just for entertainment's sake, I love it. The pure hilarity of it is impressive.

(Also, just ran over to the Indy page to see what the deal was, of course, it's not so nearly entertainment so much as people trying to pretend ToD and KotCS didn't happen. ACCEPT THEM AND MOVE ON WITH YOUR LIFE. It's on these occasions I am sad that the Indy fans are relatively a good deal older or a good deal younger than me...)

(Additionally, wtf, "the skull was magnetic, the gold could actually be real magnetic material"?! YOU FAIL AT SCIENCE. CRYSTAL =/= MAGNETIC.)

These sort of things make me wonder how many movie viewers actually incorrectly explain plot holes, as some people clearly to not understand logic and some to not understand science. BUT I DIGRESS, I am so far afield from anything relevant to this post idek.

Let's go where I was originally going, teenage rebellion. I don't know why it came up, but I was thinking about it yesterday and I have concluded that perhaps, despite my "goody-two-shoes" image (ha), there may exist a natural rebellion in every teenager, and perhaps I was just lucky enough to be able to funnel this energy into more useful outlets. Pats for Hats, holding grudges against certain asshats, and feminism. How did I realize this? I realized, when speaking metaphorically that sexism is THE button to press to make me go off--I realized that I (rather comparatively) flip out whenever sexism is the issue at hand. Regardless of how big or small the issue may be. And I really have no reason for feeling that passionately--well, actually, that may not be true, now that I put it to paper (or blog as the case may be). Perhaps my paranoia (well, constant worry over unnecessary things) against all sorts of things to go wrong causes me to feel oppressed by my environments and that's why I flip out with feminism? To try to regain confidence for the oppressed? I don't know, it's a legitimate theory.

Particularly in relation to this article I just read, that the objectification of women by men DIRECTLY AFFECTS THEIR SELF-CONFIDENCE. Perhaps what I believe to be my greater social awareness is to blame for what I call my "paranoia"? Maybe I will just start calling it "avid awareness" or some bullshit term because I feel like paranoia is unfair (not to mention unfounded. I'm somewhat clinically curious, though). ANYWAY.

(...My theory also explains why, I think, my family thinks I am bat-shit for thinking Twilight is bat-shit. Because I react that way, and I expect others to be as offended about feminism and stalkers and pedophilia BUT MAYBE THAT'S JUST ME.)

No, I definitely still think that shit is horrifying

Again on the topic of feminism, the anti-rape condom. I have mixed feelings about this. One, well, it is good to have a tool to fight in this war? I don't know. But (two) it really bothers me that this puts the responsibility in the hands of the victim. I mean, I don't want to have to shove that thing up my vag just to maim a rapist in the event that may happen. I mean, what, do you wear this every time you go out? Every day? All day, all the time? (And technically, by the mechanics of it, is it really a condom? Idk, it's more like... a diaphragm trap. Except it's not a diaphragm either, I know I know, so... what is it?

...Well let's just say I'm resisting the urge to post Ackbar in here.) Anyway. I feel like this is a measure for the desperate only, and otherwise has some rather dire implications. BUT that is society and welcome to it =/

I am learning to play Hey Soul Sister on my uke; the chords are difficult both in that they hurt (gotta learn that stretch and that muscle memory) and that I don't know how to hold my uke properly to change chords rapidly. THIS IS A PROBLEM. No thanks to my uke teacher, of course, because I remember asking her and she never really had anything to say because she didn't have any sort of formal teaching. Awesomesauce.

Melissa taught me a new word today: revagulous. This may just take over for recockulous in terms of outlandishness and entertainment value. (See, I told you, I can appreciate bodily function jokes on the same level of my brain that is in psychology-mode. IT'S CRAZY, I know.)

(...Literally?)

CLUB OBI-WAN let's goooooo

Handwriting is History?! Let me answer that with an emphatic NO. What if all our computers were to die? And I'm guessing it teaches kids good small-motor-skills. Oh and then there's the part where typing special characters and equations is still a huge fucking pain in the ass. But this dude is a journalist so I'm sure he has no idea that trying to write out Taylor Series expansions is SO EASY WITH TABLETS, amirite? Oh wait, almost none of the engineers use their laptops to take notes. Too much a novelty, still.

This shirt is ugly as sin but I love the pun.

Random thing: I was just looking at passiveaggressivenotes.com and saw a "flowers to go: if your name is bitch, come in and get your free flowers" post. It reminded me that, I think, the night before I left for Spain, I was coming home from Regal 20 and met my parents for dinner at Marion's or ice cream at Friendly's or something (actually, I think it was a Thursday and I was coming home from my Thursday night science lecture), and I passed the flower place over by the gas station, and it had that promotion but it said "Diane" that day. =) Good times. Wow, random memory, huh?

A somewhat worrisome facebook article. They keep everything. HOLY SHIT. Also, it pisses me off that though they have all this old data, I can't recover my statuses and Twitter only keeeps 1,000 tweets. I lost all my first tweets :( And I had some good stuff I wanted to come back to, as well...

(Also, Facebook Beacon! Done via a 1x1 GIF bug. That is sly. And douchey. And I'm starting to hate facebook more and more.)

A history of the ampersand! Completely fascinating.

And on the topic of typography and characters, an English-language sarcasm mark. Only I find it ugly and I think if you are blatantly told something is sarcasm you are missing a critical level of enjoyment and understanding of sarcasm. In addition, if you miss written sarcasm you may want to re-evaluate whether you are truly understanding the writer. (Although the use for indicating sarcasm in subtitles is useful.) (And... it costs $2 to buy and use? Yeah... not gonna catch on, buds.)

Nightmare snowmen! As featured in Calvin and Hobbes. Fantastic work. Art.

So I was going to write about Sherlock Holmes. BUT ALLOW ME TO FEMINIST!RAGE FOR A SECOND FIRST.


So Jon and I are sitting in psychology, and we're talking about physiological factors. In this case, we are talking about how someone's brain, in extreme cases, can have physical effects. In the example we are talking about how sexually repressed the Victorian society was and Freud's beliefs on that, particularly women in Victorian society. How guys can enjoy sex but women have sex to have babies, and then they take care of the house, et cetera. We're also talking about how very strict societies can cause mental stress when one feels things that seem okay but society claims as morally and socially wrong. Our modern-day example (since this was the overview class, not a deep examination yet) was homosexuals in conservative cultures. ANYWAY, so in this Victorian-times example, a woman comes to the doctor/psychologist/diagnostician/idk with her hand paralyzed. And our professor (who is a hilarious guy, btw) asks, what do you think she was doing that caused her brain to paralyze her hand? What was she dealing with?

And, you know, class that's 90% freshmen, no one wants to say anything, haha, and the teacher knows, so he kind of smiles and says "Does anyone want to say it?" and of course, no one does, but one talkative up at the front says "Can we use euphemisms?" And the professor says, no, I want someone to say it. So we're all kind of waiting and this guy a few seats in front of me raises his hand and the professor calls on him and the guy says "Because she was pleasuring her man?"

LET ME TELL YOU I WAS SEETHING. Thanks, dude, for showing the world that you--at least subconsciously--support those very ideas we were discussing. That men get pleasure and women do the work.

FUCK. YOU.

Argh.


Anyway, Sherlock Holmes. I enjoyed it. I think the complexity of Holmesian stories maybe made it a bit too convoluted, but it's still pretty damn good. And the dialogue is fantastic, not to mention the action and slapstick humor. And Jude Law and RDJ are hilarious together, although I completely forgot Rachel McAdams was in it, and she was awesome, too.

My only problem with it is that they don't really show you the clues so you're puzzling over the mystery; I mean, you're certainly engaged in the story. But I just enjoy plot twists and murders and detective stories more when the evidence has been staring you in the face, yet you missed it. =/ Idk. But it wasn't bad, that's for sure.

Also, Blackwood's snaggletooth bothered the hell out of me. GODDAMN.

Anyway, the way they presented the mystery was great though. The final twist, as it were. And I did like that Holmes was not presented with his deerstalker, though he did almost always have his pipe. And I loved RDJ's portrayal of him as kind of an egotistical intellectual. Especially with all his snarky comments, GOOD TIMES.

And playing the violin like a uke. OMG. Hilariously awesome.

Oh, and the soundtrack was really good, I think because it was so unique. Very odds-and-ends feeling, but in a good way. I don't think I've ever been so conscious of a soundtrack when watching a movie (disregarding musicals, let's say).

So, yes. Definitely recommending it. And definitely spending my $25 Barnes and Noble christmas gift card rectifying the absurdity that I have NEVER READ HOLMES.

And Carroll's Hound of the Baskervilles (or Wishbone's for that matter)... I don't really remember it. It was kind of crazy, I know that. And I wore the murderer's Crazy Dress my senior year and let me tell you that was my favorite dress. It was super-flowy and awesome. Lol. Important things.

I've got a massive tab dumb coming up, but this article is so filled with batshit that it deserves its own post.

This article has made me disgusted with humanity. :C

OH MY GOD I GOT A ONE ON MY PLAYING AUDITION! :D I don't know how that happened. But I am really excited. So January 2-4 I am headed off to Wyoming, where I still have to do a marching audition, but which I am not at all worried about. Marching, I love. Marching, I can do. (Their vis staff was not able to get to the camp, so we were done early and everything. It was lovely.)

Oh my god, I miss drum corps so much. I can't wait for next summer. Just need to do more pre-conditioning this time around, and I'll be good. Arm strength, ability to run... Especially since everydays in June will be a mile high and cold. Breathing block will be miserable. And it sounds like Troopers is big on running laps.

But I'm glas I made the choice I did... It was interesting to hear the guys at the camp talk about how vets would go off to the "good" corps for a year or so and then age out back where they had family. Basically, the impression I got from my audition at Phantom was right... They are mostly interested in winning, not in who you are. Apparently one of their friends was the center snare for Phantom--center snare--and the staff didn't know his name until several days into everydays. That's ridiculous. And not to say every winning corps is there, but it just makes me feel better about not going to Crown. I think it's insulting to get money out of camps for so long and waste my time, not to mention... that. So much a different type of family, it's not even funny.

As for my computer, UDit is completely useless. Every time I email them about a message I am getting (no matter how minor) their general response is a lame question about retrieving data I already gave them, and "if that doesn't help then bring it in". So once again, they proved completely useless and with several hours of programs that didn't work, I finally found the solution through Google (I ran the fake program name as well as the "trojan" name). Oh, I don't know if I got that far in explaining before--it turned out to be an adware file that only looks like a windows security message telling you that you have a trojan (mine was Trojan.Zlob.G, but the file itself was merman.exe) and recommends you download a removal program (Program Defender 2009). This is fake safety software that "runs" a diagnostic to find the issue and fails partway through, prompting you to upgrade. So then the hackers get your money. And the multitude of anti-spyware programs I now have downloaded got rid of the fake security program, but to get rid of the adware (the fake windows messages) you have to start your computer in safe mode, go to Applications, find the "Google" folder and delete the two fake files in it. (I was worried at first, but there's nothing else there--it's not actually a Google folder.) So, once again, UDit is a failure and I fixed my own computer simply with Google-fu.

And now, lots and lots of linkspam because I've been a terrible, terrible tab user lately. And no lj-cut because I am CRUEL.

I rather love this Neil Gaiman poster. And speaking of zombies, I just watched 28 Days Later, which is a pretty good movie but feels... incomplete, somehow. But it did remind me of watching Sean of the Dead, which I somehow connected to that from the fact that I finally got my Phi Rho paddle, and I thought it looked like a cricket bat, and Christine and I somehow determined we are going to play cricket with my paddle and bouncyballs. Yesss. I miss Nookball a lot, haha.

This may be the saddest PostSecret ever. Not the most depressing, but one I could never understand... That's a sort of compromise I could never make, and it must be terrible to be in fear of something that other people think is so great about life. Wow, that was a really concise version of what I think and probably doesn't make a whole lot of sense... Maybe I'll expand upon it more later. I don't know.

Harrison Ford doing J. J. Adams Comedy? I'd be up for that. He's really entertaining with dry humor.

Daniel Craig wants Moneypenny and Q in the next Bond movie. EXCELLENT. Craig should be my new best friend. I want Q back and I think they should keep John Cleese. He can do srsface just fine.

The interesting source of phrases such as "in the limelight". Cool beans.

FSM nativity, pirates included. I love it. (The displays of FSM lights are awesome, too.)

I am totally doing this in my room. Now just to find tables...

This freedom-of-religion article showed up on my friendslist somewhere. I've had that sitting around but today I randomly stumbled upon an article discussing it (and atheist messages) which I think is really interesting. Another article about atheism where I think the more interesting topics are unrelated--digital ghosts and older people's mentalities. My dad said he read an article about the testing of older folks, and that it's not the idea that "old people are grumpy" but rather, they lose the ability to censor themselves, so to speak. Which is interesting in contrast to the idea that they are like children.)

A really interesting article about the "anti-wedding" which I may have posted when I was talking about feminism. It has a lot of good points. Sorry about the awkward formatting, the link to the actual article was really messy.

Thylacines can open their jaws up to 120 degrees... That's so, so disturbing.

The octodress. Is it not amazing? As creepy and fucking disturbing as ocotpi are, they are really cool as a deocrative element. (However, when they decide to take over the planet, we are doomed.)

This is some pretty cool art with lamps and such in nature. Awesome.

I forgot about this Pushing Daisies soundtrack that was coming out! SO MANY SONGS, I LOVE IT

Pretty cool article about major movie studio logos. I forget what the original reason was that this was so fascinating... Some tidbit I can't remember at the moment.

Pretty cool old "music video" from 1928.

I like these alternative Christmas Tree ideas.

Someone commented on Betty Page's death calling her "spectacularly singular"... I don't know why, I really like that phrase. And it's true.

So tonight I went out to dinner with my parents and grandparents and my aunt and uncle, and we got to talking about Facebook and the fact that my dad has one to keep in touch with people, and then of course my grandparents being my grandparents we started arguing about the morality of employers checking the Facebook profiles of potential employees. Of course I just gave them my solution--lock your damn facebook. But it's interesting what some people might think about what's on your profile, and different points of view on that. And talking to some people, it's weird to have parents on facebook. I was just looking back at an older post from when dad joined, and I said "WHAT" like it's weird but I think moreso it was just unexpected. Laura apparently didn't friend him, but she, who knows, might have something to hide. (Partying, probably.) I don't necessarily want dad to see my excessive cursing or the fact that I'm no longer Catholic (not that he'd necessarily see "pastafarian" and "church of heathus christ of ledger-day saints" not as humor only), but you know what? Laura's cursed in front of him, he knows we watch shit-for-tv or movies sometimes, I don't care so much. I don't curse in front of him or my grandparents, that's good enough for me. But other people talked about having family finding out about photos on facebook that they didn't want their parents or others to see, and you know what? I don't really get it. If you're worried, make it private, friends-only. If you're concerned about your little brothers and sisters showing your parents... Here's a grand idea: don't do anything in your life you wouldn't be proud of. If you make mistakes, admit they were mistakes and move on, but if something is a concern to your image, don't do it! I don't understand why that's so hard for people... I mean, from peers to politicians, what's so difficult about making good decisions? About thinking things through... Honestly.

Oh my god there is a hilarious skit on Robot Chicken about the construction of the Raiders temple. IT IS AMAZING. Hopefully it will be up on youtube superfast.

OH MY GOD. THEY CAN TAKE IMAGES OUT OF YOUR BRAIN NOW. You have no idea how long I have been waiting for this sort of technology to get started... I want to record dreams like crazy.

Whew, I think that's everything for now.

Weeeeelll, it rained today, so I couldn't get out and take any pics. Instead I unpacked all my bags and I'm going to set up a still life to make up for it. In the meantime, have some reading material!

Uncle Jay explains Congressional recess. ...Someone who tends to not avoid politics, tell me: does Congress really have that many days off?! (I don't really try to avoid politics, I just try to only pay attention when I need to. There's too much drama-gloom-and-doom-desperation for me.)

I can has Tony Stark?

( Crystal skull stolen... not really that interesting of an article )

And now, I'm going to discuss the Twilight series a little bit. I'm going to cut it because I know some of you are fans, and I don't like it, but ( I'm going to try to treat it civilly. )

OKAY. I'm off to set up the photo. Bbl.