Archive for May, 2004

All right, I know it’s been a little while since I’ve written two blogs in one day, so I guess today is a special day. I’m going to take a minute to reminisce in the nostalgia of the moment and ponder the possibilities that the future may bring. Ok, that was a minute just wasted. I find myself sitting here torn between decisions. Given the fact that my general psychology class let out really early I have to ask myself what to do with the excess time. I could (a) walk around the campus aimlessly and watch people with mild hopes of meeting someone interesting, (b) find a nice place to sit (most likely just outside of the library and watch fox news), or (c) go to the computer lab early and revert to the total geek I am… err… was and start adding to my blog from within the classroom. I’ll bet you’ve already figured out which option I chose. So, here I find myself sitting in the curiously comfortable computer chair looking at a blank (windows) desktop and asking myself the thought provoking, disturbing, and quite possibly the most proverbial question ever relating to computers; what the heck do I do now? Once again, I’ll make the assumption that you have an IQ higher than that of frozen yogurt and figured out that I promptly went to my website and started writing. All right, enough blabbering about nothing, I’ve had a few topics I’ve been meaning to write about lately so I guess now would be a good time.

Radio?! Why would you want a radio?! For as long as I can remember listening to recorded music, I hated the simple idea and concept of radios. I’m not talking about two way communication devices here; I’m talking about the old fashioned static ridden devices used to tune into radio stations and fill ones mind with mindless consumer driven popular music. Anyway, I’ve been a big fan of being able to select your own music for portable uses. I cleaned the garage in my home when I was young and did some other things to earn money. I think I was in first grade, but I could be wrong. I do know that it was either first or second grade when I purchased my first music device: a walkman tape player. I was the coolest person ever when I got that thing… or at least I thought I was. At any rate, I liked the thought of being able to pick a song and listen to it over and over or pick a few songs and just listen to the ones you like. Or, better yet, take a little time and make your own tape of all your favorite songs so you know that no matter what happens a song will be playing that you like. As I got older and the technology advanced, naturally my selections in portable music devices shifted. The walkman was replaced with a portable compact disc player when they became affordable. The problem then was that I didn’t like the idea of not being able to control what was on the CD, but it didn’t matter that much since it was so easy to skip tracks (no fast forwarding or rewinding!). Actually, I think my fist walkman was SO bad that it couldn’t fast forward or rewind. It only knew how to play. How do fast forward? You hit play and walk away. How do you rewind? You flip the tape upside down and hit play for a while, then flip it again, hit play, check if it’s what you want, and repeat it until you got to the point you wanted. Anyway, back to the topic at hand. To be honest with you, I’m trying to type a lot of fluff because I’ve already started typing (at a surprisingly fast rate) and this keyboard is very loud. Am I basking in the false levels of impressiveness that I don’t care to be associated with? Possibly, but it’s fun nonetheless. I doubt the people in the row behind me can read what I’m writing, and I just found out that the computer to my left doesn’t work. The one to my right has a HUGE monitor for visually impaired students, so I think I’m in luck. If things go well, I’ll have this area all to myself! Ok, back to the topic at hand (again!) CD burners let me change my mixes of songs and then mp3 player came out yadda yadda. At the time of this writing, MP3 players are the big thing. Minidisk players are still very popular in Asia and parts of Europe, but in the US it’s all about the MP3. So, what the heck would I be doing thinking about buying a really small radio to use with headphones? Well, I’m glad you asked. I’ve been listening to the news a ton lately. I listen to it mainly in my car, but I’m also listening to the news on the radio in my room when I don’t do the computer. That’s right, when I don’t do the computer. Now that everything in my room is disabled (including my web servers as of yesterday morning) I have a lot of time that I used to use the computer and now don’t. Dang, I’m really redundant today. No, I’m not redundant, maybe it’s just wordy? Crap, at this rate and I’ll beat that kid’s 10,000 word blog goal in no time. Ok, where was I… oh yes. In the mornings I listen to Shannon Berk on news radio am 540 WFLA. After that (mid mornings to afternoon) I LOVE listening to Glen Beck. He has his “Glen Beck Program” every day for a few hours and this guy is awesome. He’s smart, snappy, he takes lots of call ins and talks about tons of current event topics. His humor is great and his voice is fun to listen to. I even think he’s more fun to listen to than Rush Limbaugh! Speaking of him, he’s on for two hours at noon. Then, after him, Bud Hettinger (I think that’s right) comes on for a few hours. I think his name sounds funny; it’s like “butt head”. Anyway, after him comes Dr. Laura, at which time I promptly turn off my radio. At any rate, the news that they play on the school TVs in the library is good, but it’s pratically muted it’s so quiet. I tried turning it up a few times, but I almost always get yelled at by faculty. I’m a nice guy! I’m not trying to do anything bad! I can’t blame them though; I’ll bet they’re used to people coming and doing all sorts of crazy stuff to the TVs. In fact I can remember a few months ago (my second semester) when a bunch of the geeky people all rose from their tables in the cafeteria simultaneously and everyone started running around franticly. I stayed to watch what’d happen because these people were total geeks (not in a bad way) so it was weird to see them… you know… WALKING. They stacked tables to reach the TV on the ceilings and attached game cubes and play station twos to all of the TVs and started having gaming tournaments. It was great to watch! Anyway, I was thinking that since Glen Beck is really fun to listen to and he plays while I’m waiting between classes for an hour, a little cheapie small radio would be cool to get and sit down in a chair and listen to. The next class is psychology which I doubt will cause me any problems. There are few tests, no quizzes, and I don’t think I’ll have to study for it before class… ever! So, yeah, I’ll be looking for one of those.

Well my C professor just walked in and sat down at the computer right in front of mine that’s reversed… huh… I guess I didn’t expect that computer to be for the professor, but then again it only makes sense. (I don’t know who I thought it might otherwise have been for) Ok he said five minutes until we start so I’ll start posting this. This is a freaking four and a half hour class! Have a good one (again)! –Scott

All right, I don’t have long. That’s right; I’m posting yet another blog entry from class. Ok, so I’m not technically in class. Between two of my classes I have a forty minute gap. Calculus just finished (1:30) and General Psychology starts in forty minutes (2:10). I figured I’d stop by the computer lab and check if anyone was adventurous enough to add comments to my last blog post (being it’s been two days since I last added anything) but was a little disappointed when I saw that no one wrote, so I couldn’t resist the urge to write something myself.

I met a guy from last semester’s chemistry class while waiting for calculus to start. I feel stupid because I forgot his name and it never came to me. Oh well. He’s a nice guy and we worked together on some of our homework when we shared that class. He got there early every day (like I) to study so we all studied together and the group (the four or five people that always got there early) knew each other pretty well. No, he’s not in my calculus class, but he’s in a humanities class that starts in a room across the hall at the exact same time. I have a feeling I’ll be seeing him a lot this semester.

I met Wee again! Yes, those of you who are dedicated blog readers will remember when I talked about Wee from my English composition II class two semesters ago. Yes, his name is Wee. I’m not sure the exact spelling, but he always wrote it like “Wee” because it was easier to pronounce. Anyway, he is Vietnamese (obviously, by his name) and he saw me a few minutes ago (in the library sitting down at the computer) so he came to me and was like “hey Scott! What’re you taking this summer?” I made friendly conversation (I liked this guy, he was nice. I think he’s 29, but he looks like he could pass for 15). “Calculus, Gen. Psych, and another programming class… what about you?” He hesitated… I asked again (I guess he didn’t understand me). “Are you taking summer school?” He laughed… “That’s a silly question Scott.” (I guess it was being that I’m talking to him at the school library!) He then started walking closer to me and lowered his voice. “grvay an epio”… “what?” I asked. He got closer and whispered slower. “Ballet, and piano.” Ok, I had to try to keep from laughing. This guy is the nicest guy I ever met but for some reason when he said he was taking ballet I pictured him in a tutu prancing around the mirrored practice room… “well good luck with that!” I said trying to withhold some laughter that I felt bubbling up in my gut. He must have been embarrassed, and it would explain why he continued. “I’m trying to expand in my life, you know, try new things?” I have to give it to Wee. What a guy… what a guy. I have to admit, I was seriously impressed.

Ok I’m going to see about grabbing some lunch and doing a little last minute studying. The class starts in less than twenty minutes from now so I guess I’d better get going. I doubt I’ll write tonight because I have some silly homework to do and I’m going to be getting home pretty late from school (about ten thirty). I hope you’re all doing well so with that I’ll leave you to your own (relatively uneventful) lives. Have a good one! –Scott

I’m writing tonight’s blog in the car believe it or not. As simple of a thing as it may seem (writing a blog on my laptop in my car) I do believe that this is the first blog I have started in a car. I’ve discovered that I actually do rely (somewhat) on the internet when I compose these silly little texts. I use dictionary and thesaurus dot com to help me with words and ideas. I browse deviant art dot com for inspiration and those cool little pictures I put in my blogs. I talk to different people privately to ask them what they think about certain topics and whether or not I should write about them or what I should say. Yep, tonight I feel disconnected and for good reason. I’m helpless; truly alone to write my blog in complete solitude. Peaceful? Hardly. I think I’ll manage though. This morning waiting outside of my first class I saw something funny and wanted to remember it. I zipped open my backpack (ok, ‘unzipped’ would work too) and stuck my fingers between the covers of a closed folder and vertically tore out a sheet of blank notebook paper. I whipped out my silver mechanical pencil and twirled it around my fingers a few times (like Boris in Goldeneye) and folded the paper in half three times. I curled the paper in my palm and wrote down a quick phrase that could remind me of the event. I continued to carry this paper with me in my pocket all day and record little things I wanted to blog about. “Wow”, I thought to myself at one point, “I’m getting serious about this blogging stuff!” I’m sure you’re all wondering what the funny thing was that inspired me to pull out a sheet and start using paper to record my thoughts. So, with no further adieu, I’ll start my blog.

I should make a Dr. Pepper commercial! Seriously, I hope a PepsiCo representative reads this blog, I think I hit some gold here. The scary part? Yeah, it’s real. I was sitting outside my first class. My backpack was propped up on the wall behind me and I was sitting Indian style on the ground with a Dr. Pepper in my hand. I locked down at it and slowly twisted the cap off. A smile slowly crept over my glum face as the familiar sound of rapid decompression hit my ears. Ahhh I could hear my taste buds telling my mind as I raised the Dr. Pepper to my mouth and the first flavorful bubbles hit my tongue, exploding with taste and flavor from this refreshing beverage. I set it down and took a breath. I looked to my right and watched some people exiting the hallway through the double doors on the north side. I then slowly twisted my neck counterclockwise and looked to the left and watched a pretty girl come in the double doors. As she approached me I raised my Dr. Pepper to take another sip. As the soda was flowing into my mouth, I tilted my head up and looked to the side at the girl. From behind her she slowly pulled out her Dr. Pepper and raised it to her mouth. We both lowered our Dr. Peppers at the same time. I smiled because I thought it was funny. She returned the smile and continued to walk. A match? I’d be reluctant to say so. Although I can say one thing; we share preferences in our carbonated beverages.

So how were your classes today? Remember only two of my (3) summer school classes meet on Mondays. Overall though, it went very well and I think it’ll be a relatively light summer. My calculus professor seems to be in his mid fifties with dark gray hair and a fashion sense stuck in the eighties. He seems like a really nice guy though. He was really interesting to listen to, and I think he’ll turn out to be a really good professor. Granted, I’ve taken calculus before, but I think it’ll be a good refreshing and a nice A to add to the GPA. Since it’s a five credit course (most classes are only three credits) it’s very important that I get an A in it, but I have little doubt that I will get one. After math class was my general psychology class. College classes are just like high school classes with a lot more work. I think that this psychology class will be the same. In high school, general psychology classes are “really really easy”. In college, they’re only “really easy”. I haven’t had my computer programming class yet, but I can’t imagine it will be anything more than a breeze. I’m not complaining though. I’m getting eleven credits this summer (assuming I pass (joke)) for classes that aren’t that much work. I thin I’ll take this summer as my “breather” from school and use it to relax a little. Next semester looks like it might be tough, with a lot of harder classes. Calculus II, Chemistry II, Physics I, Statistics, and whatever else I decide to pile on top. I think it’ll be a nice summer for classes academically, but I can hear some of you screaming out “but Scott, did you meet anyone interesting?!” Hmm… nope, not really. I came home and one of the first things my mom asked me was “so are there any cute girls in any of your classes?” … “Hmmm”, I said deep in thought and consideration, “nope; not one!” Oh well, maybe next time ^_^

Some guy came up to me and was like “Yo, do you have any of these books?” as he handed me a sheet of paper. After skimming it I realized he was taking some classes and wanted to guy books cheaper than they sold them in the bookstore. I looked them over and said “nope, sorry” and handed the paper back. Well, I tried to at least. He put up a flat hand at me and wouldn’t take the paper. “Well don’t you have any friends here?” he asked. “uhh” … I hesitated. The thought had never occurred to me. No one ever asked this of me before! “no, not really I guess” I feebly replied. “Oh, this is your first semester?” … ouch … “It’s my fourth, actually.” The guy looked at me and said “freaky” and walked away. I had to laugh at his strange response, but then it made me think about it a little more. Do I find it disturbing, depressing, or sad? No, I don’t think so. Does it look really sad? Yeah, I guess it kind of does…

Ahh! I’m over helping people! I don’t know why I’m talking about this but for some reason I thought it was worth mentioning so here it goes. In math class, the girl that sat next tried to get me to tutor her after class. She first pounded me for questions about my schedule so she knew when I had free time, then tried to convince me why she needed my help in this class. She hasn’t taken math since high school years ago and she needs this credit to graduate etc. Oh, I’m sorry! You must have mistaken me for one of the free math tutors down stairs. And there’s another thing! If you are so positive you can’t pass this class on your own, then why the heck did you sign up for it (it’s easy to take a refresher course to work up to where you need to be)? On top of that, why did you procrastinate in taking this math course until your last semester? I don’t want to sound mean or cold, but your little story doesn’t interest me. Grr! Sorry if I seem irritable, but it’s because I AM! I’m sick and tired of people (girls, or even worse guys online pretending to be girls) trying to get me to help them with humongous tasks. This girl didn’t even know how to graph a piecewise function. I mean, dang. Now I can hear some of you asking “but Scott, what if she were your girlfriend, then wouldn’t you want to help her?” Pfft, no way. First of all, that task is to big for me to want to walk any girl through, no matter how close she is. Also, no, I would never date a girl that’s so helpless that she can’t look up and find out how to do incredibly basic math problems all by herself without trying to go to someone else for help. I think there’s a lot to be said for people who can research and put forth a little initiative to get done what they want. Now are those the kind of women I’d be interested in? You betcha ^_-

I heard an interesting comment tonight at dinner. I just got home from class and I was a little tired and didn’t feel like starting my homework right away. (Can you believe me?! It’s the first day of class and I’m already putting off school work) Anyway, my sister was going to go to track practice and my mom was going to drive her. I decided I’d go and take my laptop (the reason this blog was started in the car). After we dropped Kelly off we went to a little café place. We killed time by eating dinner and talked about different college stuff (past, present, and future). At one point I threw out a stray comment about how different people lately have commented positively on my writing. My Comp I professor asked if I was going into it as my major (ha!) and my World Literature professor told me that my final paper was one of the best he has ever read and even requested a copy (!). On top of that, I get comments every day from people (many of them complete strangers) telling me that they like my writing. I don’t think that I have ant special writing skill or anything like that. I think I’ve become better at it because I’ve been blogging for so long. It’ has really helped my writing in general. I can sit down and my writing mindset will come over me and all the sudden I can write in clear (rarely concise (joke)) sentences with meaning and passion. Oh yeah! I almost forgot the comment. My mom said something like, “…yeah I told something to Dave (my dad) about it and he had no idea you could write.” I don’t know why I decided to blog about it, but I find it interesting nonetheless. I guess the ability to write is one of those wonderfully concealable talents that you always take with you and can pour out when given the opportunity. It’s too bad I can’t work without spellcheckers, but it’s all good! I have my blog and that’s all I’m planning on writing. If you like it, I encourage you to start your own; it’s amazing what it will turn into if you give it a little love.

OH YEAH! Some dork decided to steal my work! OK so it wasn’t anything bad. In fact, I don’t mind at all. I just find the whole story really funny. Yesterday I was sitting (quite bored) at my desk and decided to hop on my public screen name (RTS) for good times’ sake. What do ya’ know? ‘TA4′ instant messages me. For those of you unfamiliar with TA4, check the archives section and read the very short post that I wrote on Jan 4′th of 2004. Anyway, this guy’s a total idiot. He claims his screen name was “hacked” from him and then returned, but who knows. He lies to me so much it’s hard to tell where they start and where they stop. I rolled my eyes and was about to close his IM, but for some reason I decided to check his profile. At the bottom I was absolutely shocked by what I saw. “Headphones show three things: an enjoyment, an escape, and moderate independence.-Paul” Holy crap! He just copy and pasted one of my lines directly out of my blog (entitled “time for a little bloggie!” posted on May 2′nd of 2004) and stuck it in his profile. This isn’t what bothered me though. The part that was simply blew my mind was that this guy had the gall to sign his stinkin’ name by it! Oh yeah, like that retard of a kid concocted such a sophisticated and poetic description that I wrote to describe the type of WOMEN I find most attractive. I asked him about it and he made up some crap story about how his girlfriend in another state added it to his profile when he asked her to. Thinking it was his creation, she signed his name by it. Nice, try, but there are two things wrong with that story. First, profiles are stored locally and uploaded at sign-on. Unless she somehow hacked his computer in his state, that profile wouldn’t be visible when he signs on. Secondly… Paul? Girlfriend? You’ve got to be kidding me. Now if he said “my boyfriend…”, I may have believed him.

Ok I was a little harsh. I just ripped some guy a new one. But ya’ know what? It was worth it. I thoroughly enjoy overreacting to meaningless and quite unimportant situations. I know that I’ll probably get the ever so common IM asking, “Scott, why were you so harsh on him! You’re just trying to make a scene so people will comment about it.” Wow, you’re a smart one! =op Anyway, yeah, Paul’s a nice guy I guess… I don’t hate him or anything, so I hope you don’t take all that the wrong way. Well, it’s getting late and I should start my homework. Kelly has a friend over to spend the night and I have the feeling that she’s going to be quite loud. Uhhg, I hate being unable to sleep because of noise. The buzz of multiple computer fans spiraling in the night whispering their quiet notes in my ears never seemed to bother me. The high pitched gossip of teen age girls becomes very annoying, very quickly. But hey! You got that blog you wanted. Once again, feel free to email me (info on the contact page) if you have any questions, comments, complaints, or ideas of blogging topics. I’ll blog soon enough. Have a good one! –Scott

I can’t believe I’m starting school again! It feels like only moments ago that I wrote the blog entry where I explained how wonderful the feeling was of being free from the icy grips of higher education. Most good things come to an end I guess… buy why does summer break have to come to an end so quickly! And something stupid like… “Titanic” (the movie) take three and a half hours to come to and end. I guess I’ll never be able to figure out some of the mysteries that will forever haunt my nightmares, but thankfully I won’t have to. I get plenty of user feedback from this blog, and I hope that you’ll contribute by sending in your comments to tonight’s post too! Believe it or not, I’m actually going to focus on churning out a really nice blog tonight. I hope you can enjoy it! I’ll be touching on a few different topics including my new friends, peoples’ reactions to my blog, the girl movie I cannot believe that I saw, and even some guy who’s so obsessed with me that he uses my words as his own! I don’t have much of a life and I know you must not either (because you’re reading this) so I don’t have to worry about how long I take to talk about irrelevant and quasi-meaningless issues that don’t pertain to modern day reality. What’s new around here, right?

I can only guess as to what kind of people I will meet tomorrow. The stupid thing is that I just realized I had absolutely no idea what classes I was taking tomorrow, so I had to log in and look at my course schedule to remember what classes are on what days. I might have a stalker out there that wants to track my activity, so I might as well share that information. Every day (but Friday) from 12:45pm to 2:30pm I have calculus. Mondays and Wednesdays I have general psychology from 3:10pm to 5:15pm. Finally, Wednesday nights I have another computer programming class from 5:30pm to 9:55pm (that’s almost five hours!). Tomorrow I have calculus and psychology class. I think calculus will be mostly a breeze, and psychology will be more or less a joke. I heard from someone that the lady I’m taking for my psychology class handed out an exam where the answers were multiple choice and to be answered on a bubble-in scan sheet. The interesting thing is that (according to this girl, at least) “every answer was B and it was the most annoying thing because you still had to spend time and think about each question just to make sure it was right!” I doubt I’ll struggle in this class, and I doubt even more that I’ll learn anything incredible, but it’s just one of those stupid required courses and it’ll be nice to get it out of the way. A few blogs back I mentioned the fact that (outside of my immediate family) the people I’m closest to are those in my classes. My best friends (if you’d like to refer to them as that) are the people I spend only a few hours every week with. I’m not really close to anybody else and it doesn’t really bother me. One interesting aspect is that every semester change, my old friends shift to other classes like they’re being flushed down the toilet and all these new people fill around me from my new classes. It may seem a little sad (it does to me, at least) but there are advantages. You only take with you your best memories of people, you only carry with you the best experiences you gained while with people, and you leave behind any garbage that you’d rather forget. You’ve learned what to do, what not to do, and how to act. Your old test subjects are with you no longer and you’re free to be yourself… a whole new self! It’s the schizophrenic’s ultimate dream. I hope I can meet some nice people tomorrow. I try to at least pretend to make friends with a few people (pretending to be outgoing helps too) so I can get some names and phone numbers. They certainly come in handy when you just don’t feel like going to class but want to make sure you get the new homework assignments anyway! ^_- Who knows, I might meet a guy who will give me some new outlook on something that will change the direction I go in my career, changing the people around, ultimately changing the rest of my life. Who knows, maybe the person I marry will be dependant on the punch line to a joke someone tells in this class, or a stray comment someone makes. Will my future wife actually be in a class I’m going to take tomorrow? I certainly doubt it, but wouldn’t it be interesting if it turned out that way? Years would pass and on our wedding day I’d load up my website blog archive and say “ha! I told you, didn’t I?” (”you” being the curiously silent anonymous abyss of autonomous blog readers) Nope, I don’t think I’ll meet anyone like that tomorrow, but maybe I’ll luck out and find a girl I can simply enjoy being with =o)

I got another few IM’s today from complete strangers who have been reading my blogs every day for a long time. These people really freak me out. I don’t mind it, it’s just… really creepy to run across some guy or girl that you’ve never met and know nothing about, only to find out that they’ve figured out practically every aspect of your life! I don’t feel like I’m living life under a microscope as much as that I’m living life in front of a one way mirror. I live my life and think my thoughts, I write about my life and write about my thoughts (thus “reflecting” on them) and I see the images, but so do the people on the other side of the glass. Anyway, the end result is a non-threatening (mostly comical, actually) situation between me and these strange people who I’ve never met that know most everything about me. Also something interesting is being able to watch the ‘friendships’ I have with people who are long time hard core followers of my blog. I have my little team of official advisors and servants! To say that they idolize me and would give their life in my service would be an overstatement, but not by much. I depend incredibly upon these people for so many things. I don’t think I’ve formally thanked them enough for their work and time, but I certainly appreciate what they do. The innermost core of the elite has gotten the ‘privilege’ (for lack of a better English word) of being added to my buddy list (of seven) on my KLP screen name. Every once and a while I’ll add a new person, but just as often I’ll pick out an old name. It’s a slowly morphing cycle, but it’s productive nonetheless. I’ve gotten a lot of interesting comments about this (new) layout. In case you may be reading this in the future (after it’s changed to something else) it’s a layout that’s fairly narrow with small text and on the top it shows a Jackson’s Chameleon on a stick and a sexually neutral (it could pass for a guy or a girl, so why not somewhere in the middle?) person holding a cup of coffee. Do I drink coffee? No. Then again, it might be a reflection of my alternate personality glistening through the waters of insanity. Actually, to be honest, if you think you’ve figured out the meaning of those top images or detected a pattern, then you’re thinking too hard. It’s completely random with no pre-thought or planning involved. I was just browsing some images and picked a few that had good colors that would go well with my signature blue (#003366) and made a layout out of it. Some people complain that there’s too much white space at the top. My thoughts (that I share with others too) are that it gives the “open” feel so it’s not so critical or entrapping. Others commented that it’s too narrow. I think that since it stretches vertically, it’s not entrapping. The narrowness is “cozy” if nothing else. Finally, I had one guy tell me “but why’d you use the SUSE logo?” So SUSE has the head of a chameleon for their logo, does that mean that every chameleon represents the SUSE project? I certainly hope not! To be honest, I’m quite happy with this layout. I think I’ll use it for at least three or four days ^_-

Oh Scott… TELL me you didn’t see that movie! I guess I could tell you that, but it’d be a lie. Yes, it’s true folks; I actually saw “Mean Girls” today. For the social reclusive circle of my blog readers, “Mean Girls” is a movie completely targeting the ten to fifteen age groups of young girls. The plot consisted of things like boyfriends, social life at a high school, and… well no I think that’s pretty much it actually. For me to say that the plot was kind of empty would be like looking Bill Gates and saying “well I guess he has more money than I do.” (That doesn’t mean brains though) Anyway, don’t get me wrong. I had absolutely no plans this afternoon and I jumped at the opportunity to get out when my sister suggested that we (she, her friend, and me) go to a movie. Nothing great was playing, so it was picked out of desperation to put it lightly. A few weeks ago I wrote a blog talking about money and paying for movie tickets! I got a lot of feed back on that (mainly through personal emails) and I think that you all should be proud of me. I specifically asked what was happening in the way of payment before we got to the ticket counter. Actually, I had to ask THREE times! Finally, it was conveyed that everyone had money and was planning to use it. I clenched my teeth watching the two girls with my pay individually, and flinched when the man at the ticket counter asked “Are you with them?”, but I held my ground. As far as the movie went, I found it really depressing. The things that were glorified in this film were foreign to my mind. The main character of the story (a girl) was an A student and purposely started failing her math class so she’d have an excuse to get tutoring from a boy in her class. I thought “surely this will get resolved at the end of the movie” but it wasn’t! This girl was failing the class, and she could only squeak by with extra credit the teacher agreed to give her. Think about it though, what does it take to pass a high school class? Isn’t it a D? (It’s pretty bad; I don’t even know!) This A student with everything for her got a D in her math class. Heh, I guess that’s the inner geek in me screaming in rage. Go indulge in drugs, alcohol, and sex… but don’t get a bad grade in your math class! I was going to end the paragraph here but there’s one more thing I wanted to add. A pivotal point in the plot of the movie happened near the end when a girl was hit by a bus. You saw the girl (in a mostly close-up, knees to head) walking in the street toward the camera and all the sudden you see the bus fly by and you see her get hit and the white flash following the bus causes your inner psyche to picture her being hit by the bus and carried with it. The very last scene of the movie is three girls being hit by a bus in the exact same manner! It was supposed to be ‘funny’ I think, but there was pure silence in the movie theater. Even I didn’t laugh. It was actually pretty disgusting, sick, and simply morbid when you think about it. I’ve seen too many real deaths of people getting hit by busses (that’s a LONG story) and this just seemed like another instance of the same thing. Have you ever seen something so morbid that you don’t feel any emotion? That’s what I would like to compare this scene to. Now that doesn’t go to say I didn’t thoroughly enjoy seeing the most annoying girls I’ve ever known getting smashed by a 13 ton school bus.

Well It’s getting late and I still have some work to do! Believe it or not I have a promise that my room is going to be clean by tomorrow morning. Oh the joys of living at home. I haven’t spent too much time lately thinking about moving out. I think it’s one of those things whose date is set in stone and hidden from my eyes. It’ll happen, and little I do will change it, so I’m not bothering too much thinking about it. I’m eighteen now, and I don’t picture myself being in this house a year from now. Look at me, I’m going on another tangent and blogging more. I’m a weird one, you know that? I’ve already blogged a good bit over two thousand words, so I’d better just wrap it up. For someone who “has no life”, I certainly find a lot to write about! I’ll blog tomorrow night and talk about my classes. Until then, have a good one! –Scott

P.S. oops! I’m sorry! It’s late and I already finished this blog without remembering to talk about that guy who speaks my words claiming they’re his. I’ll blog about it in the next entry ^_-

All right, I haven’t blogged lately and there’s a good reason why. I’ve been out of town! Don’t fear; being the geek that I am I wouldn’t think of traveling without my laptop. I brought my laptop and all its equipment. The funny thing is, I completely forgot my suitcase… (I had to make a run to wal-mart to get some clothes once we got here!) Anyway, I have a little time to myself and the sun is setting so it’s getting darker and darker and I sit here watching the water churn and the endless horizon. I have no place to go, no thing to obsess over, no person to walk with, and no other excuse to keep me from blogging tonight. I have some things that I’ve been waiting to yell about… I think some of them will pinch some nerves of people who regularly read my blog, but they shouldn’t dictate what I write about! I can yell about whatever I want, I’m not rejecting comments about it, but I’m not going to waste me time trying to defend myself. I don’t have a script or a list I’m writing from tonight so I may be a little random, but hey, that’s what makes this place so cool right?

Where am I? Well I mentioned earlier that I’m at the beach, but I’m so stupid I forgot the name of it. It is a few miles north of Daytona on the East coast of Florida. It’s going pretty well I guess. I’m doing absolutely nothing, and it’s everything I hoped it could be. Thanks to a little war driving I was able to hop on a broadband internet connection outside of some bank. I downloaded a software pack for PeoplePC (that ISP that you see on all the commercials) and decided to use their “thirty days free” service as a way to regularly and reliably connect to the internet from my hotel room. Yeah, it’s fairly slow (56k), but I don’t have much of a problem with it. It’s more than enough bandwidth for me to check my email and browse websites quickly (with mozilla firefox’s “disable images” feature enabled). I have been here about three days now, and I’m in this awesome place! Technically this room is a condo. It’s booked solid for six months after next week. During the off season though, it’s mostly empty. The owner was happy to let us rent it for four days really cheap (about the same as a hotel room!) so we lucked out really well. This place is awesome, with an incredible sound system (that I was quick to hook my laptop up to) and four TVs (3 with dvd players) and two bedrooms and it’s just… really great. I’d love to copy this little place and build a house in the middle of no where exactly like it. That way the land and taxes would be almost nothing, and the house would be cheap, and I’d get what I want. Actually, I just stopped to think about what I’m saying. This place is way bigger than I’d need. Heck, two bedrooms? That’d be just wasted space. I do want to live in a small house though. Well, not forever, just ‘now’ if that makes any sense. I’m still in college (and will be for quite some time if I am going to get through med school) and won’t be working much, so I’ll have a quite limited income. I’m preparing for the rest of my life by studying, why would I waste my money on a place that I wouldn’t need? By living in something really small (cheap) I could save up what money I am able to earn so when I’m out (ready to get married or whatever) I’ll have enough money saved up to work with. Ok, I hear some of you screaming. No, I’m not planning on just putting money in a pot and watching it. I’d invest it in something (averagely aggressive mutual funds) so it doesn’t just rot in the bank. Dang, I’ve gotten way off track. Where was I, oh yeah, what I’ve been doing! Well this place is cool and it’s on the sixth floor of a building that’s right on the beach. Actually, there’s a swimming pool separating the two. In the last three days, I’d say I’ve spent at least twenty or thirty minutes on the beach and pool. Moving right along…

I absolutely hate DVD menus! Seriously, I want to hurt the man who had the brilliant idea “let’s make a thirty second introduction to the menu that shows clips from the movie that will absolutely ruin the story for anyone who hasn’t seen it before!” I tried to watch a movie the other day (I can’t remember what it was all the sudden) and I was absolutely amazed at the DVD menu introduction. I had seen the preview of the movie so I knew what it was about and what the main conflict was, but after I watched the dvd menu come up I saw the conclusion of the movie! It was absolutely horrible. DVD menus have to be the worst idea ever. No, actually, there is a worse idea. I want to strangle the man who thought “wouldn’t it be a good idea to add a feature to a DVD to make fast forwarding or skipping a portion of the introduction impossible?” Every time I see the little red “that feature is temporarily disabled” line of text at the top of the screen while trying to fast forward through the stupid menu I feel that someone’s sitting behind a big desk with a thousand dollar suit on pointing and laughing at me. The blinking light on the dvd indicating an error, is it really telling us that we can’t fast forward our own dvd, or is it just mocking us?

I am ABSOLUTELY AMAZED by what I see on the news these days. I’m sure you all know about the “Iraqi prisoner scandals” where the media and some authorities are claiming that American soldiers are mistreating Iraqi prisoners of war. I haven’t watched the news for the past few days (I’m trying to relax, the news always gets me frustrated), but I did manage to catch a little bit of a new clip on a TV in a restaurant. It was a man interviewing a leader of the military operations in Iraq. He said something along the lines of “There have been reports that soldiers covered the heads of prisoners with bags for up to three days. This is classified as sensory deprivation. Do you think this is humane or inhumane?” The man (quite awkwardly) tried to beat around the bush for a few seconds, but he was eventually (forced) to say it was ‘inhumane’. “Thank you” the interviewer said happily. It is a really good thing I didn’t have any rocks, plates, or small children close by; I really wanted to throw something at the TV. Today, I saw (flipping channels) that there were new reports of a soldier stepping on the fingers and toes of Iraqi prisoners. “Inhumane” seems to be the hot word this week, because the media is throwing it out left and right. Now, here’s the part where I just… I have to point out… MAYBE IF YOU REMOVED YOUR FREAKING BRAIN OUT OF YOUR COLON FOR TWO SECONDS YOU WOULD REALIZE WHAT THE HECK YOU ARE SAYING! A few weeks ago four American civilian workers (not even military!) who weren’t even fighting were captured by Iraqis, beaten, killed, mutilated, burned, and hanged from a bridge (in pieces) for public display. The strange thing is that practically no one displayed it. The media dabbled in it for a day, but isn’t this the kind of thing that should get some major attention? Isn’t this what we’re fighting against? Doesn’t this deserve media attention? Why is it that something that big is practically ignored, but when a soldier stepped on the toes of an Iraqi prisoner of war who did these things, the media covers it for days and has the GAUL to call it INHUMANE! One of the lesser news interviewees (a far left wing liberal democrat) firmly said “This is horrible; we should not be treating Iraqi prisoners this way.” Surprisingly, I do agree with this statement. If you kill American soldiers, you do not deserve to have your toes stepped on. You deserve to have a gun placed to your head, and the walls to be painted with your blood.

shot his parents one night and went to school the next morning and shot his classmates. Last night I watched a show about a boy who snapped a few years before the famous columbine shooting. It was really late (that’s my excuse anyway) and I feel really stupid but I can’t remember the name of the kid or even the school it happened at. I’m not quite sure why I’m blogging about it, but it certainly was interesting to watch. It was late, Hannah (my sister) wasn’t asleep yet and my mom came out and started watching it too. A lot of the show talked about the childhood of this kid and didn’t actually say what he did until near the end. I could tell my mom didn’t watch to watch it, but I was fascinated; I really had to find out what happened! I don’t remember ever hearing about the story, and I never even heard about the school where it happened. If anyone knows this information, post it in the comments. Thanks. Anyway, this kid grew up in relative solitude and didn’t have and real friends or anything like that. He went to a psychiatrist often but when he got near high school age the psychiatrist said he wasn’t needed anymore. In high school, the guy met a girl that “changed his life”. The boy who was a loner (to put it lightly) was said to have changed completely. He would smile and be happy about things like he never was before. Interviews with his friends testified to the way his attitude changed and how happy he was. They even showed a picture of him (passionately) kissing the girl. Then, for reasons no one said, the girl broke up with him and he was devastated. They (his friends) said he went back in his hole again, only to burrow deeper than ever before. One of the people that was interviewed said that he told him about past school shootings and pointed out their flaws and described what he would have done differently. One of the things he talked about was how he would kill himself no matter what. He didn’t want to get taken to jail, he’d rather die. This kid, remember, is just that; a kid. Anyway, one day he shot his dad after an argument and put him in the bathroom and covered him with a sheet. He was really close with his mom, and realized he could never explain to her what had happened, so when she came home he was waiting for her and yelled “I love you” and shot her. He put her in the basement and covered her with a white sheet too. He slept in his home that night (with his dead parents still there) and the next morning he got up and drove to school for the first and last time. (He was only fifteen (I think) and had not gotten a license). He wore a trench coat to conceal a rifle on his side and the guns around his waist. He carried with him a duffel bag of ammunition. He walked to the cafeteria, put the bag down, pulled out the gun, and fired about 50 times, shooting over 20 students. However, despite his plan to shoot himself, he was rushed and wrestled to the ground before he could put the gun to his head. Eventually, he was arrested, and interrogated. The chilling part was hearing a lot of this from the first person… they played some of the interview, and you could hear this little boy crying as he tried to talk about what happened. Oh yeah, one more part that was just… I can’t say it’s awesome, because people would think I’m a little weird. I’ll say it was “really interesting”. When he left for school, he knew that no matter what happened, the police would go to his house. He turned on his cd player to full volume and played opera music on repeat. Crazy, huh? Bottom line: girls are trouble ^_-

Would I ever do that? Naw, I certainly don’t think so at least ^_- For some reason these little stories are really interesting to me, but I think it’s true of everyone. One of the stories I recently heard was one about a college student who took a sniper rifle on top of the college’s highest floor on the lookout tower. I feel stupid once again; I can’t remember where it was. It was in the late 40’s I think. The video footage they played was in black and white. Anyway, this guy went up the elevator with a huge chest containing the rifle and tons of ammunition. Once on top, he assembled the gun, loaded it, and started firing on completely random people, up to a mile away! He did so for several hours, until two police officers came up the elevator and had a standoff on the top of the building (killing the sniper). The problem these days is that open lookout towers are easy targets for SWAT teams. If you tried something like that, you’d better plan to get a lot of damage done fast, because you’ll get picked off pretty soon. The good way to do that these days would be to be in another high building (one of the higher floors of an unfinished hotel would be nice) and make sure the fire stairwells are blocked to buy some extra time. Most importantly, make sure that elevator is out of service! (Cutting cables, dropping a ‘nade on top of it, whatever it takes) If you leave a working elevator, you’re asking to get shot. Then wouldn’t it make sense to have some higher explosives in place and charged ready to go off on a timer or on your trigger? That way, no matter what happens, you know no matter what that you’re not going to leave the top of that building alive. I mean, seriously, if you had to sit down and think about it, life in a jail for the rest of your life (or on death row) is just the same or worse than dying right there. Ok, I’m starting to disturb people, I’ll change the subject =o) Actually, I think I’m going to erase this paragraph. Ehh, no, it’s ok.

Ok, I cannot even believe what someone just said to me! Actually, this was said a few weeks ago, and by one of the (now 7) left on my buddy list. I was leaving to go out of town (not here, to somewhere else) and I asked everyone on my list for movie suggestions. I wanted to take a little stack of movies in the car with me to watch to make the ride a little easier. Just a side note, I realized that I’m actually watching tv as I’m typing this blog. I don’t know how much I’ve been doing this, but I’m not at all altering my vision from the tv to look at the keyboard. Ok, it’s really weird now; I’ve finally realized that I can blog without even thinking about it. Oh well, RealTV is on, I can watch tv as I blog. Where was I? Oh yeah, the comment. This guy (I can’t even remember who it was) recommended a few action movies. Some of them were playing in theaters now. I hadn’t yet told him that I wanted movies already on DVD. I first specified, “No, actually, I’m not really in the mood for an action movie. Do you have any suggestions of romance or drama movies?” I was thinking to myself “yeah, I like intricate movies with good plots and wonderful and deep stories…” The title he replied with will haunt my nightmares for the rest of my life. “Have you seen Mean Girls?” …wow

Ok I need to go. My mom wants to check her email and my sister wants to talk (for hours) on AIM (to who knows who). Oh yeah, there’s one more thing I think I’ll mention. Do you know what I think the most annoying thing ever is? In the past (not accusing anyone of the present) people have used her to get to (or something from) me and to say it’s insulting is to explain it with a dire understatement. Ok, I’m out of here. Feel free to comment, but remember, if you’re irrational or use too much bad language or whatever, I simply won’t waste my time touching it. Have a good one! –Scott