Right now I am really stuck between a rock and a hard place, the issue being where I am going to live next year. A few weeks back during all the housing application commotion, my friend was supposed to have applied for Raymond Hall for us on his day (he is a junior so he had priority). Yeah… that never happened, so now I am not registered for any campus residence, and by now, there are only traditional halls left. I guess those work for some people but I am sick and tired of living in a prison cell, I want my own kitchen, my own bathroom, hell even simply having my own room that is only mine, not shared with someone else would make me so much happier.
“Well Greg, why don’t you just move off of campus then?” you say, well, because I’m sadly not the only person deciding how I live my life at the moment. Not to get all “my parents suck” on you, but long story short they don’t believe I can handle “off-campus life”. They don’t feel I am responsible enough and my grades will slip, and if I’m not doing everything I can to get the best out of college, then the money stops flowing in, and my ass is getting some loans to pay for it. So yeah, I’m totally for living on my own and doing my own thing, but if that means I’m getting half of my money for school cut off from me (i.e. my parent’s contribution) then things start to get a bit different.
On top of my parents wanting me to live on campus (not to mention probably thinking I have everything taken care of now.. .wooo boy, this will be fun to tell em…), my friends Madi and Megan need a third roommate for their 3-bedroom as their roommate is moving out this summer. “Perfect! I don’t even need to find roommates now, just sign my lease and I’m done, the apt is already furnished and comes with all the appliances needed, is on lake mary close to campus, awesome”. Now if I do that, I screw over Kirk who still has his place in Tinsley reserved for us, despite screwing up and not getting Raymond. Plus your utilities are paid for on campus, BUT WAIT! Campus housing rates just jumped way up too, and so did meal plans, so the cost on and off campus is almost the same.
I hate this feeling, no matter where I go I end up screwing someone over, bah!
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Pulp Fiction Analysis
In tarantino's film, ethics and ethical behavior is covered alot, especially for a film based on crime, murder, and theft. This brings a unique flair to the movie as the viewer is always questioning why the characters take so much consideration into petty things as they are involved in very heavy situations. One such example is the chat Vincent and Jules have about the foot massage Marsellus's wife recieved from one of marsellus's business partners. The argument goes on for a whole scene as Vincent and Jules debate the severity of a foot massage and if marsellus over-reacted or not. In the end, vincent wins the argument and the viewer is stuck thinking deeply about the actual emotional meaning behind a foot massage. The fact that something this simple and yet out of the ordinary became such a signifigant part of a the movie. A true show of the meticulous attention to detail and out of the ordinary metaphors and symbolism that tarantino loves so much.
Monday, April 21, 2008
Destroyed, yeah that's the word.
So yesterday didn’t exactly go as planned, but that seems to be the case with me every time I try to plan some trip. I was supposed to drive down to phoenix with my friend Kirk but he apparently decided to go down a day earlier and never called me, and I never set an alarm and woke up at like 1pm, so that basically shot any chances of catching the matinee show Who Calls So Loud was having at 3, mega bummer. Anywho after much commotion I was on my way to surprise to pick up my friend Nathaniel and then get to Tempe to The Clubhouse in time for the show (we made it like half an hour early, score).
Note: the links all go the respective band’s myspace pages, which may or may not offend some people, they are all pretty heavy and “out there”, so yeah.
First up was Genghis Tron, who play a really inventive style of electronica/synth-loaded grind if you had to describe it. They had a full wall of pedals, distortion loops, keyboards, a drum machine, fluorescent lights, everything rigged together in some ridiculous fashion that most likely only the band knew how to operate. They put on a really good show, actually a lot better than I expected, usually bands like this will be pretty tame on stage trying to keep hold of all of their time-signature changes and constant effects pedal tomfoolery. But nope, Genghis tron sure as hell have their stuff together, they flowed well as a band and could not have been more energetic, the smallish crowd of people who decided to watch the openers and not just converge was really into it.
Next is Baroness, a big big favorite of mine, very cool sludge/doom metal band from Georgia. They started out with about 4 songs from their new album “The Red album”, Rays on Pinion, The Birthing, Isak, and Cockroach En Fluer. All of which were amazing live, despite the vocals being a lot more drowned out, which I think kind of takes away from their sound. After this they slammed right into their second EP (aptly titled “second” haha) and I could not have been happier, I was extremely worried they wouldn’t play any of their old stuff but sure enough they did. Not only did they play it, but they played the entire 20 minute EP straight through song for song, it was simply incredible. At the end of their set Summer (the bassist) decided to throw off his axe and jump right into the crowd (coincidentally right on top of me). Well… whoo boy we sure weren’t ready for it, my friend instinctively dodged out of the way along with some other kids leaving me and a few others to completely fail at catching summer in any decent fashion, it was more of a slowly broken fall, which also tore off my glasses, ruining them beyond recognition. At least he didn’t completely hit the ground but damn, that had to be a disappointing stage dive, we felt so bad afterwards haha. Overall though, they did an amazing job, did not disappoint one bit.
Next up to bat is The Red Chord, whom I wasn’t too pumped for just because their albums have progressively gotten more uninspired and contrived, sounding more and more like the huge plethora of hardcore bands who ride the same sound. I honestly only like a few songs off of their first album. Complaining aside, they weren’t as generic as I had expected, and the crowd was fun, a lot of the others there were really into it and it showed in the constant chaos in the pit, somewhere along their 5th song I got headbutted in the temple waaaay hard and kinda lost my footing for a good song before I felt alright again (and wow am I feeling it today, I’ve got this weird bruise/welt thing under my skin by my temple). They finished with “Dreaming in Dog Years” which is my favorite song off their old album, I was so pumped they still played it, me and about 40 other kids were all screaming along to this one up in the front, it was great.
Finally, the band who I’ve been wanting to see forever now, essentially the top of my “bands to see before I die” list, now gets to be crossed out. CONVERGE! I could not have been more pumped in my life for a show, and I essentially didn’t even care what albums/songs they played, but in hindsight, they really picked a good bunch. They opened with Plagues, with Kurt Ballou starting with the songs signature guitar lead, then the rest of the band runs in from backstage and jumps into the song exactly on time. They immediate slam into two more songs off of the new album, and then some songs off of their Swansong “Jane Doe”, after which they played a really old song “Conduit” from their first album, which is one of my favorites. The whole time this is going on I’m caught up front in the most ridiculous crowd/pit I have ever been in my life, you literally could not move an inch in either direction unless the crowd dictated it, there was sooo many people packed into this 40x50 foot area. There was no sense of a floor, no order, only a huge mass of people, stagedives so frequent it was literally a waterfall of people, by the end of this my jeans were literally skin-tight they were so soaked with sweat. Maybe half the time Jacob was actually screaming, the mic was as much ours as it was his, with so many of us knowing the songs word for word, it tended to bounce between the crowd and him in the chaos, yet not a single verse was interrupted. They finished with “First Light/Last Light” they’re somewhat trademark anthemic song, the entire crowd was screaming along with this one, everyone piling up front to get to the stage, nothing mattered, nobody cared, we were all one. At the end of all of this was literally puking from the exertion (kinda due to the fact that I was out waay late the night before and had only eaten a giant 7-11 slurpie since.. but whatever, blaming it on the show sounds way cooler right?)
You know, this all probably sounds incredibly retarded to most of you, but to me this is exactly how a hardcore show should be. Intense and violent, but never against one another, everyone in the crowd is unified, participating in the chaos because the music speaks to them and their strife. Jacob wrote all of his songs based on his own life experiences, but every single person there had some sort of connection or belief in what he expresses. I don’t think I will ever forget this show.
Note: the links all go the respective band’s myspace pages, which may or may not offend some people, they are all pretty heavy and “out there”, so yeah.
First up was Genghis Tron, who play a really inventive style of electronica/synth-loaded grind if you had to describe it. They had a full wall of pedals, distortion loops, keyboards, a drum machine, fluorescent lights, everything rigged together in some ridiculous fashion that most likely only the band knew how to operate. They put on a really good show, actually a lot better than I expected, usually bands like this will be pretty tame on stage trying to keep hold of all of their time-signature changes and constant effects pedal tomfoolery. But nope, Genghis tron sure as hell have their stuff together, they flowed well as a band and could not have been more energetic, the smallish crowd of people who decided to watch the openers and not just converge was really into it.
Next is Baroness, a big big favorite of mine, very cool sludge/doom metal band from Georgia. They started out with about 4 songs from their new album “The Red album”, Rays on Pinion, The Birthing, Isak, and Cockroach En Fluer. All of which were amazing live, despite the vocals being a lot more drowned out, which I think kind of takes away from their sound. After this they slammed right into their second EP (aptly titled “second” haha) and I could not have been happier, I was extremely worried they wouldn’t play any of their old stuff but sure enough they did. Not only did they play it, but they played the entire 20 minute EP straight through song for song, it was simply incredible. At the end of their set Summer (the bassist) decided to throw off his axe and jump right into the crowd (coincidentally right on top of me). Well… whoo boy we sure weren’t ready for it, my friend instinctively dodged out of the way along with some other kids leaving me and a few others to completely fail at catching summer in any decent fashion, it was more of a slowly broken fall, which also tore off my glasses, ruining them beyond recognition. At least he didn’t completely hit the ground but damn, that had to be a disappointing stage dive, we felt so bad afterwards haha. Overall though, they did an amazing job, did not disappoint one bit.
Next up to bat is The Red Chord, whom I wasn’t too pumped for just because their albums have progressively gotten more uninspired and contrived, sounding more and more like the huge plethora of hardcore bands who ride the same sound. I honestly only like a few songs off of their first album. Complaining aside, they weren’t as generic as I had expected, and the crowd was fun, a lot of the others there were really into it and it showed in the constant chaos in the pit, somewhere along their 5th song I got headbutted in the temple waaaay hard and kinda lost my footing for a good song before I felt alright again (and wow am I feeling it today, I’ve got this weird bruise/welt thing under my skin by my temple). They finished with “Dreaming in Dog Years” which is my favorite song off their old album, I was so pumped they still played it, me and about 40 other kids were all screaming along to this one up in the front, it was great.
Finally, the band who I’ve been wanting to see forever now, essentially the top of my “bands to see before I die” list, now gets to be crossed out. CONVERGE! I could not have been more pumped in my life for a show, and I essentially didn’t even care what albums/songs they played, but in hindsight, they really picked a good bunch. They opened with Plagues, with Kurt Ballou starting with the songs signature guitar lead, then the rest of the band runs in from backstage and jumps into the song exactly on time. They immediate slam into two more songs off of the new album, and then some songs off of their Swansong “Jane Doe”, after which they played a really old song “Conduit” from their first album, which is one of my favorites. The whole time this is going on I’m caught up front in the most ridiculous crowd/pit I have ever been in my life, you literally could not move an inch in either direction unless the crowd dictated it, there was sooo many people packed into this 40x50 foot area. There was no sense of a floor, no order, only a huge mass of people, stagedives so frequent it was literally a waterfall of people, by the end of this my jeans were literally skin-tight they were so soaked with sweat. Maybe half the time Jacob was actually screaming, the mic was as much ours as it was his, with so many of us knowing the songs word for word, it tended to bounce between the crowd and him in the chaos, yet not a single verse was interrupted. They finished with “First Light/Last Light” they’re somewhat trademark anthemic song, the entire crowd was screaming along with this one, everyone piling up front to get to the stage, nothing mattered, nobody cared, we were all one. At the end of all of this was literally puking from the exertion (kinda due to the fact that I was out waay late the night before and had only eaten a giant 7-11 slurpie since.. but whatever, blaming it on the show sounds way cooler right?)
You know, this all probably sounds incredibly retarded to most of you, but to me this is exactly how a hardcore show should be. Intense and violent, but never against one another, everyone in the crowd is unified, participating in the chaos because the music speaks to them and their strife. Jacob wrote all of his songs based on his own life experiences, but every single person there had some sort of connection or belief in what he expresses. I don’t think I will ever forget this show.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Writing Style Mimic Assignment
The text I have chosen to mimic style of is “The Manchurian Consumer” by Kalle Lasn, it is in the reserve files if you wish to read it as well. His short story follows a very rhetorical, questioning, and authoritative style, almost disgusted with the reader as they are who he is describing in his writings.
Every day at work, great deals are passed up by numerous consumers by the hour, simply because the item is not “pretty” or “modern”. Most of the time, the internal performance is better than what you will opt for. It makes no sense on paper, but that isn’t what matters, what matters is what happens when you are actually there. You always see the shiny, new computer first, the one on the end cap with the built-in webcam and Blu-Ray player, the one that weighs only 3 pounds, the one that comes in three different trims. Why do you choose it over the more basic gateway to its side, it’s only half the price and is only missing a Blu-ray player and isn’t as small. It’s because you have become subject to the system, the system built upon the gears and pulleys that are your friends and family’s expectations, the fear of being inadequate in comparison to someone else and their better technology. It’s because you can’t handle not having something that you can have, you want it because it’s there, not because you need it. You won’t ever notice the difference between that 1440x900 resolution and that 1620x1080, but you went for the latter one, just to say you have it. Congratulations, you have once again let your powerful third shoulder-angel of modern consumerism do the buying for you.
Every day at work, great deals are passed up by numerous consumers by the hour, simply because the item is not “pretty” or “modern”. Most of the time, the internal performance is better than what you will opt for. It makes no sense on paper, but that isn’t what matters, what matters is what happens when you are actually there. You always see the shiny, new computer first, the one on the end cap with the built-in webcam and Blu-Ray player, the one that weighs only 3 pounds, the one that comes in three different trims. Why do you choose it over the more basic gateway to its side, it’s only half the price and is only missing a Blu-ray player and isn’t as small. It’s because you have become subject to the system, the system built upon the gears and pulleys that are your friends and family’s expectations, the fear of being inadequate in comparison to someone else and their better technology. It’s because you can’t handle not having something that you can have, you want it because it’s there, not because you need it. You won’t ever notice the difference between that 1440x900 resolution and that 1620x1080, but you went for the latter one, just to say you have it. Congratulations, you have once again let your powerful third shoulder-angel of modern consumerism do the buying for you.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Anticipation
As of last week I’ve decided I am truly sick of college and my major and everything that has to do with it, and I could easily rant about everything I hate right now but I’m not going to, because in 4 weeks, I’ll be in The Netherlands.
That’s right, 5300 miles, a 1300 dollar plane ticket, and one language barrier away from this place. I’m not going to have a care in the world, just me, my family, and Holland. Usually my mother plans everything on our vacations but this time she has absolutely no itinerary, the only dates we are going to follow is when we have to move from my Oma Van de Putte’s summer home to my Oma Scott’s place during our stay. Aside from that its fair game, whatever we feel like doing on any given day, we are doing, anything from hitting the old-world markets spread across the suburbs of Holland or the ultimate tourist town Amsterdam. Most importantly I’ll be seeing all of my cousins, uncles, aunts, grandparents and old family friends. It’s always a trip when I see my cousins because they’re all 3-4 years older than the last time and way different (we try to go to Holland every 3 years but sometimes it doesn’t happen due to money issues). My only issue is that I’ll only be there for two weeks with my father, whereas my mother and siblings will be there a whole 4 weeks >:[ (he only has two weeks of leave from his contracting job with the air force, and I really need to work over the summer and make up all the money I’ve spent this semester, so I opted to go home early with him).
I need to brush up on my dutch too, op het ogenblik, ben ik meer niet te goed. :(
That’s right, 5300 miles, a 1300 dollar plane ticket, and one language barrier away from this place. I’m not going to have a care in the world, just me, my family, and Holland. Usually my mother plans everything on our vacations but this time she has absolutely no itinerary, the only dates we are going to follow is when we have to move from my Oma Van de Putte’s summer home to my Oma Scott’s place during our stay. Aside from that its fair game, whatever we feel like doing on any given day, we are doing, anything from hitting the old-world markets spread across the suburbs of Holland or the ultimate tourist town Amsterdam. Most importantly I’ll be seeing all of my cousins, uncles, aunts, grandparents and old family friends. It’s always a trip when I see my cousins because they’re all 3-4 years older than the last time and way different (we try to go to Holland every 3 years but sometimes it doesn’t happen due to money issues). My only issue is that I’ll only be there for two weeks with my father, whereas my mother and siblings will be there a whole 4 weeks >:[ (he only has two weeks of leave from his contracting job with the air force, and I really need to work over the summer and make up all the money I’ve spent this semester, so I opted to go home early with him).
I need to brush up on my dutch too, op het ogenblik, ben ik meer niet te goed. :(
Monday, April 7, 2008
This Weekend
I couldn’t really think of anything in particular to write this week’s blog on, which may be a good thing, because I write about some pretty asinine stuff. So I guess I’ll just narrate you guys through the amazing adventures of my weekend.
This weekend I wasn't scheduled to work either Saturday or Sunday. Yep, I got an entire weekend off of work, in a big box retail store, on the only two days I have completely open availability, I don’t even know how it happened, a server must have crashed or something, teams of engineers are working feverishly to fix this non-weekend scheduling big as we speak. I seriously don't even remember the last work-free weekend I’ve had aside from when I requested off to go to Tucson during spring break. Needless to say I was way pumped to do absolutely nothing.
….And with most of my party friends out of town, that’s exactly what I did, slept until noon on Saturday until my alarm went off (yes I do have an alarm set for noon, I like to pretend I have important things to do on days like this, I can’t afford sleeping until 2, seriously). Got a meatball sub from sub connection (which yes, IS part of a well-balanced breakfast (and yes I do realize the irony that an avid breakfast sub lover as myself didn’t get one for breakfast, (and yes I did just put a parenthesis inside of a parenthesis)). I then proceeded to begin the important task of sitting on my ass and playing Devil May Cry 4 for 6 straight hours, beating the game in the process, something which was well overdue since I had bought it when it came out, and barely played it. I then proceeded to go to the union with some friends and eat, for about an hour, eating, eating, and then more eating, defiantly flipping over the “know your portions” sign on the table, and then eating some more, tonight we dined with gluttony. After which I went back to my room to study, but within minutes some guys from down the hall asked if I wanted to play smash bros. brawl, being the diligent student I am, I slammed my book closed and we gamed it up, until literally 2am, upon which I went back to my room and watched The Office until like 4, passed out until noon again, got some breakfast, and went down to 98C to continue working on the Tandem Trike we are building for ASME, got the roll bar cut and welded, and got dinner. And here I am, doing homework at the last minute as always, but I have no regrets, as Ms. B’s said earlier in her blog, it’s good to have a whole day of nothing but what you enjoy.
This weekend I wasn't scheduled to work either Saturday or Sunday. Yep, I got an entire weekend off of work, in a big box retail store, on the only two days I have completely open availability, I don’t even know how it happened, a server must have crashed or something, teams of engineers are working feverishly to fix this non-weekend scheduling big as we speak. I seriously don't even remember the last work-free weekend I’ve had aside from when I requested off to go to Tucson during spring break. Needless to say I was way pumped to do absolutely nothing.
….And with most of my party friends out of town, that’s exactly what I did, slept until noon on Saturday until my alarm went off (yes I do have an alarm set for noon, I like to pretend I have important things to do on days like this, I can’t afford sleeping until 2, seriously). Got a meatball sub from sub connection (which yes, IS part of a well-balanced breakfast (and yes I do realize the irony that an avid breakfast sub lover as myself didn’t get one for breakfast, (and yes I did just put a parenthesis inside of a parenthesis)). I then proceeded to begin the important task of sitting on my ass and playing Devil May Cry 4 for 6 straight hours, beating the game in the process, something which was well overdue since I had bought it when it came out, and barely played it. I then proceeded to go to the union with some friends and eat, for about an hour, eating, eating, and then more eating, defiantly flipping over the “know your portions” sign on the table, and then eating some more, tonight we dined with gluttony. After which I went back to my room to study, but within minutes some guys from down the hall asked if I wanted to play smash bros. brawl, being the diligent student I am, I slammed my book closed and we gamed it up, until literally 2am, upon which I went back to my room and watched The Office until like 4, passed out until noon again, got some breakfast, and went down to 98C to continue working on the Tandem Trike we are building for ASME, got the roll bar cut and welded, and got dinner. And here I am, doing homework at the last minute as always, but I have no regrets, as Ms. B’s said earlier in her blog, it’s good to have a whole day of nothing but what you enjoy.
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Extended Argument
Although i am an engineering major, my paper wont be focusing that much on my field, aside from the fact that it deals with technology, just like my field of study. Engineering simply doesnt have any "arguments" that i really feel i can write about for 8 pages, if you want a tech paper, i can do that, because thats mostly all engineering is, facts and research and prototypes, there usually isnt a huge "other side" to things, if it works it works, if it doesn't it doesnt.
That said, for my extended argument paper i am planning on focusing on internet surveillence and governmental restrictions of internet uses. Although i feel very strongly about the whole music downloading and RIAA issue, i will try not to focus on that, if i do it will only be as a support. My main focus is going to be on surveillance, and my stance is going to be that it shouldnt be occuring as much as it is. The government is severely overstepping thier boundaries and invading thier citizens personal privacy with many of the news, and do not at all agree with that.
That said, for my extended argument paper i am planning on focusing on internet surveillence and governmental restrictions of internet uses. Although i feel very strongly about the whole music downloading and RIAA issue, i will try not to focus on that, if i do it will only be as a support. My main focus is going to be on surveillance, and my stance is going to be that it shouldnt be occuring as much as it is. The government is severely overstepping thier boundaries and invading thier citizens personal privacy with many of the news, and do not at all agree with that.
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