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View From the Sidewalk

I don't care about the Olympics. But I did find this interesting:

Here's a news story about a streaker at the Olympics. Big deal, right? Who gives a shit about the Olympics, and who gives a shit about streakers? Heh.


What they don't tell you is that he had "Golden Palace" tattooed on his chest and he was planted there as a marketing gimmick. Clever.

Damon Wayans has finally lost his fucking mind.

Man, that was abrupt. One minute he's Homie The Clown...


then he's doing Hanes Ads:

And now the cycle is complete. He's matured into a fully insane person. Proof here. That's a link, for those of you interested.

You Want To Talk About Some Sick Fucking Shit?

Link. How is that for some sick fucking shit? This guy is disgusting, how does a person get like this? I don't want to describe it, just click the link and read the news story.

Sick fuck.

We should all just take a rocket ship back into the dark ages...

Abortion has been criminalized in South Dakota. Seriously, when the fuck do you hear about South Dakota except for now, when they have regressed into the past like this? Must be a wonderful place to live.

The Mountain Goats. Attempts to find a topic I can educate a class on.

John Darnielle is an extremely cool guy. He came to Philadelphia last year as The Mountain Goats. I missed this show and this makes me sad. I've been listening to The Mountain Goats pretty much non-stop lately. The Mountain Goats are awesome if you read books and / or like acoustic guitars. If you do both, you'll probably enjoy the music that much more. Wikipedia entry to get you started. I'd write more on it, but I'm pretty depressed right now and I have a lot to do in preparation for a speech I have to have outlined by tomorrow.

I have no idea what the speech will be about.

You see, I was prepared for this speech. It's an informative speech, the first graded project in my public speaking class. I was going to do it on the recent issue of Google and censorship in China with the debut of their China-based server that hosts google.cn. I did a lot of research about this topic on Sunday, and learned a fair amount about China's history and human rights in the People's Republic of China. Chinese history / politics are pretty cool. My interest in these topics is piqued. Anyway, today I decided against this topic because I thought it'd end up being a snorefest, and the professor wouldn't like it. So, I thought I'd do my speech on the avian flu which might kill a lot of people. After doing a little bit of research, this is even less likely to work out than the Google speech. What I need is something that has a local scope or that will relate directly to the people in my class. Sadly, none of them are tech-heads so all the stuff that I think about most of my days wouldn't interest them. I know a lot of things. I just need to find one or two that I'd be able to expound upon for about five minutes in front of a group of people without boring them to death.

Math Textbooks and Ugly Folks

Apparently if you're ugly you're more likely to commit a crime. There was a study recently. (link) I'd say this is true, because ugly people are generally treated less favorably than average or "attractive" people. So they get the short end of the stick more often than not, and if this goes on all throughout life, you just might have a social outcast on your hands. But on the other hand, think about the Halo effect. I think that attractive people are less likely to be convicted of crimes. Someone should do a study on that.

Give me your old math textbooks. I want to do some math. I want to learn some math.

Reflection on Television With Emphasis on the Rise of Product Placement

So, I don't watch much TV. I don't really have a TV any more. I went to my friend's house a few nights ago to watch a show that the group likes called One Tree Hill. This show is on the WB network. I actually kind of liked the show. It was cheesy, but it was good, formulaic in a totally benign way, you know? No one was hurt in the viewing of this episode of One Tree Hill. I couldn't help but notice that product placement appears to have taken over television in the time since I stopped watching it. In the show, all of the computers prominently display Dell logos. I can't remember what, but something else was plugged in the script a few times. Sunkist orange soda was blatantly promoted at a concert in the show. This concert featured performances by Fall Out Boy and Jack's Mannequin, who are both real life bands with real agendas that include promoting their recently released albums. Once upon a time it was kind of a special thing when a real-life celebrity appeared on a television show. But this show had two different bands on one episode, and lots of products being sold through the script. I understand that traditional advertising through commercials just isn't cutting it any more, but I had no idea that entire shows were having real-world products spliced into them. Was this an isolated incident, or is this a common practice today? I myself do not know, but after seeing this I kind of think it's the latter. Oh, also there were a few instances of other artists' songs being played during the show, like We Are Scientists. At the end of the show all of the artists' new releases were shown. So let me know, if you watch TV...is this common now?

I almost drew a phallus today.

I was bored in my Linguistics class; shit was just going way too slow. So I started drawing squares. I ended up with a pyramid. A pyramid with testicles. I was scared "oh no I drew a phallus" so I drew some blocks around it to make it look less like a penis. Pictures and more information tomorrow. Writing a paper, loves. Fuck you and good night.

It's (Really) Cold In Delaware. Also, A Great Game.

Like most of the east coast, Delaware was covered in a blanket of snow this weekend. This week sees the aftermath of that snow, and how it will affect shit around here. First thing's first: The University of Delaware isn't closed. It pretty much never closes for weather hazards. I'm not exactly sure what they're waiting for. I understand that it's important that all of our classes are on schedule, because many of them really can't afford to lose even one day. But still, what will it take? Will Gabriel have to come here and toot his horn? Sometimes I wonder.

I woke up this morning and did some driveway shoveling for about an hour. That wasn't so bad. I was just ill prepared for the cold. I had no gloves, and I was newly self-conscious about my shoes because my Mom said they'd be destroyed since they weren't "real" snow boots. I went into the car I was trying to dig out and turned it on to help it thaw more quickly. Neil Young happened to be in the CD player, and working is usually better when listening to Neil Young. I feel like I'm working for Neil himself, and he's watching over me wearing a large, wide-brimmed hat and looking inquisitive, whispering out orders in his ghostly high voice every once in a while. I had to alternate hands at times during the shoveling. I would stick one in my pants by my ass where it was warm, and one would do the shoveling. This was a pretty good system. I can only wonder what people watching may have thought of me touching my ass while I worked.

Gridwars (link) is one of the most awesome games I've ever played. Definitely my favorite game so far this year, and the great thing is that it's free. Supposedly it's a free version of an Xbox Live game called Geometry Wars. I've never played Geometry Wars, so let me compare it to something you may have played in the good old days at your local arcade: basically it's like Smash TV but more fun; you can actually play it more than 10 minutes and not get bored of the concept. Plus, there are really awesome black holes. Here is a link to the developer's homepage where you can see his other games. I have no idea how they are. What I do know is that I'll be playing Gridwars in the coming days.

Peter Benchley is dead.

He wrote Jaws. Respect this dead man.

An Excerpt From An Internet Conversation

(11:33:45 AM) TheZionistDevil: i went into boarders
(11:33:49 AM) TheZionistDevil: and i asked if u were around
(11:33:51 AM) TheZionistDevil: and everyone laughed
(11:33:56 AM) SheerKann: heh
(11:34:01 AM) SheerKann: I quit around august
(11:34:11 AM) TheZionistDevil: after a month evidently
(11:34:19 AM) SheerKann: a couple of months!
(11:34:29 AM) SheerKann: I had a job at the geek squad
(11:34:30 AM) TheZionistDevil: lol
(11:34:34 AM) TheZionistDevil: HAHA
(11:34:41 AM) SheerKann: it pays more
(11:34:52 AM) SheerKann: borders is basically minimum wage
(11:35:25 AM) TheZionistDevil: true
(11:35:43 AM) TheZionistDevil: still better than waitin tables
(11:35:56 AM) SheerKann: well I guess
(11:36:03 AM) SheerKann: I've never been a waiter but I know the money can be good
(11:36:10 AM) SheerKann: I'd probably be an awesome bartender at a gay bar
(11:36:13 AM) SheerKann: the tips would be outrageous
(11:36:45 AM) TheZionistDevil: oh the money is good
(11:36:52 AM) TheZionistDevil: but
(11:37:03 AM) TheZionistDevil: i could be a stripper at a gay bar
(11:37:09 AM) TheZionistDevil: 1500 a client
(11:37:15 AM) SheerKann: whoa
(11:37:24 AM) TheZionistDevil: 2 clients a night
(11:37:30 AM) SheerKann: would you be performing lewd sex acts?
(11:37:35 AM) TheZionistDevil: oh yes
(11:37:40 AM) TheZionistDevil: 1500 for two guys to have sex while u strip
(11:37:49 AM) TheZionistDevil: 800 for the guy to jerk off
(11:37:54 AM) TheZionistDevil: 500 for nothing
(11:37:55 AM) TheZionistDevil: he can't touch u
(11:37:58 AM) SheerKann: HAHAHAHA
(11:38:09 AM) TheZionistDevil: my friend does it in philly
(11:38:23 AM) SheerKann: wait wait, so those are the real going prices?
(11:38:36 AM) SheerKann: I didn't realize a man's ass was worth so much money

Catastrophic Dreams Appear To Be Back

If you remember (you don't have to remember), I have strings of terrible terrible dreams where either I die or everyone in the world dies. I hadn't had one in a while. I just had one, and I will share it. The central event in this dream is a Wu-Tang Clan concert in Ocean City, New Jersey that has yet to happen (this coincides with tonight's Wu concert in Philadephia). Everyone in the dream is just hanging out on the beach, having a great time. A few of my close friends are there, and aside from that I still know tons of people there. It's nice. Sunshine, pretty girls, beach smells, et cetera. I get in the water, and a wave hits us. Then another one. They keep coming. They happen in fast succession and get progressively stronger; it gets to the point where one cannot even get up after the wave because another one is coming in. I manage to get up after one of them (they're still relatively small at this point, nothing to worry about), and ride the crest of the one coming in. This one is pretty huge, and it keeps getting bigger. In a split second it's taller than the hotel that's right on the shore, and I'm still on top of it. As soon as it begins to crash, I wake up. I heard their screams.

Newsflash:

The Chuck Norris shit is OLD. END IT.

Haley Joel Osment: Apparently not the Next Culkin.

If you're like me, you spend a significant amount of time in conversation about the trainwreck that usually is the private lives of child stars. Recently I was talking about Haley Joel Osment, and how we haven't really seen him since, well, since his balls dropped. Kid was born in April of 1988. That makes him less than three years younger than me. That makes him...two months away from being recognized as an adult in this fair country. Yeah. Wow. They grow up so fast, huh? Unlike some of his compatriots (Corey Haim, Gary Coleman, Danny Bonaduce, and the indelible Corey Feldman), he hasn't fallen into a spiral of drug abuse and morbid public fascination. Osment isn't exactly on the fast track to the Academy Awards, but he's doing things. There's a game coming out for the Playstation 2 console in March called Kingdom Hearts 2. I'm a fan of the first game. Many people are. It was quite a fine game. Read up on it. It's an action RPG, and Osment does the voice-acting for the game's main character. If you look up Osment on the IMDB(link), it becomes apparent that he's been doing other cool voicework too.

So, next time a child-star drops off the face of the earth, do not automatically assume that they spent their fortune up their noses, in their arms, or otherwise just fucking wasted their futures. No, only do that if you can't find any recent IMDB entries for them.

Crotchrot is a fungal infection of the groin region. Sadly there are no first hand accounts on Wikipedia.

"Playing To Win" - Highly Interesting Article On Videogame Theory

Link. The author is a game designer named David Sirlin. I found this interesting to be highly interesting because Sirlin breaks down the differences between gaming abnormalities that make the game unfun, and ones that the player just needs to work around in order to become better and develop new strategies. I can think of plenty of times when certain things in games have become "off limits" simply because the players were not willing to use or work around them. Anyhow, just read this article if you're even remotely interested in playing videogames competitively at any level.

The Blockbuster Film is DYING.

I originally saw this (link) at BoingBoing (link). Compelling study. Honestly I cannot say this surprises me. Remember what I wrote about Big Momma's House 2? (Forgetful) Well, I think the days of that kind of stuff are numbered. The question I have is, what will they be replacing this stuff with? Will it be...worse? I feel that there's a true dearth of originality in the movie industry at large, which does not mean that interesting and original movies are not born out of it. The majority are awful though. Soon enough we'll see change. Change will probably be the cloning of whatever has been a recent success. Get ready to see Brokeback To The Future...for real.

Google Update For Google Whores Like Me!

Gmail now has the capability to catalogue all of your conversations that take place through the gtalk (jabber) service. You just have to change a setting in your gmail options. You don't even have to use the gtalk program; I use gaim and it works just fine. The information is sent almost instantaneously to gmail. This is cool. Info. This actually makes Gtalk a lot more useful. It's less of a gimmick now. Remote viewing of your conversation logs is something that no other instant messaging service can claim right "out of the box."

There's a Cold Week Up Ahead.

Well, today's high here in sunny exotic Delaware is 43 degrees Fahrenheit. The rest of the week is going to be in the thirties and shit. That's chilly. That's uncomfortable. That's no way for the city of Newark to welcome me to its heart. I've been here for a few days now and it's been very nice. I enjoy walking everywhere. I enjoy seeing familiar faces around town. I enjoy feeling like I'm a part of this place instead of being some anonymous person who waves to their neighbors from the car but never actually speaks to them.

The news has been interesting this week, hasn't it? That ship that sunk in Egypt. Wow. The first thing I thought of when I read that story was, "Is this going to knock the titanic out of the top spot for Most-Horrific-Maritime-Disaster?" It appears that a thousand souls perished at sea, but it wasn't until after the disaster that things really got heated up. There's rioting in Egypt now. People are unsurprisingly...pissed. Relatives are screaming left and right that someone fucked up big time on this trip. The ship did have lifeboats, afterall.

Ugh, I need to move around. Having this mirror right next to my desk is turning me into some kind of fucking narcissist. I can't stop looking in the goddamn thing. The lookin' ain't even that great, but it's there, you know?

Time to move around.

Brokeback To The Future. I'm moving.

This is a trailer for a fictional film called Brokeback To The Future (link). It's scenes from the Back To The Future films spliced into a trailer to make it vaguely homosexual.


Light update. I'm in the process of a move.