WE CAME THROUGH THE SOUTH ENTRANCE, and Joe wouldn’t stop apologizing for the park’s lack of beauty. “Roosevelt Park,” he insisted, “is perfect in the late spring when the grass is green.” ……….He was, of course, being ridiculous and picky. “I’m just going to call you out on being too specific with your expectations and narrow in your interpretation of what is fine quality,” I said. “You’ve only ever come here during those times and this is what you expect to show us.” ……….“He’s right, Joe!” s
"ARE YOU THERE?" .........."No, to your right a bit." .........."There?" .........."A little more." .........."Wait, I see you," said Monosmith. Buzzy's bright chartreuse uniform stood out from a half a mile away, even when it was mostly blocked by tree branches. He was seated halfway up the opposite hill. There was a river in between them, so one of them was going to have to get wet. "You stay there. I'm coming to you." .........."Hurry, that light caught a bit of attention." ..........That was
IN MY MANY YEARS ONE WOULD SUSPECT THAT I WOULD HAVE IMPROVED MY ABILITY TO LIVE, and yet without fear of death I suffered a psychological detriment. The average man graduated from college and knew that at the very most he was twenty percent finished with his life, but such an estimation would be generous and his life would more likely than not play out to be shorter than that and render him already a third of the way throughout his course. Back in my heyday, man would read “Thanatopsis” and i
Reentry WE WERE IMMORTAL, BUT IT WASN'T A BLESSING. My name is John Silver, and I have been John Silver for a while. The only friends I have are old friends. It’s very difficult to find anything to do anymore that seems worthwhile. Yeah, it’s that sort of lifestyle. ..........The room was half lit and felt romantic. I was relaxed, sitting next to the fire, politics in the back of my mind. Beside me was another John, this one John Smith. I had known him since the war of 1812. Good tim
IT WAS OPEN 24 HOURS A DAY, 365 DAYS A YEAR. There was ham, sausages, bacon, pancakes, waffles, everything a nostalgic fan of the 50's could ever want. Neal Kaplen once said in the Metropolis Times that it had "Malts so thick you could eat them with a fork, hamburgers so juicy you can use a spoon, and waitresses so ornery you better know exactly what you want by the time they reach you." ..........As it happened, Lois knew before she looked at the menu that she wanted the Fresh Ground Coffee.
The moment arrived to sit on the curb To become one with the frail autumn leaves Alone, away from all the rest, to rest Never to let them see what could disturb A man who walks with his back to the breeze Away, away, to hold communion here With the dried remains of the Earth's substance With the still October air, with an air Of Death, which in earnest speaks in my ear How the door I seek is not an entrance Avant! Alas! The grimmer days I've found! The wind
[Joker] Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha! I wanna chase'm and mess with the police Break'em let'em hit me in the middle of the street (I ship it) You might hate me now but when you cool down here's my card And when you try to hunt me I'll tell you how I got these scars Oh, oh, oh It's all for naught, you can't stop my plot Oh, oh, oh It's all for naught, you can't stop my plot Care if I tell you why I've got these scars on my f
I went to this movie knowing full well that I would like it. Bruce Willis claimed that it was the "best film [he had] ever been in," which is a pretty tall claim for an actor immortalized by a span of works that is not only great, but crowned by "Die Hard", commonly acknowledged as not only the definitive Bruce Willis movie (which it is), but the definitive action movie of all time. So with that in mind, this is a pretty tall claim from one of the trusted big guns that was put into this film.
LOIS SCURRIED DOWN FROM THE ROOF. Some heads turned. Everyone seemed to notice her excitement, save for Clark, who was too busy working on his economics article to take note. She sat down in her desk directly across from him and typed on her computer with a satisfied smile. The rapid sound of keys filled the otherwise silent room for a full minute. ..........Clark finally looked up. "Lois, do you want me to proofread your work?" .........."What? No," said Lois. Of course not. This was to
People like to brag about their troubles. One person mentions how their life has been difficult, and I know first-hand that there will always be someone else who will say "Oh yeah? Well I've got you beat." You had emotionally abusive parents? Well he or she had emotionally and physically abusive parents. Your job had a cruel boss? Well he or she was in the military and had to go through a drill sergeant. You don't deserve to be sad with your life problems because there's someone else in A
The following is a worldview illustration, for worldviews are like tree trunks. The trunk begets the limbs which beget the twigs which beget the leaves, representing individual opinions and applications. In all its complexity, everything is derivative of the core idea, the trunk. Illustration enters into metaphor in the form of roots, which are the many arguments that support and form a basis for the worldview trunk. The argument here is made by comparing the end results of two classic liter
One thing I thought was cool about the opening to Superman Returns is that there is a hint of Also Sprach Zarathustra from 2001: A Space Odyssey in the Kryptonian Fanfare segment as the archived voice of Jor-El says that "You will travel far, my little Kal-El". Now, rewind a bit, to the point where you're now at a point of time before this movie. In fact, we're going back in time before Superman comics. "Superman" is a rough translation of Friedrich Nietzsche's Übermensch (it can also be tr
Looking at superhero movies these days, among other franchises with ongoing characters, life has been a bit uninspiring. Famous personas are getting rebooted left and right, yet even though many of these movies are good, very few of these movies dare to create the definitive versions of their characters. I'm disappointed to see what Zack Snyder seems to be aiming at with the upcoming Man of Steel movie, which seems content to make it good but not great. I keep on imagining what the definitive
One of my favorite books is Fahrenheit 451. There are plenty of books out there, bundles of paper with words on them, that have good stories, but this is one of the few that really tackles what the art of story is all about, especially within its respective genre of science fiction. Being a philosopher by nature, works like these are the ones that appeal to me. It really gets me thinking about why I read and why I look to the art of story, why it's one of the few things that we as a society s
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh! Gonna make the Batman dance Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh! Gonna make the Batman dance Ha ha hahaha! Haha hahaha! Go-tham muhaha! Gonna make Batman dance Ha ha hahaha! Haha hahaha! Go-tham muhaha! Gonna make Batman dance I'm laughing smugly, I'm laughing a wheeze I'm laughing as I bring Gotham to its knees I'm laughing of (of-of-of a little shove) Your childhood trauma burned you like a brand You're not like them, your rage is just canned
When I revisited my old hometown college there was a poster up on the walls for a choir group called the Canons. It was a very simple poster with some information and a picture of a very pretty girl on the front (she had short hair, which is an uncommon fashion among girls that I personally find very attractive), except for some reason her wonderful features were covered by a big circle-slash NO sign. That kind of annoyed me and I wondered why it was there, so I read the headline that went wit
Here's a post in response to this entry. I thought it was worth reposting as its own entry. These thoughts are incomplete, by the way, so feel free to add to them. I think you're just better able to express your thoughts. It doesn't make you a different person: you just find that you have a different way of interacting between environments. I don't see myself as being different people between my blog and my regular life either, just that I've found more than one way of expressing myself
I was told to write a brief testimony in class starting with the phrase "Life hit me hard when". The teacher said it was okay to write something fictional if we didn't feel like sharing our actual experiences. So I wrote a note at the beginning of my writing: "The following journal entry is a fictional account, due to the author's current inability to express his own feelings directly. Instead, he has opted to write about the feelings of an imaginary individual whose experiences and emotio
Dear Blog, It just occurred to me that my sister celebrates her golden birthday tomorrow, which officially makes her a preteen and separates her from the tragic events surrounding her birth by more than a decade. September 11, 2001 is today a day a mixed feelings for me. While thousands of people died, my mother was in the hospital pushing a new life into the world with all her might. In all this, I was in my aunt's custody, being told to watch the news for homework. I knew then just as muc
So now that I'm done with the melodrama of high school and casual friendships that come together due to circumstance, I figured that it's time that I actively invested in my friendships, maybe even in a non-Platonic relationship for once in my life. Here at WIT, it's about an hour's drive away from home. A friend of mine - let's call him Sky - commutes from my home town and has an open offer for letting me carpool with him. It has been a bit of a hassle to make sure that I meet up with him at
I looked up the true story that this was based off of, which was interesting but had nothing to do with possession, except for the fact that some people obviously possessed the box. Some spooky things did happen in real life to suggest a frightening spirit, but they were a bit more subtle. That's exactly what I figured. At the beginning, captions against a black screen play up the real life backdrop and I have to chuckle. That's could mean anything. They should have been more specific and j
Recently I talked to a young man who wasn't impressed with Superhero movies lately. I asked about The Dark Knight Rises and he said he wasn't interested. Since it was a very interesting thing to say and he seemed to be the type of person who would like such drama, I decided to find out more about his perspectives. Here's his response: "I'm not sure why people idolize him. Instantly to me I just see a rich billionaire go down and become a sick man who dresses up in a bat costume and goes ou
Of all the teen music stars to come out of the Disney Channel, she was probably one only good ones. She also wasn't that bad of an actress. I still remember some of her great songs such as "Come Clean", "Someone's Watching Over Me", "Beat of My Heart", and "Hey Now". For the 00's pop music, this was actually noteworthy "real" music, so when I remember pieces like this I realize that the 00's were still worth it, and there's this hidden little bit of happiness somewhere in my chest that resurf
Just as I predicted, this movie was twice as good as the original purely by the virtue of having more famous names. How is that supposed to be right? Star power shouldn't be what drives a movie forward, but rather a good plot, and movies that cramp in too much star power are almost always destined to fail by putting together a half-baked plot with too much emphasis on cameos for actors who aren't even going to do the characters justice because their faces are too famous to keep willing suspens
Sure, it's really expensive, but I'm genuinely saving up to by one of the 5,000 authentic Helms of Sauron. There's not much that I desire more. Can you imagine how hardcore I would look wearing this on Halloween? I've decided I've moved past action figured and evolved into a figure of action myself. Hopefully I can get enough art commissions this year to earn a few thousand dollars. If not that, then maybe over the course of the next few years. If I'm really lucky, I can also get the mone
