As a student tries to leave 15 minutes early from a 3 hours physics lecture, the student is addressed by the proffesor:

“You wanna leave? Go ahead, leave. I’m going to tell everyone the answers to the test as soon as they walk out of the room. One of the answers will be your name, you’ll know which when you see the question.”
-Professor Bresloff

yeaaaahhhh!! Don Hertzfeldt (The man behind “Rejected” as well as many other fine cartoons.) and Mike Judge (Beavis and Butthead, Office Space, King Of the Hill) have put together their own Animation Festival of their toons as well as many other rockin bits of animation and it just rocks.

This show includes 5 different shorts by Hertzfeldt (Rejected included), as well as several Mike Judge cartoons including an early animated version of Office Space.

I saw it last Saturday and it rocked. If you’ve been continually disappointed by Spike and Mike’s, think Don and/or Mike Judge is the greatest, or just like cartoons, you should really go see this show.

For schedule of showings, click the picture. For you slo towners note that the show WILL be playing at the palm. I might just come up to see it again.

After a couple weeks of being without internet, I’ve finally switched ISPs. Goodbye sbc, hello comcast! I don’t think this will be a turning point in my life, but at least I can post to this blog now ;-) I’ve got a couple different things to add today, I’ll at least post one of them after this before I get back to hw, but we’ll see how it goes.

Also, Ryan Du Bois has a new website up now, check it out here. Or you can just click on his link on the right. Lauren’s web page has also been moved, as it used to be on my sbc account. Check Lauren’s new site out here.

Lauren’s mom took us to see Swimming Pool today. Not a bad movie if you’re into soft core porn; I can’t say I understood the ending, but I learned stuff from this movie. Apparently in France, when you meet somebody of the opposite sex, you are obliged to have sex with them before you ask their name. Who knew? I would have just said “hi.”

“If the computer says it’s there, but the shelf says it isn’t, I’m going to have to side with the shelf.”
-Los Angeles Public Librarian

Libraries rule. Everyone here can benefit from their local library and I suggest you take the following steps to do so:

1) Go to Amazon.com and search for your favorite books. Then once you’ve brought up one of them in the web browser, scroll down the page and you should see two things of interest: “Customers who bought this book also bought:” and “Our Customers’ Advice.” Both of these should give you some starting points for books to read. Make a list of books that look interesting to you. I looked up Catch 22 and ended up reading Syrup by Maxx Barry or The Contortionist’s Handbook, a Novel. by Craig Clevenger, two books I never would have otherwise read.

2) Go to the Internet Movie Database Top Movies and have fun looking around for a while. Look at the Top 250 films of all time as rated by users of the internet movie database. Check out your favorite genres, whether it be fantasy, musical, or film-noir. Make a list of movies you’d like to see. The cool thing is that even though these are great movies, a lot of them are the type that blockbuster won’t have and the library will. I’d recommend Annie Hall, Spirited Away, or even The Great Escape.

3) Locate your library if you don’t know where it is. I’m sure google can help with this. Try searching for “YOUR CITY public library.”

4) Place holds. Every modern library I’ve been to has an online catalog, so you can see if they have your books/movies before you actually go there, as well as place holds for books without stepping foot in the library. This is good, because even though your library says it has 3 copies of the movie you want, it doesn’t. Databases like to lie. So put it on hold; This means that someone will find your book for you, hide it, and put your name on it. The nicer ones will even send your book to whatever library you want and let you know when it gets there, so your lazy ass doesn’t have to go all the way cross town when there’s a library branch 20 feet away.

I’ve been trying to take advantage of my library system in the past month, with decent results: I’ve been reading more, watching interesting movies, and saving money. Which is good, since I don’t have money to save.

Like vintage lookin t-shirts as much as I do, but wish you could buy new ones and avoid the second-hand funk? Check out Simply Vintage, I want all of it, if only because it’s the most random crap I’ve ever seen. The “Stop Potato Violence” t-shirt is epic. Also, if those t-shirts are too expensive, check out the bargain bin, which is cheaper and has a bunch of t-shirts that I like better than their more expensive siblings. See the “Gnome Sorcery Foundation” or the “Maryland Matters” t-shirt if you don’t believe me.

Tom and I discuss the finer points of our recent differential equations test:

(09:57:00) Me too: that test sucked
(09:57:07) Tom: i hate him

If you haven’t taken differential equations, it’s essentially everything you ever forgot from Calculus 2 plus everything you never wanted to remember from trigonometry. It’s fun stuff.

First off, make sure you all check out Eric Conveys An Emotion. Good for a laugh or a temporary cure for boredom. People send in suggestions for emotions, and Eric conveys his version of that emotion. Some of the best ones aren’t emotions, for example this, or that.

Lauren came back this weekend, which made it a good weekend by itself. We had the opportunity and privilege and opportunity to help Katie (Lauren’s sister) move this weekend. Lifting heavy things and traversing lots of stairs was an effective reminder of how badly I am out of shape. After I finished moving all I wanted to do was go swimming, but instead I got to deliver pizzas. I’ll post a pic of me in my uniform at some point, so posterity can mock me.

Off to get my car smogged….

Almost a year ago I saw a screening for Gigli, the new Ben and J. Lo movie, for free. It was a really rough cut, but you could still tell it was really horrible. So I wasn’t all that surprised when critics started bombing on it like nothing I’ve ever seen before. But one thing I noticed in a review was weird:

“The Ben and J.Lo stuff in the beginning was awful. So god-awful that I almost left the screening. But the one bright star in the movie is Raquel Castro, seven, who plays Affleck’s daughter. Castro completely redeemed the film. This little girl was brilliant!” -New York Post.

Which on first glance might not seem that weird, I know plenty of seven year olds who could act circles around Ben and J. Lo, but the thing is, when I first saw the movie, Ben Affleck’s character didn’t have a daughter…

“The VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston Strangler is to the woman alone.”
-Jack Valenti, MPAA(Motion Picture Association of America)

Dr.Fredericks was brilliant, he was funny, and he was definitely a bit of an ass; despite his threats and somewhat random grading methodology he remains regrettably unforgettable. The following are quotes of his I collected throughout the semester:

“The beatles recorded that song [Can’t buy me love] in hamburg, a german port town. They could’ve bought some love.”

“I like bitter people, it just means they cared too much.”

“Venice Beach is a lot like the lower depths of hell.”

“The procrastinator is the ultimate optimist, he’s always assuming he has more time.”

Dr.F’s ex: “John[aka Dr.F], people never really change.”
Dr.F: “I changed! I got worse!”

…reading a particularly bad ex-student’s paper:
“It’s like she’s just masturbating on the page!”

“Go look at the Quaker oatmeal box, don’t do it when you’re stoned or anything, you’ll get in trouble.”

“I’ve been meeting a lot of girls that like girls, that’s all that is.”

“For Lent I gave up hope.”

“You also need your ass kicked, that’s what I’m for: I’ve got the shoes.”

“I don’t know anyone who wishes they were more shy.”

“Flirts are like the good Thai restaurant in my neighborhood, they don’t deliver.”

Student: “Do you know what I’m saying?”
Dr: “No… No I don’t”

Dr.F on Hamlet:
“Surprise! Here’s your new Dad. Surprise! It’s your Uncle.”

Dr.F walks in with a knee brace
Student: “What happened to you?”
Dr.F: “Ambition, too much ambition.”

“If someone tells you they love to write, they’re probably not very good at it.”

“The Apocalypse is coming and elimiDATE is my proof.”

I’ve been thinking I need to get back to reading, especially modern authors. I’ve spent a good amount of my life reading “classics” by aging or long deceased authors speaking to a generation long past. There have to be brilliant new authors producing works right this moment that are relevant to me. With this thought in mind I started looking at books that I like on amazon.com and then seeing what people recommend in sort of a “If you like this, then try”. This turned up “The Contortionist’s Handbook: A Novel” which I’m going to check out. Hopefully I can get back in touch with my inner bookworm.

“met her at the star wars convention
did I mention, she was looking for love?
had to call her bluff, lady you don’t mean how that sounded
(the thousand-pound dude in the ‘no fat chicks’ shirt’s astounded)
thought she’d take it back, revoke, rescind, rewind, retract
ya heard me, she said, I want any man here
to descend in the cave where you conquer the fear
and I’ll steer you to side of the force that you choose
somebody’s man enough here — now who?

This girl, now you have to understand,
would not look out of place on the arm of an attractive man
so the geeks in attendance got jaws on the floor, one extends his
saber but he tripped on his cloak, I stepped to the front then I spoke
I ain’t spitting game, look I got a wookie hat on,
but these guys here are used to gettin’ spat on
by girls, see you put em in shock.
And this ain’t the right con to quote mister spock
but it’s highly illogical to me. Girl looked in my eye, said is your mind free?

Cause I got something for you
it is shiny, it is clean
Come on up and I’ll adore you
with my yellow laser beam

sitting in her room upstairs,
watching her wind up the buns in her hair
I declare that I’d like to be luke,
unless that’s a little bit too perverted for you
I could be jaba, a jawa, an ewok, when we talk “oo ga la gee bla!”
wait — I seen all the flicks, all the books that I read,
don’t remember any character tied to the bed
but that’s all right, I’ma just pretend that I’m encased in carbonite
and why that’s a nice gold bikini, you make that?
shows off what you got, make no mistake that’s
one fine view of chewbacca you’re giving me
lower that down here, we could be living the
linguistic lifesyle of the protocol droid.”

-MC Frontalot “Yellow Lasers” (Note: there is more to this song, but it’s not safe for mixed company.)

If you’ve seen office space you’ll appreciate that you can now buy red swingline staplers like this one. But why is it such a big deal that you can get a red Swingline stapler?

Because Swingline didn’t make red staplers until this past April. The prop guy took a black stapler and painted it red for the movie. You can find obvious office space references on Swingline’s product page. “Up the Revolution: The Red Stapler! Staple and be heard! WHAM-cubicles! WHAM-dress code! WHAMWHAMWHAM!”

There is a Korean christian center next door, and they recently put up a huge sign with a bible passage on it, both in Korean and English. However, the english part is translated from Korean and not the other way around. It reads:

“GOD SHELLHELP HER JUST AT THE BREAK OF DAWN –PSALM 46:5” (Yes it’s in all caps and yes ‘SHELLHELP’ is one word)

Which is interesting, because according to this, Psalm 46:5 reads:

“God is within her, she will not fall;
God will help her at break of day. “

Dorcus is no longer the clothing powerhouse that it once was. And with ideas like this it’s not all that hard to see why.

If this doesn’t do it for you, you’re probably dead.

Have you ever thought to yourself, “If I was a geek, what would my name be?” Well, me neither. But this is still pretty funny. Geek name generator.

After not having even thought about football for months I found my self at the ESPN college football website and it’s all over. I’m already excited about the new season. Even though I haven’t seen what the new quarterback can do, I already care that USC has been ranked #6 in the country by ESPN’s Ivan Maisel, even though I have not a clue who Ivan Maisel is or whether or not he’s ever even watched football. Oh well. At least I can get free tickets.