Archive for July, 2007
A Better Life for Cynics
I’m always trying to find a better way to lead my life. I’m overweight, in debt, and single, so clearly, there’s room for improvement. So whenever there’s a story on Digg about how to improve your life, I check it out. Over at LifeRemix, they’ve put together 100 tips for better living so Martha Stewart can go choke on her potpourri. In reading the first story on 27 tips for keeping your house in order, I realized that that good advice is helpful, but bad advice can be downright hilarious. Let’s run, the list, shall we?
1. never buy “souvenirs.”
You have your memories and that’s all you need. Why take a memento of a great trip that may be part of a great story when you can instead of the wonder of EMPTY SPACE. Which brings us to tip #2.
2. somewhere, keep an entirely empty shelf or drawer.
Nothing says “Fuck you, practicality,” than an empty shelf or drawer. Sometimes I go to The Container Store, buy big old tubs, and just leave them empty.
3. strive to keep surfaces bare. Put away kitchen appliances you don’t use every day; don’t cram stuff onto every ledge.
4. get rid of newspapers and magazines as soon as possible. Never keep a newspaper overnight, and never keep a magazine for more than two months—unless you find a positive joy in keeping an orderly collection.
5. have an exact place for everything.
6. know where to give things away: books, clothes, kitchenware, toys. It’s much easier to get rid of things if you can imagine who will benefit. Figure this out before you start a major clutter-clearing effort.
7. fight the piles that accumulate in the hallway, in corners, on bedside tables, on the dining room table.
If the piles fight back, you have a poltergeist. Act accordingly.
8. use dimmer switches.
Except on fans which will most likely cause an electrical fire. But other than that, super advice.
9. don’t buy things on impulse, particularly from bargain stores.
That pack of gum from the drug store will haunt you till the day you die.
10. storing a thing means you don’t need to use it. So before you squirrel something away, ask yourself, “Do I really need to keep this?”
Don’t need clothes, don’t need food, don’t need dead hookers. So Captain Magic, those appliances I stored, I don’t need. And if I’m trying to keep surfaces clean, where exactly does my stuff go?
11. never accept anything for free, unless you’re thrilled with it. A mug, a tote bag, a hand-me-down toy, the lamp from your mother-in-law–if you don’t need it, don’t take it.
I get a bit of free stuff on the junkets I attend. I was unaware that the correct response to Universal giving me a Bourne Ultimatum jacket was “Fuck you, don’t clutter my life.”
12. According to “broken windows theory,” signs of decay like broken windows or graffiti create an atmosphere that contributes to larger crime. Burnt-out light bulbs and empty toilet-paper holders are the broken windows of the home; don’t tolerate them.
Alright, this point I actually agree with.
13. have enough hangers in every closet.
14. make your bed every morning.
15. keep your keys in the same place each day.
On the outside of the front door. Check.
16.every night before bed, do a tidy-up to put away everything that’s out of place.
Yeah, because when I’m tired, I’m an organizing machine.
17. if you have stacks of unopened CDs, unread books, unwatched videos of PBS series, or unopened spice jars, don’t let yourself buy any more until you’ve made a dent in what you already have.
But only PBS series. Let all other videos (and you’re using videos and not DVDs, right? Good.) pile high.
18. don’t let yourself run out of necessities like envelopes, tape, toothpaste, stamps, Band-aids, batteries, and the like. If you hate to shop, buy large quantities and stockpile them.
Ah, so the empty drawer is for the industrial-sized toothpaste from Costco. Now I understand.
19. don’t hoard huge quantities of things that you could never use up: binder clips, rubber bands, clay pots, florist vases, plastic grocery bags. Give the rest away.
To whom? Who is so poor and so unorganized that they’re like “Man, I wish I could get some clay pots and some rubber bands, but who can afford such luxuries?”
20. hang up your coat (this is probably the rule I personally violate most often).
Fucking hypocrite.
21. buy a box-cutter. They really are handy.
Just ask the 9/11 hijackers!
Too soon?
Shit.
22. if you have lots of things that you’re reluctant to throw away because you’re not sure what they are—mystery cables, random remote-control devices, important looking screws that appeared mysteriously on the floor, obscure vacuum-cleaner attachments—put them all in one box. You’ll never use the stuff, but you’ll know it’s there.
And put a giant question mark on the box, Riddler-style. Who doesn’t love a Mystery Box?
23. for extra credit, put a date on the box, and if you haven’t opened it in a year, throw it away.
Shit! Don’t let her near the Time Capsule!
24. never allow a drawer or a closet to get so full that it’s hard to open and shut.
25. get rid of things that don’t work. If you’re like me, you’ll be amazed at how many things you have around the house that are perfectly useless.
Shit! Don’t let her near the children!
26. set aside a place where you put things to give away, and as soon as you realize you want to get rid of something, put it there. That way, you prevent clutter from accumulating.
May I suggest a bin of some kind? And if you were to put this bin outdoors, maybe, just maybe, a group of people will come by in a large truck and empty the contents of that bin. Then you can refill that bin once more.
27. if you can’t find something, clean up.
What if I want to find the mop…or did I just blow your mind?
I had fun with this. I might do it again.
Grades Don’t Have To Be Grade-A Bullshit
So this article I’m blogging is about the shortcomings of the grading system. While the tone comes off more like someone who just recently failed his latest exam, I sympathize. Grades are a terrible way not only to evaluate someone, but to teach them about life. Now I’m only 23 but in reading about great leaders and successful men and women, I’ve learned that they share a common trait of perseverance.
Grades teach the opposite. Grades are about maximum preparation for one shot and if you miss that shot for any reason, then it’s “go home, thanks for playing, and fuck you.” I’ve thought about if I were a teacher, how would I grade. Grades, like it or not, are a necessity. It’s a way to turn a qualitative value (unless it’s an absolute objective subject like math or science) into a quantitative value. There’s no universal truth that says my essay on capitalism in the southern colonies is a B- and while that grade can be defended by the grader, whom ever that may be, another grader may not find my mistakes as egregious or another grader my find my errors to merit an even lesser grade. So how do we make grading fair? We allow for perseverance. So in my classroom, you may get a C but if you want an A, then you talk to me, you look at my notes, and you figure out how to make a stronger paper. You’re still catering to my inclinations as a grader (which is why you can only be taught a base level of grammar and style and you’ll have to adjust to every professor’s whims, like it or not), but at least you’re learning how to improve because while I sincerely doubt that you’ll need to know about the 18th century American economy to have a good life, you’ll need to know that preparation is important, but perservance is even more important.
No Such Thing as a Free XBOX360
I don’t have $400. I’m shocked when I just have $40 dollars. And because I tend to be shocked at that small amount in my wallet, then there’s no way for me to get an XBOX360 without either working really hard (as if!) or winning a contest (I get to watch movies and interview celebrities for a living so I think I’ve pretty much exhausted all my available luck) or doing some online pyramid scheme where I convince people to sign up to sign up to get an item through my link (in this case http://www.3604free.com/index.php?ref=3872949) and then they complete some advertising offer and then usually cancel about a week later. Well, I’ve been doing this for well over a month and it doesn’t look like I’m gonna get my 360. I usually propose a trade where someone on one site will complete a referral for me and I’ll complete a referral for someone on a site of their choosing. Eventually, you run out of offers (some require a little bit of money, but after a while, all those $10 offers start to add up) and then you find that you’re basically fucked since you’ve completed five of the offers but you’re just not going to find those three more you need.
So I learned an expensive lesson and while my dickbag of a friend Carl enjoys his 360, I’ll realize that I just helped perpetuate a system that doesn’t really work that well and I have nothing to show for it. Live and learn.
The Silver Lining in Explosion Clouds
Normally I don’t post videos like this because my sense of schadenfreude doesn’t run deep enough and I’m not a 20-year-old college frat boy. However, I would like to point out that this video of what happens when you mix a baseball coupled with high velocity to a can of WD-40, may seem like an act of stupidity but really showcases some real outside-the-can-of-penetrating-oil thinking.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmaLy_LVIOA]
Now all we see is the boy smashing the can with a baseball bat. We have no prior frame of reference. Maybe his family was murdered by WD-40 and this is an act of vengeance. Perhaps this is just a large-scale game of whack-a-mole gone horribly, horribly wrong.
But even in the face of defeat (and a giant ball of fire), this young lad has discovered a simple and effective way to rid yourself of eyebrows. Furthermore, he remembers to stop, drop, and roll, whereas I know I would not have taken a baseball to a pressurized container of oil in the first place.
So before we judge too harshly on mishaps such as these, let us try to look on the brighter side as it engulfs us in flames.
CNN: The Most Amusing Name In News
Oh, CNN. The fact that you took the time to respond to Michael Moore’s open letter questioning your ethics and integrity deserves some commendation but your refutation is pretty damn funny. While I won’t go and play “Who’s the better researcher?” with you as you try to refute each of Moore’s refutations, I will comment on your introduction.
“It’s ironic that someone who has made a career out of holding powerful interests accountable is so sensitive to having his own work held up to the light by impartial journalists, as we did in our examination of ‘SiCKO,’ ” the spokesperson said.
Since when is Michael Moore a “powerful interest”? Granted, he’s powerful, but let’s not pretend for a second that Moore has anywhere near the influence as General Motors, weapon manufacturers, the U.S. government, or the American health care industry. Furthermore, Moore took the time to address you and your accusations whereas Moore’s subjects tend to dodge his camera. I will say again that I applaud CNN’s interaction with Moore.
“We appreciate Mr. Moore’s attention to the important subject of health care and have featured him on CNN four times to discuss his movie and our reporting on it. While Mr. Moore may want to continue the discussion in order to drive publicity to his movie, we have presented the facts and are comfortable letting the viewers judge for themselves.
Yes, damn Michael Moore for driving people to see his movie. I’m glad CNN would never engage in such base tactics in trying to drive up their ratings. I’m also tickled by your closing clause about presenting the facts and letting the viewers judge for themselves. It sounds so familiar…I could have sworn that I heard it elsewhere….*
CNN has always prided itself on balanced reporting of claims made by special-interest groups. Moore’s documentary “SiCKO,” which makes an impassioned case for a complete overhaul of the U.S. health care system, was not exempt from that reporting.
And there’s the rub. In their desire to present objectivity, CNN has instead demonstrated ambivalence. Again, there’s a mis-labeling of Moore and his efforts by citing him as a “special-interest group” except you won’t find an army of lobbyists descending on Washington with millions of dollars to donate for the cause of free, universal health care. This forced equality makes you look even more ridiculous as you might as well devote equal time to showing why Evolution has as much merit as Intelligent Design even though one is grounded in fact and the other is grounded in spirituality. And if CNN is truly trying to stand up for the little corporations, then where are the stories about how McDonalds isn’t as bad as your obesity-epidemic stories may claim? The truth is that you don’t take a side because you want to appeal to as broad an audience as possible while still maintaining an illusion of ethical journalism.
So I take the time to laugh at you today because it’s fairly obvious that you think you’re being unfairly attacked my Michael Moore, it’s also obvious that you’re not the fair and balanced (I’m sorry, would you prefer “equal and evenhanded?”) news source that you think you are.
*Image Credit: Offline Adventures of an Internet Junkie.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - Review
Why is it the best film in the series to date? I’ll tell you why.
Speaker Pelosi: Lazy Chickenshit
“Well, yeah, the Constitution is worth it if you can succeed.”
When I read this comment, I was stunned. I traced it back through Reddit, through NewsMax, and to Calling All Wingnuts because I never visit the latter two sites and I wanted to make sure that the comment was not out of context or even, God willing, just a bit of satire. But no, she said it and it’s as bad as it reads because it hits to the heart of why the Democratic Party is a bunch of failures that make you absolutely sick to your stomach because they’re the worst kind of career-obsessed, selfish, unimaginative, opportunistic sleaze.
While the comment comes down from a discussion about impeachment proceedings against President Bush (and I don’t know how many people you have to impeach just to get people that will actually try to help this country rather than use it for their own personal gain but you’re gonna have to really work your way down the line of succession), Speaker Pelosi’s answer is sickening and is really the credo of a party that was sent to Congress with one very clear objective, get us out of Iraq, and still couldn’t figure out that you stand your ground and fight rather than acquiesce and hope that no one notices you just got the ever-loving shit kicked out of you by someone with less strength but bigger balls.
And for Speaker Pelosi and her ilk, that’s what it comes down to is not fighting the fights that need fighting but only fighting if you can win. And when you’re insecure, petty, and scared, you don’t think you can win any fights so you sit around with your thumb up your ass and you whine about how unfair the world is and let that be your legacy.
Speaker Pelosi, the Constitution is always worth it you miserable, braindead, spineless sloth. That was the correct answer. Sadly, she lacks the imagination, wit, and knowledge to discuss the finer points of impeachment with a liberal blogger on a conference call. Perhaps one day Speaker Pelosi and her ilk will realize that in their desperate quest to avoid being deemed “failures”, they ended up as even greater failures then if they had fought and lost. Instead they just forfeit, which would be fine if they weren’t forfeiting our country along with their souls.
E3 2007: I’m Not There
Not to diminish the experience of all the journalists that get to go to E3 and actually play the games and meet industry professionals, but as far as announcements and trailers go, I’m pretty much getting the same thing except maybe one hour later and in a more comfortable chair with less people to gawk at my hideous naked form (do they frown on nudity at E3? I imagine they would frown on nudity…wait, nevermind. I just saw the SOUL CALIBUR IV trailer). Anyway, here are my worthless impressions of what I’ve seen so far:
ASSASSIN’S CREED: Holy depressing. I don’t know who I feel worse for: Jade Raymond showcasing her game only to have it glitch up like a motherfucker. For a game set for release this November, you’re showing off something that’s clearly not ready for primetime if your making phantom contacts with NPCs and having floating bodies.
MARIO KART WII: I don’t know how you make a Mario Kart game seem not cool, but they pulled it off. Major selling points of online play have already been accomplished in Mario Kart DS and points like newbies being able to go “bumper to bumper” with veterans doesn’t seem so much “appealing” as it does “lame”. I mean, if I play more of a game, I want to be better at it. I don’t want Lucy McReadsalot to just pick up a Wii-mote and start kicking my ass. And that Wii-ell, well, if you think it’s lame me calling it that, then clearly, you have way too much respect for something that already exists and already doesn’t sell whatsoever.
WII-FIT: If you thought Wiis were hard to find now, just wait until parents find out that they can put their kids in front of a TV AND keep them healthy. Gamers may scoff, but has once again shown that they have their finger on the pulse of the mainstream.
HALO 360 CONSOLE: None more green. Also, it takes a big pair to announce a Halo 3-themed 360 and then say it won’t come with Halo 3.
NEW 360 ACCESSORIES: Until you learn the value of transparent plastic, I’ll just stick with the black and white controllers, thank you very much.
http://www.destructoid.com/elephant/my_post.phtml?pk=34934
My Post :: DESTRUCTOID :: Hardcore gaming blog
WII ZAPPER: Let me see if I have this straight: you show off Resident Evil 5 but not Duck Hunt? FAIL.
MASS EFFECT: Still not sold on this beyond “It’s an RPG from Bioware”.
LOST ODYSSEY: Not bad but I’m not in the Cult of Sakaguchi so I’m not gonna splooge all over it.
ROCK BAND: I guess the only question left is which instrument I’m gonna get.
MY LIFE COACH: The signal that perhaps its time to kill yourself, now on the DS!
THE SIMPSONS GAME: I want this to be good, it even looks kind of good, but since when have The Simpsons been good and since when has a Simpsons videogame ever been good?
GUITAR HERO III: Not much newness. It really remains to be seen whether or not Neversoft screwed the pooch on this one or if they’ve managed to at least keep the game as good as it ever was.
More of my armchair quarterbacking as new stuff to criticize based solely on appearance becomes available.
How To Celebrate Independence Day
Today is the 4th of July. Every country has it. They may not know it or may not care but here in the United States of America we celebrate it. We celebrate it because it was the birth of our nation. It was when a group of men decided they would not be subject to the whims of a tyrant and decided to forge a nation of freedom and equality (not so much for all the black people that were brought here to work against their wills but still a noble sentiment nonetheless).
On Monday, the latest perversion in a long line of perversions came forth from the Bush Administration as the President commuted the sentence of I. Lewis Libby. Personally, I’m out of outrage. It’s too exhausting to constantly tally this administration’s long line of corruptions and simply not break down and cry that our country has suffered more not at the hands of our enemies but at the hands of those we asked to protect and defend us.
The commuting of “Scooter’s” sentence is purely partisan. Anyone who truly loves America cannot look at this act and not understand that the President decided not to uphold the law, to not respect if not at least agree with the conviction of his crony, and basically spit on the laws of our country and decide those laws were not applicable to one of “his guys”. Is that America? Are we all equal under the law unless you know a guy who knows a guy?
On various news aggregators I visit, people were positively foaming at the mouth when they learned that Paris Hilton would be under house arrest rather than serving time. Libby doesn’t even have to stay home. He has to pay a $250,000 fine which will no doubt be covered by his pals. There’s also the matter of probation but in light of his recent prison-dodge, I think we all know that’s a joke.
But it’s hard to get mad today. Today when we’ll take a day off from work, spend time with family and friends, eat a hearty meal straight off the grill, and marvel at fireworks. Celebrations aren’t the time to get mad. But I will say that sometimes before we can celebrate, we must honor. We must pay homage to the act we wish to celebrate. And so I ask that you please take the half hour (if that) out of your day to contact your representative and contact your senators. Even if you didn’t vote for them; even if they’re Republicans and you think they’ll choose their party over their country. Write because that’s how you truly celebrate America.
I’ll leave you with a link to the more eloquent and intelligent Green Greewald’s thoughts on the matter as well as a rousing and powerful Special Comment from Keith Olbermann:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGq7mqkDJ7E]
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