Wow, Wendy.... Strike two.

So, my Acting III teacher, Wendy Mortimer, lost serious points yesterday in class. She already went off on a rant on me alone one day in class, which I discussed in a previous post. But yesterday, after everyone got done running our scenes, she lectured us all. And this was bad, I mean she was getting emotional. I was sitting watching the scenes, impressed with the choices that I was seeing and the improvements that I was seeing in everyone. When the last group finished, she closed her laptop and said, as she walked down the pruis steps, "Ok. We need to talk." And proceeded to give us this ridiculous lecture about how we have all hit this wall and how none of us are hitting the guts of the pieces and how none of us have that extra "something" that is missing in all of the scenes. She was so frustrated the whole time, telling us about how we were all just not getting it and she wished there were some way that she could teach us. Now, the past several weeks in acting, I have dreaded going to class. And I know that many of my friends and peers have felt the same way. And I think that it is interesting how my acting classes are my least favorite classes that I have, and THOSE ARE MY MAJOR CLASSES. AND I DREAD THEM. Hell, English is more fun for me, I look more forward to English class than I do for the classes in which I work on the craft that I plan to use as a profession. I think it is also interesting that each project we have worked on in Acting III, we have, as a whole, gotten progressively worse. This should not be the case. And Wendy tells us things like, "some of you may not even click while you're in school, which is fine. Please, you should not be doing your best work in school. This is a safe environment in which you can PLAY." But she making such a big damn deal about it, and making everything so damn serious to the point that many of us dread acting, and go into our work expecting to fail. Because we know that nothing will be good enough for her. I am taking everything she says with so much more than a grain of salt now. She has severely lost something from me. I don't know what it is - respect, the degree to which I care about her opinion, whatever... but she's lost a great deal of it.

WOW!

It has been a good year since I last played that terrible game, World of Warcraft. When I say terrible, what I mean is a mix of terrible agony and absolute bliss. There is nothing better than coming home after a hard day of school and escaping into a realm of elves, orcs, swords, magic, and dragons. But as with all online games that I have tried, once you reach the highest level in the game - the fun is over. Some games, such as Final Fantasy XI, take a much longer time to reach that level cap. But once you get there, the game switches entirely to a gear hunt. You spend all of your time, at that point, trying to get into linkshells or guilds with lots of other players. Once you manage to break into one of these elite groups, you spend hours a day, many times every day of the week, or atleast well over half, trying to defeat high level dungeons and get gear that rarely drops, if ever. The fun is all in the levelling up. The questing and the friends you meet along the way. But recently I started another character and I plan to start the journey anew. Sorry school, sorry classes, looks like you're about to take a hit...

'Due'ga Hideki

Duse: Hey, get out here

Duse B: I am out here.

Duse: Ah, shit.

Duse b: What's da plan.

Duse: To get our dues.

Duse b: Well, yeah...

Duse: Well, shit, L's in there somewhere. I don't know.

Duse b: What? How'd he find us?

Duse: Bitch, he's L, how does he do half the shit he does?

Duse b: Shit.... you got a deathnote?

Duse: I got two.

(Duse holds up fists.)

Duse b

Duse

Duse b

Duse

Duse b: We'll talk about that later Suzan Lori Parks, let's go.

Duse: Hey!

Duse b: Come'on.

Duse: This is gonna be tricky, have you ever seen L?

Duse b: I'm pretty sure I saw him on the Tyra Banks show once?

Duse

Duse b

Duse: Bitch, no.

Duse b: Oh Shit. Then no.

Duse: Then I guess we're gonna have to do ass-kickin' on sight! No prisoners.

Duse b: And then we get our dues?

Duse: (looks up) ...Some dues cant be paid in cash, L.

Duse b:

(A grenade explodes at their feet. They jump from the smoke down to the street screaming what eye witnesses could only describe as sounding like "Duuuuuuuuuuuueeeeeeeees!")

You're on my bad list today, Wendy Mortimer.

So I had a really bad day the other day. It was a busy weekend, straight through. I had my show twice, and all of the time that I wasn't in the show, I was either working on homework or filming for this T-Com student who's film I'm in. Saturday I had to show up at 5:45 for the play, (for fight call - there's a lot of combat in the play, so fight call is kind of early) and I didn't get out until 11 because a guy came to judicate the play. Once I got out, I was at Pita Pit from 12 midnight until 6:30 am. trying to film scenes for this T-Com student's project (we were only supposed to film from 1am to 2 or 3am. All this said, I had absolutely no time to put any work or research into my scene for Acting 3. So I came into class on Monday, tired as a dog and without much preparation other than having read the play and thought about the character a little bit. And my acting teacher, Wendy, pretty much ripped me a new one. She told me that if I came into a professional rehearsal like that, I'd be fired. She asked me, "you're never going to bring this kind of work again, are you?" "No ma'am," I replied. She pretty much stopped giving me notes and was only working with my partner. And the worst part was, I was making choices about the character, and she was confusing my acting choices as lethargy. It was just a bad, bad day. But fuck Wendy Mortimer, in the last scenes we did, my partner was having a bad day, so she just left the class, and Wendy sympathized with her. She let us go Friday instead of Wednesday that week. But here, I got completely reamed out. What if I had just left the class 'cause I wasn't feeling well? What, should I have just asked to go on Friday instead? WHAT THE FUCK WENDY, COME ON!!!!!

Topdog, Underdog

So, Jet Li vs. Jackie Chan. I am writing about this topic because I have been a Jet Li fan for a long time and so many people say that Jackie Chan is better. It irritates me every time (especially when they argue with me), so I am going to get to the bottom of this vicious falsehood. People seem to like Jackie Chan for two reasons: He is funny and he does clever stunts (and all of his own stunts.) Jet Li is not funny (in his movies) and he does not do as many clever stunts (or all of his own stunts.) So, let's establish that Jet Li and Jackie Chan have two different styles. But what are they? What category are the two of them compared in, in which we can determine who is better? Jet Li and Jackie Chan are both martial art superstars. What does it mean to be a martial art superstar? Let's take the first half of the title. Martial art. It would seem to me that to be a martial art superstar, you must be excellent at and have a masterful understanding of martial arts. Let's look first at Jet Li. He was the national wushu champion in China for several years. He trained in many actual forms of Chinese wushu from the age of 8 and on. Since he was named the champion in China, I think we can give him the title of master. How about Jackie Chan? Jackie Chan trained in the Peking Opera School... Opera?! What does that have to do with martial arts? Basically, Jackie Chan learned how to jump around and do alot of acrobatic stuff associated with performance. He learned how to look like he was fighting. And this is very apparent in his movies to anyone with a knowledge of martial arts. The things he does are flat-out fake. The only thing that people find interesting about his fighting is all the stunts. Maybe part of the problem is that no one knows anything about martial arts, so when they watch him fight, they are willing to accept what he puts out. Jet Li, on the other hand, is a beautiful martial artist. Every movie he is in, he carefully thinks about and chooses what fighting styles (both externally and internally) best represent his character. His fights are a beauty to watch because he doesn't have to lean on a lot of stunts. He is also not funny. Let's face it - neither Jet Li nor Jackie Chan are very good actors. But Jackie Chan plays the same goofy character in every movie - and that is Jackie Chan. Jet Li plays a serious guy in alot of his films, but especially lately he's started to put more acting into his work. All in all, if you want to see a guy jumping off walls and through car windows, why don't you go rent a Tony Jaa film? He does all of that (I might add even better than Jackie Chan) but with some brutal martial arts as well. But if you want to see a true master of the art of combat work and create art, go watch some Jet Li. It'll do your soul good.

Yummus

I had some pretzel chips and hummus from Noyer last night. I had never tried hummus until this summer - it just sounded like one of those things that I couldn't possibly like. But this summer, a couple of my friends got me out to a hookah bar and I tried some. This was top-of-the-line Mediterranean hummus, with warm pita tortilla-like stuff, and it was so good - I couldn't get enough. I hadn't had any since then, and I saw it in Noyer last night and had to have some. I'd been avoiding getting it because we have a friend that talks about hummus aaaaaall the time, and now we just call him hummus. I knew if I got anymore that I'd have to admit that I actually like hummus. But who has to know? Please, don't tell them. I've also never smoked before, until that hookah. I guess it's still not exactly smoking, but it's the closest I've been. At first it was kind of fun, but when my head started spinning, I was kind of weirded out. And after a while, my throat started to get sore and I had to stop. I also had some coffee, but I'm as much of a wimp when it comes to coffee as I am with smoking. I had to pour like 6 packets of sweetener and some cream in there, and it was a pretty small mug. All in all, I'd like to go to a hookah bar again, so I can experience some things (like smoking and coffee) to a tamer degree - except for the hummus.... That, I will experience in full.

There are probably a hundred different types of different martial arts, without even going into the different styles within each martial art. Actually, if you go into all the different kinds of chinese kung-fu, you'd probably be far beyond the hundred mark. Let's discuss a few of these martial arts. We start out with Karate and Tae Kwon Do. Karate is Japanese and Tae Kwon Do is Korean, but I start with the two of them grouped together because they are very similar. They are two of the most commercialized martial arts that exist today, and they are both very stiff and rigid if you ask me. They are very basic, with your "knife hand"s and your "low block"s and such. Tae Kwon Do just has a few more kicks. Aikido. This is a much different martial art, all based on center of balance. This martial art takes longer than most to be able to use effectively in combat. It's all about very subtle movements and trying to softly and swiftly take away your opponent's center of balance and easily making him succumb to where your body is moving. This martial art was original created for the samurai - it was what he resorted to if he somehow lost his sword, so many of the movements resemble what it might look like if there was a sword in his hand. Ninjutsu. This is a very sneaky and deceptive form of martial art. The ninjas were all about defeating their opponents mentally and then physically, so you will never be able to predict how a ninja will attack. They are true masters of the art of mental warfare, so they will mislead you with their physical actions. Kung Fu.

Yeeeeaaaaaah BUDDYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!

I'm fresh out of things to write about. I was watching videos of Ronnie Coleman this morning on Youtube. He always cracks me up, 'cause he's such a huge guy and I think he won the title of Mr. Olympic eight years in a row or something. But he has such a great attitude. He's not one of those big stiff dopey guys with a grimace on their face, or at least he doesn't seem to be in the videos that I've seen of him. Whenever he works out, he's absolutely obnoxious, and he yells stuff like "LIGHTWEIGHT!" and "Yeeeeaaaaah BUDDYYYYYYYY!" Those are just a few of his Ronnie-isms, others including: "Just like Brutis, didn't know you could do this," "Ain't nothin' but a peanut," "Ain't nothin' to it but to do it," and so on. I would be completely distracted just working out in the same gym as him, but honestly, looking at the weights he lifts, I think he's earned the right to yell just about whatever he wants. It's good to know that you don't have to be a complete goon just to be muscular. And though I'll never be big enough to be a body builder (and I'll never want to be), Ronnie is an inspiration to me just in terms of getting myself to the gym 3 days a week to build the little bit of muscle that I do have.

Christmas

I went home this weekend and spent my one day (plus the weekend) of Fall Break with my family. It was nice, but it really made me wish Thanksgiving Break were here, and then Christmas Break. Today, I can't wait for Christmas. I can't wait to buy a small Christmas Tree for my dorm room, and some egg nog, and to be able to enjoy a small taste of the Christmas spirit before I get home and experience the real thing. The nativity scene, the lawn ornaments, the big Christmas tree, the little light-up house collection my dad has, the train, all the Christmas movies on T.V., the food - everything. I will have to buy a rug though to go under the tree in my dorm room, because freshman year when I had a ground tree, it was difficult getting all the little green pieces of plastic off of the floor. Sophomore year I just used a tiny tree on top of the refrigerator, because I had a different roommate (whom I did not know pre-college, like I had known my roommate freshman year) and our room setup didn't allow for a larger one. The tree sophomore year was one of those little fiber-optic spinning trees, and it was fun, but the damn thing always leaned to one side, and eventually started falling off of the fridge daily. And that meant picking it up, spending 5 minutes repositioning it, picking up all the little spongebob and coca cola ornaments I'd bought for it, sometimes replacing the light bulb in the base, etc. Not this year - this year, I've got a single, and I'm gonna get a rug and like a 4-5 foot tree that doesn't spin or lean! And lots of egg nog.

A Rose by Any Other Plastic

My palms were sweaty. I licked my lips nervously as I tried to slow my heart down, which was beating against my chest like a jackhammer. I was certain someone would hear it and it would give me away. Just one look over in my direction was all that it would take to spell ruin for me. This was it. I was throwing everything on the line. But there was no other way. And even though I was 99% sure that I would be unsuccessful – that 1% far outweighed the “what if’s” that would have tormented me for the rest of my middle school career if I hadn’t gone through with it.

Adults often underestimate adolescence and write them off as “too young to understand.” But I believe that by the time you get out of your teenage years, you have already experienced the entire range of human emotion, whether you know it or not. Because as trivial as adolescents can sometimes be, you can be sure that whatever endeavor they may undertake will be treated as a life or death experience – whether it’s trying to get a job, staying at the top of their class in school, or, in my case, attempting to get the attention of a particular girl. She had a glow about her, along with the dangerous power of instantly paralyzing me with a glance. She had olive skin, dark eyes, dark hair, and her name was Amanda Mervine. She was the most beautiful and, consequently, the most popular girl in middle school. I wore sweater vests.

I knew that I was a nerd, but I also knew that Amanda Mervine was my soulmate. I too had olive skin, dark eyes, and dark hair! And if that wasn’t a match made in heaven, I didn’t know what was. So I set into action the brilliant plan that was bound to prove to her that I was worthy. As I was leaving the house to go to school one morning, I sneaked a plastic rose from the centerpiece in the middle of the dining room table. It would not be missed, and what I had planned for it was much more important.

In middle school, everyone has a “home room” in which they meet for the first and last classes of the day. My home room class was science, and Amanda was in it as well. I had never waited such a long 45 minutes in my life. Finally the bell rang and we all packed our stuff up and got ready to leave. I had to be swift and I had to be sneaky. As the last few students piled out of the room, I opened the desk I knew to be Amanda’s and quickly threw the plastic rose inside. The hardest part was over! Now all I had to do was wait. What I didn’t know was that the hardest part was far from over.

About halfway through the day, a boy that I recognized from the popular crowd came up to me with a worried expression on his face. “I don’t think she wants the flower.” A thousand questions ran through my head in a matter of seconds. “How did he find out about this?” “How did she find out already?” “Who is he to judge whether or not she wants the flower?” Before I could make sense of anything, he asked me with a sympathetic tone, “Do you want me to try and take it out?” I had gone this far, but I began to realize just what I had done and he was offering me a chance to save what was left of my dignity. I looked at his Abercrombie shirt and then at my sweater vest. “Ok,” I replied.

I walked into seventh period, the second to last period of the day. I sat down, weary from the events of the day. All I wanted was to get through this period, get my rose back, and get out of the school. And then the worst possible thing that could have happened…happened. Amanda Mervine walked in. She had a plastic rose in her hand and an amused look on her face. I had completely forgotten that Amanda Mervine was in my seventh period class. And apparently my ally had been unsuccessful in retrieving the evidence from her desk. She sat down next to me and I stared at her. And I kept staring at her. I couldn’t move or speak, and I think she knew this, as she decided to say the first word. “I got your flower.” In the next aisle over, a couple of kids laughed. It seemed that this had gone from a private matter to a public matter very quickly. I continued to stare at Amanda, dumbfounded, as she threw them a severe look and told them to be quiet. I had expected her to start laughing with them, and I tilted my head a little bit when I realized what she had said. Was it possible that she actually cared about me? Could she even have possibly shared the same feelings for me as I had for her? It was while these hopeful thoughts ran through my head that she spoke the words that crushed me. “I think we should just be friends.”

I knew full well that we would never be friends. Middle School works exactly the same way as the rest of the natural world – nerds don’t hang out with popular kids any more than a gazelle would chill with a lion. This was especially true once the rumors began that she and I were dating. See, I found out shortly after that she was actually “going out” with someone else, which made me all the more embarrassed about the rumors. If she didn’t already hate me, she certainly would now. I spent the next few days ducking into bathrooms and hiding behind doors to avoid her. Fortunately at the time I had a good group of friends who decided to start another, bigger rumor about one of themselves in hopes that people would forget about me, which they did.

We all know what it is like to desire the unattainable, to reach for the unreachable. Most of us, once matured, learn from our mistakes and figure out newer and better ways to go about achieving what we want. We stop using bows and we start using guns. We throw away our sharp sticks and develop blades. We leave behind the primitive and opt for the advanced. But if I could go back to that fateful day in middle school when that fleeting impulsive thought entered my head and change what I did, I would not touch it. Well, maybe I would have tried to get a hold of a real flower, but that’s beside the point. The fact is I went for it the only way that I knew how – with a sweater vest and a plastic rose.

Road Trips

My family used to go on a lot of road trips. We'd usually go either to St. Louis or Ohio - close states that we have relatives in. They were only on average about four hours, but they were still fun. But occasionally we would take the 6-10 hour road trip. My favorite was when we didn't get started until the evening, and then we ended up travelling through the night and into the next day. My dad has a huge GM van that the four of us would pile into (me, my parents, and my sister). We always got to pack our choice of drink (diet coke for my mom, diet rite for my dad, grape soda for me, and orange soda for my sister) and my dad would make us all bologna sandwiches (I wanted mine with mayo, my sister's was always mustard.) We would stay up late watching movies or playing video games on the t.v. in the van. Eventually we would fall asleep. I always loved waking up in the middle of the night at a gas station or rest stop and going in to get snacks, then staying up for another half our or so (maybe reading), and then conking out again.

Can't Take Dat Heat

It has been freezing cold in my room for the past two weeks or so. And I love it. I don't know why, but I need the cold. It's gotta be very cold for me to sleep well, so that I can bundle up in my comforter. At home it is always a war, for several reasons. For one, I am always warmer than everyone else. That stands on its own. But the other problem is that I spend most of my time upstairs, while my dad (he is always complaining about being cold) spends all his time downstairs. For whatever reason, the upstairs is noticeably warmer than the downstairs - and my room is the hottest by far. He spends most of his time in the kitchen, cooking and watching T.V. When he isn't cooking, he's sitting in a computer chair in the kitchen watching T.V. Is it too much to ask that he goes upstairs to his comfortable bed where it is warmer to watch T.V.?! Is it too much to ask that he put on a long sleeve shirt and some pants? Once I'm naked, I can't take any more layers off!! No, instead he turns the heat up. If it is any higher than 74 degrees, I cannot survive (again, it is hotter upstairs). I need it at about 71 to be bearable, and 65 would be ideal. Especially at night - I can't stand having to sleep in my underwear with the fan on high because 1) I can't bundle up in my comforter, it's way too hot for that and 2) I can't sleep with that stupid fan on. I can sleep at school with the AC on high because it's loud, but it makes one constant hum. My fan at home on the other hand makes random non-rythmic quiet subtle clicking noises. So I have to sleep with the covers off and the fan off. That just ain't gonna work.

I O U

I had a dream last night that I can't remember with great detail. I do remember that it was late, late evening with a very small bit of blue still in the sky and I walked into a house, and there was a group of organized burglars there, holding people hostage and robbing the house. They didn't see me, so I exited back out the door and walked into the house through a different door - the front door. As I was walking through the living room, some cops burst through the front door where I had just entered. They immediately pointed their guns at me and told me to get on the ground, which I did. They had confused me for one of the burglars. As they were patting me down and cuffing me, my face smashed against the carpet, I heard the sounds of more cops breaking into the other part of the house, and dealing with the real criminals. I tried as hard as I could to convince them that I was not a burglar. Suddenly, gunshots were coming from the other room and I could tell (as could the cops that were holding me) that the burglars were slaughtering the cops. One of the cops holding me down (the female one) pulled me up and started to take off my handcuffs. She got them off and helped me to my feet, opened the door, and told me to run and save myself. I could hear the burglars in the other room starting to break the door down and I knew it was a matter of seconds before they broke through and killed these last few cops that had been dealing with me. In that moment I felt an inexplicable sense of love toward the female cop that had freed me. I ran out the door and cleared the yard, but then I knew I had to go back and help her - I owed her something. I started running toward the cracked front door with yellow light pouring out onto the front porch, and then I woke up. I'll always owe that woman - in the last few seconds of her life, she chose to help me instead of saving herself.

Da Maker of GREAT Mistakes

Uh oh, I can't think of a thing to write about, so I will have to talk about collectin' da dues! Dat's what I do, I collect dues. Because everyone owes dues. Yeah, even you! Whoever you are readin' dis, you owe dues. And you better pay. Right now! And de maker of great mistakes sittin' next to me - he owes more dues dan anyone! Runnin' around, usin' black terms, I'm 'bout to snatch him BALD-HEADED. He tinks he is street, but he's just a POSER!!! And I don't deal with posers on my streetz! He owes such major dues dat I ain't even gonna worry about collectin' your dues right now, butchoo better not forget 'em. Yeah, dat poser grew up with rednecks in the bumpkin town of la grange, and can't no redneck belong on da streets! I ain't tryin'a hear that, and I can safely say that no one else on my street is neither! I happen to know he likes to sit around watching "Naruto" all day, and I'm pretty sure - wait, let me check..... - oh yeah, I am 100% sure dat no white anime-loving cook like himself could possibly survive on the streets for one minute!! Ooooh it's a good ting for him dat he's got Malt-o-Meal over at his house, 'cause I woulda kilt him for sure if he didn't keep havin' me over to eat dat stuff, so that he could have less dues on his tab. Uh oh! Yeah! It's just really funny to me how he keeps making mistake after mistake after mistake over dere! I am gonna quit typin' now, and go see if I can correct some of dose mistakes, and get da dues that are owed me.

Little Debbie ain't nothin' but ho-ho's and tricks!

I do the same thing with my little Debbie. Whether it's the Ho-Ho's, the Zebra Cakes, the Swiss Cake Rolls, or the Oatmeal Cream Pies, I always eat the edges first and save the middle for the very last larger-than-normal bite. And I will go so far as to say that anyone who doesn't eat theirs like that is demeaning the pastry! Sure, you could argue that if you eat in moderate regular bites, you are preserving the taste and drawing it out. But listen, I've talked to little Debbie, and she ain't tryin' to hear that. Every bite of the dessert is supposed to build up in preparation for the last bite. It's sort of like a well-written play. The first bite gives you the exposition. It's just enough to let you know what's going on without giving too much away. The bites after that are all forwards, leading you up to the final bite, filled with cream, which is the climax of the experience. Finally, as you are licking your fingers, you come to your resolution and leave thinking about what you have just witnessed, wanting to change the world. And, a side note, what happened to the double decker oatmeal cream pies?!?!?! Someone owes dues...

Yeah, I play childish games. Whatchoo gonna do about it?

I went to Gamestop and reserved my copy of Animal Crossing for the Wii. Ok, let's go ahead and get it out of the way: animal crossing is a childish game. It is sort of like the Sims, except for like 6 year olds (not really, I exaggerate.) You go around, expanding the size of your house, meeting neighbors and running errands for them, collecting furniture sets, fishing, growing fruit trees, catching bugs, digging up fossils, and celebrating seasons and holidays as they come. The thing is, you are a goofy looking wide-eyed little guy (or girl) and your neighbors are all animals. Bears, wolves, porcupines, kangaroos and all other sorts of animals (there's even one that is a robot frog, if I remember correctly. And if anyone tells me I'm too old to be playing it, I'll tell them where they can put their opinion! It's a fun and addicting game even if it is stupid and pointless - that's the point of it. I have played the earlier games for the Gamecube and DS, and they were both fun and enjoyable. The new one for the Wii looks like it will have even more content and newer ideas to play around with. I was slightly upset with the DS one, because they took out the great holidays like Christmas, Halloween, and Thanksgiving, and made up stupid ones like "La-di-da Day" and so on and so forth. Hopefully in the Wii edition, they will put the real holidays back in. I haven't played my DS version for a week or two now, so when I finally to get back on, I will probably have a lot of weeds to pull, cockroaches in my house to kill, and angry neighbors who wonder why I haven't been around lately or attended their birthday parties.

Jet Li vs. Jackie Chan

Jet Li is one hundred times better than Jackie Chan will ever be. Now, just let that sink in for a minute. The thing that I always hear from people is, "Jackie Chan is way better than Jet Li, 'cause he does his own stunts!!!" Let's examine that statement. So, Jackie Chan doing his own stunts makes him better than Jet Li? How so? There are hundreds of stunt men out there, what about Jackie Chan is any different? The fact of the matter is that they are both competing martial arts super stars - and they key words are "martial" and "arts." Jet Li was the Wushu champion of the world for several years in China. He learned REAL martial arts and actually competed and was chosen better than anyone else at what he did. Jackie Chan grew up in an opera school, learning how to perform. He may know a little bit of martial arts, but most of what he learned was how to flip around and jump off things and do prat-falls. And this is very apparent when you watch him fight!!!! If you know anything about martial arts above a basic level, you will see that Jet Li's martial arts are beautiful, captivating, and meaningful. And that is why Jackie Chan is most peoples' favorite - most people don't know a thing about martial arts, they just want to see some funny guy jumping off of ladders and into windows. And I guess if that's all you want, then you can go get yourself a Jackie Chan movie and watch him jump around and act goofy. I suppose if that's all you look for in a "martial arts movie", then Jackie Chan will give that to you. But he'll be cheating you. Because a real martial arts movie will concentrate on the martial arts used, and the stunts can be done by stuntmen or wires, and it shouldn't matter. Jackie concentrates only on the stunts and humor, and his martial arts really leave something to be desired. He owes me serious dues.

In a Time of Myth and Legend

My favorite show growing up was (and still is) Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. It's the first television show that I have memories of seeing when I was young. Alot of people criticize the show for several reasons. The effects, by today's standards, are not terrific - and in fact they are pretty cheesy. But what people don't understand is that that is part of what makes the show what it is. At times it is very serious and dramatic, but can quickly turn humorous and just plain goofy. A lot of people also say that it is "campy" (the good guy always wins, there's always a moral, etc...) This is true, but in my opinion it makes the show that much more enduring. Kevin Sorbo depicts Hercules as a true hero, not a meathead like he is usually portrayed. The real humanity of Hercules is explored as he has to make all kinds of sacrifices for humankind, trying to teach them that the gods don't care about them and they shouldn't waste their time trying to please them, but instead, find the hero inside of each and every one of themselves. Hercules showed us that true strength doesn't come from the size of your arms, but the size of your heart. This is the only show or movie that I have ever cried while watching. "But wherever there is trouble, where ever an innocent would suffer... there would be Hercules."

LIGHTWEIGHT!!!!!

I have been working out for the past couple of weeks, in the morning. I work out over the summers at home, and that is the time when I am most able to gain considerable muscle mass because I have a personal trainer (a friend who graduated high school with me and is a bodybuilder) and I am able to eat the things I need to (i.e. lots and lots of meat) without worrying about a meal card budget or class schedule. But I am still trying to consistently work out so that I don't lose the work I did over the summer. If I can gain even more strength that's great, but it's not looking promising, because I am already feeling the effects of decreased protein and carbohydrates in my diet (and just decreased food intake in general) and it's also difficult because I have to work out early and don't have time to wake up an hour beforehand and eat a meal. The biggest factor, though, is the fact that I am working out with two other guys. One of these guys is a big guy and lifts about the same as I do (usually a little less, but occasionally a little more on some exercises), but the other is smaller and I am finding it increasingly difficult to concentrate fully on my own workout, and at the same time try to guide these other two guys through theirs. They're racking up dues real fast.

Everybody gets 1

So, I biked to my car and then drove over to the apartment of a new friend of mine named John Detty. He's a transfer student. I am a gamer for life and it turns out he too claims to be an avid player of video games, so we decided to have a get together one afternoon and play some games. I've only hung out with him in person a couple times, so it was sort of awkward and we were both ready to test each other out and see how we compared in skill. We only played to games - the first was Super Smash Bros. Brawl. I knew that he'd played Melee before for the gamecube, but I could smell that he wasn't going to be good enough to beat me (not that I'm above average, but I am competent) and he couldn't. So then we switched over to Halo 2 and he said something like, "and now it's time for my revenge." Ooooooo that was a mistake. Now it's true that I don't play alot of Halo 2, but a real gamer can pick up skills he's learned from other games and transfer them over (within the same genre of gaming). Now most of my first-person shooter experiences have been on pc and this one was xbox, but that's just a minor obstacle. So we began, and he was ahead of me for awhile. This is for two reasons - 1, he was used to the game whereas it was fairly foreign to me (hadn't played it in half a yea atleast) and 2, he knew where the two really really good weapons were (weapons like this are called "noob cannons" because they are extremely powerful yet very easy to use, so that any newbie can pick them up and have a chance against even decent players - in other words, they are cheap) and he got them immediately and started destroying me. It got to the point where the score was like 23 - 10 in his favor. At this point I had had enough, so I made my come back. Sometimes I used those weapons, and other times I just used crappy weapons and pure skill.

I went and saw Babylon A.D. with my family on Saturday. I really just went to see it for Vin Diesel, thought it ended up having a pretty good story, I thought. Vin Diesel is an actor that I have looked up to for some time now. I am studying to become an actor and have the all-too-common dream of heading out to L.A. and beginning the hunt for acting work once I leave college. I admire Vin Diesel because he, like me, is multi-racial (we are both half black, but my other half is white and I think his is Italian). His first piece of work was written, and directed by him and he also starred in it. It was about his early experiences as an actor, auditioning time after time after time in New York and never getting the role because he was either too white or too black. One of my acting professors told me that I need to "embrace my ethnicity" and somehow use that in my acting. I have no idea what this means, but Vin Diesel figured it out. He payed his dues.

Last night I had a SANDWICH. It wasn't a great sandwich and, in fact, it wasn't even a GOOD sandwich. But it was a sandwich, and thus I enjoyed it. The best sandwiches come from Jersey Mikes. This is a fact. When you order one of their hot subs, they don't do any of that goofy cold cut junk - they put real chunks of meat in your sandwich. That is their way of saying to you, "We are serious about this, and you should be too." And I am, I take each sandwich very carefully. I do not like to be rushed when ordering my sandwich - I need to have enough time to stop and imagine how the different components of the sandwich are going to taste together in my mouth so that I put together the optimum combination. Jersey Mike's is the only place that I trust completely to give me a sandwich I am satisfied with 100% of the time. The other places - they gotta pay their dues.