Stuff that’s Cool: Len Cannon

I’ve been trying to do stuff this summer and it pains me greatly to think that it is quickly coming to a close. So many things are left in want and I realize that if I don’t spend every day doing things that I want to be doing, then I going to go to bed regretting that I’ll never be able to get my day back.. I started writing this post 6/27 FFS! (Pardon my internet speak.) But anyway, I’ve been finding cool stuff on the interwebs (mostly from browsing for articles for my blog at Examiner.com, found here) that I would like to share.

The following video is an awesome lecture about… Well, it’s about a lot of things: how everything in video games is being more geared toward reality, how technology is both converging and diverging, and how everything in life will reach a point where everything becomes a game! It’s really fascinating and I recommend it to anyone who cares where technology is going. Check it out:

http://g4tv.com/videos/44277/DICE-2010-Design-Outside-the-Box-Presentation/

In the following article, Len Cannon talks about children’s television that was probably gross and unsettling but we never noticed when we were kids. Invader Zim, Billy and Mandy, and Gumby were pretty crazy shows! Also, wtf is with the name of that bar in Rocko’s Modern Life?  http://hubpages.com/hub/Inappropriate-Childrens-Shows-Violent-Gross-and-Unsettling-Kids-TV

Len Cannon is also the author of this fine article titled: “Horror Movies where the Black Guy Lives.” It really is unfortunate where most of the time he dies. http://hubpages.com/hub/Horror-Movies-Where-The-Black-Guy-Survives

I like the cut of your jib Len Cannon, you are a man of good taste and you get my seal of approval and are now officially considered “cool” which is a weird word ever since I found out that video game publisher Majesco’s stock name is COOL: http://www.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NASDAQ:COOL

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go make an abridged series.

P.S. Inception is a mindblowing movie that everyone should go watch.

The Return and Rocks in my Mouth

Wow, the last time I saved a draft on WordPress was 7/13/09. What can I say now?

Well, I just wanted to see if I could write again, dust off the old shoes and see where it goes. If it’s good, then we’re gold. If it’s gold, then we’re good. If it ain’t, then we won’t. Simple as that.

I really want to write another Harold Potter story. Harold Potter and the Floating Rug was not the end, that was just a bad joke. I’ve been working on and off on one that I really feel can be my strongest piece yet, so you can look out for that.

One of these days, I’m going to do more Dickheads songs. JJJJeah!

Reading my old poetry it seems to be very creative but has no meaning or has a lost meaning. It’s really some stuff that I can’t be completely proud of because I don’t know what exactly is going on. It sounds kinda cool, but I really think I should have higher standards than just “it sounds cool.” While I am not exactly an expert on poetry, I still know what I like and my poetry I do not like.

As a matter of fact, most of my old writing I don’t like. Most of the Harold Potter stuff was pretty bad. One that I really did like was the Haggard story about The Lion, The Witch and The War Robe. Does anyone remember any of this?

Alright, enough about stuff for the future, I’ll just write a short thing on my trip to the dentist.

He’s the same man that treated me since I was a boy. That man that looked inside those calcified structures in my mouth. I think of them as “the rocks in my mouth” that I don’t care enough about, but they will last when the rest of me whithers away. I am grateful for what the doc did for me, he straightened my teeth with braces when I needed them to be straightened. He takes care of my health which is probably more than I have done in a while… But at the same time there’s this professional distance he maintained on my visit to him on the 23rd of June of the Year 2010 A.D.

It was a quiet wait in that old waiting room in that same building that I’ve seen since I was about 5 or so, making the temporal distance approximately 14 years. Dad filled out the forms to ensure the dentist would be paid and that I would be treated. That old waiting room… There’s that fish tank that used to have fish, all it had this time were bubbles that made sounds drowned out by drilling and whirring noises. There were those old posters for exhibits at the Museum of Modern Art, one for Joan Miro October 17, 1993 through January 11, 1994 and one for the Kadinsky Compositions running from January 26 through April 25, 1995. There were some people waiting and a stack of magazines.

I played Professor Layton and The Curious Village while I waited for him to finish up his treatment of his previous clients. Are they clients or patients?

Eventually we realized that it would be 30 minutes before we would be treated. We’d expected to be treated sooner, both my dad and I wanted to see him. Well we didn’t want to see him as much as we wanted him to see us… or rather not see us but treat us. Anyway, we walked out of the office into the local mall while drinking a 99 cent medium iced tea from Dunkin Donuts. My dad has built a bit of a part time occupation buying and selling games from video game stores so we spent our time looking for sealed copies of a particular game that day.

We got back and it was soon my turn to go. The doc was a quiet worker that exercised his craft without any particular attachment. He gave simple orders, he performed his actions as required. He drilled and scraped against those rocks in my mouth. The intense sound coupled with the splashing and dripping of drool on my face and on my chin made for an experience that I would rather not have often. My jaw felt numb from keeping it open. I stared into the light above and the reflection of my mouth in the doc’s glasses. There was a poster of Mickey and Minnie Mouse dressed in contemporary clothing (t-shirt and jeans) and a GE television set w/ a VCR that looked like it hadn’t played anything in a while. I spat up blood and rinsed my mouth a couple of times. All said and done, I had my retainer for my bottom row of teeth removed.

I looked in the mirror with the width of three of myself and the height of one and a half of me. I looked at my teeth. Cleaned. White… relatively. It would be dad’s turn. He wanted me to look after the car. I didn’t know where to find it. I smiled sheepishly as his frown and anger came through.

“You don’t know where’s the car?”

I found it and added coins to it. Eventually I found myself waiting for dad in a McDonald’s as I ate a Ranch Snack Wrap I bought for $1.49. I could have bought a McDouble for $1, but why feed that to myself? It wasn’t worth the cost of my health. I’ve been trying to think like that more lately.

It was an unmemorable experience although I can’t help but feel that there’s something about it all that made me not want to forget it. Does it matter if we remember what happens to us? Will remembering that place matter in the future if I never see it again? It’s not like I should cherish these memories for any reason. But they are what happened to me and they are a part of who I am. I guess, memories are all I will have in the end.

Pokemon: Explained

From the Journal of Cartoon Overanalyzations, Pokemon is explained:

Have you ever noticed that the pacing, tone and story development of Pokemon changes after Ash is hit by lightning in the early episodes, how Ash and his world were relatively normal until after the incident?

I have a theory.

The accident with the bike put Ash into a coma. Days later he was found and was hurried to the hospital and treated with heavy medications, which is why Team Rocket became less menacing. The medication took effect and stabilized his coma dreams so that instead of being terrifying, they became idyllic, allowing him to live out his Pokemon master fantasies.

It’s good for a laugh and just a fun exercise in psycho-overanalysis.

full article here

Harold Potter and the Floating Rug

Image via Wikipedia

Harold Potter woke up one morning and the first thing that came out of his lips was “penis.”

Harold Potter looked like an otter. The weather was good, so he decided that he wanted an adventure. Not just any adventure, but a magnificent one. The very best adventure there ever was. As a matter of fact, “adventure” was practically his middle name that day if it weren’t for the fact that he legally changed it to “animalgenitalia.com” after selling it on eBay for $5. Yes, there was something about the morning that called to him and so, he went over to his microwave and sent an internet to his best friend David Davidson from Japanada.

"Dear David,

It’s me again, Harold Potter. I know we have not met,  but today seems like a good day to meet for an adventure. Come to my house soon, but make it unexpected. I’ll be in bed when you suddenly arrive in and make today suddenly take a turn for the unexpected.

Sincerely, Harold Potter

PS Do I really look like an otter?

He sat on his bed and pretended nothing would happen. He saw something on his baby blue sheets and leaned over to sniff it. Then the room burst into what seemed like flames but was really special effects and David appeared.

“Harold!” he shouted. “Stop talking to me! I gave you a smiley comment on facebook that one time and you’ve thought we were friends ever since. Here’s your frickin’ plot device.”

He threw a magic rug on the ground.

“So, what is this? A magic carpet?”

"Uh, yeah, sure. It’s the most important thing you need for your journey. DO NOT GO WITHOUT IT!” David was already casting his teleportation spell again. He only had enough MP to use it twice today. Green swirls started spiralling around him in case his chanting and being transparent didn’t give away that magic was happening. “And if an otter could look stupid, fat, ugly, have no friends, and no  at the same time, then yeah, you do look like an otter.” And then he vanished.

Harold was alone again, so he started to talk to himself. “He said that I had to figure out what I had to do with it myself… I guess that means I should ask Hermione.”

Hermione was next door because she was his neighbor for some reason. She was busy studying a Magic Theory when Harold knocked on her door.

“Hermione,” Harold said. “How do I use this magic rug to further the plot?”

“Go to the peak of the tallest mountain and leap off it towards the Great Abyss to continue your journey and take Haggard with you.” She produced a boisterous fellow with a large beard and a viking biking helmet.

“Oh, I see, he’ll lend his strength to aid me on my epic journey to the great unknown where dangers are on every corner, right?”

“Yes… I mean, no. I just hate you two.” And she slammed the door.

They did a bunch of stuff like gobbling hobgoblins, hobbling gobhoblins, fought a bear, and even tied their own shoe, a feat that they hadn’t accomplished for a thousand years. On the way, they managed to encounter many secondary characters who ended up getting killed. It took them seven days and seven nights to reach the icy mountain peak two stories high and one story long.

“We’ve finally made it!” said Harold. “Now, Haggard, hand me the rug so we can ride it when we leap.”

“Uh… Here.”

“You just said, ‘Uh… Here’ and handed me a tomato.”

“To-may-to, to-mah-to, what’s the difference?! Let’s keep going!”

“Haggard, I don’t think-”

They jumped and they died.

The End

Nostalgia List

I was sitting in Psych today and I was thinking about what matters to me so I ended up making this list of things that have nostalgia for me.

1. Xanga
2. Shareaza
3. Epileptic Gaming
4. Drew Carey Show
5. Early Adult Swim Shows
6. Prisoner’s Dilemma
7. Derren Brown
8. Existentialism Class
9. Digg
10. MIT OCW
11. Chucky Note Pad (lost that shit senior year)
12. Fables (comics)
13. LXG (comics)
14. Dofus
15. Disney Movies (especially in the 90s)
16. Counter-Strike
17. Starcraft
18. Pokemon (TV Show, TCG, video games)
19. Yu-Gi-Oh (TV Show, TCG, video games)
20. Pink Floyd
21. Ender’s Game
22. A Modest Destiny
23. 1/0
24. Harry Potter
25. Final Fantasy (6,7,Tactics)
26. The Sims
27. X-Play
28. TechTV
29. Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory
30. Call of Duty
31. Rollercoaster Tycoon
32. West Side Story
33. Robocop
34. Unwrapped (Food Network)
35. Playing with toys and Action Figures
36. Playing with Legos
37. Star Wars
38. Indiana Jones
39. PBS (Zoom, Zoboomafoo)
40. Cartoon Network (Dexter’s Lab, PPG, Samurai Jack)
41. Nickelodeon (Hey Arnold, Catdog, Wild Thornberries, Nick Arcade)
42. Nick Jr. (Little Bear, Richard Scarry)
43. Imagining the Tenth Dimension
44. Resident Evil 4
45. Playing the Clarinet
46. Playing Alto Sax in Middle School
47. Simpsons
48. Stock Market Game
49. WWF/WWE
50. The Hobbit
51. Howl’s Moving Castle (the book by Diana Wynne Jones)
52. Ray Bradbury’s Martian Chronicles
53. Old Kung Fu Movies (Lau Kar Leung, Gordon Liu)
54. New Kung Fu Movies (Jackie Chan, Stephen Chow)
55. Newgrounds
56. Round Enix (club at stuy)
57. Homestar Runner
58. Gundam Wing
59. Discovery Zone
60. Chess
61. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
62. Nintendo Entertainment System / Nintendo 64
63. Going to my cousin’s house on Long Island
64. Going to my uncle’s house in Connecticut
65. Reading a book to get that coupon for a free pizza at Pizza Hut
66. Book Fairs
67. Lateral Thinking Puzzles
68. Optical Illusion Books
69. Where’s Waldo
70. I Spy (Books)
71. Sesame Street
72. Being the kid who turned down the lights during two graduations when I was in elementary school
73. Winning the Spelling Bee at my Middle School
74. Tim Burton Batman Movies
75. Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure
76. Nightmare Before Christmas (this was scary when I was young)
77. Travel Channel (Las Vegas)
78. Poker Tournaments on TV
79. Birthday Parties
80. Catching a ball flying deep into center field by jumping into the air in softball
81. Sconex
82. Ocean’s Eleven
83. The Matrix
84. Getting Cable for the first time
85. Playing kill the guy with the ball
86. Playing soccer
87. Blue Brothers
88. Park near Stuy
89. Azra’s Apartment
90. Eric’s basement
91. The year when Christmas could never be as good as it used to be
92. Sharing a room with my brother
93. That day I got hit by a car
94. That time I slipped and fell and cut my chin open and needed stitches
95. My Teachers
96. Conversations on the train ride home from Stuy
97. Waking Life
98. The Machinist
99. The Prestige
100. Deviant Art
101. Science Projects…
102. History Projects…
103. Yearbooks
104. Being afraid of the basement
105. Peanuts movies (Charlie Brown)
106. Dr. Seuss

I think that’s most of it.

What’s a gremlin to another?

Hear this here, you’re a missin the idea
of this beer begat version
of the Illiad
the will he had
cannot foot the bill he had

registering for fate

I think I have just the thing
and I think I have the brains
dont know about the veins but
I can grow wings

If I have to fly forever.

Interesting paradox
wrapped in a pair of socks

shoved up your anal sphincter, wow.

Not a clever scheme.
Not a fulfillment of wishes.
More like a cerebral swishes.
That’s swimming with the fishes.

The snack that
Smiles back,
Goldfish

Bibbity bobbidi Boo
Till the sun goes down
Guns at high noon
Let’s burn something soon

What can catch fire really nice?
Something ffffffresh like Dentyne Ice.

Shaquille O Neal, your life is at threat
You can’t deny this fact, you’ll soon be dead
Send me to prison, but the task has been filed.
You’ll be on fire soon. I also raped your child.

Let’s speak of the truth

Smile back with the grinning
A while back we were winning
Til the sun goes down
These words are my beginning

But my bags are quite mute
We’re traveling in a suit

I’m scared to fly cause I’m leaving the ground
I drink too much, my soul is quite bound

Unless I spread wings

Or you stop drinking, you punk?
Why do you insist?
You must not persist.
And get out of this funk.

I’m supposed to be polar, swimming in the ocean.

You’re goddamn retarded.
The sun’s where I’m bugging.
And you’re quite well regarded.
I’m more worried with what I’m chugging.

What’s a gremlin to his mother?

That’s why it is said
Wear your heart on your sleeve, and keep your mind on one another.

then go out and just think, jesus. think of something on your own.

Johnny P: On Wanting

Sometimes I feel all I want is a lazy Saturday, somewhere peaceful where I am away from everything. I want peace. However, as consequence of being, I am drawn into the conflict of living. Thus, I am forced to act, to make a decision. If we fail to act in our hesitance to accept reality, we leave ourselves open to the consequences of failing to act.

Sometimes I just feel wantless dissatisfaction under the tyranny of my own doubt. What the hell is stopping me from just sitting down and doing nothing for ever? Why would I want to participate in this mindless game where we constantly compare our own wants to the wants of others? Am I just joining the good fight and dressing up in a uniform like everyone else to go out into the world and simply meeting the desires of whats expected of me, carving my own destiny simply to keep up appearances? Are people just letting themselves be subject to the sense that what they do matters to them merely to satisfy their egos and vague sense of meaning, determined by arbitrary means? We’re just products of the machine of nature. The difference from being a product of nature and a product of the machine of men is that there was no inherent purpose. We’re just made because something wanted to make us and they were made simply because something wanted to make them, just this replicating immortality of the desire to pursue procreation as recreation. We’re just tiny bugs that learned to think how to make 1 + 1 = 2 without understanding why it’s possible.

I don’t want anything. Just forced around all the time, shoved into existence to make decisions as per the laws that determine the psychology of a neotenous biological mechanism. We’ll develop science, we’ll create art, we’ll uncover what we define as truth and what is right for the state of the world at the time and feel proud that we have done something of some merit. We’ll do it because we’ll have no other alternative. There’s nothing to life. To exist is to come from non-existence and to return to non-existence. We’re stuck in consciousness as part of the condition and no matter what level of transcendence or supposed ascension of reality that we wish to pursue, we’ll always be stuck as who we are and be determined as a chemical reaction that just happens. There’s no indication that there can be more than one outcome of a situation. Our path is chosen for us.

I’m not criticizing people. I’m not saying you should stop doing what you’re doing because you’re hypocrites. I’m saying that not only should you keep doing what you’re doing, you are going to do what you will be doing irregardless. Why? Because you have to. There’s no other way to find if there is something meaningful for you in life other than to live it and you’ll be just fine. You’ll settle. You’ll settle for reality. You’ll accept things and press on forwards in the vitality of ambition, the ambition to achieve something that you want. You’ll carve out a little microcosm for yourself in the world and look upon what you’ve made and declare, “It is good.” And you’ll be right.

She saw seesaws

She saw seesaws by the shore, sure.
She’s seen Sheen’s scene in the seen sheen.
Sheen seems steamed. She’s seen Sheen’s team see teens teem.

She sure saw sore saws by the seashore.
Sheesh or see soar sore sea storks tore the East orc’s store.
She walked on the beach pit and balked on each pitch.

Under sand, Stan’s sand stands, understand?
As she stands on sand, she seems sane. Shane seems the same. No shame on the Seine. Not Shane for the same.

Sue sees sushis shoo Sue’s seas.
She sold sea soles by the sea shoals.
So she solely sold shoal soles.

Sue’s shoes sewed shut. So sue Sue’s shoes.
She saw suitors shoot such such tutors.
Flew such tutors to the fluter, the fluter shooed Tudors to tour.
Peter Piper pied the fifer. The fifer replied, flying the pipe to fry the pauper’s paper.
The pauper replied, My paper, my paper! My paper, why us? Why must you fry my papyrus?
I did not mean to fry your papyra, nor did I mean to set Popeye’s papaya on fire.

Burning urns burn earnings.
Yearning an awning, she earned her yawning.
She took a trip on a ship’s chips.
See Cooke’s cookies ease cook keys.
East Islanders eased Highlanders.
Itsby bitsy spider spied her.
I’d eye her while Ayer dyed her.
This appearance, disappear hence.

With her gone, her argon was gone. With our ergon, how were her’s gone?
Hours of sour showers.
Sat in Cincinnati, cities in since incense.
Now the town’s sounds surround.

One day, Monday, a mundane dane’s dames deem main manes maimed.
Maine men may make crooks cook cakes.
Locke crocks clock locks with clock rocks.
To rock two woks, or to tuck two trucks?
Cockroaches watch coaches.
Coke’s cloaks croak oaks.
Motes coat most moats’ coasts coats.

Some day, Sunday, summed some daze.
A sun there, asunder, a sun there, a thunder.
One day under, shun the sunders. Then the thunder gave some wonder.

Cauchy’s couches ease ouches.
Slatter’s slanders shatter sanders.
Holy cow, Krakow concocts cacao.
Cure a sow with curacao.

Studs stutter “Shut her udders.”
Sutter sought to solder otters shut.

So much of such soot.
Shoot seats of sheet soot.
Hatshepsut shuts up Seth’s hut.

To shoot the hoop suits the soup.
Soon noon, monsoon. Moon soon, some noon.

Dirk’s shirt irks dirt.
Our elves sell our shelves.
No known gnomes moan.
Dwarve’s wharves dwarf Worf’s.
Doves of love dove troll’s troves.
Fairly fair fairies ease air lease.
White sprites spite rites.

Phone home, hone foam, roam home, Rome’s home!
She came back on camelback.
Bragged she brought a bag of broths she bought. A bunch of broths for brunches.
She had sea hags see her knees sag.
Some sons sang, some sands sung. Some suns wonder one less rung.
She saw seesaws by the shore, sure.
She said sea sheds shouldn’t be sore.
So she showed up and sewed up her store.
She lept to sleep, she slept to leap.
She sleeps sound, she’s sound asleep.

Do dream, two dreams, deemed to teem.
Tutor the fluters, seen what Sheen’s seen.
Suitors sued her, and fried a papyra.
A trip on ship’s chips, earning burning urns on fire.
Cooke’s cookies ease crooks’ keys.
Crock locks’ clocks, rock two woks.
Stud utters, stutter udders.
Dirk’s shirt flirts with fairy dairies.
The light is bereft, and the left is right.
Good norm, good might, Good morn, good night.

The Dickheads: Women are from Venus

Shwing Shwing
Take me to Sing Sing
Worth ten years,
it don’t mean a thing thing

Meet a strange girl in a bar
Bitch’s name is Ting Ting
Drink near and far
Bitch’s name is Ling Ling
Drink a lot more
Bitch’s name is Something Something
Lookat dis bitch… She had dat ass

I was in a rut
I wanted that butt
I wanted to bust a nut
I wanted to stimulate her clut

I’d screw her brains out
I’d screw her in the head
I’d screw her brains in
I’d screw her when she’s dead

I’d screw her with a screwdriver
I’d screw her with a log
I’d screw her with a piledriver
I’d screw her with a dog

I’d screw her without consent
I’d screw her with a knife
I’d screw her baby sister
And then I’d screw her wife

I sleep with the women
I sleep with the honeys
I leave them with the children
I take all their moneys

I steal to be rich
I steal from the hos
I live to be kitsch
I give to the bros

Some people got problems
Let me tell you son
I got 99 bitches
And got problems with just one

Her name was Lolita
She was a little Chica
She come from Puerto Rica
But she was the little sneak-a

I met her on the street
I thought I’d pull a fast one
I thought I had her beat
But then she pulled out her gun

They say men are from Mars
And women are from Venus
A man can hide his scars
But a woman can hide her penis

Watchmen Wednesday

I was planning on making a video for Watchmen Wednesday, but it ended up taking to long to say nothing that great, so I’m just going to post my review of the movie and a funny video about Watchmen. I think I’ll do better next time.

I saw this 160 minute long movie and I can summarize my feelings of this movie after I left the theater in one word: “Wow.” I read the novel before, but decided not to read it over before watching the movie and I felt that the movie basically kept all the elements that made Watchmen such a strong story. It starts off as the story looking into the mysterious murder of the superhero The Comedian, but it becomes a story about the various personalities that would come from the friction between humans with unbelievable powers and the harsh reality of this world. I felt that this theme was translated to the screen beautifully. The ending did change to some die-hard purists’ chagrin, but I felt that the direction Zach Snyder went with worked much better and made the whole movie come together.

As a Watchmen fan, the movie was an engaging experience. The visuals and audio kept the audience up with the plot development and the action sequences, which are top notch at filling in what every person who dreamed of how things in the graphic novel should have been. The camera angles are all set up the right way, the music sets the tone to the time period in a subtle but effective way, and the attention to detail in each setting really puts the audience into the world of the Watchmen. The characters are well-developed and given a sense of depth and history that adds to the experience much like when I was reading the graphic novel. The actors portraying the characters seemed to nail them down and breath life into them. Nite Owl’s boy scout superheroism, Rorschach’s borderline psychopathic, yet self-justified tendencies, Dr. Manhattan’s cold distance as the quantum ubermensch, Ozymandias’ calculating intellect, and the Comedian’s sense of humor on the grim truth about humanity are all captured immaculately.

So I guess what I want to say is that the film’s visuals are immersive, the audio sets the tone, the characters are spot on, and the writing is just as devastatingly powerful as the original graphic novel was. I must say that this is from the opinion of someone who had read the graphic novel before the movie, so I would like to know what people who didn’t read it beforehand thought of the movie. I might imagine that some people thought it was too long, but I certainly enjoyed soaking in every moment of it. Overall I think the movie gets 4/4 stars.