Yet again I have decided to break into the world of weblogs, or blogs for those of you who didn’t know where the name came from. I’ve been negligent in my blogging and even shut down my old blog (which is a shame because it has several resources that I was looking forward to using . . . STUPID!! STUPID!! STUPID!!). Oh well.

This one will be different.

I like to lurk on forums and message boards, www.netalive.org is a great place. If you want to see some random postings and ramblings of computer programmers and gamers, feel free to check out www.gorc.us/forums and forums.g33xnexus.com.

Well, after looking at my posts and such on these forums, I decided that perhaps I should set up a blog again. At the very least to inspire discussion about movies and other fun subjects like religion and morals. (Beware all of you argumentative types . . . oh wait . . . that’s me)

Just a little note – you are more than welcome to comment, but keep language mild – I will edit any post as I see fit. Your intellectual property won’t be altered, but your profanity will.

I hope my readers (all three of you) will enjoy what I have to say, and I can’t wait to see comments.

Oh, and I WILL be accepting submissions for guest articles, so feel free to hit me up with whatever you want. If I like it, I’ll post it. If I don’t . . . well . . . don’t hold your breath.

Okay, time to kick off this rant with a hotlink. My fiancee showed me this article today and I just about died laughing when I saw it.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10897027/from/RS.4

Now, once you’ve finished laughing your head off you’ll probably do the same thing I did. Stop and think to yourself. How pathetic is it that a celebrity will sell a kidney-stone for charity? As happy as I am that Shatner gave the money to charity and didn’t put it in his own personal account, it still seems a little . . . stupid.

More so, how ridiculous is it that a site will purchase stupid things like that for so much money, and even moreso, how ridiculous is it that MSNBC finds it necessary to tell us when the nasty thing was passed! Who cares? So Shatner suffers from kidney stones . . . that’s about as normal as he gets.

Is it not possible that maybe we’ve lost sight of true heroes and so we choose to elevate the shallow pedantic attempts of a celebrity to break into the realm of eccentricity? I will admit that Shatner’s quote is actually more humble than I portray it here. Perhaps we should start taking a serious look at GoldenPalace.com.

Life sucks and I’m tired of it.

Don’t worry, I’m not suicidal or anything, I’m just sick of where I am. I hate my classes, hate the fact that I do so much and yet am so unproductive.

When your dead-end retail job is the highlight of your wednesday, you know you’re in a bad way.

Okay, so I’d been down in the dumps for a while (as evidenced by my last two posts) but I recently started a couple of games of calvinball on some forums. I’m thinking of starting up a board dedicated entirely to the game and have a giant tournament going on.

This could be fun.

Okay, so I really need to find a way to increase traffic on this site. Of course that would entail actually getting off my duff and writing something interesting once in a while.

Eventually I plan to have this thing set up as a movie critique blog, and I might as well do that. I’m actually sitting on campus with NOTHING to do. Yeah, that’s right, I went the entire summer without posting, so a few updates before I jump into an analysis.

I moved into a nice little place with a friend of mine and we’re . . . surviving. Nah, it’s fun.

My wedding is coming ever closer (and it’s taking its sweet time! ARGH!).

Oh yeah, I’m now a comic artist and will be attending ConnectiCon next July. If anyone stumbles upon this blog and actually attends the con, look for the Precursors: Requiem for Innocence booth.

Okay, now then – on to the criticism!

Since it’s been a little while, I’m gonna tackle a summer release: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.

Now I know what a lot of you are thinking. Eh, it looks stupid. I have one word for you: HARDLY. This movie was phenomenal, albeit NOT for those under the age of 17. Right up front I’ll tell you that the language is atrocious and there is some nudity. Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, you can’t gripe at me – I warned you.

Foul mouths aside, this movie is hysterical! I absolutely loved it. Written by Shane Black (who incidentally wrote all 4 of the Lethal Weapon movies), this is film noir like you’ve NEVER seen it before. Robert Downey Jr. comes out of a slump to create an absolutely loveable character, Harry Lockhart. Harry is a small time crook who, through a series of bizarre occurances, finds himself travelling from New York to Los Angeles to star in a film. He his set up to take detective lessons from private investigator Perry Van Shrike a.k.a. “Gay Perry” (masterfully played by Val Kilmer).

A little personal commentary here – being a heterosexual male, I have a tendency to treat things from a slightly homophobic perspective simply because it’s unnatural to me. However, Kilmer played this character SO well that I had no problem relating to his character even when he made some OUTRAGEOUS gay jokes!

Okay, back to the analysis.

Harry and Perry end up working together on a case that involves murder mystery and mayhem. Okay, fine I made that up – it only involves the first two.

One of the more unique things about this film is the use of an active narrative voice. Robert Downey Jr. narrates the movie with biting wit and some extremely clever criticisms on the fact that the film is INDEED that – a film.

I love movies that are so self-aware.

Realism and satirical commentary on the nature of everyday life runs rampant in this film and is a testament to the incredible skills of Shane Black, not only as a writer but also as a director. I could easily spend hours picking this apart moment by moment, frame by frame, but for now I’ll leave you with a simple statement.

Go rent this movie! If you love it like I did, then buy it!

Ah, college.  A myriad of experiences that can be frightening and frustrating for the incoming freshman.  Unless of course, you go to Texas Tech university, in which case the frustrations continue well into senior year.  I’m talking of course about the parking situation on campus.  No, I’m not about to gripe about the lack of student parking lots – enough people have done that in the past.  What I’ve noticed is a distinct lack of VISITOR lots.  In a park and pay lot, certain TTU permits are allowed to park at any time.  However for some stupid reason, parking control likes to shut a lot of them down for no good reason.  The parking lot next to the foreign language building is a prime example.  It’s a designated park and pay lot but it’s also what’s called an R-11 lot.  Anyone with an R-11 sticker has an assigned spot.  Now, the lot next to the theatre is an R-3 (same story).  They are both designated park and pay, but the theatre lot is the only one of the two that will not garner you a ticket if you park there.

WHY?!?

They both are assigned lots, they both have park and pay booths, and the foreign language building is NEVER full, whereas the theatre lot is NEVER available.  What is the point of allowing visitors to park, (and believe me they make it seem like you can park anywhere, I had to ASK parking control if it was allowed) and then turning around and ticketing them for following the apparent instructions?

Idiots . . . every last one of them.

To be quite honest, I can’t wait to graduate.  Not because I’m tired of TTU, I love it, but rather because if I’m a graduate research assistant and/or teaching assistant, I MIGHT be able to get ahold of a parking sticker instead of hiking a mile and a half to class.

At last.  The end of the semester approaches, and I couldn’t be happier about a semester ending unless I was actually graduating.  Ugh . . . this semester has been one of the roughest of my career.  I’m so very glad that Christmas break is coming.

In other news, I finally quit my job.  Yeah, the horrendous consumer-driven retail monstrosity that was driving me slowly into insanity . . . is gone.  I’m actually moving into a better job in the call center at a local bank.  This is going to open up so many doors for me.  I’ll finally have all my evenings off in order to spend time with my beautiful fiancee, and I’ll have more time to work on my comic strip.

I’ve been praying about that a lot lately.  I really feel this is where I would be happy – working on comics and such.   And I’m hoping that this will eventually turn into something big.  My writer and I have been talking, and we’re hoping to have two or three books written and published within 7 years or so.  Now I just need the patience to wait for this stuff to work out.

Oh well . . . anyway, check out the link to my art blog on the sidebar if you want a taste of what I’m doing.

Because most of what I’m going to talk about is already in my other blog, I’ll be sure to keep my thoughts in this post as original as possible.

There’s always quite a bit going on in my life around this time of year, and this year is no different.  Well, I take it back – it’s very different.  This is the first holiday season since I moved out of my parents’ place and I’ve gotta say . . . it can be a bit depressing.  Yeah, I know, a lot of people will look at me funny for saying that.  I don’t know how many times I’ve heard “but . . . you’re free to do what you want!”.

Yeah, I am.  And I want to be with family.  Be it my folks, or my fiancee, I’m a little tired of school and living with a roommate.  Don’t get me wrong, I like my roomie, but I can’t go into what frustrates me about him for fear of being sued for libel.  (If you’re reading this, Travis . . . well, I’ll probably be halfway to Tijuana . . . .)

So . . . yeah.  I’m a little blue.  I’m sure this will all change soon enough.  These past weeks have just been frustrating.  My computer fried.  My windows partition on this computer bit the dust.  I had to shell out more money than I wanted to in order to replace my PC, and the post office has really been giving my writer and me a lot of crap over the shipping of a single package that should have been here a week or two ago.  Oh well.  I’m sure I’ll feel better once my PC gets here (it’s SUPPOSED to be delivered today).

I dunno, there’s a part of me that wants to sit by a fire (campfire, fireplace, burning building, old tire, I don’t care) and roast marshmallows with a homeless guy.  For one, I’ll bet no one has given him more than 30 seconds of attention in the last year (and you can meet some really incredible people who are just down on their luck), and for another thing, it’ll allow me to get away from the fast food, microwave generation who are so wrapped up in instant gratification that they won’t do anything without being paid in advance.

I’m not old, but I’m starting to sound that way.

I could go on, but like Solomon said, “many words makes for little understanding.”

Hey guys, sorry I haven’t been updating the blog in forever.  It’s been super busy.  I’m finally settled into the new job at the bank, and I’m thoroughly enjoying it.  I would take the time to write a review of a film for you right now, but I’m still kinda swamped with classes and such.  So . . . lemme just say this:

The Illusionist.  Go.  Buy it.

Well, I’m sitting here at work (hurray! our internet service doesn’t block this site!) and I’m feeling really blue.  I figured the best thing to do would be to talk about it.

I wish I could actually pinpoint this feeling.  I know the latest thing that has contributed to it, but I also know that it isn’t the only thing.  I received upsetting news last night.  It seems that one of my two best friends has joined the United States Air Force. 

 Now . . . I’m from a military family and am in full support of his decision to join up.  The thing that bothers me is the timing.  I’m getting married May 12th.  He’s standing in my wedding.  In fact, he was second in line to be my best man.  Now he’s shipping out to basic training on May 1st and he won’t be able to be there. 

This is only the latest thing though.  I’m just getting so burned out on everything.  Class is a burden rather than an interesting experience.  I don’t really get much chance to hang out with friends because of planning for the wedding and work and homework.  When I DO hang out with friends, I’m bored within a few hours and just want to go home.  My busy time is cutting into one of the two things that I love: the comic.  (The other is spending time with my fiancee, but she lives out of town, so my busyness doesn’t cut into time with her nearly as much.) 

I’m ready to be finished with class for a while.  I’m not sure what I’m going to do.  I’m frustrated, and pulled in eight million directions, and tired, and occasionally unhappy, and I just need a hug. 

I know there’s always someone watching over me, and I am constantly growing in Him.  But man . . . life is rough.

 Sorry for being so melancholy.  I think I’m going to work on a couple of paintings when I get home.  Hopefully that will help me feel better.