My experience with Watchmen began similarly to pretty much everyone else’s: by seeing the trailer for it before the Dark Knight. Before that trailer I had never even heard of it before, so seeing a preview for a movie based on the “most celebrated graphic novel of all time” threw me off at first. I thought that surely I would have heard of a novel of such prestige before. Nope. Never had.

After seeing the Dark Knight several times, and consequently, the Watchman trailer, I was intrigued enough to go out and pick up a copy from Barnes and Noble. It took me awhile to get in to. Not because it wasn’t good, but because I didn’t have the time. In the middle of my state of not reading, a friend who had also gotten it and been reading started raving about how great it was, and how I needed to read it, so I did. The next few days I read every chance I got, and by the end, I was blown away.

I am trying to word the following the best I can.. Often when I read a really good book or watch a great movie, I have a feeling afterwards of “That movie was awesome, and it all makes sense and I totally know what happened.” Then there are things that I come across that leave me thinking “That was amazing, and I know for a fact that about 80% of it went way over my head, but I love it anyway.” When things are good, or great, I enjoy it because it is truly well done and everything fits together in the end. At the end of the proverbial journey I feel like I have completed something, as if I have experienced everything the characters have, and any repeated viewings/readings would be purely for enjoyment. But when something is truly brilliant, like the Watchmen, I come to the end and I feel like I couldn’t possibly understand everything in one reading. There are layers and layers of complexity and substance to it, things that might even take me 10 readings to pick up on.

Anyway, on to the movie. I saw Watchmen with my girlfriend and a friend the Friday it came out. First thing I should say, if you haven’t seen it, it is extremely graphic. If you have a weak stomach or heart, are pregnant or may become pregnant, or are prone to seizures and being morbidly obese, stay away from this movie. Or if you are all of the above like my girlfriend and still want to see the movie, make sure you have me to shield your eyes when it gets intense. In Watchmen, you see peoples arms get cut off with a saw, people’s bones breaking out of their arms, people exploding, as well as some truly disturbing scenes involving attempted rape, as well as a little girl and some dogs. Not to mention the graphic sex scenes and nudity. So before you go to see it, make sure you are ok with all of the above, or are at least prepared to tolerate it in order to see one of the best movies in a long time.

If you have never heard of Watchmen, like I hadn’t, here is a basic overview. The movie takes place in alternate history in the US in the 80′s. It closely mimics real history, with a few important differences. In this world, super heroes are real, but they don’t have any powers. They are “costumed heroes” who fight and solve crime. A lot of the story covers how society responded to their existence, such as them being hired by the Government and any that refused to join were outlawed. Most heroes have retired from their crime fighting. The story follows many characters, but primarily Rorschach (Ror- shack) a trench-coat and mask clad vigilante who has caught on to a plot to eliminate costumed heroes. We also follow the second retired Nite-Owl, Silk Spectre, Ozymandias, the Comedian, and the only hero with powers, Dr. Manhattan. I can’t say much more without spoiling anything, so go ahead and see it then come read the rest.

First, I’d like to say that this movie couldn’t be any closer to the novel. There are some noticeable differences, like Nite-Owl’s costume, and most notably the ending, but neither changes lessened the impact of the movie. But the characters were all spot-on. Jackey Earle Haley’s portrayal of Rorschach was spot on perfect. Everyone did a great job of portraying their characters, but Rorschack couldn’t have been any better. Just sayin.

Nextly, (I made up that word, like a real man) you see a blue dangly bit. Well several of them. I realize some people can’t get past this, but try not to let it distract you. It would have been much more awkward to frame each shot to avoid seeing it, and it is a lot to do with Dr. Manhattans character. So get over it.

Anyway, I could go on but I don’t feel like it. Go see Watchmen.

This past week my parents were out of the Country in Puerto Rico. Most people my age would throw a party or do something crazy. Apparently not me. For more info, just watch the video.

On the topic of drinking and partying and stuff, I think I’m pretty much ok with out it. I think my friends and I are way happier and have way more fun doing what we do, then anyone who spends their time drinking, partying, and smoking whatever kids are into these days. Most college students and people my age seem so apathetic and boring, only talking about being drunk and school. None of them are really happy. Most people just complain and talk bad about their friends and other people. It’s sad.

You can call me a nerd or geek or loser or whatever you want, I don’t care, but the point is I don’t need that stuff to have fun. I have a great life, a great family, a great girlfriend, and great friends. My parents don’t embarrass me either, in fact, they are some of the coolest people I know. I much rather be with them than surrounded by people I don’t know at a random party.

I’m not telling people how to live their lives, I’m just saying that based on the fun I have with my friends compared to the fun I see other people have doesn’t really compare.

Has anyone been to YouTube recently? You know the site that you go to to watch videos of cats, people hurting themselves, and of course me? Yeah that site. It looks like crap. I think they might even be the same designers who designed MySpace. And by “designed MySpace” I mean created a glorious Internet display of unattractive, tacky, and disproportionate objects splattered erratically across an innocent and unsuspecting social network and marketed towards people who like posting saucy pictures of themselves for you to look at whilst listening to their stupid freaking Fallout Boy song which is set to play extra loud the second you open their page. Long, confusing sentences aside, YouTube now looks worse than MySpace.

If you’re thinking “MySpace doesn’t look that bad, nerd.” then get away from me, I don’t want to speak to you ever again. I only associate with people who have eyes. Eyes that allow them to see things. And common sense to tell them which things they see are terrible.

YouTube used to look vaguely ok. But then, just like the ‘space, they began adding new features. Lots of them. My problem is not with new features, those are awesome, but with the fact that they don’t come up with a good way to incorporate them ergonomically into the site. They just sort of slap them on and rub the other links around until it all fits, then yell ‘screw it’ and all go out for coleslaw. Their homepage does nothing but scare me now. There are ads everywhere, and hordes of links and buttons and random videos that I could care less about. Oh wow you have videos recommended especially for me? Awesome! Now could someone tell me their basis for recommending me this? I’m not even going to get into the legal ramifications of a cat adopting a rabbit, mainly because I’m not qualified. But is this video supposed to be happy or sad? Are we happy because one fuzzy thing adopted another fuzzy thing and its cute? Or are we sad that the rabbit is going to grow up and find out that it’s not even the same species as its parents and that its rabbit mom didn’t love it enough to even adopt it out to a family of similar animal? This is sick. What the biss YouTube?!

Now I’ll be more specific about the things that I find crappy.

First of all, the logo is one of the smallest things on the page. This should not be. I am going to YouTube.com, not StupidCatadoptingaGoat.com. The homepage is so cluttered with nonsense no one can tell what’s going on. There isn’t even an obvious way to get to your list of favorites or own videos. You have to go to a tiny drop down box in the last place you’d expect to look. Also, everything is disproportionate. Links, page numbers, buttons, logos, ads etc. They all vary in size and give no clear path for the eye to follow. Everything is drawing you to look in different directions.

I miss the good old days where you could go to the homepage, see a list of decent featured videos, and then click to see your subscriptions and what not. Times were simpler back then. No ads. No promotions. Just videos that you watched because you wanted to, not because it’s being promoted or recommended to you by sick cat and rabbit haters.

YouTube works and is functional, but that’s it. It’s ugly, confusing, and apparently has a sick sense of humor regarding inter-species adoption. It’s definitely time for a redesign. Preferably one that doesn’t suck.

I filmed this randomly while nervously studying for a test I had to take later that day. Just in case you care, I got a B on that test. Definitely not my best work, but oh well. (referring to the test and the video.) It’s pretty random, but hey, what did you expect?

On a more depressing note, today was a horribly stressful day. I had to do a group speech presentation with an a group of people who were, for the most part, extremely ill prepared. Everyone in our group went on WAY too long. We didn’t even have time to finish the speech because some people have no sense of time while talking. I’m not going to say I did great, but I certainly gave the best speech from my group. Not only did most people’s speech suck, but our teacher was in a terrible mood and was being really harsh on everyone’s presentations. Luckily class finished before he could get to tearing us apart, but I guess that only means I have that to look forward to next week.

Moral of the story is that people suck and can’t be trusted to do anything properly.

Last night I watched the Oscars with my family. My dad describes it as “an orgy of self admiration,” with multiple hours of people wallowing in what they think is their own greatness. This year though was definitely superior to all the rest, even enough to make my dad lose some of his cynicism on the event. 

First off, the set was awesome. I watched the making-of thing they had before the ceremony, and it was pretty neat! I loved all the architecture and the design on the floor and of course the sparkly diamond curtain. The music was fancier this year also, putting a new spin on all of the classic songs. What really impressed me though, was Hugh Jackman. He’s never really stood out to me before. I mean he was good in X-Men and and The Prestige, but I never really thought much of him, he was just kind of there. Forgettable. But as the “Master of Ceremonies” he was great! I didn’t know he was such a good singer and dancer. His opening number was hilarious/awesome/vewwy honorable. He was surprisingly funny for someone who plays a razor clawed man-beast as well as a devious magician. And it’s hard not to love the Aussie accent!

I’m definitely happy that Heath Ledger won the Oscar for best supporting actor. Some people have been saying that he wouldn’t have won it if he was alive, and maybe they are right, but he really was incredible in Dark Knight. Slumdog was an incredible movie and it deserved all it won, but I still felt sad every time Dark Knight was passed up for an award. It was an amazing film! Not just because of it’s amazing story and dialogue, score, effects, and awesome acting, but because of what it did for the comic book movie genre. It showed that at super hero film could be equally as well done as any crime/drama movie.  Augh I need to move on before I go on any longer (Which I so could) on the Dark Knight. Point is, I was secretly hoping for more Oscars for the Batman. It’s like Will Smith said, we like action movies because they have explosions, car chases, and fans. 

But Penelope Cruise for Vicci Christina Barcelona? Really?! That movie bored me to tears. Maybe I didn’t like it because I don’t have ovaries, but I really did not like that movie. And Penelope cruise was just a crazy scary woman. Bah. 

And with that, I’m going to bed.

After being separated from my copy of Fallout 3 for many a month, we finally reunited just last week. I forgot how much I’ve missed it. I never beat it because silly Fable 2 distracted me, but now I’m finally getting some quality time in post-apocalyptic DC. It’s really a great game. I’ve never played any of the other Fallout games, but the third one is so good I think playing the old ones would only spoil it for me. What can I say? I’m a sucker for shiny graphics.

My friend J. Alan, who you’ll see in the video and who also had been keeping my game hostage for previously mentioned long time, came over the other day and we decided to play some and do a few side quests. We ended up following a mission that led us to this underground settlement of vampire type people. They aren’t necessarily bad in the sense that they attack you, they just aren’t good people and have been known to, well, kill people. Their settlement is set up like most towns in the game, they have someone who sells weapons, some people sell food, clothes etc., and it’s full of people you can talk to and pick up quests from, and they even have a fancy emo-looking leader named Vance. (It should be noted that all of the vampires in the town look like they’d be in a band. Vance was lead vocals.)

We came to the point where we were ready to turn off the Xbox since we had been playing a few hours. Before we turned it off I decided I would just use everything at my disposal to try to kill everyone in the town, something that really didn’t seem possible. So I planted a few mines around the main area that everyone was standing, and threw a few grenades. Some died, but the rest came and murdered me. We tried a few more times, squealing all the while in fear as they would attack us and eventually kill us.  Finally we discovered a room where we could hide and shoot them from after planting the mines. So the next time I tried setting mines, then ran to the room and looked around, picking up all the health packs and ammo I could find, and looking for spots to shoot from. Suddenly “Vance’s left leg has been crippled” flashed on the screen, indicating that he had stepped on one of the mines. This meant that it would only be about 30 seconds before they all stormed through the door and snuffed me. And they did. 

Learning from our mistakes, we saw how it could work. So we decided to try one more time, and this time with my laptop recording just in case it worked. This time J. Alan played. He left a trail of mines leading from the congregation of vampires all the way up to the escalator. From there he ran to the room we found and put a more powerful mine there. He then ran back and threw a grenade down blowing up a few people as well as the first mine. As the vampires charged up towards the room where he was hiding, they managed to trip all of the mines. By the time they made it to the room, there was only one girl left. J. Alan was able to kill her, then run back downstairs where the leader, Vance (Lead vocalist) was pacing the floor. He was able to dead him in the face with his mini gun. After that he looted all the badmins, picking up a fancy flame sword which you see in the video!

We’re quite sure that we weren’t supposed to do any of that, but we did. And we’re awesome. And by awesome I mean need to go outside more.

I haven’t had too much time recently to make a video, but today I had a couple hours to spare, so behold the fruits of my leisure time! I figured it would be good to mention the blog so more than just Twitter people know about it.

Anyhoo, Wii Fit is a demon. See the problem with Wii fit, is that video games are made so that you can hurt fake people in the face and make them dead, without any fear of consequence. But with Wii Fit the game tries to hurt you greatly by forcing you to contort to impossible shapes and positions, with MANY a consequence. And that white bendy woman is so smug, wallowing in her own nimbleness. She makes it sound so easy: “Now, gently rotate your leg until your knee touches your back, making sure to not lose contact between your forehead and calf. Now hold… deep breaths.. now slowly rotate your pelvis off of the wall…deep breaths… and release. Now repeat until you lose feeling in your spine.”

All this talk of video games is making me want to murder something. Fallout 3 time.

Anyway, a lot of the special was about the way coffee effected society, and the importance of coffeehouses. Before coffee, people had nothing better to do when they got together than drink themselves silly. With the discovery of coffee, they could enjoy a fancy beverage and still remain in their right minds enough to have a meaningful conversation. Things started getting done, because rather than picking fights and passing out by the toilet, people were discussing things that needed doing. They were making plans, talking about the economy and government, and talking about how to better the world.

The coffeehouse became a popular and lively place, where all members of society could get together and down a few hot ones. I remember one lady on the TV said something to the effect of “They didn’t go to coffeehouses to drink coffee. They went there to have a conversation, and coffee was only the excuse.” People wouldn’t go there to just talk to people they know. It was perfectly normal to strike up a conversation with a complete stranger.

Watching that special made me really want to find a coffeehouse that was closer to that old image than to the current model. For awhile now I’ve been getting tired of Starbucks. I haven’t been in at least a month, partly because we recently got an espresso machine, but also because Starbucks isn’t personal anymore. It’s more of a franchise than a coffeehouse.  And as cheesy as it sounds, I think it has lost its charm. Also it’s more overpriced than a free ticket to a Katy Perry concert.

Much to my delight though I discovered a new coffeehouse that was just put in not too long ago by my house, called Boston Coffeehouse. I came in yesterday to try it, and loved it right away! They have a huge menu of breakfast items, lunch foods, smoothies, coffee, and of course tasty pastries. I was overwhelmed by all the choices, so I asked the lady behind the counter to choose for me. And well, it was good! So good I came back the next day (today.) I’m sitting here now writing this and looking around at everyone sitting at tables talking, eating, drinking, waitresses walking around bringing people their drinks. That’s right, they bring you your food! 

Ha, it’s kind of funny. I was talking about people sitting by themselves on their laptops at Starbucks, and here I am writing on my laptop..alone…IN A CAVE…WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!!!!  (sorry, Iron Man reference) Anyway, point is that I’m liking Boston Coffeehouse way better than Starbucks. It’s much more personal and friendly, and most importantly, cheaper. It’s decorated all fancy like and it makes me feel at home. I’m definitely going to become a regular here. 

Now I realize this blog was quite pointless, but sitting here has put me in a creative writing mood and I felt like sharing my joy of finding a good place to buy hot brown liquid. Before I hit the publish button though, I’d like to share my dad and my idea for a new coffee company, named after the first discovery of Coffee. Legend says that coffee was first discovered by some Ethiopian shepherds when they noticed that their goats were “dancing” after eating some coffee berries.

So we came up with the idea for the “Dancing Goat Coffee Company.” ….. Crap. Just googled ‘dancing goat.’ Looks like I’m not the first to think of it. They’ve got a sweet logo and everything. I wanted to make a logo… Now I don’t get to photoshop anything. Well poo.

I’m going to go cry now. Bye.

How adults see the internet

I remember a few years ago when MySpace was becoming popular, what a ruckus it caused in the adult community. Parents, police, and politicians (the three dangerous P’s) were all against it because it was putting too much information on the Web and was opening kids up to being molested in the face by the internet. They believed it was some sort of demon that let their kids talk to strangers who would at first chance, molest them in the face.

Then comes along Facebook. Mr. Face (Put-your-full-name-address-phone-number-email-age-and-age-on-your-profile) Book. And boy do the adults seem to love it! Adults everywhere are signing up, parents and teachers alike! I’m not sure what about it it is that makes them feel it is any safer than MySpace. On MySpace, everyone lied about their age, name, location, everything! Only the idiots were posting information that someone  could use against them on it. On facebook, your full name, address, phone number, age and everything is right there on your profile! People that you don’t even know can see your pictures if a friend of there’s is tagged in an album of yours. With Facebook, nothing is private. Nothing is even yours! It’s all out in the open.

MySpace is certainly more tacky than Facebook, since users can customize their profile with sparkly obnoxious things, but all of the main things that caused adults to shun MySpace are fully present in the FBook! You can still talk to people you don’t know, people can lie about who they are,  you can still post saucy pictures of yourself, you can expose too much information to people, and pervo-rapers can still lie about their age to get to kids. But for some reason, it is ok on Facebook. 

I think the difference is that adults have actually tried Facebook, where with MySpace they just judged it based on what they read about it. They listened to the news go on about how dangerous it is and so they believed it was some sort of Internet contraption that sprays you with pedophile attractant. People fear what they don’t understand. But now that adults are finally trying the whole ‘social networking’ thing out, they are seeing it isn’t all bad. They are starting to understand how if you have a little common sense, you can tell who you know and who you shouldn’t talk to. The same people who once asked “How do you know that you are talking to your friend and not some criminal?” are now chatting online with people they haven’t seen in twenty years. They finally realize that the Internet can be a decent place and that not every link you click takes to a rapist hotline. 

The old people have finally discovered the internet. Let’s just hope that parents don’t discover Twitter.

(Update:) Looks like Facebook is going back to their old terms of agreement. 

I’m sure most have you have heard of the show “Fringe” by now. I’ve been a bit lazy getting into it. I’ve heard people rave about how good it is and I’ve watched a few episodes, but haven’t had time to start from the first episode. Well tonight I was awake with nothing better to do, so I downloaded the Pilot. It seems decent, and I definitely plan to catch up on the rest of the episodes in time for the re-opening in April.

It seems to me though, that J.J. Abrams has some kind of fetish for female lead characters who are Federal agents, and who’s boyfriends get severely dead in the first episode. Also he seems to have a thing for main male characters who can go days without their beard getting longer, or without shaving. I guess the homeless look is in this decade. Oh, he also seems to have a fascination with terrible things happening involving planes. I’ve only seen a few episodes, but I get the feeling no one is ever going to actually be dead.

I’m going to go ahead and call it now, Walter is a polar bear, and Olivia is actually Jennifer Garner’s mother.