Everything you're about to read is true.
Y'all doubt me. I know it... I feel it, in the way you keep ignoring me and acting like I ain't shit. Well the truth is, you right, for now. At this moment I ain't shit, I'm just a little guy with a little blog who never writes and when he does, it's all bullshit.
"Iggy's Quest"? What a fuckin' weird concept, dude. What are you, like, a pasty RPG-playing, Hot-Pocket-chomping nerd with no friends? Oh and that whole "BSB" thing last week? I could barely stomach the first fuckin' paragraph!! Condescending, know-it-all, impossible to read bullshit. And how about a review I can read that doesn't spoil the whole goddamn plot!!
(For the record, I have friends.)
That's all okay if you don't know me though. A lot of people who meet me think I ain't shit either. I have a medical condition, the result of a hyperactive gag reflex of some kind -- it's something that no doctor has fully understood or been able to diagnose. It happens every time: I eat too much, too fast, or too much sugar/fat -- I go to meet my boy Ralph. He don't talk much, but he real colorful. As a result I have the body of a little boy -- have since I WAS a little boy.
Now I know this: IT'S NOT MY FAULT.
But I walk into any room and all the other boys know I'm second-class, cuz I'm short and I'm skinny. And you know all the girls go wet for fuckin' Mini Me.
I ain't looking for sympathy, I'm way the fuck past that. I know you probably pity me when you see me. I KNOW YOU DO. But it's not something I can control. People tell me "you need to eat a sandwich, dude!!" and then laugh. Yeah. Awesome.
I go to the beach, I take off my shirt, I hear giggles. No joke, this happened last weekend. It sometimes takes me a few weeks/months to get in good with new folks -- they call me weird at first, and I guarantee you, it ain't my personality because I'm pretty fuckin' normal. I walk out of rooms and conversations start. I walk INTO rooms and conversations stop.
As you might be able to guess, growing up with this shit in my head every day, it's given me some... confidence issues.
To be honest, the greatest thing I want to accomplish in my life... is to prove all the pricks wrong. Prove that I'm an important Iggy, that I can do something of value. Prove that I DESERVE RESPECT like anyone else. That I'm not a little boy. I'm a writer.
This ain't my best work either. I know that. My best is years and years away.
Now... I tell you all this because I know you doubt me too. You, my tiny, tiny readership. You've read "667" and it isn't that great. You like the blog, but you know how impossible it is to break into Hollywood, and usually it's the strongest personalities that rise to the top, the most forceful. You've met me in real life, and you know I don't got what it takes. People don't listen to me, they don't buy what I have to sell, because no one takes me serious. Sorry kid, but in Hollywood, you HAVE to get people to take you serious. If you can't even do that -- hop on the 405 South, hop a train, hop a plane, and get the FUCK out of this town. No sympathy, just honesty.
Well, I have a message for you. I know you doubt. I do too.
But you ain't seen nothin' yet.
Someday I'm gonna make it. Someday, people are gonna listen to me... someday, it's all gonna happen for me. People are going to know my name.
That's why I don't care how much people crap on me now, boys and girls alike. One day I'll rise above it all. The heavens will part and angelic choruses will sing, and I'll ascend further and further into the sky, through clouds and ozone and space and stars and galaxies, and as I rise my earthly body will grow and swell, until I'm bigger than the world, and then I'll turn around and pick it up and eat it in one gigantic bite, and all the billions of people in my belly will cry out to me and beg me not to digest them, and as I finally drift beyond the Universe I'll open my mouth and expel this whole place out my throat and back into space, and then I'll be gone, and my name will be on the lips of every man, woman and child who still lives, and they'll sing of my strength and my power and my glory until the end of time.
Or something to that effect.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Friday, May 29, 2009
the most important thing you'll read today
A lot of people -- in fact, I would say the vast majority of people -- don't really understand how reality TV works. There's no shame in that. TV networks, and the news outlets who own them, would prefer that you didn't understand. They like to divide their programming into two different categories: scripted vs. reality. A scripted show would be something like House, 24, Desperate Housewives... where a "reality" show would be something like Survivor. Fear Factor. America's Next Top Model. The Biggest Loser.
In truth, most of these are just highly evolved game shows. You have contestants, you have a prize, you have timed tasks to complete and predetermined competitions to win. If you call Wheel of Fortune reality TV, maybe you have the right idea after all.
But there's another category of reality TV, in which there isn't a competition, and there are no winners. Shows like Extreme Makeover, MythBusters, or my personal favorite... Tough Love. (Yep, we got a Wikipedia article.)
Since these shows don't depend on finding a winner, the producers actually have far more creative control over what happens... or at least, what they show on TV. Game shows like Survivor must justify to their audience HOW the winner succeeded. Unless they hire actors to compete (which many shows resort to doing), they must depict the real story, as it happened. But in the second kind of reality TV, basically, producers can show whatever the hell they want to show, because there's no predetermined result. The line between "scripted vs. reality" is even further blurred.
This latter category is where I would put Jon and Kate Plus Eight.
Now I'm sure you've seen the news stories. Affairs, lies, marital problems galore. I've actually watched the show, and I know a thing or two about relationship problems, so I know there's definitely truth to these stories. Jon and Kate are in some serious shit. You can see it in all their interviews. But somehow, some way, they've managed to turn this public relations nightmare into a nice, fatty cash cow. TLC just doubled the number of Jon & Kate episodes this season to 40. Ratings are soaring. They're going to walk out of this hell as ice cold millionaires.
But that's not what I want to talk about. I want to talk about the other eight employees of the show... the ones who don't have creative control. The ones whose lives are actually being lived out on national television, whose life experiences are carefully being written and plotted out by producers in a control room above their garage.
According to a story published today by the Associated Press, Jon and Kate Plus Eight has come under investigation by the Pennsylvania Labor Department for possible violation of child labor laws.
Having experience in this business (and this genre), I can tell you that unless most reality TV is done completely differently than what I saw on the set of Tough Love, this investigation has a lot of merit and should be taken quite seriously.
The experiences you see on a non-competitive reality TV series like Jon and Kate Plus Eight -- birthday parties, family outings, even simple day-to-day "storylines" -- are about 85% scripted. That's not to say the dialogue is written... it almost certainly isn't. But just about everything else (that isn't spoken) is mapped out in advance. Most of the events that happen are specifically calculated to provoke reactions from the stars of the show (called the "talent"): joy, disgust, anger, goofiness, etc.
In this case, the "talent" happens to be the eight Gosselin children -- none of whom are over the age of 10.
These children have been surrounded by TV production crew and cameramen, on a near-constant basis, throughout most of their lives. Where you and I have home movies from our childhood, that few have ever seen, their "home movies" are beamed by satellite to millions of homes across the country, and worldwide. And my guess is they don't sign a waiver for every episode.
But all violations aside, they will be paid quite well for all of this, don't worry. Their trust funds are surely through the roof.
If I'm disillusioning you about the "reality" of reality TV... I apologize. But the truth of it is, the Gosselin children should be treated like professional actors, because that's basically what they are. And honestly, there's no telling what kind of damage is being done to them psychologically by this whole goddamn sick affair. There might be lawsuits down the road. There WILL be therapy.
In fact, this whole situation reminds me of a fantastic movie I saw several years ago. At the time, it looked like science fiction...
In truth, most of these are just highly evolved game shows. You have contestants, you have a prize, you have timed tasks to complete and predetermined competitions to win. If you call Wheel of Fortune reality TV, maybe you have the right idea after all.
But there's another category of reality TV, in which there isn't a competition, and there are no winners. Shows like Extreme Makeover, MythBusters, or my personal favorite... Tough Love. (Yep, we got a Wikipedia article.)
Since these shows don't depend on finding a winner, the producers actually have far more creative control over what happens... or at least, what they show on TV. Game shows like Survivor must justify to their audience HOW the winner succeeded. Unless they hire actors to compete (which many shows resort to doing), they must depict the real story, as it happened. But in the second kind of reality TV, basically, producers can show whatever the hell they want to show, because there's no predetermined result. The line between "scripted vs. reality" is even further blurred.
This latter category is where I would put Jon and Kate Plus Eight.
Now I'm sure you've seen the news stories. Affairs, lies, marital problems galore. I've actually watched the show, and I know a thing or two about relationship problems, so I know there's definitely truth to these stories. Jon and Kate are in some serious shit. You can see it in all their interviews. But somehow, some way, they've managed to turn this public relations nightmare into a nice, fatty cash cow. TLC just doubled the number of Jon & Kate episodes this season to 40. Ratings are soaring. They're going to walk out of this hell as ice cold millionaires.
But that's not what I want to talk about. I want to talk about the other eight employees of the show... the ones who don't have creative control. The ones whose lives are actually being lived out on national television, whose life experiences are carefully being written and plotted out by producers in a control room above their garage.
According to a story published today by the Associated Press, Jon and Kate Plus Eight has come under investigation by the Pennsylvania Labor Department for possible violation of child labor laws.
Having experience in this business (and this genre), I can tell you that unless most reality TV is done completely differently than what I saw on the set of Tough Love, this investigation has a lot of merit and should be taken quite seriously.
The experiences you see on a non-competitive reality TV series like Jon and Kate Plus Eight -- birthday parties, family outings, even simple day-to-day "storylines" -- are about 85% scripted. That's not to say the dialogue is written... it almost certainly isn't. But just about everything else (that isn't spoken) is mapped out in advance. Most of the events that happen are specifically calculated to provoke reactions from the stars of the show (called the "talent"): joy, disgust, anger, goofiness, etc.
In this case, the "talent" happens to be the eight Gosselin children -- none of whom are over the age of 10.
These children have been surrounded by TV production crew and cameramen, on a near-constant basis, throughout most of their lives. Where you and I have home movies from our childhood, that few have ever seen, their "home movies" are beamed by satellite to millions of homes across the country, and worldwide. And my guess is they don't sign a waiver for every episode.
But all violations aside, they will be paid quite well for all of this, don't worry. Their trust funds are surely through the roof.
If I'm disillusioning you about the "reality" of reality TV... I apologize. But the truth of it is, the Gosselin children should be treated like professional actors, because that's basically what they are. And honestly, there's no telling what kind of damage is being done to them psychologically by this whole goddamn sick affair. There might be lawsuits down the road. There WILL be therapy.
In fact, this whole situation reminds me of a fantastic movie I saw several years ago. At the time, it looked like science fiction...
Sunday, May 24, 2009
BSBs
I went to another double feature last night. I've become convinced that this is the only way to go to the movies in Orange County. If it's a less-popular movie, I always pay full price for a ticket (it's the right thing to do) but as for the big summer blockbusters... they don't need my twelve-fifty, so I'll just keep it in my back pocket, thanks. I saw two such films last night -- with two completely different groups of people -- Angels and Demons and Terminator: Salvation.
The thing about "Big Summer Blockbusters" (or BSBs as I sometimes like to call them) is that they're designed fully and completely, from the ground up, for total mass consumption. AKA the "least common denominator". You take a bunch of elements that have worked before in thousands and thousands of movies... the "hero's journey" works extremely well for this purpose. Take your (generally badass) protagonist and dump him in shitsville. Then watch him climb to greatness, while overcoming his Main Character Flaw, and falling in love with a beautiful Love Interest along the way. If it's a "good" BSB, you should also have some pop psychology discussions and some witty one-liners. There should be a Low Point around the end of act II, where all seems to be lost for our hero, until a Mysterious Helper visits and pulls him out of the depths, so that the big Act III (complete with all the biggest explosions, car chases, and climactic battles) can build to the HUGE-GIGANTIC-FUCK finish, usually with a Last-Minute Twist you NEVER see coming (except for when you see it coming). If it's a "good" BSB, the hero might die as a sacrifice -- or it might be an "ambiguous" or unhappy ending -- as long as it's consistent with the tone of the whole movie.
Now take this formula, repackage it to your own little "concept", spare no expense for cast or special effects, and there you have a bona-fide Big Summer Blockbuster. It's not cliche, because everyone's doing it. That's what all the Hollywood execs say, when they aren't busy swimming in a vault full of their own money like Scrooge McDuck.
The truth is, I don't really have a problem with the form. When a BSB is done right -- IT WORKS. When it isn't done right -- God help your greedy little souls.
Angels and Demons (the book) was written by Dan "I Secretly Love Jesus" Brown in 2000, three years before the worldwide phenomenon Da Vinci Code. In the novel, Robert Langdon is still a young Harvard symbologist, having never met Sophie or Teabing or Sophie's grandpa or the albino guy or Jean Reno, or any of the other unforgettable cast of characters from Mr. Brown's 2003 magnum opus. In this movie, Angels and Demons has been retconned to occur AFTER the events of the Da Vinci Code.
What this means is: just after Robert Langdon puts forth to the world the idea (Da Vinci Code spoilers) that Jesus Christ had a torrid affair with Mary Magdalene, and actually fathered a child... and that Jesus's bloodline still exists in the world today... Yep, that sounds like a perfect time for the Vatican to come ask him for help in investigating a murder at CERN in Switzerland!
Wait. What?
Unfortunately, this movie doesn't start out making a whole lot of sense. Which is a shame, because the book (Angels and Demons) is probably the best thing Brown has written to date, and it seemed to make sense when I read it. They took out a couple of key scenes -- but kept all the exposition, meaning about ten minutes into the thing you get hit with a solid wall of Plot. I will say this about Tom Hanks: he can deliver exposition like few actors can. The Swiss police captain, the Vatican chief of police, and Langdon's lady-friend Vittoria Vetra, on the other hand, sound like they're reading out of a Chinese textbook. But all of this doesn't matter anyway, because this is a BSB and we haven't even STARTED the real shit yet.
Luckily, things get going pretty quickly after that. Tom Hanks runs around the city of Rome looking concerned, as every hour, another cardinal of the Catholic Church is executed and branded with a symbol of the "Illuminati". Now having seen the movie, I don't want to spoil anything (as the basic story is actually not bad) but can I just say, the instant Ewan McGregor walked on screen as a "camerlengo" (or pope's assistant), I thought, how the hell can he NOT be vitally important to the story? It's Obi-Wan Kenobi for God's sake! They wouldn't cast George Clooney as "Reporter #2". It seems like a huge giveaway to an audience that has never read the book, something they could have easily avoided by casting an actor without Name Recognition.
Okay, I'll probably need a !!!SPOILER ALERT!!! for this next part.
Finally Langdon reaches the end of the Path of Illumination, or whatever the big scavenger hunt was called. This is where things took a turn for the absolute ridiculous. Highlights include a massive explosion of "antimatter" that behaves NOWHERE NEAR how actual antimatter would behave (I know it's nit-picky, but I mean, don't make it your major plot point if you don't understand how it works)... the major villian simply running away, leaving Tom Hanks alone, completely alive, and never appearing on-screen again... Ewan McGregor driving a red-hot iron brand into his own chest... Ewan McGregor parachuting into St. Peter's Square... and of course the religious intrigue of "who's the next Pope??" Wait, was that the whole point of the movie? Finding a pope?
Nahhh, I kid -- honestly, it wasn't that bad. Lots of action, lots of energy, and plus, who needs brain candy every time you see a movie? It could have been worse. Could have been Terminator: Salvation.
I'll try to keep this one brief. If your idea of a perfect movie = popular video game Gears of War, minus what little plot the Gears of War programmers could hack up... well my li'l friend, look no further! Visually it's awesome, and I can't deny that. The desaturated colors really give atmosphere to the post-apocalyptic setting. Or in English: nothing looks bright and happy since the world blew up. The action's good too, if you like a shit-ton of explosions and flying robots with grabby little arms, who pop into scenes with almost no warning. I have to admit, a lot of Terminator: Salvation made me laugh out loud, but I'm not sure I was meant to.
Again, the ending is completely out of control and ridiculous. Spoilers ahead.
Okay, first of all -- A heart transplant?? With what equipment and tools? Who's the surgeon? Do blood types matter in the future? Or can you just rip out a robot's convenient human heart and plug it straight into your bleeding chest cavity? And how was John Connor still alive?! He was impaled by a metal bar THROUGH THE CHEST, and Marcus just picks him up and says "Let's get you out of here"?? Why didn't the robots kill him (or Kyle Reese for that matter) when they had the chance? They had hours and hours to kill Reese!! Why didn't John Connor kill Marcus when HE had the chance? Why was Marcus's story more interesting than any of the major characters, and why was Christian Bale shouting so much?? What kind of parent would name their child "Moon Bloodgood"? Where was Bryce Dallas Howard?? She's the cutest girl in the whole franchise! Oh yeah and the whole "I'll be back" thing? Lame right? Why does everyone think Christian Bale is a great actor when he's only decent? Why didn't that little girl say a single word the whole movie, was she a Terminator too? AND HOW DID JOHN CONNOR SURVIVE A METAL BAR THROUGH THE HEART?!
Hmm. These are all good questions.
And of course the plot followed the basic BSB formula. Hero's journey, single character flaw, love interest, build-up to huge explosive climax, personal sacrifice and a "bittersweet" ending. The only problem was, the new guy Marcus was given this arc... NOT John Connor. Now Sam Worthington did a great job with this character. But why not make the movie about John Connor? That's the Terminator sequel I want to see. Maybe someday they'll get around to making it.
The thing about "Big Summer Blockbusters" (or BSBs as I sometimes like to call them) is that they're designed fully and completely, from the ground up, for total mass consumption. AKA the "least common denominator". You take a bunch of elements that have worked before in thousands and thousands of movies... the "hero's journey" works extremely well for this purpose. Take your (generally badass) protagonist and dump him in shitsville. Then watch him climb to greatness, while overcoming his Main Character Flaw, and falling in love with a beautiful Love Interest along the way. If it's a "good" BSB, you should also have some pop psychology discussions and some witty one-liners. There should be a Low Point around the end of act II, where all seems to be lost for our hero, until a Mysterious Helper visits and pulls him out of the depths, so that the big Act III (complete with all the biggest explosions, car chases, and climactic battles) can build to the HUGE-GIGANTIC-FUCK finish, usually with a Last-Minute Twist you NEVER see coming (except for when you see it coming). If it's a "good" BSB, the hero might die as a sacrifice -- or it might be an "ambiguous" or unhappy ending -- as long as it's consistent with the tone of the whole movie.
Now take this formula, repackage it to your own little "concept", spare no expense for cast or special effects, and there you have a bona-fide Big Summer Blockbuster. It's not cliche, because everyone's doing it. That's what all the Hollywood execs say, when they aren't busy swimming in a vault full of their own money like Scrooge McDuck.
The truth is, I don't really have a problem with the form. When a BSB is done right -- IT WORKS. When it isn't done right -- God help your greedy little souls.
Angels and Demons (the book) was written by Dan "I Secretly Love Jesus" Brown in 2000, three years before the worldwide phenomenon Da Vinci Code. In the novel, Robert Langdon is still a young Harvard symbologist, having never met Sophie or Teabing or Sophie's grandpa or the albino guy or Jean Reno, or any of the other unforgettable cast of characters from Mr. Brown's 2003 magnum opus. In this movie, Angels and Demons has been retconned to occur AFTER the events of the Da Vinci Code.
What this means is: just after Robert Langdon puts forth to the world the idea (Da Vinci Code spoilers) that Jesus Christ had a torrid affair with Mary Magdalene, and actually fathered a child... and that Jesus's bloodline still exists in the world today... Yep, that sounds like a perfect time for the Vatican to come ask him for help in investigating a murder at CERN in Switzerland!
Wait. What?
Unfortunately, this movie doesn't start out making a whole lot of sense. Which is a shame, because the book (Angels and Demons) is probably the best thing Brown has written to date, and it seemed to make sense when I read it. They took out a couple of key scenes -- but kept all the exposition, meaning about ten minutes into the thing you get hit with a solid wall of Plot. I will say this about Tom Hanks: he can deliver exposition like few actors can. The Swiss police captain, the Vatican chief of police, and Langdon's lady-friend Vittoria Vetra, on the other hand, sound like they're reading out of a Chinese textbook. But all of this doesn't matter anyway, because this is a BSB and we haven't even STARTED the real shit yet.
Luckily, things get going pretty quickly after that. Tom Hanks runs around the city of Rome looking concerned, as every hour, another cardinal of the Catholic Church is executed and branded with a symbol of the "Illuminati". Now having seen the movie, I don't want to spoil anything (as the basic story is actually not bad) but can I just say, the instant Ewan McGregor walked on screen as a "camerlengo" (or pope's assistant), I thought, how the hell can he NOT be vitally important to the story? It's Obi-Wan Kenobi for God's sake! They wouldn't cast George Clooney as "Reporter #2". It seems like a huge giveaway to an audience that has never read the book, something they could have easily avoided by casting an actor without Name Recognition.
Okay, I'll probably need a !!!SPOILER ALERT!!! for this next part.
Finally Langdon reaches the end of the Path of Illumination, or whatever the big scavenger hunt was called. This is where things took a turn for the absolute ridiculous. Highlights include a massive explosion of "antimatter" that behaves NOWHERE NEAR how actual antimatter would behave (I know it's nit-picky, but I mean, don't make it your major plot point if you don't understand how it works)... the major villian simply running away, leaving Tom Hanks alone, completely alive, and never appearing on-screen again... Ewan McGregor driving a red-hot iron brand into his own chest... Ewan McGregor parachuting into St. Peter's Square... and of course the religious intrigue of "who's the next Pope??" Wait, was that the whole point of the movie? Finding a pope?
Nahhh, I kid -- honestly, it wasn't that bad. Lots of action, lots of energy, and plus, who needs brain candy every time you see a movie? It could have been worse. Could have been Terminator: Salvation.
I'll try to keep this one brief. If your idea of a perfect movie = popular video game Gears of War, minus what little plot the Gears of War programmers could hack up... well my li'l friend, look no further! Visually it's awesome, and I can't deny that. The desaturated colors really give atmosphere to the post-apocalyptic setting. Or in English: nothing looks bright and happy since the world blew up. The action's good too, if you like a shit-ton of explosions and flying robots with grabby little arms, who pop into scenes with almost no warning. I have to admit, a lot of Terminator: Salvation made me laugh out loud, but I'm not sure I was meant to.
Again, the ending is completely out of control and ridiculous. Spoilers ahead.
Okay, first of all -- A heart transplant?? With what equipment and tools? Who's the surgeon? Do blood types matter in the future? Or can you just rip out a robot's convenient human heart and plug it straight into your bleeding chest cavity? And how was John Connor still alive?! He was impaled by a metal bar THROUGH THE CHEST, and Marcus just picks him up and says "Let's get you out of here"?? Why didn't the robots kill him (or Kyle Reese for that matter) when they had the chance? They had hours and hours to kill Reese!! Why didn't John Connor kill Marcus when HE had the chance? Why was Marcus's story more interesting than any of the major characters, and why was Christian Bale shouting so much?? What kind of parent would name their child "Moon Bloodgood"? Where was Bryce Dallas Howard?? She's the cutest girl in the whole franchise! Oh yeah and the whole "I'll be back" thing? Lame right? Why does everyone think Christian Bale is a great actor when he's only decent? Why didn't that little girl say a single word the whole movie, was she a Terminator too? AND HOW DID JOHN CONNOR SURVIVE A METAL BAR THROUGH THE HEART?!
Hmm. These are all good questions.
And of course the plot followed the basic BSB formula. Hero's journey, single character flaw, love interest, build-up to huge explosive climax, personal sacrifice and a "bittersweet" ending. The only problem was, the new guy Marcus was given this arc... NOT John Connor. Now Sam Worthington did a great job with this character. But why not make the movie about John Connor? That's the Terminator sequel I want to see. Maybe someday they'll get around to making it.
Saturday, May 9, 2009
watermelon cubes
Wow. Have I really not written an update here since that stupid Playoff predictions list?
Sometimes the fact that I get any readers whatsoever is enough to make me thank the Lord God of Google, for indexing my pictures of the business chimp and Veiny Rambo. I still get hits on that baby.
Well, I wasn't too far off with most of my picks. The Spurs completely fell apart without Ginobili, losing to DALLAS in 5 games. That's a pretty sad way to go out, for a team who won a championship two (apparently long) years ago. I didn't give Houston the credit I should have. They looked strong, dismantled the Blazers' unbalanced attack, and they're poised to give my Lakers some more problems in the second round. I stand by my Eastern Conference picks... I think Miami had a real shot to win their series in 7, but D-Wade couldn't do EVERYTHING after all.
As far as my Quest -- I'm still stuck in limbo. I sent "667" off to a management agency who guarantees free script coverage, even if they don't pick you up as a client. I wrote another project that I'm really excited about, but I can't talk much about it yet. It involves the resurrection of a certain podcast I used to do with a friend of mine, but not in a way we've ever done before. Other than that, I'm just looking for odds-and-ends jobs to make money and kill time.
School has become a real interesting thing with me lately. Mainly in that I haven't been going. It's certainly not because I don't like the people I go to school with. I have several good friends there, who I've missed. It's a simple matter of burnout. I'm tired of the grind. Classes, homework, textbooks, midterms. I've been doing this stuff since I was three years old. (yes... preschool midterms were surprisingly brutal, where I went to school anyway.) And all my life I've been doing it for someone else's sake (aka Ma Iggy). Around a few months ago, I finally realized the truth: I don't have to go if I don't want to. No one is keeping score. It seems like an obvious thing, but if you've been raised all your life to believe otherwise, there's a hidden guilt factor you have to overcome before you can really take advantage. And it's not like a degree in sociology is particularly going to help me succeed as a writer, anyway.
Don't worry, I'm still doing my homework (mostly) and I'm still taking my midterms. Basically I'm doing the bare minimum I need to do in order to pass my classes. No apologies here. That's the way it is. And I love it.
So what have I been up to? I've been watching a lot of playoff basketball, for one thing. I've also been enjoying a brand-spanking-used MacBook Pro laptop that I got from my friend Diego. He really hooked me up with a great price -- and I seriously can't express how much I love this goddamn computer. It's just the thing I needed to really feel like a Legitimate Writer and Artist.
I've really tried to curb my Internet time though, despite the new 'top. I can't even remember the last time I was on Facebook. It's a nice thing, being disconnected from the Matrix a little bit. I'll probably be doing more of the same this summer.
Maybe I should put a picture here, so I can get more Google Image Search hits on search terms like "crunchy wet hair" and "Lindsay Lohan doing coke backstage with a Mexican mariachi band".
Woah woah woah woah woah. Okay, hold on a second. Are those supposed to be watermelon cubes? Apparently? Wow, that's weird. Are they even real watermelons? And as a follow-up: why would anyone ever do this to their watermelons?
Although I guess it does make them easier to store in Go Yaffa containers.
Sometimes the fact that I get any readers whatsoever is enough to make me thank the Lord God of Google, for indexing my pictures of the business chimp and Veiny Rambo. I still get hits on that baby.
Well, I wasn't too far off with most of my picks. The Spurs completely fell apart without Ginobili, losing to DALLAS in 5 games. That's a pretty sad way to go out, for a team who won a championship two (apparently long) years ago. I didn't give Houston the credit I should have. They looked strong, dismantled the Blazers' unbalanced attack, and they're poised to give my Lakers some more problems in the second round. I stand by my Eastern Conference picks... I think Miami had a real shot to win their series in 7, but D-Wade couldn't do EVERYTHING after all.
As far as my Quest -- I'm still stuck in limbo. I sent "667" off to a management agency who guarantees free script coverage, even if they don't pick you up as a client. I wrote another project that I'm really excited about, but I can't talk much about it yet. It involves the resurrection of a certain podcast I used to do with a friend of mine, but not in a way we've ever done before. Other than that, I'm just looking for odds-and-ends jobs to make money and kill time.
School has become a real interesting thing with me lately. Mainly in that I haven't been going. It's certainly not because I don't like the people I go to school with. I have several good friends there, who I've missed. It's a simple matter of burnout. I'm tired of the grind. Classes, homework, textbooks, midterms. I've been doing this stuff since I was three years old. (yes... preschool midterms were surprisingly brutal, where I went to school anyway.) And all my life I've been doing it for someone else's sake (aka Ma Iggy). Around a few months ago, I finally realized the truth: I don't have to go if I don't want to. No one is keeping score. It seems like an obvious thing, but if you've been raised all your life to believe otherwise, there's a hidden guilt factor you have to overcome before you can really take advantage. And it's not like a degree in sociology is particularly going to help me succeed as a writer, anyway.
Don't worry, I'm still doing my homework (mostly) and I'm still taking my midterms. Basically I'm doing the bare minimum I need to do in order to pass my classes. No apologies here. That's the way it is. And I love it.
So what have I been up to? I've been watching a lot of playoff basketball, for one thing. I've also been enjoying a brand-spanking-used MacBook Pro laptop that I got from my friend Diego. He really hooked me up with a great price -- and I seriously can't express how much I love this goddamn computer. It's just the thing I needed to really feel like a Legitimate Writer and Artist.
I've really tried to curb my Internet time though, despite the new 'top. I can't even remember the last time I was on Facebook. It's a nice thing, being disconnected from the Matrix a little bit. I'll probably be doing more of the same this summer.
Maybe I should put a picture here, so I can get more Google Image Search hits on search terms like "crunchy wet hair" and "Lindsay Lohan doing coke backstage with a Mexican mariachi band".
Woah woah woah woah woah. Okay, hold on a second. Are those supposed to be watermelon cubes? Apparently? Wow, that's weird. Are they even real watermelons? And as a follow-up: why would anyone ever do this to their watermelons?
Although I guess it does make them easier to store in Go Yaffa containers.
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