Pruning / Reorganizing MP3s

This process involves me deleting music which is no longer relevant, or albums that are incomplete or otherwise fucked. My rationale for deleting albums that are really just missing a song or two is that I would not want to listen to an album that is incomplete, and to spend the time searching for just one file is a waste of my time. After all, there is an ocean of music out there and I can't ever possibly listen to everything I would like to hear.

Libertarian Perspective: Father, Son, and Environment

My friend Peter has an interesting and thought provoking blog. His most recent entry can be seen here:Libertarian Perspective: Father, Son, and Environment

I am giving up on DeadAIM and moving on to Trillian

It's good so far. Really.

My iPod Needs Purging

All 30GB are filled up. I need to go through and remove what I know I will never listen to again.

There's a new AIM virus going around

Don't click links unless you ask a person if they are legit

Read about it here

DFA79, or: How I Got My Face Melted Off And Enjoyed Every Moment Of It

Holy fuck that show was all kinds of awesome. The crowd was absolutely rabid. Sebastien was talking a lot of shit to the kids in the audience who were saying things. His caustic wit was hilarious. Like, someone was complaining about the bass, and he was like "Well you're in the fucking mosh pit, if you want it to sound good go stand in the middle like everyone else." (That is not exactly what he said, but it was pretty similar.) There was a lot of other stuff that happened, and all of it was cool. All of the other bands were pretty good but Controller.Controller was really awesome as well. When you have 5 people on stage rocking out, it is generally awesome. I want to hear more of them, and I want them to put out a full length album (they had an EP on sale at the show that I did not pick up but would like to hear very much).

It was memorable to say the least.

Something beautiful happened in the church house, but it didn't have to do with God

I saw Q And Not U last night and it was an amazing and fun show. There were a lot of good people there, I had a great time. I spent about 45 minutes trying to find parking, and it was such a fucking bummer I almost gave up and went back home. A decent spot magically appeared on Market Street though, so I stayed in Philadelphia. No, seriously, it was like 45 minutes.

In any case, I went into the show and I missed some of Horses' performance. What I saw was really pretty good though. Manhunter was next, and they showed the crowd a good time. People danced, Manhunter danced, fun was had by all. Then there was this hip-hop act, Food For Animals. I did not like it very much, and I am a gigantic hip-hop fan. I really dug the noise, but the rapping was lackluster, although there were a few good punchlines. I felt it was more like some guys on stage jamming, and a fat bearded guy just enjoying himself doing some rapping on the stage, and not really giving a shit about the crowd, or his flow. Actually, that's EXACTLY what it was. The crowd was bored. We were all bored, but they were enjoying themselves pretty hard. It was like they were just all up there masturbating, and we were waiting for them to finish up. Q And Not U though: Damn they were amazing. It was so much fun. I don't usually shake my ass, I am a pretty rigid person, or at least I was until then. Last night I shook my ass. I shook it for quite a while and enjoyed it.

Hitler: The Pathology of Evil

A few days ago I finished this book, Hitler: The Pathology of Evil, by George Victor. I don't normally get down with non-fiction books, but my next book just might be another history book. It was extremely interesting to me. This book was excellent. Basically, it is a breakdown of Hitler's life, but less of a biography and more of an analysis of what specific events had on Hitler's psyche, and then once his personality had taken root, how it affected the decisions he made in life. It does a pretty good job of explaining why he did some of the extremely irrational things he did during his life; so many of his actions are contradictory. Many, perhaps even most of the decisions Hitler made while he was in power are based on extremely personal things in his life. He really used the National Socialist Party to carry out a personal agenda, none of it good. He really did loathe himself, and if one were to read this book it would be obvious. This book has changed me a little. I have read and seen things about the Holocaust and World War II era-Germany before, but those things did not make the issues real for me. After all, I was born 40 years after it all ended. What made this book significant for me was the idea it put in my head: the idea that if one terrible person, just a single tainted soul takes a position of great power, they can command the deaths of so many innocent people. Hitler himself is the only one who can be blamed for the unfathomable number of lives lost back then. He committed what are undoubtedly the most evil acts in history. No one belonging to any particular ethnic group, or nationality, or religion should be put to death simply because they belong to a certain group. The man's ideas were terribly flawed all around, not just regarding racial purity. The truth of this matter reveals itself in his command of the military and his personal life, especially. Anyhow, I recommend the book.

It's too bad she won't live! But then again, who does?

I saw Blade Runner for the first time tonight. I think I have seen all the films based on Philip K. Dick novels now. It was good, but it was not a bright film. It is one of the darkest films I've ever seen. God bless the 80s. I think Useff summed it up pretty well when he said, "This movie is a toilet."

Broomball or Broom Hockey; Either Way, It Was Rough

Today I wanted to take some pictures of things in my room and write about them. The camera I use is out of batteries though, and besides: fuck that camera. It is old and bad. I want a new camera that is good (much better than this one).

Instead, I will tell you about Friday night's Broomball experience.

First of all, I should tell you a little bit about the game. I do not know very much about it to tell the truth. Friday was my first time ever playing it, and I had not heard very much about it prior to last week. It is a game played on an ice rink with sticks that resemble hockey sticks. Instead of having a blade at the bottom, there is a triangular stopper. This tool is called a broom. I assume it is called a broom because it resembles one. We played with a large ball which is about 1/2 the side of a soccer ball if I remember correctly. We wore our sneakers on the ice. The way we played it may not have been very correct according to the official rules, but let me tell you about it. It was like a game of hockey, but with less rules. We could use our hands to swat the ball out of the air, and we could also kick the ball if we desired.

So Pat Ruff asked Useff and I to come join him for a Broomball tournament that the university was having on Friday night. We met him and a student from the dorm where he is an RA at one of the indoor ice rinks on campus. This student, Emilio, would be our goalie. There, we were not sure what we were doing because we basically just showed up. A co-ordinator told us that we had to have eight people on the team, so he gave us four total strangers. Their names were Lei, Kelly, Brad, and Brian. I am not sure if those names are spelled correctly, because I never saw them in writing and had never spoken to these people before the tournament, and I have not seen or spoken to them since. Anyhow, we got all ready to play, which really didn't involve anything. Some of us wore helmets, some did not. We went to another rink to play against our first opponents, and the rink was really slippery. I fell and busted my ass a lot, and for the next two days I was basically just one big bruise because of all this falling. A lot of people were falling. I am still sore in some places. We beat this team 2-0 and we were very proud of ourselves. I was proud that I performed so well in a sport that I did not even know existed. Our next opponents were not so easy. They called themselves an intimidating name which I cannot remember. I gave our team the name The Eggs, which was not very intimidating, but I tried to convince my teammates that it was. Against this second team we played our hearts out, and I gave it all I had, but we lost 0-2. The good thing was that the rink was not nearly as slippery as the first one. The other team was extremely aggressive though, and a few of them were actual hockey players so they knew what they were doing. I didn't realize just how fucking sore I was until the next day when I had trouble climbing a set of steps. Even in spite of our loss and injury (No one really walked away without being hurt), I am still proud of our team The Eggs. We played like champions.

If you want to read more about Broomball, here is a link to the wikipedia entry on it. After reading that article I realize we were playing with eight players, and you are supposed to have only six in an official game. This is okay though.

I know this is not new, however:

I have taken to folding all of my shirts in the "new" method that took the internet by storm last year. Scroll to the bottom of this page to see a diagram of what to do. The rest of the page is mostly commentary by various "Laundry Experts" on this method.

I woke up today and I knew the first thing I must do was:

Listen to "Stars and Sons" on the Broken Social Scene album You Forgot It In People

I watched two movies today

In the morning, I saw Training Day, and finished it around 10. In the evening, I saw i heart huckabees, and finished it around 10.

Training Day was brutal, that was pretty much the feeling I got from the movie. This world is a brutal place with a lot of "wolves" in it. I'm very glad I watched it. Denzel Washington played an awesome character. A lot of blacks were upset that he was nominated and received an Academy Award for playing a villainous character. They say, "Denzel Washington has been in so many other amazing roles, why did he have to win for being a bad guy?" I say they need to look past that and see that this was one of the best roles anyone has ever played in a film, in my opinion. Alonzo Harris was just such a great character, and I think the award going to him had very little to do with him being black. Perhaps I am being overly optimistic though.

i heart huckabees was pretty good. I mean, it wasn't great, but it had memorable things about it. It is basically about existentialism vs. nihilism, and the whole movie is done in a kind of slapstick humor fashion. There are pretty well defined agents of existentialism and nihilism who are trying to win the different characters in the movie over and guide them along their paths. One thing I found interesting was that most of the scenes with the existentialists were EXTREMELY chaotic, while the main agent of nihilism appears in scenes that are more serene, with fewer people trying to talk over each other and less wacky stuff going on. Anyhow, if you've seen the movie you may want to explore it a little bit more and see how my observation makes you feel about it. There are definitely some messages in there far beneath what can be gathered from the film and screenplay.

A Dream

This afternoon, I dreamed that myself and a friend were in a strange urban environment, at the center of which was a summer camp or kindergarden. I am not sure which, but it had aspects of both; there were free meals, but lots of playing and very little intellectual stimulation. Somehow wine and Wellbutrin were involved too. I think a third friend was getting sloppy with the wine (from a box, probably, but I do not remember) prior to our trek into the child's camp, and we each decided to help ourselves to a couple of glasses of the red stuff. I cannot be certain as the details are fading away, but we may have been posing as kindergarden children. We were fucking getting away with it, too. We had an advantage: The caretakers were all old black cracked out ghetto bitches, like the ones that may or may not have been YOUR lunch ladies, depending on where you went to school. Let's say for all intents and purposes that they were not all black, but they were still like, you know..."Lunch Ladies." Anyhow, it was like we walked into the middle of some kind of festival, or recess, or something. We were just hanging out and having a good time, and things started to get weird. My attitude and perception of things were both a little bit skewed, as if reality did not have its usual effect. I attributed this to the Wellbutrin and the alcoholic spirits which I had forgotten about imbibing. Anyhow, there were some guys hanging around the friend I brought, and one of them was grabbing her in such a way that would imply they were together. I said to her, aside, "Is that your boyfriend?" or something to that effect. She replied "No, and this is creeping me out." Then, we did the logical thing to deter any further advances from this undesirable element: we made out, and it was a good time. The guys left of course, and I was left with a feeling for the friend that seemed new, but it may have just been lying dormant for a while. Anyhow, things are a bit blurry after that, and we may have gotten sort of physical again, but I do not remember. The important thing that happened next was dinner. It was being served! It was kind of difficult to get our dinners because a lot of people were slipping in front of us and we were too polite to stop them. So we had to wait a while, and then I totally fucked things up and made the lunch ladies mad. I think I knocked over something small and it caused some sort of domino effect that knocked over one of their overly large and cumbersome serving trays. They served me though. I remember having issues picking a place to sit, but I do not remember the food, or how it tasted. I think it was some kind of peppered fish and bread, which is strange since I no longer eat fish. This story is about to come to a close. I think we just talked about things we didn't have, and then we either a) walked off into the sunset, or b) I just woke up so the dream never really ended.




I am still one large bruise from Friday's broom hockey game. Maybe I'll write about that later today, or tomorrow.

Maybe I won't write about it.

I Found My Lip Balm

At the bottom of the laundry basket.

I Suppose My G is Just Too Futuristic For Some Cats

So, in the previous entry I mentioned Sarah Tonin. I talked to someone about this, and apparently it was not too clear that I was not referring to a real person, but rather a neurotransmitter in the brain.

This is going to be pretty cool in my room 

It feels like I'm being washed over by goodness

Anyhow, it's nice to be hanging out with Sarah Tonin again.

None of the following information is really important nor is it correct, but you already know that. I just think it's nice to see. Wow, it looks especially off-target this week.

Weekly Artist Chart Week prior to Apr 17, 2005, 08:00
1	The Zombies	30
2	Sufjan Stevens	26
3	The Black Keys	7
4	Aesop Rock	6
5	Q and Not U	5
6	Fleetwood Mac	4
7	El-P	3
7	Super Furry Animals	3
9	Supergrass	2
9	Foreigner	2

Weekly Track Chart Week prior to Apr 17, 2005, 08:00
1	Sufjan Stevens - Size Too Small	4
2	Sufjan Stevens - A Good Man Is Hard To Find	3
2	Sufjan Stevens - Seven Swans	3
2	Sufjan Stevens - Sister	3
5	Sufjan Stevens - We Won't Need Legs To Stand	2
5	The Zombies - I'll Call You Mine	2
5	Supergrass - Alright	2
5	Sufjan Stevens - The Transfiguration	2
5	Sufjan Stevens - He Woke Me Up Again	2
5	The Zombies - A Rose For Emily	2

This is some sinister shit.

About diamonds. More specifically, the De Beers Group. This makes one wonder. Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debeers

Short Notification:

Japanese youth sub-cultures are far weirder than American youth sub-cultures.

I will not back this statement up on this blog right now.

Just trust me.