Monday, November 7, 2011
This Moment is Infamous
It's weird how one-sided the relationship with an entertainer can be. On one hand, you can learn everything about them. You watch their shows, hear their musix, and listen to their stories. You know everything about them. Yet, on your end, they could not say the same about you. Though there are endless I Love Yous on both ends, only one end is really visible. I understand that to know all of your fans as a popular entertainer is damn near impossible, but it's interesting that I can have a dream at night where someone I've never met is a living, breathing person, complete with voice, mannerisms, and signature clothing. Yeah, it's pretty crazy things your head can do with an image and a voice.
Sunday, November 6, 2011
This Moment is Almost Over
Right now, I'm pretty chuffed. It's funny how I'm feeling accomplished over something I shouldn't feel accomplished over. See, I made a witty comment on a NintendoCapriSun video on Youtube, and it currently has 56 likes, which is the second most likes out of any comment on the video currently. I'm excited not only because I love NintendoCapriSun to death, but because his videos are seen by thousands of people. Now I know that of those 56 people, very few will actually go and visit my Youtube page, which is kind of sad...but did you read my entry from like two days ago? I'm just happy someone...or 56 someones noticed me, and I've decided to make a momento about it in the form of this blog entry. If I'm lucky, I will get a few views. I can also be excited because it means that NCS himself might see my username. A reply or message from him would be like a reply or message from Billie Joe Armstrong or something. It might make this whole past week just a little better...it might give me hope for the future and make me continue to work on my own Lets Plays and projects like that. It might just be the kind of boost to my spirits that I need to make me properly create again.
But that's all hearsay and I can't expect anything like that or get my hopes up. Or rather, i should get excited and get my hopes up...isn't that what I just said I needed? This little moment will pass soon enough, I know, and my problems will come back to the forefront, but I'd rather preserve this one stupid little happy moment than all the ones I spent dejected and unhappy.
I figure that even though this blog gets little to no traffic, the least I can do is post the video here. Hopefully by the time you see it I'll still be a top comment.
But that's all hearsay and I can't expect anything like that or get my hopes up. Or rather, i should get excited and get my hopes up...isn't that what I just said I needed? This little moment will pass soon enough, I know, and my problems will come back to the forefront, but I'd rather preserve this one stupid little happy moment than all the ones I spent dejected and unhappy.
I figure that even though this blog gets little to no traffic, the least I can do is post the video here. Hopefully by the time you see it I'll still be a top comment.
Friday, November 4, 2011
Just Like the Flash of a Ghost
It's not fair, i can't put you on a pedestal just because you're not a physical being.
You have exactly the same chance of being like everyone else.
Except you're completely different. I swear each and every day you had the answer to immortality. Stay young and pure forever.
Sucks I have to get old.
You have exactly the same chance of being like everyone else.
Except you're completely different. I swear each and every day you had the answer to immortality. Stay young and pure forever.
Sucks I have to get old.
The World Without a Speed Limit
It's weird how a few entries this week have been about things I saw as a kid vs now. This one's kind of general, though, as opposed to one little nitpicky thing. This could just as easily be an entry about driving though...that's a whole rant and a half waiting to happen.
But that's not what this is. Today I read an article posted on GDC (Green Day Community) about how CDs are (supposedly) going to actually die in the next two years. That's completely devestating to me, as a connoisseur of jewel cases and a frequenter of the Record & Tape Traders up the street from my college (in fact I fought a Misfits album there on Monday). Ironically, I'm doing a speech on the very subject, and I'll be persuading people to buy physical. Hey, sounds like I just got some free evidence.
Scanning another thread, however, I realized that whatever this is is so much bigger than CDs. In ten years, my whole LIFE could be digital. The point I want to make is that ten years ago, in 2001, Game Boys were just starting to display more than 12 colors, my computer could only display something like 256, and there were absolutely no images of me on the internet anywhere. We might have gotten a DVD player the previous Christmas and our TV was this big assed wooden beast that sat on the floor. I might have JUST gotten a CD player, and if so, the only CD I owned was the Baja Men. CDs were the shit, and downloading was evil. Yeah, Napster. Hell, we'd JUST moved past those blocky polygonal models in video games.
2001 was an interesting year...a lot of things were beginning that are now a million times better and more advanced. Back then, I spent maybe an hour on the computer a day. The rest I spent watching cartoons and playing with action figures...or occasionally I'd go ride bikes on my dead end street with the neighbor kid. It's hard to look at how things have changed when you yourself spent the last ten years changing. When I was 9, I was a badass. I didn't give a shit what anyone thought of me because I told myself I was absolutely awesome no matter what. I was the leader. Not only was I going to follow in my sister's well behaved footsteps, I was going to surpass her...only I didn't call it that at all. Back then I was your textbook example of genius. What this means is that in ten years I managed to have my self esteem stolen and shattered, my head mixed in a kitchen aid, and...well, you get the idea. Safe to say I wasn''t always a Social Ninja striving for acceptance.
Still, at 19, I can take an hour to stop and look back, and then look ahead. Goddamn, a lot has changed in me and the world. It's impossible to put into words really, and lord knows if I were 19 in 2001, I'd have to find another way to do so. Lord knows I've done a good portion of them by now, so I guess you might call that "keeping up." One thing I know now is that ten years is a long time.
I'm living as part of a tweener generation. We're a bunch of kids that don't know what the hell to do, thanks to everyone else. I'm not the only one who's seen things these ten years. As I see it, we are a people who can only struggle through the years as the human race is figuring out what to do with itself. I like to think that there will come a point when people will figure out how to consolidate technology and...real life. Until then, no one knows what right is. There is no right. People make their own ways, none of which are proven to truly work and many of which will lead down paths unknown into less than pleasant fates. It's fate anarchy out there. Parents, teachers and counselors try to give us advice that has been proven to work for them, but the fact that it's not working here shows the rules have changed.
This topic is really too big for me to tackle in one blog post so I'm not going to try. As has been typical of this week, I'm just going to say what's on my mind. Looking at the last ten years, the next ten years are scary as hell. What the hell are we going to have then? Imagine that Skyping is just the BEGINNING of something. In 2021 we might have that sort of thing built in to everything and in very good quality. I think we'll have even more than that, but it's impossible to say what. Looking back gives me certainty that I can't know what I'm looking at looking forward. My generation's visions of the future are old and outdated...based on visions of the future from the past. Who in 1980 predicted iPods? Who predicted that in 2011 games would me controlled with a moveable remote and not a visor and gloves? Who knew that there could be discussion about HANDWRITING becoming obsolete?
That's what scares me. I'm a fairly smart guy, but I feel like all that might be lost on the world just a little later on because I spent my whole life keeping up with the times. On the Internet, there's already way more information than I can handle. i could spend several lifetimes looking at it all. I've spent years already and a good portion of it I've found interesting. In that though, i've missed out on a lot. Social activities and life experiences that other people had, and certainly my parents and their peers had. Or did I miss out? Today it's entirely possibly that I did not miss out on those things. Those things might be obsolete. I might be perfectly in line with an upcoming generation.
Look at it: kids are being taught by video games and tablets and electronics. They learn to use a computer before they learn much else. These things come naturally to them. They have cell phones...cell phones that are better than MINE. They are starting out playing video games with these motion controls and awesome visuals. They're spending way more time on the internet. They are the subjects of studies saying that these things are bad. And that's crazy too...because soon all of it will be normal, and something new and crazier will takes it place. Then the kids will struggle to consolidate it into their lives...and they'll watch kids get with it like it's no big thing.
In 2021, I'll be 29 years old. Think of all the things that happen in your 20s. You're supposed to get your career, find your soul mate, get married, possibly have kids. I try not to think about that (Woman Rock. Soon.) but that might just be what happens...well, I kind of hope it is. Seriously though, what's going to happen? What am I going to do? How much more am I going to get used to? Is it safe to say that all of the old things I remember doing as a kid will be, at very least, debatably relevant or the fodder of purists?
I'd say I'm sure this is the way it's always been...but I don't think that's true anymore. My parents never faced changes like this. The things they knew as children, television aside maybe, took their time getting better. Things didn't go so fast that the world spun a little quicker too. My generation is like that weird twilight between the colonists and the people of the 1950s. There's going to be a new old soon.
But that's not what this is. Today I read an article posted on GDC (Green Day Community) about how CDs are (supposedly) going to actually die in the next two years. That's completely devestating to me, as a connoisseur of jewel cases and a frequenter of the Record & Tape Traders up the street from my college (in fact I fought a Misfits album there on Monday). Ironically, I'm doing a speech on the very subject, and I'll be persuading people to buy physical. Hey, sounds like I just got some free evidence.
Scanning another thread, however, I realized that whatever this is is so much bigger than CDs. In ten years, my whole LIFE could be digital. The point I want to make is that ten years ago, in 2001, Game Boys were just starting to display more than 12 colors, my computer could only display something like 256, and there were absolutely no images of me on the internet anywhere. We might have gotten a DVD player the previous Christmas and our TV was this big assed wooden beast that sat on the floor. I might have JUST gotten a CD player, and if so, the only CD I owned was the Baja Men. CDs were the shit, and downloading was evil. Yeah, Napster. Hell, we'd JUST moved past those blocky polygonal models in video games.
2001 was an interesting year...a lot of things were beginning that are now a million times better and more advanced. Back then, I spent maybe an hour on the computer a day. The rest I spent watching cartoons and playing with action figures...or occasionally I'd go ride bikes on my dead end street with the neighbor kid. It's hard to look at how things have changed when you yourself spent the last ten years changing. When I was 9, I was a badass. I didn't give a shit what anyone thought of me because I told myself I was absolutely awesome no matter what. I was the leader. Not only was I going to follow in my sister's well behaved footsteps, I was going to surpass her...only I didn't call it that at all. Back then I was your textbook example of genius. What this means is that in ten years I managed to have my self esteem stolen and shattered, my head mixed in a kitchen aid, and...well, you get the idea. Safe to say I wasn''t always a Social Ninja striving for acceptance.
Still, at 19, I can take an hour to stop and look back, and then look ahead. Goddamn, a lot has changed in me and the world. It's impossible to put into words really, and lord knows if I were 19 in 2001, I'd have to find another way to do so. Lord knows I've done a good portion of them by now, so I guess you might call that "keeping up." One thing I know now is that ten years is a long time.
I'm living as part of a tweener generation. We're a bunch of kids that don't know what the hell to do, thanks to everyone else. I'm not the only one who's seen things these ten years. As I see it, we are a people who can only struggle through the years as the human race is figuring out what to do with itself. I like to think that there will come a point when people will figure out how to consolidate technology and...real life. Until then, no one knows what right is. There is no right. People make their own ways, none of which are proven to truly work and many of which will lead down paths unknown into less than pleasant fates. It's fate anarchy out there. Parents, teachers and counselors try to give us advice that has been proven to work for them, but the fact that it's not working here shows the rules have changed.
This topic is really too big for me to tackle in one blog post so I'm not going to try. As has been typical of this week, I'm just going to say what's on my mind. Looking at the last ten years, the next ten years are scary as hell. What the hell are we going to have then? Imagine that Skyping is just the BEGINNING of something. In 2021 we might have that sort of thing built in to everything and in very good quality. I think we'll have even more than that, but it's impossible to say what. Looking back gives me certainty that I can't know what I'm looking at looking forward. My generation's visions of the future are old and outdated...based on visions of the future from the past. Who in 1980 predicted iPods? Who predicted that in 2011 games would me controlled with a moveable remote and not a visor and gloves? Who knew that there could be discussion about HANDWRITING becoming obsolete?
That's what scares me. I'm a fairly smart guy, but I feel like all that might be lost on the world just a little later on because I spent my whole life keeping up with the times. On the Internet, there's already way more information than I can handle. i could spend several lifetimes looking at it all. I've spent years already and a good portion of it I've found interesting. In that though, i've missed out on a lot. Social activities and life experiences that other people had, and certainly my parents and their peers had. Or did I miss out? Today it's entirely possibly that I did not miss out on those things. Those things might be obsolete. I might be perfectly in line with an upcoming generation.
Look at it: kids are being taught by video games and tablets and electronics. They learn to use a computer before they learn much else. These things come naturally to them. They have cell phones...cell phones that are better than MINE. They are starting out playing video games with these motion controls and awesome visuals. They're spending way more time on the internet. They are the subjects of studies saying that these things are bad. And that's crazy too...because soon all of it will be normal, and something new and crazier will takes it place. Then the kids will struggle to consolidate it into their lives...and they'll watch kids get with it like it's no big thing.
In 2021, I'll be 29 years old. Think of all the things that happen in your 20s. You're supposed to get your career, find your soul mate, get married, possibly have kids. I try not to think about that (Woman Rock. Soon.) but that might just be what happens...well, I kind of hope it is. Seriously though, what's going to happen? What am I going to do? How much more am I going to get used to? Is it safe to say that all of the old things I remember doing as a kid will be, at very least, debatably relevant or the fodder of purists?
I'd say I'm sure this is the way it's always been...but I don't think that's true anymore. My parents never faced changes like this. The things they knew as children, television aside maybe, took their time getting better. Things didn't go so fast that the world spun a little quicker too. My generation is like that weird twilight between the colonists and the people of the 1950s. There's going to be a new old soon.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Social Ninja
I told myself I was in too good a mood to do this post right now, but I'm easily reminded of this fact. I'm a social fucking ninja. I am the only person in the entire world who can have negative anything human.
Nothing I do, good or bad, ever seems to amount to anything. I create things, just like everybody else...i put them out there...and nothing comes back. It's like thousands of people send thousands of bottles out to sea, and all but mine return. When I do get a bottle back, it's incredibly encouraging. The words on the sheet of paper inside are positive. All is good...but those bottles don't come back.
I sometimes worry about hate. I worry about people slamming what I do wherever I do it. But those fears are unfounded. I don't really get anything. Okay, that's not true. I get things occasionally, and I have gotten hate. It was awful.
Case and point though, I used to have this friend who did really stupid but hilarious videos. He hated them, he hated the stuff he was putting out, and eventually it all stopped coming and he tried to erase himself from the face of the Earth. He seemed pretty suicidal for a while there (and those people aren't the ones you need to watch out for) but alas...today it seems he's doing better than ever. He's doing better than I am. His videos are being re-uploaded (I can't help enjoying them immensely until...) and are getting views at a better rate than any of mine are. He's got a woman too, something he always thought he'd never ever have. He has a circle of friends (no comment on personality, but friends none the less) that have remained loyal to him. It sounds like I'm ragging on him, and I am, and I don't care because it's unlikely he will ever read this. And if he or any of his friends does, it's fine, because they've ragged on me before. Have I mentioned we used to be friends?
I haven't had a Nakama since...okay, well if the band counts, since 2009, but if not then it's probably been since elementary school. There's only one friend that I talk to intermittently that I've had since way back when. People always just come and go like I'm a city street. Like I'm a stranger. To anyone else, they'd keep their promises and see their oathes swore, but for whatever reason, it's not the case with me. For whatever reason, i can't be part of a group for more than a week. I'm not but a bit character that shows up in a random episode only to find that the audience actually doesn't like me all that much.
I'm not the only social ninja out there either. I know that. People get left in the dark every day and no one can help them out. It's one of the saddest things on Earth. I remember a generic pass along status someone posted one time about people misjudging other people. It included a teenage mother who'd been raped, an obese man with a disorder, and an ugly man who'd been disfigured in the war. Yeah, it's tragic, but you've noticed these people. Social Ninjas? No, they don't get noticed. There's no status saying that you should randomly chat someone you haven't in a while...and if that were the exact wording, it's STILL unlikely that a Social Ninja would be the one a person chooses to chat. Because we're ninjas. We can't be seen...but unlike real ninjas, this is our curse.
Every time I do the same thing as another person, whatever they do gets more attention. That's when I swear the only time I'll ever be recognized...like the few people that react to me say I deserve, will be when I'm dead. It sounds like I'm a little bitch...crying because I'm not getting attention. What is it then, that I can do? I put things out there. I make videos, I twitter, I write blogs, I post copious amoutns of status and express interest in the goings-on of other people. In this day and age, I can barely be considered isolated. I'm visible, but I'm invisible. Or maybe everyone is just blind. That's a bit more bleak, however.
Still, it annoys the living piss out of me...it's been happening for at least four...five years now. On this day, November 2, I am reminded of my band because we once had a show on November 2. It's cringeworthy to think of all the work I put into that band and how little people appreciated that work. Is it really because they were all stuck in their stupid little minds? Or was it because there was something figurative on my face? Well, on behalf of all the bands that never made it, I know I'm not alone there.
That doesn't stop me from believing this is all fate. Like when I was born everyone was told to ignore the piss out of me at all costs. A few people broke that creed, and good on them...but most of them are gone and at least one is dead...aka truly invisible. Or maybe it's the case that most everyone has it in one obscure part of their chromosomes a gene that tells them to not bother with a person of my exact description. As is the case with all viruses, some people are just plain immune...but they're few and far between.
I turn to these Fantasyland explanations because I have no logical ones. (Okay, I do, but those are both lengthy and personal). It just bothers me that I have so much to say and show, but no one to say and show it to. I'm as good as any other bard or entertainer out there, I'm certain of it, but in the dark I'm no good. Conditioned that nothing comes of my work. It's true, even if the whole world...that is all the billions of people, read this and watched my videos and loved my music, it wouldn't be enough for me...I have nothing to lose by being proven wrong (this is a variation of a good quote of mine "I have nothing to lose by proving them right!").
I'm sorry for this rantiest of rants. Trust me, i hate sounding like a bitter, emo bitch, but that's how I am sometimes. I know this blog is actually pretty safe from prying eyes...as depressing as it is. I must leave you with something that serves as both a warning and a sequel hook: Woman Rock (a.ka. Pink Shit Blues) is coming. It may not be tomorrow, but it will come because much like my status as a Social Ninja...the Woman Rock never goes away.
Nothing I do, good or bad, ever seems to amount to anything. I create things, just like everybody else...i put them out there...and nothing comes back. It's like thousands of people send thousands of bottles out to sea, and all but mine return. When I do get a bottle back, it's incredibly encouraging. The words on the sheet of paper inside are positive. All is good...but those bottles don't come back.
I sometimes worry about hate. I worry about people slamming what I do wherever I do it. But those fears are unfounded. I don't really get anything. Okay, that's not true. I get things occasionally, and I have gotten hate. It was awful.
Case and point though, I used to have this friend who did really stupid but hilarious videos. He hated them, he hated the stuff he was putting out, and eventually it all stopped coming and he tried to erase himself from the face of the Earth. He seemed pretty suicidal for a while there (and those people aren't the ones you need to watch out for) but alas...today it seems he's doing better than ever. He's doing better than I am. His videos are being re-uploaded (I can't help enjoying them immensely until...) and are getting views at a better rate than any of mine are. He's got a woman too, something he always thought he'd never ever have. He has a circle of friends (no comment on personality, but friends none the less) that have remained loyal to him. It sounds like I'm ragging on him, and I am, and I don't care because it's unlikely he will ever read this. And if he or any of his friends does, it's fine, because they've ragged on me before. Have I mentioned we used to be friends?
I haven't had a Nakama since...okay, well if the band counts, since 2009, but if not then it's probably been since elementary school. There's only one friend that I talk to intermittently that I've had since way back when. People always just come and go like I'm a city street. Like I'm a stranger. To anyone else, they'd keep their promises and see their oathes swore, but for whatever reason, it's not the case with me. For whatever reason, i can't be part of a group for more than a week. I'm not but a bit character that shows up in a random episode only to find that the audience actually doesn't like me all that much.
I'm not the only social ninja out there either. I know that. People get left in the dark every day and no one can help them out. It's one of the saddest things on Earth. I remember a generic pass along status someone posted one time about people misjudging other people. It included a teenage mother who'd been raped, an obese man with a disorder, and an ugly man who'd been disfigured in the war. Yeah, it's tragic, but you've noticed these people. Social Ninjas? No, they don't get noticed. There's no status saying that you should randomly chat someone you haven't in a while...and if that were the exact wording, it's STILL unlikely that a Social Ninja would be the one a person chooses to chat. Because we're ninjas. We can't be seen...but unlike real ninjas, this is our curse.
Every time I do the same thing as another person, whatever they do gets more attention. That's when I swear the only time I'll ever be recognized...like the few people that react to me say I deserve, will be when I'm dead. It sounds like I'm a little bitch...crying because I'm not getting attention. What is it then, that I can do? I put things out there. I make videos, I twitter, I write blogs, I post copious amoutns of status and express interest in the goings-on of other people. In this day and age, I can barely be considered isolated. I'm visible, but I'm invisible. Or maybe everyone is just blind. That's a bit more bleak, however.
Still, it annoys the living piss out of me...it's been happening for at least four...five years now. On this day, November 2, I am reminded of my band because we once had a show on November 2. It's cringeworthy to think of all the work I put into that band and how little people appreciated that work. Is it really because they were all stuck in their stupid little minds? Or was it because there was something figurative on my face? Well, on behalf of all the bands that never made it, I know I'm not alone there.
That doesn't stop me from believing this is all fate. Like when I was born everyone was told to ignore the piss out of me at all costs. A few people broke that creed, and good on them...but most of them are gone and at least one is dead...aka truly invisible. Or maybe it's the case that most everyone has it in one obscure part of their chromosomes a gene that tells them to not bother with a person of my exact description. As is the case with all viruses, some people are just plain immune...but they're few and far between.
I turn to these Fantasyland explanations because I have no logical ones. (Okay, I do, but those are both lengthy and personal). It just bothers me that I have so much to say and show, but no one to say and show it to. I'm as good as any other bard or entertainer out there, I'm certain of it, but in the dark I'm no good. Conditioned that nothing comes of my work. It's true, even if the whole world...that is all the billions of people, read this and watched my videos and loved my music, it wouldn't be enough for me...I have nothing to lose by being proven wrong (this is a variation of a good quote of mine "I have nothing to lose by proving them right!").
I'm sorry for this rantiest of rants. Trust me, i hate sounding like a bitter, emo bitch, but that's how I am sometimes. I know this blog is actually pretty safe from prying eyes...as depressing as it is. I must leave you with something that serves as both a warning and a sequel hook: Woman Rock (a.ka. Pink Shit Blues) is coming. It may not be tomorrow, but it will come because much like my status as a Social Ninja...the Woman Rock never goes away.
Just a Thought on my Chest...Possibly Literally
Can someone please explain to me the rage with tattoos today?
It hasn't been long since I was a kid, it really hasn't, and back then it seemed like only bikers, hippies and just weirdos were the only ones who really got tattoos. Now, it seems to be the women first. I mean like, all of them. This isn't some "I haven't been enlightened" or "I haven't opened my mind" thing either. It just strikes me as odd that at a certain point someone feels the need to have something drawn onto their body...and then again and again.
A few years ago in high school we had this blog project to do where we had to make a blog with a certain theme (yeah, it was nothing like this blog...this one's a lot better), and someone's was a blog about tattoos. I remember she talked to someone who had a lot of them in one entry and said this of her "...has turned her body into a living work of art!" I swear that's a plot point in a movie somewhere...that some villain is trying to turn people into living works of art. It's definitely somewhere out there, and if it isn't then it should be. It gets worse when I actually picture this. A work of art? What will they do, skin you and hang it in a museum? Macabre man, macabre.
That's the thing...tattoos are both permanent and temporary. They're permanent in that once you get it it's on you for good. It'll be there when you get married, it'll be there when you get old, and it'll be there when you die (and yes, I know you can get rid of them, but if you're so hard on getting one, that kind of defeats the purpose). At the same time, they're very very temporary. When you die, that art dies with you. I mean yeah, you can take pictures, but it's not REAL per se. It'd be like having a picture of a painting. No, the art gets burned or thrown into a casket, and on top of that if you're buried you're dressed. Furthermore, it's entirely possible that people won't remember you for your tattoos. There was a poignant demotivational (though i guess the de is kind of null) of a person with some intense sleeves hugging a little kid that said tattoos don't change character. And yeah, that's right they don't, but they don't necessarily define it either.
And then there's the idea that people tend to get tattoos of things involving temporary obsessions. Or they'll get something really really vague or universal. That's a whole nother Foamy rant in and of itself (although this is less of a rant and more of a hmmm type thing) that people in general just aren't creative. And those memorial tattoos...I don't know, I guess that's more meaningful than putting it on the back window of your car. Okay, actually that makes a lot of sense, the memorial thing. But with some people, yeah it's a nice design, but it'd be great if it was on your wall and not your back. That begs the question "Who is this really for?" If I spent as much money on a tattoo as some people do (these living works of art end up costing more than non-living ones in some cases), I'd at least want to look at it! I mean boy....having the wrong thing on the wrong part of your body could make for some awkward love making. Well, or some hilarious love making (making note of this for that Hooker Jesus story...)
There's something that seems...Freudian in all of this however...or at least overly psychological. I mean, anyone can get tattoos. Maybe people "get addicted" to getting tattoos because they believe they're covering up their body with something better. It almost makes sense when you remember that I said it seems to be mostly females jumping on this whole tattoo thing. That logic gets taken to a whole new level when you realize that fat people have more space for tattoos. Instead of ugliness, you can then view it as "more potential beauty." As much as that's a joke, there's a fair point in there. Women tend to be more likely to have image qualms, right? It'd make sense they'd then try to cover that up with art.
Just a thought...
I don't have a beef with tattoos, I really don't. If you want em fine. If you've got some sort of tattoo fetish (and I know its out there otherwise some people wouldn't have half as many as they do), that's fine. but me? I don't get it. For me tattoos are something that give you special powers...and until they do that, i probably will not be going through any such process.
It hasn't been long since I was a kid, it really hasn't, and back then it seemed like only bikers, hippies and just weirdos were the only ones who really got tattoos. Now, it seems to be the women first. I mean like, all of them. This isn't some "I haven't been enlightened" or "I haven't opened my mind" thing either. It just strikes me as odd that at a certain point someone feels the need to have something drawn onto their body...and then again and again.
A few years ago in high school we had this blog project to do where we had to make a blog with a certain theme (yeah, it was nothing like this blog...this one's a lot better), and someone's was a blog about tattoos. I remember she talked to someone who had a lot of them in one entry and said this of her "...has turned her body into a living work of art!" I swear that's a plot point in a movie somewhere...that some villain is trying to turn people into living works of art. It's definitely somewhere out there, and if it isn't then it should be. It gets worse when I actually picture this. A work of art? What will they do, skin you and hang it in a museum? Macabre man, macabre.
That's the thing...tattoos are both permanent and temporary. They're permanent in that once you get it it's on you for good. It'll be there when you get married, it'll be there when you get old, and it'll be there when you die (and yes, I know you can get rid of them, but if you're so hard on getting one, that kind of defeats the purpose). At the same time, they're very very temporary. When you die, that art dies with you. I mean yeah, you can take pictures, but it's not REAL per se. It'd be like having a picture of a painting. No, the art gets burned or thrown into a casket, and on top of that if you're buried you're dressed. Furthermore, it's entirely possible that people won't remember you for your tattoos. There was a poignant demotivational (though i guess the de is kind of null) of a person with some intense sleeves hugging a little kid that said tattoos don't change character. And yeah, that's right they don't, but they don't necessarily define it either.
And then there's the idea that people tend to get tattoos of things involving temporary obsessions. Or they'll get something really really vague or universal. That's a whole nother Foamy rant in and of itself (although this is less of a rant and more of a hmmm type thing) that people in general just aren't creative. And those memorial tattoos...I don't know, I guess that's more meaningful than putting it on the back window of your car. Okay, actually that makes a lot of sense, the memorial thing. But with some people, yeah it's a nice design, but it'd be great if it was on your wall and not your back. That begs the question "Who is this really for?" If I spent as much money on a tattoo as some people do (these living works of art end up costing more than non-living ones in some cases), I'd at least want to look at it! I mean boy....having the wrong thing on the wrong part of your body could make for some awkward love making. Well, or some hilarious love making (making note of this for that Hooker Jesus story...)
There's something that seems...Freudian in all of this however...or at least overly psychological. I mean, anyone can get tattoos. Maybe people "get addicted" to getting tattoos because they believe they're covering up their body with something better. It almost makes sense when you remember that I said it seems to be mostly females jumping on this whole tattoo thing. That logic gets taken to a whole new level when you realize that fat people have more space for tattoos. Instead of ugliness, you can then view it as "more potential beauty." As much as that's a joke, there's a fair point in there. Women tend to be more likely to have image qualms, right? It'd make sense they'd then try to cover that up with art.
Just a thought...
I don't have a beef with tattoos, I really don't. If you want em fine. If you've got some sort of tattoo fetish (and I know its out there otherwise some people wouldn't have half as many as they do), that's fine. but me? I don't get it. For me tattoos are something that give you special powers...and until they do that, i probably will not be going through any such process.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Eh No, Let's Stay Generic
'Nother sentimental argument and bitter love....Oh wait, that's Worry Rock.
Actually, I've been feeling kind of ill lately, for whatever reason. Ew. Hoping THAT won't continue...I think today at least, it's due to stress and Halloween candy. I'm a bit of a fatass at heart, and I guess I shouldn't be. You won't see me turning this place into one of those health and fitness blogs though, nope. Even if I do start making a bunch of good choices, I'm not going to parade it around or anything. I mean, I SHOULD start doing stuff again...I think my voice is being affected by a lack of activity, and that sucks.
Originally, this was going to be a topical entry about...well I'll save it for when I post that one. But in light of me feeling so odd, I've decided to just write about what's going on right now. Stress and frustration hit me today. I just caught a break from this whole school thing and now it's back and madder than ever. All of a sudden I've got a whole bunch of stuff on my plate again. It's not that it "snuck up" on me due to procrastination either. It's more like I just got out of one asteroid field and now I'm staring down another. Due dates one after the other...and then there's scheduling...ew.
We're at that point in the semester where you realized you lost a few weeks somewhere. They just zipped on by, week after week. When you first think about it, you see the light at the end of the tunnel. Then you realized the light blinded you for a few seconds and there's really a lot of tunnel left, and it's actually pretty dark.
This is all exceptionally weird considering I used to have classes almost nonstop before now. You know, it was called High School. And now, I can't even handle a few months without moaning. Granted, it is a headache. You want it to go by and go fast, but you don't want to lose your time anywhere. Once time speeds up, it seems, it never slows down. I cannot fathom how fast it'll be moving in ten years, but I'm wise enough now to know that it'll be so fast I can't actually fathom it.
It's weird how I live though. I think about ten years from now and then i don't want to anymore. All I'll think about is what I SHOULD have, and no doubt the me of the present will have no requisites for that future. So then you could say I live in the present. Somehow, though, I'm not a "live in the moment" type of guy. I don't have too many moments I'd like to linger on. Besides, the present is so fleeting. You linger longer than a spilt second and it's dwelling on the past. Have to keep moving. If you keep moving though, you'll go faster than the treadmill of the present and end up in the future. Time is much like Rules of Citation: they're both more confusing than they have any right to be.
You might recall me writing about how everything is routine. Same concept here. You walk the same path too many times and it wears down, then you're in a rut. That's kind of what it feels like.
I'm not into this whole "college" -y thing. I hate the word "scholarly," research is the bane of my existence, and, when it all comes down to it, the whole thing just seems...stuck up. Maybe it's all just too upper class for a shamefully proud middle class kid like me. I wasn't handed everything, but I've never pulled a true all nighter either. I don't consider myself all that hard working. I just have a memory for the mundane. I always say I'm really good at remembering useless information and that's why I'm so good at college. That's the best explanation I have, and it makes it make sense that I hate research papers. They require me to get information on my own...and find a use for it.
It's little things like that that ruin the kinds of challenges I like. I mean, i don't really like challenges at all because I've got a...what do you call it? A hair trigger temper. So maybe challenge isn't the right word. I'm talking about this phenomenon when you're in a class called writing fiction and the first thing the teacher says is "No science fiction" and you're the one wearing the Star Wars t-shirt (granted I still loved that class to death). A lot of college assignments seem really fun, but 95% of the time (and I say 95% of the time because a few weeks ago I got full credit for spending 20 minutes talking about LGBT themes in Fight Club. No strings attached.) the merit of it just being a college assigment makes it too formal to be fun. You have to cite your sources or have four sources or pick something within a specific realm of topics or include an aid or demonstration or...you know, whatever. The closest I came, and you can interpret this however like, to that kind of freedom was in that very same class I used in my example.
But yeah, that's just something that's been bothering the living urine out of me today...well aside from the fact that I think my body's finally shrivelling up into itself...but that's another story. Overall this little random ramble went well I think, and I'm feeling better than I would if I'd stuck to my original plan. So hey, there you go, the me of right now (or more than likely by the time you read this, the me of the past) in a nutshell...well, I think it's safer to say that nutshell is inside a bigger one...
Actually, I've been feeling kind of ill lately, for whatever reason. Ew. Hoping THAT won't continue...I think today at least, it's due to stress and Halloween candy. I'm a bit of a fatass at heart, and I guess I shouldn't be. You won't see me turning this place into one of those health and fitness blogs though, nope. Even if I do start making a bunch of good choices, I'm not going to parade it around or anything. I mean, I SHOULD start doing stuff again...I think my voice is being affected by a lack of activity, and that sucks.
Originally, this was going to be a topical entry about...well I'll save it for when I post that one. But in light of me feeling so odd, I've decided to just write about what's going on right now. Stress and frustration hit me today. I just caught a break from this whole school thing and now it's back and madder than ever. All of a sudden I've got a whole bunch of stuff on my plate again. It's not that it "snuck up" on me due to procrastination either. It's more like I just got out of one asteroid field and now I'm staring down another. Due dates one after the other...and then there's scheduling...ew.
We're at that point in the semester where you realized you lost a few weeks somewhere. They just zipped on by, week after week. When you first think about it, you see the light at the end of the tunnel. Then you realized the light blinded you for a few seconds and there's really a lot of tunnel left, and it's actually pretty dark.
This is all exceptionally weird considering I used to have classes almost nonstop before now. You know, it was called High School. And now, I can't even handle a few months without moaning. Granted, it is a headache. You want it to go by and go fast, but you don't want to lose your time anywhere. Once time speeds up, it seems, it never slows down. I cannot fathom how fast it'll be moving in ten years, but I'm wise enough now to know that it'll be so fast I can't actually fathom it.
It's weird how I live though. I think about ten years from now and then i don't want to anymore. All I'll think about is what I SHOULD have, and no doubt the me of the present will have no requisites for that future. So then you could say I live in the present. Somehow, though, I'm not a "live in the moment" type of guy. I don't have too many moments I'd like to linger on. Besides, the present is so fleeting. You linger longer than a spilt second and it's dwelling on the past. Have to keep moving. If you keep moving though, you'll go faster than the treadmill of the present and end up in the future. Time is much like Rules of Citation: they're both more confusing than they have any right to be.
You might recall me writing about how everything is routine. Same concept here. You walk the same path too many times and it wears down, then you're in a rut. That's kind of what it feels like.
I'm not into this whole "college" -y thing. I hate the word "scholarly," research is the bane of my existence, and, when it all comes down to it, the whole thing just seems...stuck up. Maybe it's all just too upper class for a shamefully proud middle class kid like me. I wasn't handed everything, but I've never pulled a true all nighter either. I don't consider myself all that hard working. I just have a memory for the mundane. I always say I'm really good at remembering useless information and that's why I'm so good at college. That's the best explanation I have, and it makes it make sense that I hate research papers. They require me to get information on my own...and find a use for it.
It's little things like that that ruin the kinds of challenges I like. I mean, i don't really like challenges at all because I've got a...what do you call it? A hair trigger temper. So maybe challenge isn't the right word. I'm talking about this phenomenon when you're in a class called writing fiction and the first thing the teacher says is "No science fiction" and you're the one wearing the Star Wars t-shirt (granted I still loved that class to death). A lot of college assignments seem really fun, but 95% of the time (and I say 95% of the time because a few weeks ago I got full credit for spending 20 minutes talking about LGBT themes in Fight Club. No strings attached.) the merit of it just being a college assigment makes it too formal to be fun. You have to cite your sources or have four sources or pick something within a specific realm of topics or include an aid or demonstration or...you know, whatever. The closest I came, and you can interpret this however like, to that kind of freedom was in that very same class I used in my example.
But yeah, that's just something that's been bothering the living urine out of me today...well aside from the fact that I think my body's finally shrivelling up into itself...but that's another story. Overall this little random ramble went well I think, and I'm feeling better than I would if I'd stuck to my original plan. So hey, there you go, the me of right now (or more than likely by the time you read this, the me of the past) in a nutshell...well, I think it's safer to say that nutshell is inside a bigger one...
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