Far Cry

Looking back on that incredibly mopey and indulgent blog entry makes me realize what a whiny bastard I've been, a mindset that can only manifest itself if I'm feeling extremely good about myself, which I currently am. My Friday was mind-blowing in so many ways that perhaps it was the catalyst I needed to turn my shit completely around. Who can argue with a Counter burger, watching the soon-to-be-classic Moon, and kicking it with the gents for the night? The depressive attitude I had lingered on afterwards, but once this week started, I was just on top of everything.

For God's sake, I've started to go running in the early morning (10 AM is still early in my book, heh), tanning, watching Curb Your Enthusiasm and attempting to give myself a manicure (failed so, so miserably). Through just sheer force of will, I've compelled myself to change and try new things, things that have ultimately paid off in making me happy, or whatever. The house doesn't feel like a prison any more, but more like my personal playhouse. It's a nice feeling to know that everything you're doing is ultimately contributing to the benefit of your mental and physical health.

I might have broken a sobriety oath on graduation night, but I figure that a one-time exception on my graduation night is hardly a blight on my existence. I definitely don't mind doing that shit once in a while, but I am absolutely not centering my life around it. I've come to realize I can't stand it when that's the only thing to do when I'm with people. It's pointless, excessive, and often very, very boring. I'm all for hedonism, but a line's got to be drawn somewhere. I am excising the negative.

Prospects are looking bright. No jobs or whatever, but my scripts have been read by people who can actually do something for me, which I was extremely surprised and grateful for (Thanks be to Hollie). Pretty girl from Santa Barbara is talking to me, which is also great practice for the real deal, and I'm gearing up for the environment that will greet me when I go down there in July for orientation. I'm no longer petrified; I'm looking forward to it immensely. Like Poison once said, it will be "nothin' but a good time."

Bear in mind, I'm not one of those fucking hysterically positive, butter-side-up, types. The rain's just stopped. Maybe it'll be back. You never know with Bay Area weather. But at the moment, there's not much that's causing me to cut myself and writing shitty poetry with my own blood. Things are looking up for this old codger.

PS. If that agent can get my script to the right places, I will officially begin to wear a cross and sing praises of Allah. Seriously.

Iran so far away

The turmoil in Iran is an interesting situation, but I feel an ultimately futile one. American intervention in the country, like American intervention in any country, fucked the region fifty ways from Sunday. Apparently, the brilliant minds at Langley didn't consider that the millions of pissed-off Persians, strongly averse to the idea of a pro-Western puppet government would rise up against the regime and install an Islamic republic, a synonym for "despotic religious dictator state." The funnier thing about that era was that Americans were so paranoid about Communism spreading in the Middle East that we supplied weapons to Saddam Hussein, thinking "Hey, we can disarm him any time, he won't be any trouble at all!" A horrendously ironic mistake we would make not ten years later when we would arm the Taliban and train Osama bin Laden to combat the Soviets in Afghanistan. The lesson here is to 1. Not screw with the Arabs and 2. Forget about intervening anywhere.

But I digress. The Iran situation, the mass protest is symbolic of, I think, two things. First and foremost is the buildup of resentment against the Ayatollah Khomeini and his whole bullshit regime. He's the Rasputin behind the throne, in a way, the real voice behind Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad is just a figurehead, no real power, no real sway. But the youth in Iran are openly rebelling and protesting against the corruption in the government, which is to say that the next generation in Iran will remember how horrible and ridiculous this notion of a "theocractic republic" is. The youth have the capacity to change things in Iran, and I believe that they can do so if they keep up this open rebellion.

Secondly is the desire for real democracy. Now, democracy isn't always a good thing, but in this case, it's at least preferable to a Supreme Religious Prophet running things. The whole Middle East is as stable as an epileptic at a rave, but if the Iranians can do away with the extremely strict cultural norms, relax their anti-Semitism, ease in a more democratic and involved system of a government, than perhaps it'll be the first state in the region to chill the hell out. As far as Iraq is concerned, there are less attacks every day, less soldiers dying; it's a lot more stable. And if they can maintain it, perhaps set an example, then maybe Syria, Jordan, hell even Palestine, can follow suit. Israel could finally take off its body armor before going to bed.

But it all hinges on the countries stabilizing themselves. Foreign intervention will simply exacerbate matters and further alienate the Arab world. Give peace a chance, you fucking war-mongering assholes.

PS. Now all we have to do is exterminate the religious right in America and all will be well.

The best of both worlds

Well, let me tell you about the fantastic day I had! Golly, it was a hum-dinger. I woke up at around 9:30, but decided an hour of sleep would do wonders for my health. After all, there's nothing quite like getting enough rest to go about the rest of your day with! I had some cereal too, but it appears someone put the bag inside the box upside down, and then tore open the bottom of the box, so cereal went everywhere! Oh brother, but I had it all swept up in a manner of minutes! I finished the milk too. It tasted really fresh!

The day I had today was comparable to being crucified with blunt nails shaped like dongs. I'm telling you all about it if only to vent and tell you uninterested masses about my unfulfilled and putrid existence. Why do I wake up at 9:30 when the only benefits it affords me is allowing me more time to stew in my misery? I'm going back to bed, to hell with being healthy. I'd prefer to stay unconscious, where I'm not tortured by my overactive imagination and idiotic proclivities of the hooting teenagers driving down my street. But I better have some breakfast, which has been delayed by some fucking moron sabotaging the box of cereal I was planning to stuff down my craw. Now it's all over the kitchen floor and I have to sweep it up before a swarm of ants consumes it and subsequently the rest of my house. And what do you know, I just had the last of the milk and now I want to die.

Oh, how I love to exercise! I managed to finally break my record today. I wanted to see how many crunches I could complete in three minutes, and I pulled off 300! The new ten-pound barbells I picked up the other day burned up my arms something awful, but it's part of the bodybuilding process! It's a bit hot today, making exercise a lot tougher, but it'll all be worth it in the end!

Funny how managing a super-human feat like 300 crunches makes me feel just as vapid and empty as I have for the past few days. The new weights feel like several needles full of asp venom delivered straight into my major veins. If this is how people get muscles, then I am committed to eating McDonald's for the rest of my life and limiting any physical activity to strictly masturbation. And Jesus fucking Christ, it's like a Mumbai slum up in this bitch for how hot it is. If I wanted to die slowly of heat stroke, I would do jumping jacks in the Sahara.

I had a delicious meal today! Lean turkey meat on toast, with some protein bars and shakes to mix it up. I made myself a little fruit platter too, with grapes, strawberries, blueberries etc to add a bit of flavor. Golly, it was delicious. I could eat this stuff for the rest of my life, I tell you.

This fucking toaster oven is fucking broken. Why is it incapable of doing the simple task of toasting my bread? Why must I continue to reset it after every ten seconds? This turkey is drier than Hilary Clinton's vagina after a trip to the Dead Sea. Why the fuck is all this fruit rotted and soft? It's like eating a pimple or a corpse's flesh! If I ever eat this stuff again, it'll be too soon.

I finally finished The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemmingway. What an excellent book! I especially enjoyed the strong characterization of the cast, and the intriguing setting of Pamplona, Spain. The author sure loves his vivid descriptions. I do too; it makes me feel as though I'm there, running with the bulls!

Killed a nugget of time finishing up Hemmingway's first novel. Pretty exceptional work, and I especially dug all the drinking, brawling, and sex that comes with the fiesta. Of course, Hemmingway has to kill myse buzz by portraying it as vacuous and unsatisfying, so I guess it all cancels out. But it was still a fantastic read which brightened up my day a smidge. Which is right there with giving a burn victim a bandage and claiming that's about as good as it's going to get.

Time for a shower, and then I'm going to watch American Psycho! The book was one of the best pieces of contemporary literature I've ever read, so let's hope the adaptation can capture what's so special about it.

Time to stew in my filth, and then I'm going to try to add meaning to my life by watching an inevitably poor translation of one of my favorite novels. No doubt the film will tarnish whatever fond and psychotic memories I have of Ellis' fine satirical work.

PS. Hooray, I'm graduating tomorrow from an institution that prides itself on a different style of education but attempts to poorly emulate the normal going-ons at other schools. Here's to sitting in the blistering heat listening to a guest speaker blither on for forty minutes about nothing in particular.

Limp and ineffectual

I believe the song "Satisfaction" by the Rolling Stones, while an anthem on the futility of sexual reproduction, is a fully accurate description of my life at the moment. There's no way to talk about any of this without sounding like the wrist-slitting, black-eyeliner-wearing dipshit that characterizes most emos, but I believe I transcend most mortal labels because I am a God among men. Which is ironic, because omnipotent beings don't usually get massively depressed and find zero stimulation in the funnest of activities.

I'm not quite sure what it is about my sudden and acute case of the blues, but I like to think it's a combination of watching other people become successful, happy, and satisfied and being trapped in this house with nowhere to go. While I'm sure I'd be welcomed warmly at the daily smoking sessions that take place around these parts, I'd rather not because I'd simply be trading sitting in a house doing nothing for sitting in a house stoned and doing nothing. Ennui is the true killer of most people. The highlight of my week was going to lunch for half-an-hour. Because it was new. Because it was unexpected. It's small things like that that snap me out of my spell briefly before I sink back into the quagmire like a fat man trying to swim in the deep end of the pool.

And my efforts at alleviating my boredom, mixing it up with my television viewing schedule, reading new literature, exercising myself close to death in a vain attempt to be so muscular that I gain one "Ripped douchebag" card, redeemable for polo shirts and the confidence to abuse women, and watching movies. After watching Conan and loving it, I've found myself sunken into the mire of routine. He's still as hilarious as ever, but marginally less so now that he's been ingratiated into the repetition of my day-to-day activities. Reading new stuff has been fun as well, but like watching late-night television, the excitement of the newness fades away faster than a shot of heroin in the ass. The only area where I would say I've found constant stimulation in is working out, but I can't do that every day for fear of severe injury. I usually work myself to the point of near-death, and that is consistently entertaining. Movie watching has also become marginally less exciting too; I find myself rewatching old favorites for the comfort they afford me instead of experimenting with foreign and new stuff. So I guess that problem is easily remedied; I just need to find the drive to continue it. Even writing, which used to bring me so much joy when I completed a script, now brings me fleeting ecstasy that's gone within half an hour, no matter how good I think it is, or what compliments people give me.

For a while, I've been on a somewhat vain attempt at self-improvement, which I don't think is working as well as I thought. As the above paragraph mentioned, I'm still reluctant to try new things and take a gamble, which is an inherent personality flaw. I should be addressing that moreso than anything else. Confidence issues have remained buried within my deep, rotten core. It does become unlocked, however, when certain substances are introduced into the equation. Plus, irrational and envious thoughts have been a constant and consistent plague on my mental health, contributing to this seemingly inescapable torpor of sadness. I am really trying, but like the wise Linkin Park once said, "IN THE END, IT'S DOESN'T EVEN MATTER!"

Funny how I still have my sense of humor. It's pathetic how I still can't surmount that anthill.

I also acknowledge how pathetic it is that I'm taking a temporary gateway out of this suck-zone to cope with my idiotic problems. I blame nobody but myself, because self-pity is for idiots, something I strive not to be. Really though, all it takes is a nice little adventure for me to snap out of my depressive, angsty trance, and now that the summer has begun in full swing, I look onto the horizon with a healthy dose of cautious optimism that things will swing my way before I leave this hick town for greener and sexier pastures. Maybe I can finally make a movie. Maybe I can finally find the elusive lady. Maybe I can become so utterly brawny that it appears I'm built out of a brick shithouse. Maybe my perpetual plague of meekness will prevent me from attaining true greatness.

PS. Maybe I'll tie a belt around my dick and neck and proceed to swiftly masturbate myself to death.

And now for something completely different

The black colossus of a video game platform, the PS3 has, at best, a handful of genuinely must-own titles that take full advantage of the hardware and deliver a surreal and fantastic experience that cannot be replicated by any medium. And now inFamous, the latest offering from Sucker Punch Productions, a studio renowned for their games about a pilfering and hyperactive raccoon and his gang of anthropomorphic woodland mammals friends, is here to mostly justify all the money you spent on that particularly heavy paperweight.

Players step into the electrified shoes of courier Cole McGrath, the gravelly-voiced protagonist who sounds like a drunk man doing a Batman impression, whose package (not his junk, the package he's delivering) explodes and ravages Empire City, a fictitious metropolis that resembles an especially gray slum after the MacGuffin goes off. So Cole is off to do some grunt work for some lady in the CIA, his annoying sidekick Zeke, his ungrateful girlfriend, and some mysterious dude who you never actually meet, but whom Cole follows blindly anyway. The main missions are all variations on "Go here and shove lightning bolts up everyone's asses," but the game never feels repetitive. An extremely diverse palate of powers ensures you'll never stick to just one method of electric murder, and the environments are nice, varied, and easy to navigate. Summoning a lightning storm to smite a group of hoodies like you're God and they're the peasants who have displeased you simply never gets old. Neither does grinding on power lines firing explosive lightning bolts at random passerby.

The sidequests take a leaf out of Saints Row's book. Successfully completing them eradicates enemies from the rooftops, but other than that, there's no tangible reward. By contrast, Saints Row rewarded territorial control and side missions with fat stacks of in-game money for you to purchase extravagant mods for your cars and rocket launchers and pretty dresses. There's no real benefit to completing side missions in inFamous, other than not being hassled by gunfire when you leap around the rooftops. But then again, you can heal yourself by sucking the electric soul of your enemies, so mere human weapons are more of a temporary annoyance rather than anything serious, like a kitty leaping on top of your head. You can also scour the city for pieces of bling, which at least extend your power bar, so that's a side activity worth exploring, if you're a scavenging little vulture who needs to attain 100% completion in your games because you're psychotic.

The big selling point behind inFamous is the touted moral choice system, wherein every choice you make influences your appearance, how the NPCs in the game world interact with you, and what powers you unlock. It's a mostly shallow and extraneous addition, whose only purpose is to force you to play the game twice to see all the content. Sucker Punch seems to be fully aware of the whole notion of "Nice Guys Finish Last and Biggest Jerk Wins," and have thus beefed up all the evil powers to be totally mind-bendingly awesome and capable of laying waste to and enslaving all of humanity, while the good powers are about as effective as a bunny's farts. Furthermore, any choices you make won't influence the course of the story in any way whatsoever. Once you realize that, the needlessness of it all becomes painfully obvious.

The story is also an atrocious spectacle to behold, with truly awful characters and writing. There's the requisite secret cabals of evil scientists, ineffectual MacGuffins, and characters so annoying and cliche, you'll want to electrocute yourself. Even after you've written it off as a soft-science nightmare, the game throws in ridiculous plot twists that involve time travel, cloning, and mind control to spice up the story, which is right up there with adding pepper to your own vomit to give it a bit of flavor. You'll find yourself firing lightning bolts at a giant robot made of trash controlled by a malevolent, psychic hobo, meandering sewers looking for a nyphomaniac who can control minds, and fighting hoodied gangs capable of teleportation. The whole story is bananas, and as necessary as the aforementioned Karma system.

inFamous is flawed, but not so much that it burns down your house and kills your children, like Dynasty Warriors: Gundam. Despite all the negative criticism, inFamous is quite a fun game. The combat mechanics are refined and diverse, and the platforming and exploring are oodles of fun. It's just unfortunate that the story is so horrendous and the Karma system so needlessly tacked on. Ultimately, if you can overlook those flaws, you'll enjoy what inFamous has to offer. Even if you can't look past them, then you're probably a fun-hating trainspotter, or Benjamin Croshaw.

PS. I haven't done this since the 7th grade. I think my prose has improved since then, right?

Updates from Beyond

Mein Gott, I haven't updated this blog in a dog's year, though you could probably attribute that to the fact that I have nothing to angrily complain about, at least nothing that's not pressing or urgent enough to warrant such a response. Although I have to admit that the Twitter fad has me irked to the point where I would swallow asbestos before hearing another news story on how 'big' it has become. Personally, I follow Conan O'Brien's Twitter Tracker for all things related to that preposterously pointless website, that vapid hole of dullness where people pretend to be interested in the day-to-day happenings of your life when it's about as exciting or as scintillating as changing the bag on your vacuum cleaner.

Perhaps I'm speaking a little bit out of my ass, as I do have a Twitter that I experimented with occasionally over the course of two weeks, but the whole social networking thing has exploded to the point that it's getting a bit worrisome. A culture that worships lapping up the banalities of famous people, celebrities, fashion models, and foreign diplomats isn't a particularly interesting one, one that strikes me as borderline obsessed. No, not borderline, genuinely obsessed, as though we take some sort of deranged pleasure in knowing that, hey, Ashton Kutcher goes to the super market too. Maybe it's our way of giving comfort to ourselves, to know that others are sharing in our miserable, nebbish existences. Misery loves company, especially when that company has starred in atrocious romantic comedies that appeal only to pre-teens and stroke victims.

This entry is going to be rife with hypocrisy because I am on Facebook about 27 hours out of the day. And what discernible difference is there between Facebook and Twitter? With these new updates they roll out every month, soon to be nothing! So perhaps I'm a part of this cult that worships intimate knowledge of a person's life. I guess I should kill myself now.

Although I'm less into stalking celebrities and more into stalking my Facebook friends to see which of them are insufferable.

PS. There is no spoon. There is a fork though, if you check the dishwasher.