The General

So I guess there's some sort of blogging challenge floating around the interwebs this month? I think it's in the style of NaNoWriMo or Movember or Toyotathon or something. Anyway, I was asked recently if I do any blogging and, since I started writing for TVLatest, I admitted I haven't done much "pleasure blogging." So let's try this.

I'm in the process of de-cluttering my surroundings. No, I'm not a Hoarder – not a capital-H one, at least – but trying to live more simply involves getting rid of the little pieces of paper that I only look at whenever I go through a cleaning kick. Pieces of paper such as this:

REVENNNNNNNNGE! Okay, so some backstory is in order. In my 11th grade history class we had this semester-long program simply known as The Game. The class was divided up into teams that formed countries. These countries would develop land, cultivate resources, and amass wealth throughout the semester. Grades earned on tests would generate revenue, but most of the action took place during a weekly Game Day. After 15 minutes of "World Bank Time" – the opportunity for teams to purchase land, buildings and military pieces – we would go into the Q&A round. Each team would send someone up to The Panel to answer a question related to material covered in class since the previous Game Day (or material we were about to be tested on if an exam was coming up). A correct answer would allow teams to collect money, place acquired land and pieces on the giant world map game board, or move a piece already on the board. Oh yeah, the world was not just limited to our class: LB taught 5 classes a day, each with its own set of countries competing to amass the most wealth. The top three countries in the world at the end of the semester got to go to a pizza party.

Now would be a good time to mention that I took the game VERY seriously. LB started calling me The General, though looking back I think it would be safe to elongate that nickname to General Asshole. For example: each non-resource game piece a team possesses needs to have the country's logo on it in ink. Otherwise, other teams could swoop in and erase the logo and place their own branding on it, claiming it as their own. Oh, and you better make sure farms are on plains and not mountains, otherwise some guy with a little too much time on his hands may pull the piece off the board. Rules are rules.

Along with the psychotic auditing of game pieces, I really got into the idea of pitting teams against each other. It should be noted, Survivor didn't premiere until the end of this school year. One time I wrote a fake note about one team plotting to go after another and had one of my friends in a class earlier in the day drop it so that the second team would find it and get distracted. It worked for about 30 seconds before they decided to declare war on us. Don't worry! They spelled "missile" wrong on their war declaration, making it invalid. I actually cackled like a Bond villain after I pulled down the failed declaration from its bulletin board.

I'm trying to remember the circumstances leading to the war declaration above. The cackling incident happened in Fall Semester, while the image was from Spring Semester (different games; same churlish behavior). The problem second semester was that all five of the people on my team had opinions and loved digging in heels at the first hint of a disagreement. I was friends with all three members of MCA, but their territory was positioned in such a way that attacking them regularly was fairly easy. Both they and I made things personal when it really should have just been business. Unfortunately, I did not win those disagreements within my team, so the "revenge" felt more directed towards me than the team as a whole.

On the last Game Day of the semester, MCA was successful in nuking us. Unfortunately, we had a Superchance (a bonus card with awesome powers) that nullified up to 3 successful attacks. While they groused about my general awfulness ("General Awfulness"?) we successfully attacked a country that had acquired, but failed to secure, the wealth of one or two other countries. We managed to secure our haul by the end of the day, and we ended up winning despite ourselves.

This is the Cliff's Notes version of The Game, but feel free to mention it at any gathering of my friends from high school. The stories are fantastic.

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MMXI

One of the things I want to try to do more of this year is update this blog more than twice a year. There are two major obstacles that were preventing that this past year:

1) I've been doing A LOT of writing for TVLatest.com. I've been working on the site since the end of May and I am now at the point where I can generating traffic out of nothing. It's kinda awesome. We aren't the next Google or Facebook (yet), but I'm doing work that I enjoy. Unfortunately, the work is not lucrative enough to actually make it my living, so the jobhunt continues.

2) The other obstacle has been a lack of things happening in my life. I would like to report on my jobhunting, but there's been a lot of silence from places I've applied to. To draw on the dating analogy, this is where you go up to someone you fancy, look them in the eye, ask them to dance/get coffee/introduce yourself and they look at you as if you are from Mars and say nothing. We've all been there?

Instead, I am working on creating a separate blog about my jobhunting experience. I'll post a link here once I get it up and running. It's on WordPress and I'm kind of excited to learn how to work within that system.

So I guess in terms of an update, here are the bullet points:

• I'm still in Dearborn.
• I'm still unemployed (in the traditional sense of the term)
• I miss you all (I'm not in prison, I miss seeing people in person)

How are you doing?

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V is for...

Vixen
Vindaloo
Venture
Visitation
Va-va-voom
Valuable
Valentine
Veneration
Vigor
Vice
Vagueness
Venom
Verify
Vilification
Vindication
Vengeance
Validate
Vacate

Very well.

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ReMMIXed

Let's see if I can get this posted before midnight. I should be at a party right now, but I came down with a pretty bad cold, so I'm sitting in my mom's basement as she watches 42nd Street. So yeah, I brought my own party.

Although this isn't the ideal way of ending 2009, it is no way an indication of how 2009 panned out. I've been noticing that the general sentiment seems to be of the "Fuck 2009" persuasion but I just can't get on board with it. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that nothing terrible really happened directly to me this year. Although I am no longer working, that is by choice and not because of the economic climate. Check back in June to see if I am eating those words. No major health problems or crises that I am aware of, though if I've been kept in the dark I think that would count as a win anyway.

Also, a number of pretty nifty things have happened this year. I got to write a guest article on the super fun blog The Critical Condition. As a result of my WTF, Little House on the Prairie? blog, I was interviewed for a book about Little House.

Then there's the whole grad school thing. That is going extremely well. I've met amazing people, I've been working on awesome projects, and I'm pretty optimistic about the whole finding a job thing. I'll be heading to NYC in a couple weeks for an industry seminar -- tourism with a purpose, as I like to call it. Then one more semester and I'll be done. Woo!

I'm going to call 2009 the year of street cred. And with street cred firmly established (work with me here, folks), I think I am going to try to make 2010 the year of Swagga.

Until then, here is one last awesome blast of 2009:



Happy New Year!

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Anniversary

It's been a weird day. Some of the weirdness and randomness was just the universe trying to say howdy but a good chunk was self-induced, though I tried to avoid it as much as possible. Truth be told, I'm still debating whether or not to hit the "delete" button once I finish writing this, but I feel like I need to get over this obstacle.


You see, today would have been my one year anniversary with Brandon. For those who may be out of the loop or who have just noticed the past tense, it's been over for a while. Officially it happened back in September, but actually the end may have been much earlier. Sometimes the "Sell By" and Expiration Dates are a bit different, y'know? I won't go into the details, partly for discretion, partly because I still don't have a complete understanding as to what happened.

Anyway, the day started with me receiving a copy of The Origin of Species: The Kirk Cameron Approved edition. I get to add that to my collection of unsolicited free religious texts. I guess it's a hobby?

We shot most of the multicam episode today but a number of technical problems, including micromanagement (not by me, for once), is forcing us to film on Monday. It's an unfortunate snag that allowed me to start feeling bummed out -- a feeling I was trying to avoid if possible. A few of us went out for dinner and drinks after the shoot which was nice, just not enough to lift my spirits fully.

As I walked past the front of Newhouse on the way to the bus stop there was a commotion on the path between Newhouse and Schine. I thought it might have been a pep rally or something since it is basketball season, but the News10 van indicated that something else must be going on. As I reached the crosswalk I heard someone call out for me. I saw Cyp, Kelly and Tim in the crowd. A number of people were holding signs including Tim, whose sign read "BALLS". This caused the Obie in me to amble over and see what the happs were. A man with a banner advertising an Ex-Gay ministry was being interviewed by a reporter as the students cajoled drivers to honk in support of gays. Good times indeed.

So I don't know how I feel about today. It's been at least two months, but I'm still sad about the situation. However, the sadness doesn't find its source in regret. I know my coming to Syracuse was a contributing factor to the failure, but I think I would regret not having the experiences I've had here with the people I have met.

This whole grad school thing is a process in improving one's self. An evolution, if you will. I'm hoping that by writing this I can now get out of whatever has been bogging me down. Thanks.

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Name Game

We're filming project two for my multi-cam class on Wednesday. It is a pilot for a webseries about a sex addict who opens his own dating service in his sister's basement. I'm one of the writer/producers for the project and things are going pretty well. Our set looks awesome, particularly the basement that is filled with the most random crap from the prop closet.

The prof is a bit of a perfectionist, particularly when it comes to policies and legal issues, so we've had to tape over some logos and brand names (despite learning in law class that we don't have to do that, but whatever). Here are some of the renamed board games we have on the set:

PE Ratio:



You and your doctor friends invest your payments after elective surgeries. Bet on the wrong stock and your patients will be abuzz!

Mouse Rap:



Bust laps around the board, bust rhymes with your homies, collect cheddar as you go. I got first on Lil Squeekz.

I don't play golf, so this is what I do as producer since my main job is pretty much done.

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Master of My Domain

It's time to take this blogging stuff seriously. Not necessarily content-wise since I think I already do treat this as a semi-legitimate venue for musings and critiques. However, I'm looking to create something a bit more professional in appearance and accessibility. I may have to forego the Rube Goldberg moniker but that's down the road. Until then, I need to come up with a domain/site name that says "Hey! I'm talking about TV and pop culture here! Look at me, will ya?"

This is proving incredibly challenging. According to GoDaddy every single one of my ideas has already been taken. Of course when I go and visit these sites the screen is either "This has been parked by GoDaddy!" or just a splash screen that amounts to "Neener neener neener! This domain is mine, bitches!"

Not cool, yo.

I have a feeling landing a .com is going to be next to impossible unless I come up with a title that is incredibly obscure, but that somewhat defeats the purpose of putting out money for a bit more exposure. For some reason I have an aversion to .net, as if I'm getting the store brand, which is weird since I usually buy the store brand anyway. Wait a minute...dammit, wegmans.com is already taken.

The name I wanted was whatchawatching.com, since I think that does a pretty good job of encapsulating all the items I blog about. Both the .com and .net are taken, so I either have to go with .us (which isn't catchy) or come up with something else. huluhoop is taken, vastwasteland and thevastwasteland are both taken, even thehapps.org has been absorbed. I'm debating incorporating "WTF" (as in WTF Little House on the Prairie), but I feel like that might be shooting myself in the foot.

Help?

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This Week in TRF

Here's a highlight reel of what was covered in class this week in TRF:

My law class:



More videos to follow...



My research class -- specifically my group's research topic:

http://www.vh1.com/video/play.jhtml?vid=162112

A preview of our next project in Multicam:

Good Cop, Baby Cop from Will Ferrell

And what I get to watch in Dramatic Writing (sans Kids in the Hall):

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YORRRRRR!

I'm really enjoying my Tuesdays this semester. I have my law class at 11 am and then I'm done for the day. Except for the Tuesday screenings at Thompson's office. They have been a bit of a mixed bag, which is kind of the point. The first screening (which I wasn't able to stay for much of) featured Walter Cronkite and Don Hewitt. Last week we watched the first and only episode of the 1986 version of the Jay Leno Show. That was horrendous. As far as we know Thompson has the only surviving copy -- even IMDB disavows any knowledge that it exists. Really, it is that dreadful.

Today we continued with the dreadful theme with a screening of Yor: The Hunter from the Future...


This movie almost defies description. The good news is there is a fan riff track available. Here's a preview:



The guy above is pretty chatty, but we were making our own comments throughout as well. Such as when the blind leader of the resistance movement from the future is introduced and shots are filmed from that character's point of view. Let me repeat: They filmed shots from the BLIND person's POINT OF VIEW. Then they showed him groping for the buttons on a control console later. At least they maintained continuity?

The best part was the theme song, which can be heard here.

I don't think this movie is helping in the cinePHAIL project, but it is giving me confidence that whatever screenplay I write this semester will probably be better than this. And this script was produced!

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TRF 67%

It wasn't my intention to ignore this blog, I've just been busy. Oh my GOD how I've been busy. Today marks the end of Week 4 of the six week Boot Camp process here in TRF land. Luckily, what I've been up to since my last post can be presented in visual form.

For starters, here is my first film project for my production class:



It won't be screening at Cannes next year but I've learned quite a bit within the process of producing the movie.

Here are some more items that have kept me busy...









Plus Andy Griffith, The Beverly Hillbillies and Gomer Pyle USMC.

I've also been working endlessly on a documentary about the producer of The Smashing Machine. He's a student in the program and we're going bowling in a few minutes. Oh yeah, I was also the subject of a documentary for another group about my 299 game.

For the rest of the semester (as in the next two weeks) I'll be studying TV history from 1959-1990 and will be part of the production of a movie written by someone in class. I was hoping my script would get picked up but so far no one has expressed interest, but who knows. There are a number of really good projects to choose from so I won't be too disappointed if mine is passed over.

This weekend: Finish editing the documentary and, if I can accomplish that tomorrow, I get to relax for two whole days.

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Play List: Blarney

I still don't know if I like the song "Poker Face". Theoretically I should -- Lady Gaga seems to be a hybrid of the positive attributes of Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears. The first few times I listened to the song it passed the American Bandstand test ("It's got a good beat and you can dance to it"). I heard the chorus once as a ringtone and it sounded like something I would enjoy, though I couldn't fully distinguish what was being said. Something along the lines of "hee-ba-hi, hee-ba-hi hee-ba-ho-bi-ba-na-de-daadaaa (huminana huminana)". It wasn't until one of the students on my staff included it on a mix CD that I was able to put all the pieces together (and rip the track for my own purposes). Yay, now I can have the song on my Shuffle and get the real translation of "hee-ba-hi".

And that's where the problem lies...


With the song playing directly into my ears, I can actually listen to the lyrics and...they're not good. Like, at all. It reminds me of the "poems" that people would write in my high school creative writing class, though to Gaga's credit her metaphors aren't as thoroughly mixed. I realize it is pop music we're talking about here and expectations are low. It's not like this song will be passed to future generations, but the lyrics are so bad that it actually detracts from the listening experience. It's hard to get my dance on when I keep on stopping to say "that's dumb".

There are plenty of instances of this bizarre phenomenon in pop music. Here are some examples:

"A Horse with No Name" ~ America

"There were plants and birds and rocks and things"
"The heat was hot"

"MacArthur Park (Abridged)" ~ Donna Summer

...yeah.

"The War Song" ~ Culture Club

"War, war is stupid / and people are stupid / and love means nothing / in some strange waters." Besides being absolutely insipid, I think this may be a protest in response to the Falkland Islands conflict.

"Video" ~ India.Arie
"Keep your Cristal and your pistol / I'd rather have a pretty piece of crystal"

These songs, with the possible exception of "MacArthur Park", are perfectly serviceable but have the occasional lyric that makes my earholes say "ouch". I have a couple of theories as to the causes of these errors, though it is hard to pinpoint what exactly happened. I can't tell if the songwriter painted him/herself into a corner and didn't want to have to undo an entire section (India.Arie maybe). Or, in America's case, they may have come up with the riff and cadence first and then tried to see what would fit in with whatever story they were trying to tell. A thesaurus might have been handy, but a lack of one didn't stop them. As for Culture Club, this just screams "filler track", though if it was released as a single that might explain why the group dissolved not too much later. Sadly, I think Lady Gaga is expecting people to not pay that much attention, which is fair since it is a great club song -- just keep it off your iPod.

Are there other songs that you have encountered where one word choice or line makes you cringe, affecting your reception of the song?

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Boyle-ing Point

This Susan Boyle thing is really starting to creep me out. For those of you who don't know who I am talking about, let me give you a rundown.

Susan Boyle appeared on the program Britain's Got Talent last week. She sang the song "I Dreamed a Dream" from the show Les Miz. After her performance, the audience was cheering and the judges all gave reviews that led to three "Yes" votes for moving her on to the next phase of the competition. Pretty typical reality show sequence of events, but that doesn't explain why Boyle is being described as an internet sensation. Some other facts to color the scene: Boyle is 47, unemployed, and, in her own words, lives with a cat and has never been kissed.

And then she broke the interwebs.

The consensus is that Boyle gave a good performance on the show. Many would say excellent and I have yet to see a review that called it anything less than good, so let's go with the less extreme opinion. However, that's where the joy ends. Many of the blogs that I subscribe to have shared their positive opinions on the Susan Boyle Experience and have since been inundated with flame wars about the varying degrees of opinions and the application of semantics.

People have taken offense at Boyle being referred to as "older". 47 is older than me, so I would describe her as older. But those in their 50's, who do not consider themselves "older", have expressed contempt for that term being applied to someone younger than them. There's "older" used as an adjective of comparison, which seems to be the more common usage in this case, and "older" used as a pejorative adjective which I don't think has been the intention of any use of the term.

The other issue that has come up is physical nature of Ms. Boyle. She is not ugly, she is not glamorously beautiful, she is just...average. I don't have any of her measurements, but she appears to be average in just about every dimension. If anything, she is the human manifestation of beige. This has created intense debate about lookism, particularly in the realm of talent based reality television. It is an interesting conversation topic, but the vitriol is getting a bit much.

There's nothing that bothers me about Susan Boyle personally. Her performance is a joy to behold, which also seems to be part of the general consensus. If anything, the presentation is a bit overwrought, but that is a fault of production and outside of her control. However, all this joy is eradicated as soon as people have shared their reactions on the web. Civility is beginning to go to the wayside because one person's joy does not necessarily synch up with another.

What I'm taking from the clip is that extraordinary talent should be celebrated, regardless of the source. Why does that celebration need to be shouted down by other celebrators?

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Chatterbox

Every Tuesday afternoon the bowling center I work at hosts a local senior bowling league. It's a program that works in conjunction with the town Senior Center and each month they produce a newsletter/booklet called The Chatterbox. It contains a listing of upcoming events for the month, a holiday related recipe or two, a "poem" (or whatever you call rhyming couplets based around banality) and requests for volunteers and donations. I'll usually skim through to see what sort of stuff is happening around town and see if there is anything worth passing to Passive Aggressive Notes or the FailBlog. Here is an excerpt from the newest issue:

IMPORTANT NOTICE:

It is with great regret and sorrow that Ruth and I have decided, due to massive cut backs in spending that we are no longer going to be able to publish the Chatter Box after this publication. We in the past have been running off 650 copies of each page to distribute to the general public in different public areas, hospitals, Dr. offices, living facilities. Our normal publication has at least 9 pages of information and 1 calendar page. That comes to a total of 6,500 pages for each month. The cost of ink has risen too as well as the price of paper. Not only does the increase cost affect us be we too are considering the effect on the environment by cutting so much of our tree population to produce the paper. We as a Senior Center must contribute to saving our planet. It seems like such a small sacrifice to make. I know that some of you will be upset with this news, but all we can say to you is: APRIL FOOLS!

What I like about this is the conversation I'm imagining took place as the author(s) were writing up this joke.

Ruth: Ooo, put in that part about saving trees
Not-Ruth: Yeah! That's a great touch! That'll really make the sale!
Ruth: Hey, wanna hop in my Hummer and knock down trees in the Arb after we print these babies?

I know that conversation didn't take place, but I think it makes their little joke that much more enjoyable.

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Commatose

The first step in confronting any addiction is to admit that you have a problem. Okay. Here it goes. Deep breath.

I...am addicted to commas.

This addiction has destroyed relationships between words and ideas. So many misunderstandings have occurred because I can't control my right pinky while I type. So much red ink has been spilled trying to correct the mistakes caused by this condition.

I think part of the problem is my education. Grammar was only vaguely touched on during my schooling. If it wasn't for my older siblings growing up with Schoolhouse Rock I probably wouldn't know the difference between an adjective and an adverb. Since my schooling didn't really delve into the elements of speech it would seem to follow that the elements of punctuation would not be covered either. Periods and question marks and exclamation points are self-explanatory but internal punctuation was kind of glossed over. I didn't achieve a functional understanding of colons and semi-colons until my junior year of college.

But commas seem so easy to use. I think part of the issue is that I tend to write in a conversational tone. As a result every pause in thought is highlighted by a comma. In that last sentence I would want to put a comma between "result" and "every" because if I speak the sentence out loud I would pause between those two words. The same with "loud" and "I". I think this idea was reinforced at a board meeting a couple years ago. Reading over the minutes of a prior meeting I came across a line where I was speaking and every one of my pauses had a comma. It was obvious that I was thinking as I was talking because there were 8 commas in one sentence.

I should educate myself on this subject. My fear is that the guides will be of the Eats Shoots and Leaves snobbery instead of a Punctuation for Dummies guide. But writing this post without a single comma is giving me the DTs. I am not joking.

Edit: You can see an example of my comma problems here. I am not above shameless self promotion. You should go this blog anyway because it is a fun read. Enjoy!

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