A Strange Situation Arises

It has officially been 20 days since my last post. Twenty days of hanging with visiting friends, getting drunk, masturbating and finally feeling guilty enough to do uni work. So you can clearly see why I haven't been blogging as of late (Har-de-har-har). But seriously though I have been in a bit of a fix of late trying to get my head into blog mode. Blog topics can become hard to come up with at the best of times and a strange situation arises when I'm hanging with visiting friends that makes blogging a bit tricky. You see friends bring with them many humorous adventures, stories and show me interesting things that have slipped under my radar (like the "gay fish" episode of South Park). This would, one would think, provide me with a seemingly large supply of post topics for my blog. But as I so often joke, my friends are pretty much my only readers. So then this situation plays out in my head where I debate with myself the relevance of blogging about shit my friends already know about. David getting naked at Ollie's party? It's a good story but my friends were there. Wolverine without special effects? I watched that with my friends. So as a general rule I avoid post topics that will only retread familiar territory for friends. But then what do I blog about? I haven't been doing anything else? I've been too busy hanging with my friends to find anything else to blog about. What I really need to do is see a significant increase in my popularity outside of my close friends circle. Then I could use some of the adventures I share with my friends as entertaining blog posts and most of my audience will be new to it. Then after that happens I'll be even more popular due to my wit and insight and be crowned King of all Entertainment and I'll have enough money to buy my own country. Gosh! It sounds so easy.

Why Would Anyone Want to Become a Geologist?

Before we begin I want you to think back to your youth. A time of simple joys and mischief. Perhaps you remember running about and playing hide and seek around the forbidden parts of the playground. Perhaps you remember going behind the groundskeepers shed and forcing each other to pass out. I'm sure at some point all of my readers have had some sort of fun involving rocks, whether it be throwing them at some jerk, throwing them through some jerks window or using a rock as crude chalk to write about how much of a jerk some jerk is. Then we have people who have fun with rocks by observing them, what they're made of and trying to work out their history and how they fit in with their environment. Oh what fun THOSE kids must've been. I mean this is a person who loves rocks not as a tool, not as a weapon and not as a source of youthful mischief but because they find them fascinating academically.

I don't get it and I'm sure lots of people don't get it. Now I actually do a geology unit for my Science/Teaching degree and I gotta say that my lecturers definately find it interesting. Hell, when we went on out first field trip there were people who'd brought their very own personal geological hammers for chipping rocks out of the layers. This wasn't required. It wasn't part of the course. It was off their own bat, for their own enjoyment. I could hardly believe that I was seeing two busloads of students on the side of the road all chipping away and discussing their findings. Someone actually said, and I quote...

"I have a rock collection. It's pretty much just rocks"

- some geology jerk

I couldn't beleive what I'd heard. I was suppressing laughter like you wouldn't believe. Here I was, out in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of rock crazed uni students and I was apparently one of the few people who just flat out didn't give a shit. Now I know it may not be what I'm into. Sure I don't give a shit if a rock is part of the matle, but you know what? I gotta respect geologists. Here they are in what is arguably the most boring scientific field and they're not afraid to admit they're having fun. So even though I don't understand why anyone would want to be a geologist I admire their passion.

The Great Facebook Experiment

Let's face it, blogging was always going to appeal to me. Here I am, a 21 year old male with a shitload of opinions secretly building up inside of me that I would only feel comfortable expressing in an environment where I can't get punched in the face. So when someone (the use of the word "someone" in this case is a little more revealing than it may appear...it's an "in" reference) decided to tell me I should write a blog I did my best to play it cool and hide the fact that I was extremely excited by the thought. "yeah...maybe" is probably something like what I said at the time whilst I was secretly compiling a list of TV shows I thought should burn like a bag of dogshit on an old man's doormat. Anyway so I guess what I'm saying is that when the opportunity for blogging presented itself I felt I adapted to it rather well, with enthusiasm and fresh ideas. When my girlfriend set up a Facebook for me on the sly however, I was fairly conflicted on the matter. Aside from the fact I have little time as it is to do things I actually give a shit about (gaming, blogging, drowning my sorrows) Facebook really seemed like something I would dislike. I didn't get it. Essentially it appeared to me to be the same as a blog, except with a zillion apps to distract from the fact that nobody had anything interesting to say to one another. So when I finally took the wheel of my own Facebook I just stared at it a while, tagged myself in a few photos, sent a few friend requests and logged the fuck out. Is this what I was supposed to be doing? I was honestly confused. Is this how you use Facebook? I still don't really know what I'm doing but I guess I'm starting to get over my initial reservations now. I realised I could probably use my Facebook to advertise new posts on my blog (fucking sad). Plus Sam Thornton is on Facebook, that's a good enough reason for me to keep it.

The Pros and Cons of Having an Afro

I don't know how many of you have noticed but my hair is a bit...err...afro-ish. It's been on and off like that for a number of years now (all through high school really) and it's brought me many different emotions before I eventually just became indifferent. At times it has brought me love and friends and at other times it has brought me scorne and sarcasm. So I just thought I'd list the pros and cons I've personally experienced having an afro like the obsessive compulsive tool I am.

Pros

• Some people are friendlier to me because of it. Let's face it, I'm no charismatic stud. I'm an awkward man at the best of times and I tend to overanalyse social situations to the point where I realise about 15 minutes too late that I should've asked how they were. Therefore I need all the help socially I can get.
• It does provide some shade
• Coupled with my height, people find it easy to find me in crowds

Cons

• Random yelling from cars. You wouldn't believe the way young hooligans in cars behave towards me sometimes. I put up with years of "Guy Sabastion!" being yelled at me as a P-plater sped past.
• Jokes. I hate having to stand there forcing weak laughter in response to a joke about my hair that I've heard many times before from other people. It's embarrasing for all involved.
  
• It's embarrassing when someone says I have something in my hair like a stick or some leaves. It's even worse when I'm in the shower at the end of the day, a stick washes out and I realise I've been wearing it all day.
• This one's really only an isolated incident but one day my best friend was drunk and called me a "Flat-fro motherfucker." This wouldn't have normally bothered me but I, too, was drunk and in a sensitive, crybaby kinda mood.

That's more or less it I think. People also like to try and straighten my hair. I always tell them that my hair will win but they never believe me. I don't mind though, hair straightening is fun.

1000 Words Anyone?

I Wish I Knew Where My Copy of "Thirteenth Step" Was

Does anyone know where my copy of Thirteenth Step is? It's one of my favourite albums of all time and I really feel like listening to it right now but I don't know where it is. I'm sure someone else has it...but who? Here's what it looks like.

WARNING: The rest of todays post will be a personal analysis of Thirteenth Step and why I love it. If you don't want to witness my gushing and getting all loving and emotional on you I suggest you read one of my earlier funny blogs or something. Maybe the Guide to Being a Villain or my porn review or something. You've been warned!

Anyway I thought that while we're all looking for Thirteenth Step I'd share with you why this album is held in such high regard by me (hopefully the thief who stole it will feel guilty and send it back to me...with a letter of appology...soaked in tears...wrapped in money). Anyway so Thirteenth Step is the second studio album made by A Perfect Circle, a band formed in 1999 by Tool frontman Maynard James Keenan and Billy Howerdel, a guitar technician who had worked with Tool. Together they gathered other musicians to collaborate on some songs they'd been recording and eventually a new band (A Perfect Circle) and album (Mer de Noms) was born. Mer de Noms was a great album featuring several awesome songs like Judith and (my personal favourite off the album) Orestes. It was heavy, but also intricate and atmospheric. Many people consider Mer de Noms the best of their work; those people are wrong.

When I first got into A Perfect Circle I had totally missed the Mer de Noms era and was entering the scene after discovering the bands various connections with the Smashing Pumpkins (my favourite band evaaaaaaarrrrrggghh). Anyway so I downloaded a few tracks and blah de blah de blah I ended up buying their second album, Thirteenth Step.

Thirteenth Step is highly realised and conceptual. It deals with issues of addiction (the album title explicitly refences the thirteen step program for alcoholics and drug users) . Each song takes on a different role in the complexity that is addiction. There's regret, anger, accusation and fear woven throughout the lyrics. Sometimes the songs are from the point of view of the drug, maliciously manipulating it's victim, offering it empty comforts. Other times the songs are about friends in denial, not wanting to believe that they are watching someone who is essentially dying. There are twelve tracks with twelve stories to tell, each becoming part of the larger tale that is the album. One of my main issues with APC's first album is that it sounds disjointed and stilted. It sounds exactly like what it is, a series of great songs recorded and written individually and then glued together at the end. Thirteenth Step however is fluid, even though the songs have different sounds, stories and images you never feel like one song has ended and another has begun. As stated earlier the songs merge as part of something bigger. I have analysed this album lovingly for many hours, even that fact that there's an unamed and unrecorded "13th" track at the end of the album, perhaps signifying that the story of the album isn't finished; like it's left for us, or whoever needs it, to finish for themselves. That said the album isn't explicit. The songs never actually say "I'm on drugs and boy I love it but it's also not good for me." You can honestly take whatever you want out of the album. I recommend Thirteenth Step by A Perfect Circle more highly than you could imagine.

One of these days soon I'll think of something funny to write about again. Just felt passionate about this post is all.

Watchmen Review

Before I get into the serious review stuff I'd just like to congratulate Tom on his speedy response to my previous post. Elija Wood shall be yours my friend.

Moving on now, the Watchmen. The Watchmen is about a group of vigilante style "superheroes" who are outlawed by the American Government and forced to live out their lives as regular human beings, which you'd think to be relatively easy to do because all of them, bar one, ARE regular human beings. Anyway the year is 1980-something and the doomsday clock is ticking out it's last 10 minutes or so as America aniticipate the onset of nuclear war with Russia. I won't dig too much farther into the extremely involved story because we've got bigger things to discuss. Now overall I liked the Watchmen. I went in expecting a shitty, no-brainer superhero action flick of the Daredevil ilk but instead was treated to one of the grittiest and most tense films I've seen since The Dark Knight. Every one of the heroes is a well developed character with their own flaws and problems to resolve. As heroes they are all morally questionable in some way and as such you're left with a sense of deep running emptiness as you watch these vigilante heroes ruin innocent lives. You can forget about calling Spiderman a conflicted character because he can't balance his real life with his superhero life. Try watching a man who can't bear to be without his mask as he clashes violently with anyone who ticks him off. The effective thing about having such flawed main characters is that not only do you characterise them more strongly but you also end up connecting emotionally with the people they wrong along the way, the everday people.

Having said all that the movie is gritty, heavy and dark to the extreme. I wouldn't recommend it to just anyone, you need to be prepared for it. It's like trying to digest a really good meal without chewing it properly, it's a movie that'll sit heavy in your brain for a good while after watching it. That and it's graphic. There's reasonably explicit sex and some extremely visual violence. If you don't want to see a man have his skull cleavered repeatedly then don't watch this. I thought the soundtrack was pretty solid though, even if it was also unsubtle. I was thankfull that the movie wasn't trying to ram some no-name bands new single down my earhole and instead went with proven rock classics like Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel and Jimi Hendrix.

My last issue with the film is that the movie feels as long as it is, which is very. I'm conflicted as to whether this is a good thing or a bad thing because on the one hand I didn't feel like there was an abundance of unnescessary bits , in fact there were moments were you got a sense of having missed something. On the other hand it can't be good if I check my watch and say to myself, "it felt much longer than that." The movie is based off a graphic novel of the same name written in the 80's and had quite a bit to fit in and coming from a person who hadn't read the novel I found it coherent and enjoyable, so perhaps the length issue was an inevitable necessity. Every main character has his own tale to tell in the movie and they're all given a fair hunk of time to work with, so I guess that's a good thing. Overall however I find Watchment a hard movie to review. It does so many things really well and does so many new things with the overly formulaic "superhero" genre that I'm tempted to call it a must see. Unfortunately the gritty and violent nature of the film makes it unsettling and will probably alienate certain people. It's a powerful film that challenges the superhero ideology and the black and white nature of the superhero genre, but it's also likely to divide audiences.