In America

inamerica
Originally uploaded by mr marbles.

My mom rented In America the week after I got off of my mission. I didn't want to see it. Man, was I being stupid. This movie is really quite good. It's possible that I might consider placing it on my list of all-time good movies(...it's 3 in the morning). But seriously, this was a very well made movie with an excellent story (apparently it's based on the director's own life) and superlative acting. I thoroughly recommend it.

inamerica_cutelittlegirl

inamerica_cutelittlegirl
Originally uploaded by mr marbles.

The actors from In America. The two little girls are real life sisters and the little girl on the right is one of the cutest little girls ever.

Aljazeera.Net - Iraqi candidates shot dead

Iraqi candidates shot dead
What the crap kind of election is this? This is absolutely NOT freedom. What are they voting on? Whose name they think looks cooler on the ballot? The candidates aren't releasing their names because they are getting killed by the insurgents. Interestingly enough, according to this article, the Islamist groups do not oppose elections in general, but do oppose elections while US troops remain in the country.
This isn't democracy; it's a farce

Isn't that just like you homs.

Running and Waiting

I was sitting on my bed waiting for the phone to ring and I realized(actually I realized this on tuesday) that I absolutely HATE waiting for the phone to ring. You're so helpless. It just bothers me so much to sit waiting for a phone call that probably isn't coming until tomorrow. So, instead of waiting for it to ring, I went running today. I sprinted all out. But only for like two blocks at a time. Then I would basically collapse. Then, as soon as I got my breath back...I'd run like two more blocks really fast. Then, I'd collapse again. I am in an interesting spot. Which is why I went running. You see, when I am sad, I go run and try and cause myself to be happy or something. And I feel sad, but I have nothing to be sad about. What's that all about? I mean seriously, my life hasn't been better since....as long as I can remember. And yet, most of my day is spent in relative frustration. It just doesn't make much sense at all. I think I need to go bouldering. It must be that sport climbing is frustrating. But, really, this isn't a change from when I bouldered all the time. Maybe it's just a general lack of exercise. Maybe it's just that my life is so incredibly good that I refuse to believe it.
But even though I went running, I'm still sitting here waiting for the phone to ring an hour later. Suck!

IS this the future?

Installment #7: Climber's Fashion

While contemplating the virtues of the gussetted crotch, I came across this article at New England Bouldering. It made me glad that I only wear one pair of Prana pants. Maybe this isn't funny for those of you who aren't climbers, but this made me laugh out loud (and I never laugh out loud while surfing the web). Here's my favorite part:


7 Spandex
Little known fact: Wearing spandex does not make you appear to be skinnier. It makes you appear to be you, wearing spandex.
The spandex situation is similar to the Verve situation only worse. If you're a supermodel cool, go on with your bad self. Sadly you are reading my column on newenglandbouldering.com. Therefore you are not a supermodel. Therefore you may not wear spandex. Again the reasons for this should be obvious. Particularly if you are a man. TMI baby, TMI.
There are other reasons why spandex is a bad choice. The most common reason is that if your fashion sense is so bad that you are wearing spandex, then you are probably wearing white cotton underwear underneath it. This can be seen. It really does look as bad as it sounds. Think baby seals in an oil spill, or your parents running naked through your office. It's that bad. No really.

Saved!

Saved! is like the Singles Ward of bible belt culture. IT is a crazy movie. If you watch it on DVD...don't watch the 'saved revelations'. They are way too raunchy for their own good.

Rock on Liberals! 

The Legend of Billie Jean

The best movie in the history of the world. Ok, maybe not the best movie, but it's really amazing. Pat Benatar's theme song is killer.

TOo MUch...

CNN.com - Nail embedded in man's skull for 6 days - Jan 16, 2005

CNN.com - Nail embedded in man's skull for 6 days - Jan 16, 2005




That is crazy. I mean seriously crazy. I mean, I'm wigging out. It's like when I watched A Beautiful Mind. That was some trippy stuff. I actually worried(for like five seconds) that it would happen to me.

Double Standards rear their ugly head 

The Republic

I'm sitting in my Political Heritage class right now. The professor is talking about Socrates in the Republic. Not quite sure that I'm a big fan of Socrates. He asserts that he's not smarter than anyone, but then he asks these questions that are infuriatingly condescending and take us on these tangents that in reality have nothing to do with the nature of justice. Unfortunately, the Republic is merely Plato's interpretation of Socrates, so it's entirely possible that Socrates isn't actually that infuriating.
Additionally, I hate that in book 2 they take a dreadful tangent to see justice 'writ large'. I enjoyed(on the 'it made me think' level) the example that Glaucon/Adeimantus put forth and I don't see why they all of a sudden start making up this imaginary city and go into an incredible amount of detail about the Gaurdians. I fail to see the connection to the discussion of justice.
If we take away all the temporal advantages of justice, is it intrinsically good? I fear that the answer is no. Without the addition of the external Good, there are no benefits to being just. Whereas, being injust is only bad when we add the external Good. If there were no divine consequences for our actions, then what would the benefit of being just be? Fortunately for me(so that I don't go around being unjust), there are consequences.

CNN Programs - Larry King Live

The former presidents are on CNN together. Yeah!



CNN Programs - Larry King Live

Fortitude

I think that Greek plays are great. I read Antigone for my political heritage class. It's a great social commentary applicable today. Then, I tried reading Aristophanes' The Frogs at work, but I was working...so that made it a little difficult. There were all of these vague allusions that I wasn't sure I was getting. I'm sure if I read it without any distractions it'd make more sense. Right now I'm about to delve into The Republic. I've tried on many occasions, but it just doesn't work. It doesn't excite me for some reason. Over the break I was supposedly going to read Walden. But unfortunately it didn't excite me either. Like, I opened it at random and I found a little(...actually it was like a page long) tidbit that was incredibly insightful, but as far as reading it cover to cover...it involves more fortitude than I'm willing to give it.

Vote Counting Reform

This is a selection from an email I got from John Kerry. Quite frankly, I'm impressed. It's not being a sore loser, it's making sure that there is no question that our federal elections are valid and that there is no question as to the results. So, do it. Call the congressional leaders and your local congressmen. Make them make these changes to help us. Kosher.

Despite widespread reports of irregularities, questionable practices by some election officials and instances of lawful voters being denied the right to vote, our legal teams on the ground have found no evidence that would change the outcome of the election.
But, that does not mean we should abandon our commitment to addressing those problems that happened in Ohio. We must act today to make sure they never happen again.
I urge you to join me in using this occasion to highlight our demand that Congress commit itself this year to reforming the electoral system. A Presidential election is a national federal election but we have different standards in different states for casting and counting votes. We need a national federal standard to solve the problems that occurred in the 2004 election. I will propose legislation to help achieve this.
Florida 2000 was a wake up call. But the Republicans who control Congress ignored it. Will they now ignore what happened in 2004?
There are nearly 3,000,000 of you receiving this email. We accomplished so much together during the campaign. Now let's use our power to make sure that at least one good thing comes from the voting rights problems of the 2004 election. If we want to force real action on election reform, we've got to demand that congressional leaders hold full hearings. Make sure they hear from you and help hold them accountable.

Speaker Dennis Hastert: 1-202-225-0600

Leader Bill Frist: 1-202-224-3135

And please report that you've made your call right here:http://www.johnkerry.com/signup/electoral_reform.php

Snow

It's snowing. I'm def. pleased. But, my head is killing. I'm def. not pleased about that. I made some curry this afternoon--while it was in the pan it smelled nasty but it tasted ok. I'm going now because my room is thrashed(and I mean thrashed) and I must be to cleaning it.
Lesson of the day: If you're tired and sick- than it's ok to not go to your six hour shift in order to catch up on the sleep you missed by getting home at four in the morning because of your missed flight.

The Anti-Year's End List

Everywhere you turn there's a list of the top...whatever. So I decided to do the anti list. It's going to be a list, but there's no category. It's just a list of things. Some of them may be cool, some of them may be not cool. That's the point. It's not a list of the worst or the best of this year, it's not even a list of this year. It's just a list. Isn't that clever? So here goes:
1. 3-disc DVD players are useless
2. Reading blogs is really only fun if you know the person writing it or the blog is peppered with controversial political talk.
3. Mary Poppins was written by an australian.
4. I just bought a pair of skis.
5. Jetblue vastly improved their JFK terminal since the last time I flew through there.
6. John Cleese is also known as Spitting Image.
7. Over 70000 people have died in Sudan in the last two years.
8. I think that one thousand is a lot of people.
9. Before you move into a house- make sure that the toilet works properly. There are few things more frustrating than being forced to fiddle with the toilet to get it to flush properly (and being yelled at when you don't get it right).
10. Timing is crucial.
11. Games that use DVDs are usually disreputable.