Hipster? Nah...

Recently I've been informed that I am partaking in the ever-growing hipster lifestyle. I have one question: how? I was sent the following link as a means of explaining how I'm a hipster, and I agree with a few of the points on there, but other than that, I don't see why I've been hastily labelled a hipster. I can understand the whole sarcasm and ironic part. I do have sarcastic proclivities but I don't see how I can be very ironic considering I don't fully understand what irony is. (Not to say I don't have any grasp on the concept, I just don't understand how it can apply to daily life) I also enjoy musical tastes that aren't very popular. But that's only because I enjoy broadening my tastes and talking to other people about music. I don't think that necessarily makes me a hipster. As for the hipster fashion, I don't think I am included AT ALL. First off, I have no money to fund a hipster's wardrobe, because if I were a hipster it would be the splurging and wealthy one, not the cheap and thrifty [ironic] one. Furthermore, I was under the impression that hipsters don't care about anything. This couldn't be further from the truth. In fact, I develop obsessions rather quickly. As my readers will remember, I have Anglophilia (obsession with Brits and Ires). I always thought hipsters were people who are aloof and just go wherever they feel like going and doing enjoy anything except music, sex, and drugs. Sure, I like music, but I'm not one for drugs, and I've never partaken in sexual acts, but I can imagine most people would dig sex if they had experienced it. Similarly, I thought hipsters were aiming to be individuals, not be homogenous to the rest of society. If this is the case, then I am not a hipster. I try too hard to be like other people to be a hipster. I am simply the result of the people I know and try to act like.


To conclude, Jack Kerouac has been labelled the original hipster due to his book "On the Road", which defined the Beat generation. However, it was recorded in an interview that Jack "hated the Beat generation". It wasn't about people who were going where they wanted and did whatever they wanted. It was about the era when people were beaten down (oppressed, if you will) by everything, so they had no choice but to do so. Second of all, the Beat generation was defined by his book as the 50's. Jack Kerouac simply got the book published in the 50's. The events in the book actually occurred in the 40's. So apparently Jack didn't even write about the era he defined. To connect this to hipsterdom, it has been stated that hipsters are simply a Beat revival. If I were to revive the alleged "Beat" generation (the 50's), I'd be doing the twist and listening to Elvis, Buddy Holly, and Chuck Berry. And I don't listen to any of those geezers.

Score
Hipsters: 0
Me : 100000

Wait... Don't hipsters blog? Damnit...

A Summer-y of the Summer (Haha...)

I consider this summer a summer of discovery. Not a discovery of land, electricity, or mathematic formulas (well I didn't discover them). This summer - the hot and humid summer of 2010 - was, indeed, a summer of discovery. I discovered myself. Now before you laugh at the corniness of that statement, let me explain. I will begin by outlining what I discovered about myself:
-Music
-Communication
-Preference
The awesome part is that they are all connected. (Side note: If you don't want to read the worst and most dragging blog ever, please skip to the 2nd to last paragraph. I was distracted while writing this, so it's a terrible blog post.)

I suppose I'll start with music. As you may or may not know, I go to FSU every summer for their summer music camps. Choral camp, specifically. While there, I roomed with a kid I met at last year's All-County choir. He and I both played guitar and took the guitar class at the camp. We shared our musical interests and gave advice on playing, singing, etc. However, while there the men's choir sang an Irish folk song called "Fergus an' Molly". Also, while there, my roommate bought a CD by the Irish band Flogging Molly. This is where the communication portion will take over.

While I and all of my friends speak English, there are still many ways of using the language. All of my life, I have had an enormous fascination with accents, mainly English, Scottish, and Irish. Then a friend suggested the movie "Trainspotting" to me, and it was the spark to my obsession. If you read earlier post, you know the extent of these obsessions. Most recently I've distinguished the difference between the Irish and Scottish accent. One day as I was leaving Ross, I walked down the sidewalk and saw a store called A Touch of Tartan, which is filled with only Celtic/Gaelic products and other British goods. The owners are from Scotland themselves, so I spoke to them and I've decided to go to the store everyday for the rest of my life. (Exaggeration) But I also recently downloaded the complete discographies of Irish bands Flogging Molly and The Pogues (Still music related.). The accents are coming along alright, but the more exciting part is that I now have RosettaStone for Irish (Gaelic/Gaeilge), Tagalog, French, and Italian. I should probably learn Tagalog first because my mom's entire side of the family speak it. But I'm working most on Irish because it's a lesser-known language and I think it's more interesting. So we'll see how that goes...

I guess now it's time for the preference portion. As I'm sure you know, the English are famous for their tea traditions and whatnot. So recently I have taken a liking to all teas. I used to only enjoy sweet tea and flavored teas, but I actually decided that iced tea is best served unsweet and with a bit of lemon juice. But most recently (as in yesterday), I bought two boxes of Twinings of London tea. I got Irish Breakfast Tea and English Breakfast Tea. They are simply delicious. I have a pot of hot water and all I've been doing all night is pouring hot cups of water and putting bags of tea in them. (Or making tea if you wanna be a killjoy.) I think I'm on cups 11-12. I've been making them in pairs so I drink an even number of English and Irish teas.

On top of those three main things, I've been taking two online classes: Pre-Calculus and HOPE (Health Opportunities throught Physical Education). I recently finished only Pre-Calculus (today).

So here I sit. Naked on my living room floor. (I'm home alone for the weekend, so that's what I do when I'm home alone.) I rode my bike to Office Depot this afternoon to buy my school supplies and I had to bring a backpack to carry all of the stuff. I can't believe school starts next Tuesday. Less than a week. Ugh.

However, my summer will end perfectly. Tomorrow, I'm going to a Demetri Martin show. Then school starts. The second day of school I'm going to a Jack Johnson concert. The third day of school is my birthday. The first Saturday of the school year, I get my license.

This was a terrible blog post because I'm so distracted. I'm sitting naked on the carpet with my laptop on my right side, and my guitar on my lap, while watching Friends and getting up to make more tea every five minutes. I apologize. If you would like a better explanation, just hit me up I suppose haha.

P.S. I also got CPR Certified. I can save your life.

American-Born Scot, Update

So if you'll look below, you'll see a post that says "My Life as an American-Born Scot". This is because I'm trying to master an Edinburgh Scottish accent. I'd gotten pretty good at it up until about a week ago.

I came across an Irish folk choir song that my friend sang and I was a huge fan of. However they sang the song in an Irish accent. Now what's the problem, you may ask? I'll tell you: as I began to hum and whistle the song to myself, I also began to sing it to myself... IN AN IRISH ACCENT. Of course you're probably wondering why this is a problem.


Well if you're geographically advanced as I am, you know that Scotland and Ireland are both on the British Isles so they have somewhat similar accents. HOWEVER, they have some IMMENSE differences about other things.

For example: a Scotsman would pronounce the word "about" as 'aboot', or 'aboat'. An Irishman would say it 'abaht' or 'abut'.

Another example: Scotsmen say the world the letter "I" as 'ay'. So if you came across Gerard Butler or Ewan McGregor, he would say "Ay 'ave never meht yew bafore ehn may layfe." (I have never met you before in my life.) The Irishman next to him would say "Oi hahv nehver maht you bafore in me loife."

The letter "R" is also key in both accents. Scots roll their R's heavily. If they don't roll it, they flip it. On the other hand, Irish people don't roll the R, but they overuse the r sound. It's quite hard to remember .

Scottish people also tend to say the "i" in words like "lift" as "lehft". Irish say it more like "laft". Scottish also say "word" as 'werd', which Irish say "wahrd".


But anyway, the problem is that Oi'm star'en tae fahrgeht whech is whech (I'm starting to forget which is which) and I'm getting them mixed up. But I've decided from now until I master it, I'm going to stay away from all Irish influences and focus only on the Scottish culture. I even checked a book out from the library about Scotland. I'm very excited to read it. I've also become very fond of the Scottish national anthem, "Flower of Scotland". It's not the official national anthem, as Scotland is part of the UK (whose national anthem is technically "God Save the Queen" and oddly enough goes to the same tune as "My Country 'Tis of Thee").

As you can tell, my life is a wreck right now...

My Life as an American-born Scot

Recently, I've been using a lot of this web application called "StumbleUpon". What StumbleUpon is is a website whose toolbar you download and check off boxes of your interests and based on your likes, every time you click "Stumble" on the toolbar, it redirects you to a random page it thinks you might like. Being somewhat a jack-of-all-trades (at least I'd like to think so), I use this toolbar quite frequently just to stay cultured with what's going on in the interwebs.

StumbleUpon

Anyway, so I found a video of a Scottish man imitating all the known accents of the English language. If you haven't gathered it already from my earlier posts, I have a lot of things that I'm into that people don't know about me. For as long as I can remember I've been, for lack of a better word, obsessed with being able to speak in several accents (in order of importance): Scottish, Irish, British, New Zealand/Australian, French, South African, Russian.


A while back, I checked out a book from the library called "Accents: An Actor's Manual". It comes with a CD of lessons that teach different accents of different regions of the general countries' accent. I ripped that CD on iTunes and returned it (obviously). I had forgotten about my accent obsession until recently I began watching the show "Flight of the Conchords", which used to be on HBO and only had two seasons with a total of 22 episodes. I'm very sad that the show was cancelled. But that's not the point.

The characters on the show are all from New Zealand both in real life and on the show. I quickly learned to imitate their accent. In order of how well I've mastered the accent besides my own, it goes Canadian, New Zealand/Australian, British, Scottish, and then WAY down the list, Irish, Russian, etc. But lately I've been getting into the Scottish culture after watching a Scottish comedian named Danny Bhoy and listening to him tell a joke about the Scottish national anthem. I developed a liking for said national anthem and YouTube'd it. That is how my vacation in Scottish culture began.


I went on YouTube and found a series of lessons on how to speak with Scottish accents from real Scots. However, one series was by a man from Edinburgh and the other was by a man from Glasgow. Glasgow is the rugged, brutish, man accent as heard by Gerard Butler, or the Edinburgh accent which is the smooth, sexy one heard by Sean Connery or Ewan McGregor. I've decided that it's easier to try Edinburgh because it's more enunciated as I'm used to with an American accent, then I will shift into the sloppier Glaswegian accent.

I've also found a website that teaches all about the Scots language and vocabulary and whatnot. I will post all of these links at the bottom.

To help me adapt to the Edinburgh accent, I saw a movie called Trainspotting which takes place in Edinburgh. It's not the plot of the movie I was watching for (which was twisted but awesome), but the accent and I think I picked it up rather well. I discovered this movie was based of a book by a Scottish author named Irvine Welsh. I went to the library and looked in his books to find to my delight that all of it is written phonetically as a Scotsman would say it. Thank you, Mr. Welsh (the writer not the physics teacher, though I'm sure I'll thank him too).

But one thing's for sure: next time I go to Disney, I'll be one of those Europeans pretending to be a tourist in America. But don't worry; I'll just be practicing my accent.

Edinburgh Accent Lesson Teacher's Page
This guy's crazy, but more informative.
Glaswegian (Glasgow) Accent Teacher's Page
This guy's hilarious, but more phrase oriented.
Scots Language Website
This website has about all the information one could need if curious as to the Scottish language, accent, culture, etc.

Lack of Blogs

Yo yo yo.
To all my reader(s) (a.k.a. Emily), I just wanted to apologize for the lack of blogs. I don't have time to do a blog now, but I thought'd I'd just post this update saying there WILL BE MORE TO COME soon. I've just been kinda lazy with my posting, but I'll definitely start doing it more.
Ciao.

Summer Movie Marathon '10

So we have Netflix. With a Netflix memberhsip, obviously you receive DVD's in the mail and mail them back to receive new ones off your queue (list). Along with the DVD queue, you have an Instant queue, which is a list of movies you have chosen to watch on your computer, TiVo, Xbox 360, Wii, or some other Instant viewing device. The movies that you can watch instantly is limited to mostly old movies, classics, foreign films, indie films, and short films.

Lately I've been going on a movie rampage of films. So far I've seen indies like: The Vicious Kind, A Clockwork Orange, Mr. Holland's Opus, and Les Miserables. I highly recommend all of them except The Vicious Kind which was average. And A Clockwork Orange is a book, so if you plan on reading that first, don't watch it. And it will mindrape you. You will finish it and wonder what you've just seen. My reasoning for watching indies is because they have lower budgets and less effects so they have to be more creative with their limited resources. Therefore, when the movie is good, it is that much better.


In terms of foreign films, I've watched: Paris, Je T'aime; Un Chien Andalou; and Mongol. Paris Je T'aime is a French film with English subtitles made up of 18 five-minute films by notable directors. All of them share the common theme of Parisian love. Un Chien Andalou is directed by Salvador Dalí. Dalí=enough said. Mongol is a movie about Genghis Khan's beginnings in life pre-reigning Khan. It is extremely historically accurate, and filmed like a movie, not a documentary. It was nominated for Best Foreign Film Academy Award. It is in Mongolian with English subtitles and is the first of a trilogy about Genghis Khan. The second movie comes out later this year (2010).

All of this has further motivated me to become a movie writer. I've noticed that movies have systems that are intricate and would probably take experience to develop. One thing in particular I've observed is the occasional screen shot of the film that doesn't further develop the plot. I think those shots' purposes are to further exaggerate emotional statuses. I can't think of an example right now, but if I ever watch a movie with you, ask me about it and I'll point those shots out to you.

American Film Institute Conservatory, here I come.

Entourage: A Math Lesson

Have you ever seen that show Entourage? (We'll label how often I watch the show variable x and the show itself variable z) The one about an up-and-coming Hollywood movie star living with his washed-out former-actor brother, his bestfriend/manager, and his driver/childhood friend/pot dealer?

This is gonna sound stupid, but since this is one of the new shows I've gotten into heavily, I've learned a lot about the actor/manager/agent/director/writer relationship(s). Granted, it is a TV show, but nonetheless it is supposed to generate a simplified portrayal of the backstages of show biz.

Now cut to Kenny Stewart. We'll label him variable y. Straight A's. FCAT Writes 6.0. Writer of the Year in 8th grade. For as long as I can remember, I've been told I have a skill with words. I'm not being pompous, I'm just stating that as a fact. I HAVE been told that since for as long as my memory will let me to recall. I've always had an intrinsic motivation to write creatively, to write elaborately, to write. (Hence this blog.)

Now, the math lesson begins. What happens when you perform the function y varies directly as Kenny watches (x) Entourage (z)? You get y=kxz. This means that the more I watch the show (x) combined with the show itself (z), the more I (y) want to become a screenwriter.

I feel like because I was granted the gift of vocabulary, syntax, and grammar, I have to apply it toward something. However, I've noticed that the best films are the independent ones that not many people have seen or the ones that feel independent but everybody's seen them. Another way that great movies are made is when the writers themselves are in the movie, because they feel more of a connection to the characters. My favorite movie is Good Will Hunting. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck wrote this movie, and they both played lead roles. Though an award-winning film, every time I watch it, I feel as if it's something only I've seen and I'm special enough to watch. This is what a good movie is supposed to do. This is why indie flicks are the best flicks. Not to say that I don't like hyped up movies like Step Brothers, The Hangover, 300, etc. But they don't have the same quality of plot that indies have, the same texture. So in a way, I'm saying I wouldn't want my films to be mass-produced.

Oh yeah, I'm also kind of a math wiz. Congratulations, you now understand the show Entourage in terms of algebraic variation functions.

The Rootbeer Chronicles, Pt. 2

So since our last trip to Mazzaro's, my parents have taken to buying me bottles of root beer to taste test. This time, my parents got me IBC Root Beer, Virgil's Microbrewed Root Beer, and Boylan Root Beer.

-IBC Root Beer Ingredients: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Caramel Coloring
-Virgil's Microbrewed Root Beer Ingredients: Licorice, Vanilla (Bourbon), Cinnamon, Molasses, Nutmeg
-Boylan Root Beer Ingredients: Pure cane sugar, Caramel Coloring, Yucca extract
-Verdict:Boylan's Root Beer was the best. It wasn't Bulldog quality (see The Rootbeer Chronicles), but it was decent. It had an odd taste that was still relatively delicious. The Virgil's Microbrewed Root Beer was alright, but the licorice flavor was very prominent, and I'm not a fan of licorice. However, all of the other spices made it rather enjoyable. The IBC shouldn't even be called root beer. It had no remote root beer flavors or ingridients. It was like drinking carbonated cough syrup. Not cool.

I think this Chronicle's main factor was flavoring ingredients. IBC contained none, ergo it had absolutely no taste. Virgil's was licorice, which gave it the very candy, bitter-sweet licorice taste and Boylan had yucca, which is a tropical root plant that can be very sweet.

For more info on the listed sodas, click links below:
Boylan Root Beer
Virgil's Microbrewed Root Beer
IBC Root Beer

Photography/Art

As I said before, I've been getting increasingly interested in photography, Photoshop, and computer animation. I recently went around taking pictures with my phone camera, which is better than my stupid digital camera. Below I've posted the artsy-edited-modified pictures I took. If you want to see more of the stuff I've edited click here.

Wow.

It's been quite some time since I last posted but here's the rapid-fire scoop on what I've been up to lately:

-I've decided I'm going to start collecting novel tees. Just anything I see that tickles my fancy. I'm so tired of all the logo and regular tees that I see people wear everyday. I want shirts that mean something or represent an organization. Or shirts that just look cool, but no more just plain "Volcom" or "Nike".


-I've declared that I'm moderately out of shape but I'm stuck in a niche. I'm too lazy to exercise regularly and I love my current diet (or lack thereof). I wish I had a gym membership to make use of. I guess I have no excuse; we have a treadmill, a pull up bar, dumbbells, and anyone can do push ups or sit ups. But when you think about it, the gym environment is just a much better place to exercise: there are no distractions there, no food to tempt you, and no homework to use as an excuse. I also started and online P.E. class as a graduation requirement that requires I do 6 hours of physical activity a month. Obviously I could fake it, but it makes me realize how out-of-shape I am.


-I'm very conflicted as to what I want to do about college/career/post-school. I've had it embedded in my mind that I'm going to do one of two things: 1. Go to an Ivy League college (Preferably one of the big three; Harvard, Yale, or Princeton), get into a top notch Med School, and become a neurosurgeon. However the setbacks there are enormous. I would have to go through AT LEAST 8 years of school, a residency, and a training. That would be almost 12 years of school, innumerable amount of loans, and I'd be up to my ears in work. 2. Start taking voice lessons and get into FSU College of Music for either Vocal Music Education or Vocal Performance. However, even kids who take voice lessons for years don't get in and there is FIERCE competition, which is quite discouraging. Unfortunately, my parents would only consider voice lessons if I'm positive this is what I want to do. Unfortunately I'm so darned indecisive.


-I've been expanding my musical tastes extensively: I've recently started listening to Phish, which is a heavily Grateful Dead-influenced psychedelic funk-rock jam band. I've been watching videos of guitar techniques and piano soloing ideas. I'm also very proud to announce that due to perseverance by me and a friend, we are having AP Music Theory as a class next year. It will increase my musical abilities tremendously, not to mention increase my chances of getting into FSU Music.

We'll see...

The Rootbeer Chronicles

Today my family and some family friends ventured to a little Italian market in St. Pet called Mazarro's. My family's been there several times before, and I must say they have the most delectable foods you ever did see. Every time we go there I order either the classic Italian panini or the meatball, though usually it's the latter, as melted mozzarella is my weakness. They also have the largest selection of non-mainstream soft drinks I have ever found. However, the signs in front of the sodas were very conflicting: they each said that their particular soda was the best. As a gullible skeptic, I feel the need to believe these signs, but compare to see which TRULY IS the best.

So I got the Bulldog root beer, the Sprecher root beer, and the Sioux City Sarsaparilla root beer (as seen above, respectively), all of which claimed to have been the superior root beer. I tasted each and analyzed their tastes based on sweetness, flavor, and texture. However, I completely forgot about this rubric and judged them sans criteria. For flavor analysis and links to the sodas' websites, see descriptions below:

Bulldog: Ingredients- Pure cane sugar, honey, vanilla. The taste was very sweet and smooth going down, not too bubbly.
Sprecher: Ingredients- High fructose corn syrup, honey, vanilla. This one wasn't sweet at all and way, way, way too bubbly. It was borderline bitter. Interestingly enough, the New York Times rates it the #1 Root Beer. I don't know what they taste.
Sioux City Sarsaparilla: Ingredients- Pure cane sugar, honey. It was a very interesting taste, very different from the others, but in a very good way. It was just sweet enough, though with a bit too much carbonation. Overall a decent soda.
Verdict: Bulldog Root Beer was the far superior root beer. It had the great vanilla taste that gives root beer that perfect taste. Coming in second was the Sioux City Sarsaparilla. It was very good, but the lack of vanilla was disappointing and could have let to its victory. Sprecher was alright if you want more root beer for your money, but not quality. I would rather drink Barq's, A&W, or Mug than Sprecher but at least you get 4 more ounces than regular sodas.
I think the key factor that made one soda better than another was cane sugar vs. HFC syrup. The real sugar simply has a taste that is incomparable.

For links to the soda websites, see below:
Bulldog Root Beer
Sprecher
Sioux City Sarsaparilla

Trashed Sunset

I don't know if you've ever seen the sun set. You would think that it's a slow process that would be unnoticeable to the naked eye observing along the horizon. However, it's actually much faster than you think. It's kind of like filling up a water bottle; you can see the water getting closer and closer to the top until the bottle is full and overflowing with no more room for water. The sun sinks lower and lower until the light is but a faint glow along the horizon where the sun once resided just seconds before.

It's actually astonishing how quickly a moment like this can pass. It's a split-second of beauty few witness, and many overlook. This is what disappoints me.

Flip UltraHD

Ok, so good news bad news. I'll assume you want the bad news first.

BAD NEWS: The Flip UltraHD camcorder that broke last week, so it turns out, did not have a warranty on it anymore, according to Best Buy and Pure Digital Technologies.

GOOD NEWS: My dad created a fuss and haggled his way into getting me a brand new 8GB Flip UltraHD camcorder fresh off the shelf. I'm pretty stoked and glad that everything worked out.

MORE BAD NEWS: The factory wrist strap that comes with the camera is pretty wack so I found another wrist strap and put it on my old Flip. My dad gave them that Flip, so I'm stuck with another lame wrist strap. Oh well...

Evening on the Beach

So today my family, two other families, and a friend of mine spent the evening on the beach. We first arrived and threw around the pigskin, played bocce ball, and played games. However most of the time my friend and I spent our time engaging in some amateur photography: he scouted out some objects to get shots of, and I made it happen.

I took pictures almost all night. The problem is that (as seen in earlier blogs) I don't have a decent camera. I was resigned to use my phone camera. The shots actually came out really good, except that each one took me like 5 minutes to take, as phone camera settings are impossible to perfect. If you wanna check it, click the link below. Tell me what you think.

CLICK

Anyway, some interesting things transpired at the beachside restaurant, Frenchy's, that we ate at. As our waiter was taking orders for meals, I was talking to my friend about some shots I'd taken earlier. Then our waiter walked away and I realized I hadn't ordered. So the waiter came back to our table and swore he had my order. I never ordered my meal, though it seemed that the waiter had written down my EXACT order. Cajun Mahi-Mahi Fish Tacos. I was shocked.

Anyway, later on we noticed an interesting man walking to the deck with some buddies of his. However, he was dressed JUST like Alan from the Hangover: he had a beard and sunglasses. But that's not all, he also had the (Fake) Baby Carlos in a baby carrier. We decided we had to take pictures with him. Oddly enough, he too, was there with his friends for a bachelor party.

Peeps are mad weird.

Photography

So I've noticed that more and more of my friends are becoming interested in photography and big projects and whatnot. Some of them are even enrolling in photography classes in school. It's not odd that my interest in the field is increasing: my dad has always been quite the photography enthusiast. He's owned at least 7 digital cameras in the last decade.


I have everything necessary for such a photography project. Well, most of the requirements anyway. I have Adobe Photoshop Creative Suite 3, the perfect environment/community for decent pictures, an empty Flickr account waiting for pictures, and an encouraging paternal support system (father, for those with inferior vocabularies). However, I lack the most essential thing: a decent camera. Right now I have a Olympus C-5060 (as seen to the left), which is a dinosaur compared to contemporary photographic devices.

I would shell out the dough in a heartbeat for a nice D-SLR camera if I had the cash. That's the problem, though. I'm thinking that maybe if I get straight A's, I can get the folks to throw down half the cost of the camera. I'm hoping that might work, but I'm quite doubtful as to those possibilities.

I'll give you guys the Flickr info if everything works out. Just keep informed and I'll let you guys know.

How You Know Winter's Almost Over

You know winter's almost over when your neighbors have trash bag mountains full of fallen leaves. Even as a kid I never got my deserved "jump in the leaf mountain". Sigh.

Abrupt Misery

So for Christmas last year (as in 3 months ago) I received a pretty raw present: Flip UltraHD camcorder. I've been taking it almost everywhere with me so I can pretty much record and capture anything I see.

However, just a few short minutes ago, as I was playing with the flipping USB drive, the USB drive stopped closing. I am now left with a faulty USB drive on my still-functioning camera. I hope I'm still under the 90 warranty... We'll just have to pray and check.

Calf Workouts

So, this is gonna sound odd, but ever since around middle school, I've been told I have rather scrawny calves. I hoped that soccer and swimming and frisbee would change that, but alas, they remained skinnier than usual.

I recently discovered various methods of calf workouts to quickly enhance size, strength, and definition. I've decided that my favorite is fairly easy, requires no extraneous equipment, and can be done extremely frequently.

It involves walking on your tiptoes. Yes, it's that simple. It doesn't have to be extremely noticeable, just like every time you step forward, slightly lift your body up onto your toes, then repeat on your other foot. Though nowhere near their desired size yet, I've noticed after about a week, that mine are sore but I believe they look a tad more defined and larger. I'm prepared to continue this daily exercise until I achieve my desired leg muscularity. I shall prevail!

But, please. Don't make fun of the way I walk if you do happen to notice.

Random Thought of the Day #3: Asians

Among my friends, I am very much considered the Asian of the group because all of my friends are white or Hispanic or black. However, it has become more and more evident to me that I am considered the white kid among my mother's Asian family or Asian friends. This has created a longing in me to be more Asian. I have the Asian brains, but that's it. I wish I could dance like a beast, I wish I could be awesome at video games, I wish I were funnier, I wish I grew up eating exotic foods, I wish I could do crazy stunts and martial arts. Watching videos on YouTube of guys like KevJumba and TimothyDeLaGhetto and seeing them identify to their Asian-ness and how proud of it they are only reminds me how not Asian I am.

Mostly the dancing thing.

Monthly Update

WOW! It's been a while since I've last blogged. I've just had so much going on, whenever I'd look at the link, I thought "Ugh... Maybe later." But alas, later never came (that is, until now).

Anyway, I thought I'd just update you on my recent activities and periodic obsessions. They are fourfold: facial hair, music, parkour, and slang/composure.


So in fourth grade, I was the only kid in my classes with a mustache. People always thought I was older than I was. So you can imagine my frustration and surprise upon discovering how long it takes me to grow some fuzz on my chin. I've embarked upon a one-month trial campaign to see if I can kick-start this beard. I've decided to shave every evening after I shower for a month (well 4 weeks). According to a source that I can't recall, long periods of continuous shaving followed by abrupt stops in shaving produce massive amounts of facial hair. However, it's not the mustache I'm worried about; I yearn for the beard and sideburns to sprout from my cheeks and neck, even if it's just five o'clock shadow. I'll inform everyone how my campaign goes on March 24th, or day 1 without shaving.


Being an avid musician, it should seem unnecessary for me to blog regarding my interests in music, but recently I've developed new skills and acquired tastes in musical styles. I've been downloading more funk music and hardcore gangster rap. The funk music has inspired me to work on guitar soloing and learn new scales and modes for my band. I've had the measurable urge to jam with my boys. Regarding the gangster rap, I was browsing videos on YouTube and discovered some videos of people "freestyling", or rapping about a topic without having written or planned the lyrics beforehand. In school, in the car, and at home, I have more and more been creating freestyles in my head. Sometimes I'll spit a rhyme when I'm with some bros, but for the most part this spontaneous rhythmic poetry remains in the depths of my mind.


This may seem a bit odd, but again surfing the vast gallery of YouTube videos, I found many videos of this 'sport' or 'martial art' form called "Parkour". Parkour is basically the most complex and fun way to get from Point A to Point B. You run and jump and flip and hurdle over, under, between, through around, and off of objects. Obviously it can't be nearly as easy as it sounds, but I must admit it looks, for lack of a better term, epically badass. If I could find a spot with stairs and ramps and walls to practice such an activity, it might prove a handy ability to flaunt.


Okay, now I know what you're thinking: slang and composure? Yes, and as ridiculous as this may sound, I've been trying more and more lately to use terminology that is more "hip" and "with it", per se. Words such as dope, wack, fly, fresh, tight, sick, nasty, sick nasty, etc. In essence, words used on the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Now that's covered. But composure you ask? To people who know me well, this will be hard to accomplish, but I'm making attempts to come of as more of an aloof and zen, if you will, person. I've been trying not to be so uptight and edgy. When I make such attempts around close friends, they ask me what's wrong. It would seem that I need to make the adjustment more gradual for them. Not only am I trying to alter my overall personality, I'm also trying to refine my wardrobe. I'm trying to get cooler trendier stuff. To sum this whole paragraph up, I'm bored with being me. Haha.

I suppose all of these interests are a lot to take up in a matter of weeks. In theory, all of this would be hard to achieve when you consider my workload from classes and whatnot, but then again there's always the weekend and I can do some stuff simultaneously, like freestyling with modern lingo while doing parkour and growing a beard in a new jacket.

I don't know, I haven't ironed out the kinks yet.

Creatures of the Night

Have you ever been the only one awake in the house during the wee hours of the night? At this very moment, I happen to be that guy. I'm sitting in my room with all the lights on, composing this blog entry, while watching The Office. As the number of people online on Facebook to chat with dwindles, I become more and more restless, I begin to search for activities to engage in. I suppose subconsciously I desire to prolong this special feeling of solitude.

As a matter of fact, the last person I was chatting with just signed off. I don't know what it is, perhaps it's the possibility of events transpiring that cannot be prevented by maternal authority figures. Just an hour or two ago, I surmounted my struggles against laziness and retrieved a Coca-Cola out of the refrigerator. I highly doubt such actions would go unpunished had a parental unit been present.

It's not only nighttime loneliness that I'm fond of, I appreciate immensely the times when I am home alone and limitless activities available at my disposal. Exam week may have been my ideal week for such time, as we were released from school at noon each day. I spent up to 6 hours at home alone watching television, eating, and sleeping. Not that I engage in infinite amounts of tomfoolery and shenanigans while my parents aren't home, but the concept supervision's absence fills one's entire being with a sense of satisfaction and superiority incomparable to anything else.

But for now, the most I can do is cherish the hour I spend at home alone between the time I get home from the bus and the time my mother and sister arrive home from work and school, respectively.

Now I'm left to wonder when my next afternoon of [mis]adventures may occur.

Random Thought of the Day #2: Fist Pumpin' Like A Champ

I know it's not that intricate a dance, and people get annoyed by it, but I believe the Fist Pump is the best dance ever developed by "guidos". Have you ever wondered what dance to do at a party? It's simple, just follow the directions to the right or click on this link: http://tiny.cc/lHyKl

Now go tell your friends and don't stop pumpin' that fist like a champ!

iTunes TV Shows

Lately I've been putting a lot of TV shows on my iTunes library. This is because due to lack of parental consent, I have no television in my bedroom. So I've proceeded to put the first five season of The Office and all six seasons of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air on my computer. I also have shows such as That '70s Show and Fight Quest. How did I get all of these shows on iTunes [legally], you ask? Simple, a program called PQ DVD. It is a program that takes videos from DVDs and makes them iTunes/iPod compatible. Rather than spending tons of money on downloads from iTunes, spend a one-time fee of $20 and the program will more than pay for itself in two movies alone.

This program can be found online here: http://tiny.cc/wYH0x .

But anyway, back to my point. Due to this discovery, I have been watching The Office non-stop, in an attempt to catch up with the new episodes playing every Thursday night at 9 EST. I have discovered that I love TV. I understand that most people enjoy watching television and have some favorite shows, but I'm almost positive that if given the option, I would watch TV forever. It's not so much that I love every show on TV, but more the fact that I love being entertained by skilled actors and actresses who pursue activities in shows that I could never begin to think of.

This leads me to believe that my latent reason for enjoying television so much is that I subconsciously am fascinated by the idea of living in every culture and social scene or in the shoes of one of the characters from my favorite TV shows. Even if it's a reality show, somebody in real life IS doing the displayed action and I suppose that somewhere in the back of my mind this registers and I feel as if I'm actually there, just as a hidden or silent observer. I'm not going to lie, when a TV series ends, I do get a bit sad at the thought of the end of no longer having access to the aforementioned perspectives, at least not new episodic perspectives.

I think if I could have one present of my choosing, it would be a day in the life of each of the characters in my favorite TV shows including but not limited to: Friends, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, The Office, Scrubs, and That '70s Show.

Man, that would be swell.

My First Meal at Bonefish Grill

So there I sat: in the car on my way to dinner. The car radio blared a country song that my Dad chose, as our car plowed through what seemed like a hurricane. We were going to some new restaurant called “Bonefish Grill”. I must admit, the name made me skeptical. I imagined a fish filled with bones which, personally, I don’t find appetizing at all.

As we pulled in the parking lot, the first thing that I noticed was a rather large fish skeleton statue perched on the façade. I hoped, with all my inner being, that this alleged high-end restaurant would meet my expectations, as my father cracked it up to be an eatery with chefs qualified to make your taste buds dance the Hora.

We sat in a booth near the window, menus in hand. As I examined mine, our waiter informed us of an unlisted topping, “Oscar,” for the Chilean Sea Bass with lemon-butter sauce and a variety of fresh veggies. Since I couldn’t manage to find anything else to tickle my fancy, I decided to try it.

This could have been one of the best decisions of my life. The expert display of veggies, lovely contradiction of flamboyance and modesty, and flavor, had my eyes and taste buds engaged in a Hora followed by a Tango.

If I had adequate funding, I would purchase a unicycle, ride it to Bonefish Grill and order Chilean Sea Bass “Oscar” every day for the rest of my life.

Random Thought of the Day #1

What if Papa John came to your house with a pizza like on the commercials but you answered the door with a Pizza Hut pizza in your hand? Awkward...

The Flaws of Texting

Don't get me wrong, I text as much as any other guy. I have unlimited texting like everyone else in the 21st century and my phone is super-glued to my hands like the next guy. But I won't pretend that there aren't any defects in the concept of chatting non-stop, regardless of one's whereabouts.

Texting can very easily keep one from maintaining a stable conversation with real live people. I can recall many a-time when I've been with people and received a message from a friend and cease speaking to reply to my opposing converser. I will admit, it is very rude and very problematic because after I finish responding, I sometimes utter, "What was I saying...?"

Also, (and I understand other than a greater concentration, there is no way to prevent this) I have on several occasions replied with an answer to the wrong person. I won't specify who the intended recipients and what the messages were, but all I can say is that they got me into quite the pickles. Although I made my way out of the conflicts, the point is that texting is a flawed system.

Regardless of how convenient the Short Messaging System (SMS aka Text Messaging), nobody can say that the concepts are foolproof. It would be nice if people could be genetically altered to multi-task for text conversation and live conversation as well as to remember to check the "Outgoing:" bar.

Anyone willing to fix these?

Hoodlums and Hooligans

So today it was 37 degrees Fahrenheit so I was wearing three layers of tops. This include a tee-shirt, a sweater, and a hooded jacket. Because of the temperature, I was walking around all day with my hood on. I don't have a hat and I don't have ear muffs. The purpose of my hood is not to "look cool", it's pragmatic (functional) and serves the purpose of keeping my ears from freezing.

I don't like how when people see a person in a hood, they automatically stamp the label "hoodlum" or a "hooligan" on their forehead. Today I walked up to my teacher asking for a pass to the bathroom, and he said, "Whoa, be careful sneaking up behind me like that, especially while wearing a hood." He didn't have to say it, but I knew he was implying that hooded figures wreak havoc.

Also, while I understand that most people wear the hoods of their jackets for aesthetic (visual;stylistic) reasons rather than functional, the hood is added to the jacket so that way if one's head is getting cold, they can keep it from being cold to an extent. In my opinion, pragmatics (functions) beats out aesthetics (visuals;stylistics) every time. It insults me when people say, "You don't look cool with a hood on" or "Boy, you white, take dat hood awff" because they're implying that I haven't thought out why I'm wearing it.

Okay, maybe I do think it looks cool.

Hi, I'm looking for my immune system...

So this morning I wake up to a lovely scratchy feeling in my throat, and I groaned with disbelieve: I am ill once again. But that's not the great part. I just got over a cold. As in within the last two days. And here comes another one coming right back in to take the old one's place.

I try to do everything in my power to fight these ailments, including Sudafed, Robitussin, Mucinex, etc. Whenever I get sick I buy large cartons of Tropicana Antioxidant Advantage orange juice with 240% of the daily dose of Vitamin C. I buy bags and bags of Ricola's Honey Lemon and Hall's Fruit with Vitamin C cough drops. I tote around the small Kleenex pouches with tissues. I blow my nose constantly.

At this point, I've almost given up. It's nearly freezing outside and I don't think I have a fighting chance. It's not a bad cold, just an irritating one. But really, it's been TWO DAYS since I got over the last one. I'm just thinking, "Hello, Immune System. I'm just wondering what the hell's going on. Are you going on strike or protesting or something? Because whatever your demands are I'll concede to them."

Being sick sucks.

Last Day of Winter Break

As the clock ticks and my hours of freedom from classes and teachers dwindles to a close, I am suddenly filled with all of the responsibilities that I was assigned for the Winter Break and I have several tasks to attend to.

First and foremost, I have a plethora of assignments to complete before returning. This includes a book report for English, three Psych worksheets, four pages in my Psych scrapbook, a Psych packet for Chapter 8: Learning, a 20-page outline for AP World History, and a review for AP World. It was also recently brought to my attention that I had a semester review packet for Spanish 3. Just my luck; I left it at school.

However, yesterday it hit me that I had two days left to slack off and I did my book report for English on the Autobiography of Anthony Kiedis (I only recommend this book if you're a big Chili Peppers fan, it's not very well-written; more of a "this happened, and then this happened, and then this happened..." type read). I also did my Scrapbook pages regarding Piaget's Stages of Cognitive Development.

Luckily I was proactive and did my worksheets, 5 pages of my World outline, and my Psych packet. I kept telling myself, "Okay, you'll do 5 pages of the outline Sunday night, and it's not due until Wednesday, so then you'll do 5 pages of it Monday and Tuesday." But tonight when I went to do it, I just walked past my backpack and sat in my desk chair. I suppose I became content with doing 7 and a half Monday and 7 and a half Tuesday. I have a serious procrastination problem. If I don't do something when it's assigned, I will wait until the last minute to begin it.

As I think prospectively of the day to come tomorrow and gloomily at my backpack and the work within it, I can only begin to form a list of the preparations I must engage in before tomorrow. I have to make lunch, pick my clothes, get my work together, find out who's driving in the carpool tomorrow so I can ensure that I actually GET to school, etc.

On top of that, I think retrospectively of how quickly 2009 passed. Is it just me or did New Year's Eve/Day seem like just a month or so ago? I can't believe it's already been a full year. I guess the old saying "Time flies when you're having fun" can be altered to say "Time flies". It really is true, everything seems slow when you're thinking ahead about the future, but when you take the time to look back, everything seems as if it happened so rapidly.

That includes how long you took reading this post.