Emo Much?

FYI, I have commented before on the upcoming Spider-Man reboot.  The studio has since released a photo:

You have GOT to be KIDDING me.  Please tell me this is a red herring intended to throw the masses off-guard?  That in 2012, Sony Studios will throw their collective hands up and say "Ha ha!  Fooled ya!  Now, let's show you the REAL Spider-Man movie that we made"?

Unfortunately, it looks like our new Peter Parker will be strutting around in a black shirt, so tight that it appears to be spray painted onto his body, long sleeved to conceal the self-inflicted cuts on his arm.  Chances are, his iPod will be filled with My Chemical Romance and he'll cry while listening to it.  Forget about any epic climax against The Lizard...he'll be too busy laughing at him.  Peter will run away crying because his feelings are hurt.

Heck, it even looks like the spider on his chest is crying.

To this, I would like to award Sony Studios with the Facepalm Award:

Thank you for destroying our childhood memories of Spider-Man.  Now we can move on with our lives.

Facebook 500

Hhere is an interview of Mark Zuckerberg by Diane Sawyer:



Watching this interview has made two things very clear to me:

1) Diane Sawyer had a stroke and ABC is frantically trying to cover that fact up.

2) The closest contact Diane Sawyer has ever had with the Internet is making her assistant find, print and post Caturday pictures for her on her office wall.

Don't get me wrong.  I'm certain she agrees that the Internet is beneficial.  I'm also certain she would agree it was to everyone's benefit that Al Gore invented it.

The original story tries to add some sort of legitimacy by interviewing Justin Hall, who's been blogging since 1611 (his first review was a little play called Macbeth, which he described as 'kind of a downer').  I don't know exactly how they came up with him as an authority on Facebook.  Maybe that completely inaudible girl in the background was Jane Pinckard.  In any event, I'm pretty certain that nobody in Diane Sawyer's circle has ever heard of him, as their eyes would rot in their sockets if they ever actually read about anything he's blogged.

In any event, here we go again, trying to bring up the whole Facebook privacy issue again.  As the old adage goes, there's no such thing as a free lunch; somebody has to pay for it.  You pay for Facebook access with information.  Your information.  If you don't want to provide your information, you get limited service.  Anyone who knows how to program the time on their VCR or microwave can change the privacy settings on Facebook, so it's really, in my humble opinion, a non-issue.

Of course, non-issues are what drives today's news market.  Its this kind of story that provides Diane Sawyer a job to pay for her therapy.  I wish you a speedy recovery, Diane.

Apples (or oranges)

You know the nice thing about apples?  They don't talk back to you.  They just accept their lot in life.  I've had some foods that will fight me from entrance to exit, but apples give no trouble at all.

My wife, Mifa, has been giving me apples quite regularly with my lunch for a while now.  People often talk about an unequal comparison as 'comparing apples to oranges'.  Ironically, I like them both equally.  Fortunately, my wife packs oranges for me as well.  The choice between apples and oranges isn't overly complicated either, as it usually is depending on what was on sale at the market (or what she was able to pick off my mother-in-law's tree).

I was going somewhere with this, but I forgot.  Oh well.  The blog title does say 'random thoughts'.  You're getting what you paid for.

(Actually, I just remembered where I was going with this)

Anyway, my wife has been a wonderful, loving companion.  She packs apples (or oranges) with my lunch because she loves me.  Today, we've been married 10 years.  I hope she continues to pack apples (read: loves me) for the next 50+ years.  I know I will.

The Liver

I saw this on Youtube.com, posted by 'UltamiteLifeForm360'


John was the brain
Paul was the heart
George was the lungs
Ringo was the liver

This made me laugh real hard.  I don't know why.

Outer Space and Cyberspace (they're both very cold)

The temperature of outer space is a balmy 3 Kelvin.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Kelvin scale, that's quite alright.  Knowledge of it ranks on the Geek-O-Meter somewhere between owning a Periodic Table tee-shirt and knowing what comic book holds the first appearance of Spider Man (Editor's Note: the actual wearing of said tee-shirt ranks much farther down the Geek-O-Meter than the mere possession of it).

For those of you who are entrenched on the far left side of the Geek-O-Meter, the Kelvin scale is a way of measuring temperature from a starting point called absolute zero, which is so cold that all molecular activity stops.  Just to illustrate, if space were a coctail party, you were a hydrogen atom, and you were to bring up the Kelvin scale in conversation with that smokin' hot helium atom over there, then absolute zero is the amount of action you would get for bringing up said topic.  Of course, that's just fine with you, because the rumor mill has it that the helium hussy is actually an unreactive, colorless sort who's a little light-headed.  (If you actually understood that reference, your Geek-O-Meter has just shot right past larping at an anime convention).

Coincidentally, absolute zero is also the amount of interest my wife has in this blog.  Despite knowledge of this fact, I would never post anything derogatory about her for two reasons: 1) I have nothing disparaging to say about her, and 2) if I did, the rules of both the Interwebs and Murphy's Law would somehow bring knowledge of that fact around to her.

The reason I bring this up is because a co-worker of mine is obsessed with Facebook.  She uses it to keep all her family and friends abreast with her goings-on.  Recently, she used Facebook as a forum to cry about her situation in life and complain about how responsible she is but doesn't receive any acknowledgment from her family for it, and how her sister is so irresponsible her whilst not caring one iota about it.

This just illustrates how the Internet can cast this false sense of anonymity.  She thought that by merely speaking in general terms, her family wouldn't know what she was talking about.  When her sister started to recognise the situation and inquired about it in response, my co-worker panicked and asked me what she should do.  My response to her, of course, was the cardinal rule of sensibility on the Internet:  If you don't want someone to know or see something, then the last place for you to put it is on the Internet.

My co-worker made up some excuse and probably pinned the blame on me (perhaps I fail to appreciate how much work she is able to accomplish with Facebook running in a background window), because she told me the situation blew over.  Good thing, too, because you really don't want your family relationship to drop in the 3 Kelvin range.  Especially when you spend real time with them.  Even more so when they can post embarrassing pictures on your Facebook wall.

Pork

I love pork.  Especially bacon, but pork in general rocks.  I'm eating some bacon now.  Stacked on top of beef and onion rings.  Just the way that we were intended to eat it.

There are some out there that do not like pork.  I know you're out there, but my mind has a difficult time comprehending.  What's not to love about pork?  And don't tell me that its not as healthy as other things, because chances are you're a hypocrite, secretly eating chocolate or avocado or something else that you're not supposed to and pretending to be health conscience.  I'm pretty certain Jack LaLanne has a secret stash of sausage links in his basement.

As hard as it is for me to understand the disliking of pork, its even harder for me for someone who's forbidden to eat it.  I'm talking about Jews and Muslims.  They can't eat pork.  I had a guy in my office who loved pork, but couldn't eat it because he was Muslim.  I know he ate some of the pork dumplings that I would occasionally bring to the office.  Presumably, he didn't care much as long as his mother didn't find out.

I'm firmly convinced that most of the tension in the Middle East can trace its roots back to the prohibition of pork.  This might be an oversimplifcation of the problem, but I'm a simple guy and I believe it to be the root of many issues.  I picture a day when we can gather the leaders of the area into a Denny's and sit down to a big breakfast buffet full of bacon and sausage.  Once everyone's had a good, hearty breakfast, I'm sure they'll look around and say "I wonder what the big deal was", laugh about it, and walk out of there with a ham sandwich to go.

---

So, based upon my strong beliefs that pork can, in fact, unite peoples together, you can imagine how far from my mind a vegetarian lifestyle is.  In fact, my mind has a difficult time wrapping itself around the concept:

My mind:  "Wait, you want me to stop eating pork?  What was that?  Not just pork?  You don't want me eating ANY MEAT AT ALL?"

At that moment, my brain begins to hemmorage.  When I'm at the hospital recovering, hopefully the doctors will have the good sense to grind up some meat and feed it intraveniously.

The only thing harder for me to conprehend is a vegan lifestyle.  I can imagine a bunch of granolas sitting around a campfire saying "I wonder what we can do to make our lives even harder and more torturious than the prohibition of meat?"  Thus, veganism was born.

I reason myself against such a lifestyle by telling myself that a vegetarian/vegan contributes far more to global warming than the average carnivore due to the exponential buildup of greenhouse gases coming from a diet where beans is your main source of protein.

The reason I bring this up is because recently I went to a good friend's residence for dinner.  This friend and his family are all vegetarian.  Although this goes against all my beliefs, I still went because he's a good friend, and he also had corn on the cob.  Although corn is technically not meat, it ranks as closer to meat in the flavor spectrum than any other vegetarian.  Also, the entire side of my mother's family is from Iowa and so I'm certain there's a genetic reasoning.

To prepare myself, I bought myself an emergency stash of beef jerkey and kept it in my car.  Fortunately I didn't have to use it.  My friend and his wife prepared a fantastic meal and I quite stuffed myself.  Although I cannot say that I'm convinced a life sans meat is for me, I probably can go without it once in a blue moon.  Fortunately, the list of friends who are vegetarian is short.  And there's always emergency beef jerkey.

By the way, don't watch Food, Inc.  Although this has done nothing to stifle my need for meat, it has toned down my wife's desire for beef exponentially.  Due to the trickle-down effect, it has reduced my red meat consumption considerably.  You've been warned.

Paint a vulgar picture

At the record company meeting, on their hands - a dead star.
And oh, the plans they weave.  And oh, the sickening greed...
Re-issue! Re-package! Re-package! Re-evaluate the songs!
Double-pack with a photograph, extra track (and a tacky badge).
- The Smiths


Here we are, June 25, 2010.  One year from the day Michael Jackson died.  All day long, I have the above-referenced Smiths song playing over and over again in my head.

At the one year mark after his death, Disney is playing, or planning on playing, his Captain EO movie at all the Disney properties for a "limited time engagement" (read: for as long as Disney can milk nostalgic Michael Jackson fans into buying park tickets).  His documentary movie "This Is It" grossed over $260 in ticket sales worldwide, not even including video sales.  He sold over 31 million albums worldwide whilst taking his dirt nap.  All this for a man who, one year prior to his death, was struggling to keep his ranch from foreclosure and was considering selling off all his crap at auction.

It seems that death has been good for Mr. Jackson.  It seems that death has been good for everyone who stands to earn a buck off Mr. Jackson.  At least he doesn't have to deal with molestation accusations anymore.

Now, before you email me and tell me how crass and insensitive I am, let me just remind you of something.  This was a man who was social leprosy before his death.  Sure is interesting to watch, but don't get too close.  You would watch with bated breath as he went through his criminal trials and comment about "oh, how weird he is" and "is he really showing up in court in his PJs?".  You'd comment with self righteousness about the media circus surrounding him whilst purchasing a front-row ticket.  There's a reason there was so much media attention surrounding him.  Media gives the people what they want.  You're the same people who complain about traffic while watching the accident on the other side of the freeway.

(The argument can be made that the media dictates what you want.  That's true to a certain extent, but at the same time the media knows what sells.  Sure, they may post a front page article about Michael Jackson on msn.com, but if nobody clicks on that story, there won't be a follow-up the next day.)

Now that he's dead, you can't get enough of him.  He was the best selling artist in 2009 and I guarantee you most of those record sales weren't before June 25, 2009.  "This Is It" would have grossed $450.75 in ticket sales had he not died (actually, this is a drastic exaggeration.  I added .75 for comedic impact).

It's not your fault though.  It's the media.  Let's blame them for gorging yourself on all the latest Michael Jackson stuff.  While we're at it, let's blame our parents for all our social ineptitude.  Or, even better, let's blame Michael Jackson.  He won't mind.

My point being (and let's face it, I have to make up some sort of point to this sorry rant), I think everyone is to blame.  The media for exploiting someone's death to a vulgar degree and the consumer public who's eating it up hand over fist.

Now, if you REALLY wanna bake your noodle, ask yourself "would Michael Jackson have died had you given him all this money and admiration before June 25, 2009".

Maybe its just my sub-conscience telling me I need to crack open my CD case and play it again.  Before Morrissey dies and I become a hypocrite.