tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21418060243331219762024-02-07T00:26:25.693-05:00It's Turtles All the Way DownThis is what you do with a BA in English.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.comBlogger77125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-9777735583323159432011-06-14T12:04:00.008-04:002011-06-14T13:20:58.653-04:00Linked InI'm making a prediction right now. Eventually, we're going to see smart phones replaced by smart watches. I'm actually surprised it hasn't happened already. I imagine it would look something like this:<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCczsRs6Gdujegucx1SzRdjQNyoRch2ouHEsEV8fZVcuU4Iliya5bQPkf_YQWyX8xVACKzr4ZXVFtEnO9KAjCFNDqAAQh4rdX7fXhxyvNbZqOpHwQb5zI4dqDygW79aqUDw8vjOIvfzAK0/s1600/wrist-phone-case-ibike-rider.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 259px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCczsRs6Gdujegucx1SzRdjQNyoRch2ouHEsEV8fZVcuU4Iliya5bQPkf_YQWyX8xVACKzr4ZXVFtEnO9KAjCFNDqAAQh4rdX7fXhxyvNbZqOpHwQb5zI4dqDygW79aqUDw8vjOIvfzAK0/s400/wrist-phone-case-ibike-rider.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5618117117618635314" border="0" /></a><br />Badass.</div><br />I had a thought once that cell phones had successfully reduced an entire generation of people back to pocket watches. Wristwatches are a logical progression because it doesn't make sense to have to dig around in your pocket to tell the time. People wanna just look somewhere and know. That's why there's digital clocks on stoves, microwaves, coffee pots, computers and VCRS. And because that's not enough I also have an alarm clock, a clock on my wall and a wrist watch.<br /><br />Let me be clear. I KNOW what time it is.<br /><br />But I think the smart-watch issue is even more relevant, because if people love to do one think, they love to be on the Internet. And why shouldn't they? I've said it before and I'll say it again (right now, actually): the Internet is the most useful human invention since penicillin. Or at least the most revolutionary, because it was a game-changer in a way that not television, not the airplane, not the postal service and not even the telephone were. Alright, maybe the last two because of their basis in communication, but if you want to make that comparison, then the telephone and the postal service together are the sun and the Internet is Betelgeuse.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWWb91TXcVb8aPe-mv2IKpea7mOhuV4hRq2TJIxe32VtUfiFxdmcnZLm_1wubjCE89Z3PGMk2avyiJ_YDIO8lizw0RKCPm1My5t1yqDdLLacD1WTz0SM8abpRbHP_NwFpDLYBgXFo875Dy/s1600/starowned.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 290px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWWb91TXcVb8aPe-mv2IKpea7mOhuV4hRq2TJIxe32VtUfiFxdmcnZLm_1wubjCE89Z3PGMk2avyiJ_YDIO8lizw0RKCPm1My5t1yqDdLLacD1WTz0SM8abpRbHP_NwFpDLYBgXFo875Dy/s400/starowned.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5618118807264848114" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">Note: The speck you can't see is the sun.<br /></div><br />You can't compete with the Internet. It's more like the Industrial Revolution than a device. Type anything into Google and you'll find it. Any question on your mind or need you have. Just took a random walk through your neighborhood and want to see how many miles you went? There's a site for that. Lost your guitar tuner? Google will find one in 1/1,000,000 of a fraction of a second. For free. And that's on top of the insanely useful online library/encyclopedia that is Wikipedia and the virtual high school reunion that is Facebook, and never-ending entertainment machines like StumbleUpon and Youtube and Reddit. All free, all constantly updating. And the list goes on.<br /><br />So people want to be linked in. All the time. In class, at work, at home, on a walk through the woods on a beautiful day, because "you've created such a high bar of stimulus that <span style="font-style: italic;">nothing </span>competes." - Louis C.K. The only problem is it ties your hands up. You have to put something down to pull your smart phone out of your pocket, whether it's a sandwich, a baby or a video game controller. So put it on your wrist like you're in Fallout 3.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg14stf0Zib5uYae7E3V_LcjPg_bLED__g60cXXaDCLVBWLyGFNlx_eIObmu6uMFrcTACLKUW1fZqnPo9ytx6g1dKAu-KIWVifGogJ2ZYynNiJo3mCeGUS71jk1BDTPmlRGQEWiTO3IFO2w/s1600/pipboy.jpeg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 386px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg14stf0Zib5uYae7E3V_LcjPg_bLED__g60cXXaDCLVBWLyGFNlx_eIObmu6uMFrcTACLKUW1fZqnPo9ytx6g1dKAu-KIWVifGogJ2ZYynNiJo3mCeGUS71jk1BDTPmlRGQEWiTO3IFO2w/s400/pipboy.jpeg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5618123215271279282" border="0" /></a><br />Only smaller.<br /></div><br />I think the ultimate goal here is to be linked in permanently, whether we want to be or not. We're extremely social creatures, and for good reason. Without wanting and needing to be social, we never could have progressed the way we did as a species. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Kurzweil">Ray Kurzweil</a> predicts that we will eventually merge with our technology through the use of nanobots, becoming something more than the human species that we are now (though I'm sure this is a crazy over-simplification of what he actually said). I remember reading an interview of his a few years ago where he stated that man has always been merging with his own technology, ever since we first picked up sticks and rocks and used them as tools. Now, when I see people glued to their iPhones, linked into this hivemind of the Internet, streaming information and collective experiences into their brains, I have to think he's right.<br /><br />It also brings to mind "The Last Question", a short story by Isaac Asimov where (spoiler) through the ability to combine the collective consciousness of the species, the human race eventually becomes God and reverses the entropy of the universe by creating the universe anew. This to me says two things: 1: Life, in so many ways, imitates science fiction (or science fiction writers are especially prolific in their predictions of technological advancement) and 2: People sitting on toilets with smart phones playing Angry Birds and checking their Twitter are the first step in a long journey to becoming God.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-83209487569179990202011-03-26T11:45:00.017-04:002011-04-07T14:32:31.908-04:00Sleep ProblemsI've always had a hard time falling asleep.<br />As a child with a bedtime, I think it's safe to say I spent an hour of every day of my life lying awake in bed, daydreaming in the dark, talking to myself and just generally not falling asleep. As a teenager I stopped trying all together, and stayed up reading or on the computer long after it was sensible for my 6 o'clock high school wake-up schedule. I just don't like to lie awake in bed. It's boring and it's tedious, and my brain is an alright guy but he's really chatty and can be really negative. So unless I'm using him to complete a specific task or think about things that matter to me, I'd rather not be alone with him.<br /><br />Through college and into my early adulthood I've continued to stay up late and avoid the dark isolation of trying to fall asleep, but recently things have changed. It used to be that I could stay up until 4 in the morning and wake up at 10 a.m. and feel fine, but now, maybe because I'm getting older, the trick has been working less and less. If I stay up until 4 a.m. I sleep until 2 in the afternoon, and that gets old after a few weeks of seeing the sun set only a few hours after you wake up. So, against my better judgment and years of experience, I've been trying to fall asleep at a somewhat decent time these past few nights. And the shit is starting up again.<br />The other night, Lindsay and I went to bed at about quarter after 1 in the morning, planning to fall asleep to Scott Pilgrim vs. The World.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgkNRNj1_-5RDUTZmKL30uwREemPkmFQB5P-CIIdMkzHDrqwwZuV03fJf7-lKG6H4R61D_5_YluumIZpdEqiOtSrtFiGkN9Kw_1M4PJuQ54wJgK2Gn0FkyDZtbY2ZHc80R25gD8bk5sx0m/s1600/scott_pilgrim_vs_the_world_dvd_cover.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 285px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgkNRNj1_-5RDUTZmKL30uwREemPkmFQB5P-CIIdMkzHDrqwwZuV03fJf7-lKG6H4R61D_5_YluumIZpdEqiOtSrtFiGkN9Kw_1M4PJuQ54wJgK2Gn0FkyDZtbY2ZHc80R25gD8bk5sx0m/s400/scott_pilgrim_vs_the_world_dvd_cover.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5588430935731559378" border="0" /></a><br />Hell yes.<br /><br />Anyways, as the credits rolled two hours later and I found myself wide awake, I had two choices. I could get up, get on my computer and Stumble until my eyes burned enough that I genuinely wanted to close them, or I could lay in the darkness and hope that, just maybe, my brain would be merciful enough to leave me alone.<br /><br />The thing about lying awake at night is that your brain latches on to one particular thought and won't shut up about it. "Let's think about this thing until you go CRAZY," is what your brain says. On this particular night, I found myself thinking, of all things, about a wooden box I built in high school and is currently holding all of the Animorphs books I own at my parents' house. It was for a Pandora's Box project for my mythology class, and it looks like this:<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijCZJMcqd-SeRn1THOzlD7xWI77vgWwuSuGzapxPAUYzoywV8e_5b5lRwnuJgqaBtVTa3n42G-pRRsFwEC66oUe_PtIToC2QCmcYwevto0udO9eaNGMrLbaw-Ae-L3VRV2pdZSBuRpN-1r/s1600/box.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 351px; height: 289px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijCZJMcqd-SeRn1THOzlD7xWI77vgWwuSuGzapxPAUYzoywV8e_5b5lRwnuJgqaBtVTa3n42G-pRRsFwEC66oUe_PtIToC2QCmcYwevto0udO9eaNGMrLbaw-Ae-L3VRV2pdZSBuRpN-1r/s400/box.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5588452778342832578" border="0" /></a><br />So anyways, I was thinking about this box, and about how it was one of the few substantial things I've ever made from scratch, and about how easy it was and how I could do it again if I ever needed a box for anything.<br /><br />But then I was like... wait, how did I make that box again?<br />And my brain was like LET'S FIGURE IT OUT!<br /><br />Because here's the problem: I remembered distinctly that I walked straight into the store, bought the wood, came home, and nailed that damn box together. It was just that simple. I didn't measure, and I didn't remember cutting anything. What I <span style="font-style: italic;">did</span> remember was buying wood that looked like this:<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrr4g1P0GTVoobP5CqT2GdPW3Dt1vn5wsvYbZDHiAE8i35iKkflIIs4rlX2H5dZ4K8GRLKM9FzmlY1U2yIpRH2WBQp0TfHCLpjPLMp0qJ8IDyax7NuR3ke9yYvImP1olEuCVa_CXqIyUP5/s1600/boxparts.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 351px; height: 325px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrr4g1P0GTVoobP5CqT2GdPW3Dt1vn5wsvYbZDHiAE8i35iKkflIIs4rlX2H5dZ4K8GRLKM9FzmlY1U2yIpRH2WBQp0TfHCLpjPLMp0qJ8IDyax7NuR3ke9yYvImP1olEuCVa_CXqIyUP5/s400/boxparts.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5588436004035298962" border="0" /></a><br />But wait, if that was what I bought, how could I have possibly made the box? Because by nailing these parts together there would always be the same basic flaw in design. There are variations of this flaw, but really you can only have two basic outcomes with these materials.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC3oJoXycA_9oNGEcunRI6WBXEALmZUtNsfNLMbWwN48vGEkZfalJhf3UJTyhyo06oUfBWdeuXDnqRixcFYb_U63dHeRUWZcxOHKXRMkPb1qsDnU6IrPgGtPhMyc-8eRZU6a1J4vox_GYH/s1600/boxproblems.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 265px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC3oJoXycA_9oNGEcunRI6WBXEALmZUtNsfNLMbWwN48vGEkZfalJhf3UJTyhyo06oUfBWdeuXDnqRixcFYb_U63dHeRUWZcxOHKXRMkPb1qsDnU6IrPgGtPhMyc-8eRZU6a1J4vox_GYH/s400/boxproblems.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5588441239088485922" border="0" /></a><br />And my brain went over these two options over and over and OVER again, even though I was like: "Please stop. This is stupid. Let's think about something else."<br />My brain was like NO SLEEP FOR YOU UNTIL WE FIGURE THIS OUT.<br />And I was like, "Next time I'm home I will look at the box and everything will make sense again, I promise."<br />And my brain was like HAHAHA NOPE! NOT SOON ENOUGH! WE NEED TO KNOW NOW! MAYBE MOM CAN TAKE PICTURES OF THE BOX AND E-MAIL THEM TO US, AND THEN WE CAN DERIVE HOW THE BOX WAS BUILT. YOU SHOULD CALL HER TOMORROW.<br />And I was like "That is ridiculous. We will not be doing that."<br />So my brain was like YOU BETTER GET TO WORK THEN. THINK ABOUT THE BOX. THE BOX. THE BOX. BOX BOX BOX BOX.<br /><br />To appease my brain I attempted to reach a compromise. An answer that, while not technically correct, could at least logically explain how a box could conceivably be constructed from these materials. It would be something like this:<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggPLLn9WtYnz68F9507Ub_gB3mvsP43a20ilLHUJyff7SXlRjG35_EvhKMC418cUfwYmdHMX81ZdEYEAcpK2SdqP8ahYtcOWo-t4o4P1vcomklJf2e1rHOpo2Ec6Xy3VQ6yuaDAOMr89uk/s1600/boxcompromise.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 351px; height: 205px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggPLLn9WtYnz68F9507Ub_gB3mvsP43a20ilLHUJyff7SXlRjG35_EvhKMC418cUfwYmdHMX81ZdEYEAcpK2SdqP8ahYtcOWo-t4o4P1vcomklJf2e1rHOpo2Ec6Xy3VQ6yuaDAOMr89uk/s400/boxcompromise.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5588453923724384322" border="0" /></a><br />And my brain was like LOL NOPE. THAT WASN'T IT. KEEP TRYING.<br /><br />So I laid there, alternating between the only two possible outcomes from my PROBLEMS pictures above, for a good solid half an hour. It was awful and frustrating and full of irrational thoughts like "What if I need a box? I'll never be able to build a box again! I've forgotten how!" Again I tried to trick my brain, arguing that perhaps I had forgotten steps in the process of making the box. Maybe the box did, in fact, jut out unevenly like in the first example. Maybe I had made measurements to account for the extra inch hanging over the top like in the second example.<br /><br />And then it hit me.<br />I HAD cut the wood.<br /><br />I hadn't bought four long pieces and two square end pieces. I bought six long pieces and did this:<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBzVFgh7saGV53yVLYYeOhZNwpwFCKgGn5Oni1D_fZjjgMnN4P1n4NAVfVdzIAvT3X3gfq_5BlLeW35_YcPQeqPSg-vzjQGwMYEFGN871wrp6QoSp36m55cXuNWLDJLbfBIlwDJ7hoDnZ/s1600/boxtada.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 268px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBzVFgh7saGV53yVLYYeOhZNwpwFCKgGn5Oni1D_fZjjgMnN4P1n4NAVfVdzIAvT3X3gfq_5BlLeW35_YcPQeqPSg-vzjQGwMYEFGN871wrp6QoSp36m55cXuNWLDJLbfBIlwDJ7hoDnZ/s400/boxtada.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5588446804138801106" border="0" /></a><br />And so the mystery was solved! There was much rejoicing.<br /><br />Then my brain was like, "Wow, you were right. That was a stupid thing to spend so much time on. You should write a blog entry about this because it was so silly."<br />And I was like, "Yeah, maybe."<br />And my brain was like, "But how would you explain it? You would have to draw a lot of pictures. I wonder what they would look like..."<br /><br />I didn't fall asleep until 5 a.m.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-67154001513197833562011-03-10T19:15:00.005-05:002011-03-10T20:10:42.300-05:00We Have No RightsGeorge Carlin used to have a routine about how, contrary to popular belief, we don't actually have any rights. You know, like the right to free speech, due process, trial by jury, and the right to be absolved from cruel and unusual punishment. We don't have these rights, Carlin said, because at any moment they can be taken away from us. To illuminate this point he referenced the interment of Japanese-Americans in 1942, where over 110,000 American citizens were jailed without due process or any rights at all except, as Carlin said, "Right this way! Into the internment camp."<br /><br />And to me, Carlin is spot on with this assessment of rights in America, or anywhere else for that matter. Rights are privileges, he says, and temporary at that, because nothing is a right if it can be taken away. They're certainly not God-given rights. They're ideas, invented by humans, and which can be erased by humans. And you don't have to go back to 1942 to see action like this in the United States.<br /><br />I just finished a book called Zeitoun (pronounced Zay-toon) which centered on the life of a man named Abdulrahman Zeitoun, his wife Kathy and his four children in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.<br /><br />To make a long story short, Zeitoun was a carpenter, painter and business owner in New Orleans when the hurricane hit in 2005. Because he had so many responsibilities to various properties in the city, he stayed behind to weather the storm while his wife and children fled to family and friends elsewhere in the country. He had no idea how bad the storm would be, and in the aftermath he spent his time not repairing properties but saving people from their flooded homes (the water reached the second story windows of most houses, even on the north side of the city where he lived) and feeding dogs left to die by their owners.<br /><br />After about a week of rescue work, Zeitoun and three companions were arrested in a house that Zeitoun himself owned, were not read their rights, were not charged with a crime, and were taken to a Greyhound bus station where an enormous makeshift jail had been erected. Without charges he was handcuffed, strip-searched, probed and imprisoned by heavily armed guards with no discernible identities or affiliations to a particular law enforcement agency. He was kept for days at the Greyhound station, and then transported to a maximum security prison. All in all he served almost a full month without a phone call, a hearing or bail. The companions arrested with him were held at longest for eight months, and all charges were eventually dropped.<br /><br />It was so unbelievable to read this about the United States in 2005, that in a time of catastrophe while people were struggling to escape the roofs of their houses and find clean water, so much effort was being put into arresting and detaining innocent civilians. In another account, one that received media attention in New Orleans at the time, a 73 year-old-woman was wrongly-arrested for looting when she was carrying a package of sausage from her car to her hotel room. She was incarcerated in a maximum security prison for over two weeks. In another incident, a woman working at the Greyhound prison compound threatened a reporter to leave the premises or else she would "throw him in a cage."<br /><br />And I'm reading this book in the midst of news that Michigan Governor Rick Snyder has plans to implement policies that could dissolve local governments and unseat elected officials under the direction of a single, unelected authority figure or board of directors.<br /><br />And in Wisconsin the governor was attempting to eliminate the right of union bargaining in order, I can only guess, to further oppress the working class.<br /><br />And the Patriot Act was extended at the end of February and the crazy power granted to authority figures under that act is still in effect.<br /><br />And when the American government observes a person's right not to be tortured or detained indefinitely without trial, they simply move those operations to other countries.<br /><br />And racial profiling of Mexican Americans is now protocol in Arizona, shifting the burden of proof off of the state and on to the individual, who must now make excuses for his or her right to live in a country they are a legal citizen of.<br /><br />And I just realized earlier this week that I watch what I say on the phone because, in my heart, I don't 100% believe that there's absolutely no chance someone is listening.<br /><br />Because we have no rights.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-69442698297364782542011-01-09T00:35:00.010-05:002011-01-12T15:14:34.335-05:00News and Human Rights 8: Now Illegal to be Mexican in Ariz.In a shocking and unconstitutional abuse of authority exercised earlier this week, it is now officially illegal to be a Mexican-American in the state of Arizona. This turn of events came as a surprise to many, due to the grossly racist nature of the law in the supposedly progressive 21st century, but others claim the decision was only a matter of time. These more pessimistic views are espoused by citizens who cite other racially-based legal decisions that have come to pass in the state within the last year.<br /><br />Some claim that the law of early 2010, which required Mexican-Americans to carry proof of citizenship at all times, and then the banning of a Mexican-American Studies class at a high school earlier this month, began the slippery slope that led to the outlawing of these citizens all together.<br /><br />In the controversial decision to end the Mexican-American Studies course, Ariz. school's chief John Huppenthal cited (among more flagrantly racist and laughably inadequate reasons) a need to focus on "the basics" in order to improve Tucson test scores. It can be assumed that "the basics" include being white, and that white people are usually right and do good things. Especially in our nation's history.<br /><br />Sources report that, in conjunction with a Republican initiative to reopen the 14th constitutional amendment defining citizenship, that the Ariz. government may currently be in the works to outlaw citizens with African, Asian, Latino, Native American and all other non-Anglo Saxon, Christian heritage.<br /><br />A government insider claims homosexuals may also be on their way out of Ariz. if proper legal precedents are created through the marginalization of other, more easily recognizable minority groups.<br /><br />"Jews too. Don't forget Jews. I just sort of hate everybody," said an Ariz. government official.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-16896652416095672672010-10-12T01:17:00.004-04:002010-10-12T01:41:04.732-04:00Ninja Stole My BikeSomebody stole my bike a few nights ago.<br />Maybe while I was in the house.<br />Bitch move, bike thief.<br />I use that bike to get to work, and I need to work because I want to have money without being a total asshole who steals bikes off of porches even though they're chained up, and stealing the bike requires busting out not one but TWO wood panels from the railing.<br />Two huge bummers about this, besides losing my primary mode of work-related transportation:<br />1. I've had this bike since I was like 11. And it was a good bike, too. It had all ten speeds (even though I only used 3 and 4) and it looked pretty cool. It was white and blue and just sort of a good looking bike, not stupid and small like a BMX or dumb and curvy like a hipster bike.<br />2. I don't know the brand name of my bike! Shame on me as a bike owner, I guess. I just never took the time to learn it's name, so when I called the cops to file my one-in-a-million-chance-this-is-going-to-work-anyways police report, they were like "What kind of bike was it," and I was like "I don't know," and they were like, "Well this conversation is pretty much finished then, isn't it?"<br /><br />What really irks me is, in this day and age, I feel like a bike is probably one of the worst things you could ever steal from someone. Like, really, a totally uncalled for bullshit move.<br />Not only is my bike good for me and good for the environment, I NEED THAT BIKE TO GET PLACES. Two and a half miles is a big difference on foot as opposed to on a bike. Like a half hour difference. So what we have here is a person poor enough to steal a bike hurting the livelihood of a person who's poor enough to actually rely on a bike to get somewhere. This kind of poor-eat-poor attitude is responsible for so much demoralizing in the lower-class of our society, and I would venture a guess that similar circumstances result in the creation of criminals. I mean, why would I bother to go buy another bike? So it can get stolen again? Why not just steal one, if that's the rules my neighbors are choosing to play by?<br /><br />Oh man, you are just the worst kind of person.<br /><br />Anyways, I'm putting out a hit on this douche bag, and I'm offering a reward of one incredibly enthusiastic high five to anyone who returns my bike and/or punches the thief in the mouth.<br />I have reason to believe he looks something like this:<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQA6zOfmgCZgotQbnKocJI-JQcQfcTwSAsa8gWbCBMokHiD4yjCTklevyfeuTsDiqXE-IkpXRhDNtZSVqN9NtpadQ48Spg2AAxotf-GoaRhFVAuITtJI7paQjYn8RxqtvYtyk84xF0RZsJ/s1600/bikethief.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 260px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQA6zOfmgCZgotQbnKocJI-JQcQfcTwSAsa8gWbCBMokHiD4yjCTklevyfeuTsDiqXE-IkpXRhDNtZSVqN9NtpadQ48Spg2AAxotf-GoaRhFVAuITtJI7paQjYn8RxqtvYtyk84xF0RZsJ/s400/bikethief.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5527029147314208066" border="0" /></a>Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-67967667128721241572010-08-18T03:12:00.002-04:002010-08-18T03:22:16.964-04:00PerspectiveI get embarrassed when I get frustrated about little stuff.<br />And it's all little stuff.<br />Because I could die at any second, so really, being alive is pretty damn cool. Don't you think?Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-51705984819336841282010-07-30T22:19:00.003-04:002010-07-30T22:31:23.046-04:00An Open Letter to Incoming Western Michigan University FreshmanDear New Comers,<br /><br />You can take Kalamazoo, I'm done with it. You can take the student ghetto and the East Hall view and the Westnedge Hill. You can take pit bull puppies for sale on every corner and the north side, which is two miles away from a country club. You can take The Den and the Little Theater and the Dorms. You can take all three blocks of downtown.<br /><br />It's your turn to go to the WMU theater productions. It's your turn to work at Mongolian BBQ or Old Burdick's or some other shitty college job and hate it. It's your turn to get outrageously drunk on the weekends. And outrageously drunk on the weekdays. It's your turn to get rejected by the Laureate. It's your turn to try and write a book, since you're so smart.<br /><br />You can take the Welcome Week frat parties and the games of flip cup and beer pong. It's your turn to do your first beer bong. It's your turn to read books and take classes and meet professors that will change the way you see the world forever. You can take playing bass in a bar band. You can take Harvey's and Up and Under's and Shakespeare's. You can take the crackheads on the street that ask for change and you can take the crackheads that live in my building and ask stupid questions.<br /><br />You can take it all. Just know that I was here first and I did it better.<br /><br />Love,<br />Jordan WhiteJordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-44868120233123957352010-07-24T01:54:00.003-04:002010-07-24T02:15:38.335-04:00Comedians and the Truth<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFGrzmkNcJY1lof8Eux8DNVpR7x-va3-kr1bjzM7e-zweKVvC1RxIYDuo6J6Uc5gfZGRxs6Dh5wuWWrOuRUFKOZR5Jzk-6axQjyfeHze3sfYGMC-V1UNEJFPQDaWCRzuh6dyIq83H5vMzr/s1600/billHicks.jpeg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 236px; height: 321px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFGrzmkNcJY1lof8Eux8DNVpR7x-va3-kr1bjzM7e-zweKVvC1RxIYDuo6J6Uc5gfZGRxs6Dh5wuWWrOuRUFKOZR5Jzk-6axQjyfeHze3sfYGMC-V1UNEJFPQDaWCRzuh6dyIq83H5vMzr/s400/billHicks.jpeg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5497351839535082466" border="0" /></a><br />My natural instinct, when I am thoroughly impressed by something or someone, is to emulate. I think this accounts for a large part of my personality. I interact with or watch or read about people that I respect and admire, and so I emulate them by consciously pushing myself to take on their admirable character traits.<br /><br />This exists outside of my own personal development as well. It explains my chosen profession (by which I am referring to my attempt to become a professional novelist) because books were the first things that really spoke to be and made sense to me, and their impact on my life was so great that my natural instinct was to create my own.<br /><br />I think it's fair to say that the only other thing in my life that garners this sort of reaction from me is stand-up comedy. Other forms of art, such as music or poetry or painting or dancing, those are to be admired from a distance because I think that, on a fundamental level, my brain is not geared to understand them. Something about stand-up comedy, though, has always captivated me. I remember the first special I ever saw was Sinbad's "Afros and Bell Bottoms," and whenever it came on Comedy Central I would watch it until it ended. Before that it was Bill Cosby tapes with childhood friends, and later it would be Lewis Black, Mitch Hedberg, Dennis Leary, Daniel Tosh, Dave Chappelle, Bill Burr, Louis C.K. and, of course, Bill Hicks.<br /><br />When I listen to Bill Hicks, I want to put everything else in my life on hold and run out to a comedy club and become him. I want to carry on that torch, the essence of what he was trying to do, and continue to do it for him. That's the gut reaction I have when I hear him.<br /><br />What I find so interesting about stand-up comedians is that we live in a culture that is so delusional and misguided and indirect that these men can go up on stages in front of crowds and do nothing other than deliver the truth, and make living off of it. Comedians like Hicks (though I guess there never really was another one like him) have the intelligence and the wit to look at political situations, or common experiences we all share as a species, and strip away the pseudonyms and euphemisms and the pleasantries and expose the absolute, flat-out absurdity of everyday life on this planet, as this species, living within all the strange rules we've set up for ourselves. And I am so astounded by that, that it takes a man with a microphone to remind you that things are not always as they seem.<br /><br />It seems that this is where we have come to as a race: the truth is so rare that it has become a commodity.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-64910536293099847352010-05-18T18:17:00.004-04:002010-05-20T16:14:35.503-04:00YeerksI'm here today to talk to you about yeerks. I know I already wrote a blog about the Animorphs this year, but I don't care. Here's another one.<br /><br />The reason that yeerks have been on my mind lately is that I've been watching a fair amount of Doctor Who with Lindsay. The premise of the show is that the Doctor is in possession of the last time machine in the universe, and he can use it not only to travel through time but to travel through space. The appeal of this show is that, like with Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the possibilities are infinite and the overwhelming size of the universe is a central focus of the plot.<br />Now, I am the kind of person that immediately wants to emulate the things that impress me the most. Case-in-point, I read a lot of fiction when I was a kid, it made sense to me and I enjoyed it, so now I am trying to create my own fiction. Stand-up comedy also has this effect on me. This characteristic applies to more specific genres as well, so when I see a good science fiction epic, all I want to do is write one of my own. And what do you need to write a good epic? You need good and evil. You need the hero and you need the arch villain. You need other things too, obviously, but these are the most important and without them you might as well forget everything else because it'll never work.<br /><br />And so immediately I find myself unable to write a science fiction epic, because I can think of no greater enemy than the yeerks. I mean seriously.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibCmv2NKm-6KTfv4XUAFHS2yOu0dpRBvt5gFp0nKQtecRj71ajCF12YXQXvMrUnUZZKmHQfiZV3BUSFdzm8Xz66M2xr1sge0Yq85Ei2FjWptGmMn8IVA7-PjB2uEEBfKFCJlJK7wc4YVxY/s1600/yeerks.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 221px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibCmv2NKm-6KTfv4XUAFHS2yOu0dpRBvt5gFp0nKQtecRj71ajCF12YXQXvMrUnUZZKmHQfiZV3BUSFdzm8Xz66M2xr1sge0Yq85Ei2FjWptGmMn8IVA7-PjB2uEEBfKFCJlJK7wc4YVxY/s400/yeerks.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5473447586301738658" border="0" /></a><br />The yeerks are a race of parasitic slugs that enslave worlds from the inside out by slowly and methodically conquering the minds of each individual in the population. They squeeze their bodies in through the ear canal, wrap their bodies around the actual brain of the person they're occupying, and take full control of that person's every action and movement.<br /><br />What evil this is! What an incredible concept. These things imprison their hosts within their own bodies. Forever. The host must watch helplessly as the yeerk uses his or her body as a disguise and tricks the host's family members and friends into suffering a similar fate.<br /><br />But, there's a twist. Because without conquering other species and without inhabiting the mind of other creatures, the yeerks are condemned to a blind existence swimming around in muddy pools. Once they feel the sun on their skin and see the world and learn to eat and speak and run and do all the great stuff other creatures can do, they can't ever go back to that. So it's sort of a bitter-sweet war for them, and a nightmare for everything else in their path.<br /><br />It's absolutely brilliant and I can't top it. Of all the infinite possibilities that the vast nature of the universe allows me, I simply can't beat a mind-controlling army of emotionally complicated slugs. And neither can anyone else. Just watch Doctor Who. The arch enemies of that show are goofy-ass robots with high-pitched nerd voices.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXxJ54NOnl58runHc5Q2oRthGPmzhumdijg8RjL7WZ1lZguM8xZVgBYVkJFWk6MIL3WPZzpdEtIOnBU68Qp1hotb1CO9N2qiH9CAEpYL7Y1PxTm2WuUh6EHs3nP2Jfnu-BOysrbLawVupU/s1600/doctor_who_dalek_gold.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 310px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXxJ54NOnl58runHc5Q2oRthGPmzhumdijg8RjL7WZ1lZguM8xZVgBYVkJFWk6MIL3WPZzpdEtIOnBU68Qp1hotb1CO9N2qiH9CAEpYL7Y1PxTm2WuUh6EHs3nP2Jfnu-BOysrbLawVupU/s400/doctor_who_dalek_gold.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5473448060169430402" border="0" /></a><br /> EXTERMINATE!Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-11516391352315053712010-04-30T15:39:00.003-04:002010-04-30T15:51:24.717-04:00BEDA 30: The Final DayYou're probably wondering:<br />What was it like to blog every day for an entire month? Was it exciting? Was it frightening? Did you feel stretched too thin and run out of ideas and have to talk about muffins?<br />Well... yeah. That happened one time.<br /><br />Mostly what happened though was that I took the thing that was most consistently on my mind that day and wrote about it. Writing is an outlet, and it's just about the only one I have. I need to get all of this stuff out of my head, even if it is like trying to express the size of the ocean by seeing the trickle it would become if you were to push it through a funnel. Which is, pretty much, what I think all art is.<br /><br />Not to say that blogging is art.<br /><br />Anyways, blogging every day was an interesting experience and I got to make up for a lot of lost writing on this blog. I mean, when I started this thing I thought I'd be updating three times a week about something I learned in college, the book I was reading, and a news and human rights article. It was only after embarking on this mission that I realized this was a goal best left to someone without a full-time job. It was just too much work, which is what BEDA almost turned out to be. More obligations are unwanted in my life, and I'm glad to be done with this one even if it was small.<br /><br />This year in It's Turtles All the Way Down will probably be a more relaxed year. Less of an attempt at organization or agenda. No more College for Free, no more News and Human Rights. Probably the occasional book, but probably a lot more of the stuff you saw during BEDA. Relaxed observations about the world with attempts at humor.<br /><br />Now, expect a long hiatus from me. BEDA is over and I have other stuff I need to do.<br />Not adult stuff, though. I mean like write more web comics.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-89335103507202702202010-04-29T14:32:00.004-04:002010-04-29T15:00:25.274-04:00BEDA 29: XIII Is Not As Good As VII Because...Man, I am such a liar.<br />Two things I lied about in the past 24 hours:<br />1. That the blog I wrote yesterday would be a work in progress.<br />Nope! It's done. Aside from a few spelling and grammar mistakes I cleaned up just now, that blog is over with. We're moving on.<br />2. That I would write about something more interesting that Final Fantasy XIII today.<br />Nope! You get more of the same. Sorry, Dad.<br /><br /><br />Lindsay asked me last night what rating (1 to 10) I would give Final Fantasy XIII, and I must say I was hard-pressed to answer her question. I mean, what constitutes a 1? What constitutes a 10? Can it be a 9? Is it that close to a perfect game? But then, when considering the entertainment value overall, it must get points for being such a long game, right?<br />Well, here is my answer:<br />It was good, but it was no Final Fantasy VII. And nothing ever will be.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYFWlCcvokkvzhOH_KfND7L-yzcCSzQXtR6jy63b9J-jIk3wtX_TvcI2odz8HEJbhuVeRBhRw4PTTMel4C32FQApf4pta75btfWm21zP-Lo1dGw8V4l5PJBM4kXtz0eGWOw0-pAbLZgXTs/s1600/final-fantasy-vii.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYFWlCcvokkvzhOH_KfND7L-yzcCSzQXtR6jy63b9J-jIk3wtX_TvcI2odz8HEJbhuVeRBhRw4PTTMel4C32FQApf4pta75btfWm21zP-Lo1dGw8V4l5PJBM4kXtz0eGWOw0-pAbLZgXTs/s400/final-fantasy-vii.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465634484394017234" /></a><br />FF VII, both because of the game's quality and the time in my life that I played it, will never ever be trumped for best video game in my eyes, ever. It will never be touched. No other game will ever come close. Every aspect of that game was perfect for me. It is the bar by which all other games must be judged, and typically while I play a game I am thinking on some level "This is not as good as Final Fantasy VII because..."<br /><br />XIII is not as good as VII because XIII leaves very little to the imagination. All the characters speak with voices instead of text. They are extremely well animated and spend a lot of their time in movie cut-scenes rather than silent, text-based, visually unimpressive segways with awesome music playing in the background.<br /><br />XIII is not as good as VII because the scope of XIII is too narrow. Literally everything that happens in XIII happens in 13 days, and half of those are flashbacks. This amount of time is completely insufficient to build the plot, the lead-up, the sense of a quest, and the camaraderie between the characters. VII's flashbacks span decades and the game-play itself progresses over what feels like months.<br /><br />XIII is not as good as VII because there was no world map. By nature of the game I understand that going to different towns and flying around in an airship was impossible, but still. I'm just saying. In VII you got to explore THE ENTIRE world. This freedom of space combined with the passage of time made the scope of VII so enormous that after you played for 60 hours, it really felt like you had played for 60 hours. I'm all for linear games, I don't like side-quests, but XIII's extremely linear storyline and narrow world map made the game feel sort of small to me despite the 54 hours I spent on it.<br /><br />XIII is not as good as VII because VII's materia system was absolutely perfect and Square should just stick to it and stop messing with other bullshit leveling systems.<br /><br />XIII is not as good as VII because of Sephiroth. Period.<br /><br />Alright, I'm done talking about Final Fantasy XIII now. For real. That's all I had to say about it.<br />And that said, it still was a really amazing game and I really enjoyed playing it. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys FF games. Unlike that piece of shit XII.<br />It's just, you know, not as good as VII.<br /><br />Tomorrow is my final blog in BEDA! Woo!Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-29626906326445210422010-04-28T15:55:00.007-04:002010-04-29T14:32:27.670-04:00BEDA 28: Final Fantasy XIIIIn honor of my dad's birthday, I'm going to give you a full review of Final Fantasy XIII!<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirNf3aVf2YYxzF5Gf3H29mMswGsM0G5nf4HpGXP4GGspDTDHy0uKM_kV1UPki5uqqVkN7SHv6uUSk3rjlRXa9AO6JHZ55UWWVzil0vrH9CFZhKrhQeex8YWcBPTQ4UzfCNSm1zlmTMT_WH/s1600/final-fantasy-xiii.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 225px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirNf3aVf2YYxzF5Gf3H29mMswGsM0G5nf4HpGXP4GGspDTDHy0uKM_kV1UPki5uqqVkN7SHv6uUSk3rjlRXa9AO6JHZ55UWWVzil0vrH9CFZhKrhQeex8YWcBPTQ4UzfCNSm1zlmTMT_WH/s400/final-fantasy-xiii.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465279696314352002" border="0" /></a><br />Alright, so these things aren't directly related, but it is my dad's birthday and I did finish FFXIII today, so they do have something in common.<br />Actually, this is a totally inappropriate blog for today because I can't think of anything my dad would be less interested in or understand less.<br />Sorry dad! I'll write something more interesting tomorrow.<br />Now, for a full review of Final Fantasy XIII.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Plot:<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span>The Final Fantasy series is one that prides itself on plot. On the title screen you can see that the character designer for the game gets his name right up front for everyone to see. This position of importance for such a specific role should tell you how important plot is here. Some of the greatest characters in video game history have come out of the Final Fantasy franchise, and it's a position that deserves a lot of respect. It's also a position that must create a tremendous amount of anxiety in the creator, as a failure to follow through on the success of the past is simultaneously guaranteed and unacceptable in the eyes of the gamers. All we want is another Cloud, another Sephiroth, another Kefka...<br /><br />That said, it is amazing to me how often Final Fantasy fails to offer us a central villain that we can focus on. Really, the two character names that stand out most in FF history are the villains, primarily Sephiroth and Kefka. The names of the heroes are numerous and tend to fade in our memories, but you'll never forget the names of those villains that you hated and attempted to destroy for 50 hours of your life. And yet FFXIII fails to deliver here just as 8,9 and 12 did before it.<br />A lack of a clear cut central villain always takes away from the plot, but FFXIII made up for it in a way by simplifying the story line to a "save the world" mission and pitting the heroes against everyone while on a clearly defined goal.<br />Well, sort of, it gets a little muddy at the end.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br />The Battle System:<br /><br /></span>Final Fantasy XIII introduces into the series one of the greatest combat systems known to man. It's really like the game designers went directly to the fans and said "What do you like about the final fantasy battle system and what don't you like about it?" and based the style around that.<br /><ul><li>Instead of a long and unorganized list of items that you have to scroll through in the heat of battle, you get like five.</li><li>Your AI is beautiful and functions on its own through two flawless systems. One is that through the use of your Libra ability you can see the weaknesses of all your enemies and your AI will act accordingly. Two is that, through the new "role" system, the actions of the AI are limited to one of six roles of combat.</li><li>A rating system after reach battle (based on your speed and represented by 1 to 5 stars) forces you to constantly reevaluate your playing and makes players think differently about the game.</li></ul>Things I didn't like about the system mostly revolved around the issue of lead-character dominance in battle. I absolutely love to summon, and by the nature of this system you are extremely limited in your summoning ability. By keeping Lightning up front for most of the game, I was limited to her one and only summon any time I wanted to bust him out. Of course I was able to switch around the team and put other characters into lead positions, but once I found a team I was comfortable with and was by far superior to any other team I could think of, I didn't want to mess with all that. Especially as I trudged through a menagerie of harder and harder enemies in order to reach my final destination. I wanted a strong team, not diversity for diversity's sake.<br />That said, even if I had been able to use all of the summons at any given time, the summons in this game were weird Transformer-esque teammates who came out and fought beside you for a minuscule amount of time, rather than doing tremendous amounts of damage. So, yeah, I thought the summoning aspect was a little on the weak-side.<br />Also, in the vein of lead-character problems, I was infuriated with the "main character dying = instant Game Over" system. The worst was when the main character (i.e. the one you are controlling) died when the rest of the team remained totally unharmed. Enemies with instant kill abilities and the sudden teaming-up of all your enemies against the main character made this aspect of the game infuriating. However, it didn't happen too often, so it can be forgiven.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-41978022536794510322010-04-27T19:53:00.003-04:002010-04-27T20:33:42.605-04:00BEDA 27: White PeopleWhite people are afraid of black people.<br />It's true! And I think it can best be described by a comparison to an episode of Family Guy entitled "Patriot Games."<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFTARF7nAlWCqzdInrS3rUbsvG4YOtr0eLu7uB3Jju9HxWwqd2BKU6A1AAVW_ka8LHgd-GNuv7B4f8IWfjIqeA7I-8IT05IY7_ym3s4G2k7NEMGGaZD8bh6ibeu0qnTh075cO2qJ-GqJZA/s1600/stewie-beats-brain-pt-1.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 365px; height: 291px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFTARF7nAlWCqzdInrS3rUbsvG4YOtr0eLu7uB3Jju9HxWwqd2BKU6A1AAVW_ka8LHgd-GNuv7B4f8IWfjIqeA7I-8IT05IY7_ym3s4G2k7NEMGGaZD8bh6ibeu0qnTh075cO2qJ-GqJZA/s400/stewie-beats-brain-pt-1.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5464979581235889650" /></a><br />In this episode, Stewie has lent Brian a sum of money that he wishes to be returned. After Brian fails to make good on his debt and avoids his toddler aggressor by wearing a fake mustache, Stewie beats the family dog like mafia loan shark muscle beats... well... guys that don't pay them back quickly enough.<br />I mean, he really goes over the top here. He pushes him down the stairs, breaks his leg with a golf club, shoots him in both knee caps, and fully immolates him with a flame thrower. He also espouses one of my favorite lines in all of Family Guy history.<br />Stewie: "Where's my money, man? Yeah, you got money to pay for fake mustaches. How much you pay for that fake mustache?"<br />Brian: "$2.99."<br />Stewie: *Shoots Brian in the knee*<br /><br />HAHAHA! Man that's funny.<br /><br />So, after the thrasing is over and the debt is repaid, Stewie realizes that he was in the wrong and apologizes for his misbehavior. But an apology isn't really good enough, is it? Brian accepts the apology, but it's not quite enough to make them even. And now they have to live together under the same roof with a tension that builds and builds and drives Stewie crazy. By the end of the episode Stewie actually starts hitting himself in the face in order to equalize the situation, wanting so badly for the beating to be over that he's even willing to do it himself.<br /><br />And that is how white people view the world.<br />Seriously. That is the story of slavery in this country.<br />Except black people didn't even borrow money from us in the first place. We just hit them with a golf club for no reason. And now we think that someday, somehow, they're going to hit us back. This is why people say things like "Obama is going to put us all in concentration camps." It's also the reason that white people get nervous when that Jay Z song "Run this Town" comes on. "Oh my god. Are they really going to run everything? You heard it, right? <span style="font-style: italic;">All black everything!</span> Have you seen that video? They look like guerilla warriors."<br /><br />There is this real serious suspicion that black people as a community are plotting to do something awful to white people, and white people will jump at anything and say "There! There! They're doing it! The time is now, people! We're getting overthrown!"<br /><br />I consider myself extremely lucky to be both of a skin color and a peer group where, sometimes, I get to go entire days without thinking about racism at all. I know a lot of people aren't so fortunate and that totally sucks. It's so pervasive and it's so incredibly stupid. It would just make my head explode if I had to deal with it all the time.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-41731789393914531982010-04-27T14:25:00.004-04:002010-04-27T14:39:36.899-04:00BEDA 26: MegamanAnd I'm still a day behind. I meant to write two blogs yesterday but I got distracted. Maybe I'll write two today. Who knows?<br />Today, I want to talk about Megaman.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimWeL_Ex38wlQOq0IkSPYxLsuIAEAL81dSGDMbzgHTk1njT6ZWSMJdHcyrPjp0hvJ0q3tQJYsMiywkTzZHjwraee3B-zgNxFaRmA3KNXlv-mlNxLUExpVfVlDGXFZaCeaTx-VRY_CHyu8R/s1600/Megaman8bit.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimWeL_Ex38wlQOq0IkSPYxLsuIAEAL81dSGDMbzgHTk1njT6ZWSMJdHcyrPjp0hvJ0q3tQJYsMiywkTzZHjwraee3B-zgNxFaRmA3KNXlv-mlNxLUExpVfVlDGXFZaCeaTx-VRY_CHyu8R/s400/Megaman8bit.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5464885775928248034" border="0" /></a><br />Megaman is such an awesome game. Especially Megaman 2.<br /><br />First of all, let me just say that going back to any regular Nintendo or Super Nintendo game is a bit jarring for one reason: they're hard.<br />In modern games, your character is allowed a lot of leeway when it comes to damage. Enemies in a 3D environment are easy to avoid, health is regularly available, and your HP is high.<br />In the side scrolling games of the past none of this is the case. Enemies come at you in a straight line, impossible to avoid by the very nature of their 2D environment. The art of dodging comes into play, in which you must wait patiently and study the habits of your enemies before killing or avoiding them to move on. This style of gaming is all but dead in today's video games, and if you don't believe me go back and play Megaman and watch yourself die a miserable, energy explosion death.<br />Hell, in the first Megaman you can't even shoot at an upwards angle. You have to jump and shoot straight forward to kill the enemies that are above you. Oh, are the evil robots swooping down on you at an angle that makes them impossible to hit? Deal with it.<br /><br />Also, the progression in Megaman is way ahead of its time. By the end of the game you've acquired the unique and totally badass abilities of eight bosses, making you an unstoppable cyborg of death. And this game doesn't even tell you where to start. At the beginning of the game you have to randomly guess which monstrous robot boss to fight first, and you might fight your way through the whole level just to discover that you're not nearly strong enough to compete. But one by one the robots will fall and you'll slowly become a bone-breaking Terminator-like war machine ready to destroy Dr. Wily.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-90197306705723022932010-04-26T15:32:00.002-04:002010-04-26T15:43:33.208-04:00BEDA 25: One Year AnniversaryWell, I failed to write a blog entry on the 25th of April, which marks the second time this month that I have failed in my obligations to BEDA.<br />But, I have an excuse.<br />I was celebrating my one year anniversary of college!<br />Actually, I was driving home to Kalamazoo in the rain and then working for seven hours.<br />Still though, it really was my first post-collegiate anniversary.<br /><br />So what have I been doing with myself since I stopped going to school?<br />First and foremost I have been writing a book. I once heard author John Green say that writing a novel is a lot like raising a child in that no one is qualified to do it until they have done it. That is to say, you become qualified in the process of doing it.<br />Attempting to write a novel has been challenging and overwhelming and difficult, but it has also been absolutely fantastic.<br />My career plan upon graduating college was to get a bullshit job, be poor, and write a novel.<br />A year after graduation I am over 200 pages into the book, working in the food industry, and driving a 94 Honda that I share with my girlfriend.<br />So far, everything is right on schedule.<br />I feel like people sort of wince when I tell them I have a degree in creative writing. And yeah, it's true, in this economy it's much safer to get a degree in something like "business administration with a marketing emphasis and a focus on sales demographics research stuff." But I couldn't do that work. It would make me miserable. As of right now I am perfectly happy with what I'm doing.<br />It was a great first year out of the black pit of misery known as school. I'm sure there will be many more to come.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-40830951147977810792010-04-24T17:30:00.004-04:002010-04-24T19:51:19.030-04:00BEDA 24: Golf<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq_96tuAzKtHZgl4w2Kxio4AmD4A6Ru0cNqFwP2am8Da9VB1CAeSa0xTQ7iid07F4Ws9KNMzhzWEgpOAiT6FuCiOntd4vS6kCOPE7eakFiQ-4QqoMzcU8v7phGJWBGKLJ0rfL_OPvJsvE9/s1600/golf.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 343px; height: 328px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq_96tuAzKtHZgl4w2Kxio4AmD4A6Ru0cNqFwP2am8Da9VB1CAeSa0xTQ7iid07F4Ws9KNMzhzWEgpOAiT6FuCiOntd4vS6kCOPE7eakFiQ-4QqoMzcU8v7phGJWBGKLJ0rfL_OPvJsvE9/s400/golf.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5463855481517170594" border="0" /></a><br />As a kid, golf for me might have been like church for you.<br />It's something I've had to do every Sunday for as long as I can remember. Rain or shine, whether I wanted to or not, I was out on that golf course with my dad.<br />I didn't really like it when I was a kid. Well, I guess I liked it, but it was never something that I would have done on my own.<br /><br />But now I like it.*<br /><br />It was something I had to come around to over many years, but now it's something that I enjoy. I can appreciate the finer aspects of the game now that I was unable to appreciate as a kid.<br />Golf is hard. That's the appeal. It's really hard but it's also really possible to be awesome at golf (like half the time) and that's a good feeling.<br />Also, you get to be outside. Essentially you're in the middle of the woods, so that's cool too.<br />I never thought I would share my dad's enthusiasm for the game, but now that I'm older I really do like it.<br />I think I can definitely see where disc golf came from now.<br />A bunch of guys about my age thinking, "Yeah, golfing is okay, but I'd rather just play Ultimate Frisbee."<br />...<br />"You guys, I've got it!"<br /><br />*Actually, in this aspect, golf probably turned out better for me than church turned out for you.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-86889672122408611062010-04-23T17:16:00.001-04:002010-04-23T17:16:51.075-04:00BEDA 23: Uh oh.It's yet another day in the land of BEDA, and once again I have like five minutes to write this blog.<br /><br />So...<br />we're gonna talk about...<br />muffins!<br /><br />I don't care for muffins.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-67164056968370023102010-04-22T22:40:00.002-04:002010-04-22T22:53:14.647-04:00BEDA 22: Growing UpGrowing up was hard.<br />Not to say that it's totally over. Obviously, because growth never stops until death.<br /><br />But, you know. I'm back in Commerce and I'm sitting here looking at a picture of myself a few minutes after I was born next to a picture of me on the day I graduated from college. So a lot of, if not all of, the period of my life which is considered "growing up" is over.<br />And it was tough.<br />I once considered writing a sample article for The Onion that told the story of a time-traveler who had made his way back to the Jurassic Period. And even though he had been surrounded by gigantic T-Rex that were ready to rip his face off for absolutely no reason, he was still convinced that his own childhood had been more frightening.<br /><br />It just was, you know? It was really intimidating. Everything was really big and fast and I didn't have the slightest clue what was happening because things never ever seemed to make sense.<br />In fact, now that I'm older, I look at things that didn't make sense to me as a kid and they still don't make sense. It's like things aren't making sense on purpose, just to trip people up. And I'm not talking about "Why do adults work so hard just for pieces of paper" stuff. That's the kind of thing that made perfect sense as a kid that doesn't make sense to me now. I'm talking about the little things that people say and do that don't make sense at all, and which confuse the hell out of you as a little kid because you expect these people to make sense!<br />I had a first-grade teacher that made up his own stories when he read to us at circle-time.<br />I had a third-grade teacher that once asked my entire class (completely out of context) if we would cut off a piece of our own finger so we could suck on the blood if we were trapped in an avalanche.<br />And on and on and on and on.<br />I feel like 70% of my childhood was like that. A string of things that didn't make sense to me.<br /><br />And now I'm older, and I realize the truth:<br />EVERYONE IS NUTS!<br />Nobody knows what the hell is going on in the world. The adults you trust and respect so much as a kid haven't got a damn clue what is going on around them, so they say things that contradict the realities you perceive, which makes being a little kid absolutely terrifying.<br />But I'm grown up now, so I guess things are so bad.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-69917053447367929712010-04-21T15:55:00.002-04:002010-04-21T16:11:49.532-04:00BEDA 21: ConservativesDid you know that it used to be illegal and immoral to dissect human bodies after death and this greatly limited our knowledge of basic human anatomy?<br />Did you know that the first real connection between hand sanitizer and reducing the infant and mother mortality rate at birth was first made as recently as 1847?<br />Did you know we used to enslave black people, and then openly segregate against them, and even now live in a society saturated by subconscious racism because of this history?<br />Did you know we used to burn witches?<br /><br />BUT our species evolved past these mistakes in science, politics, philosophy and morality with something I like to call "progress." Through an evolution of ideas, mankind was able to perceive the world in a different, more sensible way. This made the ideas of the past null and void.<br />See, I think the definition of a conservative is someone who thinks that progress was good for the last 10,000 years, but isn't good anymore. Like we struggled as a species all the way through history to get exactly where we are and not one inch further.<br />To be conservative you can't see the time line of human achievement as a living thing extending both behind and in front of us. You have to see it as the stationary past which took place before the stationary present. In the eyes of a conservative, the present is not only stationary, but eternal.<br />Someone who opposes the progress of morality (such as granting equal rights to homosexuals) or the progress of law (such as legalizing and taxing marijuana, an incredibly popular and incredibly harmless drug) or the progress of science (such as stem cell research) is someone who thinks it will be the present forever.<br />We need not travel any further into the future. We're comfortable right here, thank you. All the important discoveries have been made. We don't need to figure anything else out or show compassion to anyone that isn't already being showed it.<br />I mean, look what happened when we freed the slaves. Now a black man is president and he's trying to make sure everyone gets health care! What's next?! What other basic human rights will be ensured to us by the government?!<br />THE HORROR! THE HORROR!!!!!!!!!!!!Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-18786918348128343882010-04-21T01:25:00.003-04:002010-04-21T01:32:23.336-04:00BEDA 20: 4/20Once again I have dropped the ball and missed a day of blogging, but I'm still writing it before I go to bed, so for me it's still 4/20/10.<br />And on this international (actually, it's probably more of a national thing. Maybe Canada too...) pot-smoking day, I think we all know what I'm going to talk about.<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Moby</span> Dick.<br />That's right. For the past few months I have been reading <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Moby</span> Dick, and I can only compare the process to trying to climb a mountain that is make completely out of glass.<br />I say this because, normally, if I were to compare a book to climbing a mountain, each word and/or sentence would be another foothold, and slowly you would make your way through the novel one foothold at a time. However, the diction in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Moby</span> Dick is so elevated that I feel like I can never get a grip anywhere. I feel sort of shut out from the content of the book because trying to get a grasp on the vocabulary is like grabbing a pane of glass.<br />Does that make sense?<br />Note: If I were to apply this metaphor to Ulysses, it would be like climbing a mountain made of glass, then a mountain made of rock, then of alcohol, then realizing you were completely lost and possibly in another dimension.<br /><br />Anyways, I'm 300 pages into <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Moby</span> Dick and honestly I don't really see what the big deal is. I think this, like Ulysses, is a book that I would need to be taught or that I would need to read alongside some literary criticism to get the most out of it. Because right now it's just some dudes on a boat looking for a big whale.<br />Whatever.<br />Maybe as I continue to push through I'll start to understand why the book is considered by some to be the greatest American novel, but probably not.<br />Right now I'm stretched between four books, and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Moby</span> Dick is not winning that competition, so I don't expect to finish it anytime soon.<br />The four books in question are a collection of H.P. Lovecraft short stories, Nietzsche, the poetry of Pablo Neruda, and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Moby</span> Dick.<br />Lovecraft is winning by a mile. More on him later.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-77148588307185685412010-04-19T15:32:00.003-04:002010-04-19T15:50:57.243-04:00BEDA 19: Computer Apocalypse<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisy4gZwzYPAQ-e0dXcft3cqkKPvktfv0zSslDPeq0cU-wc5WTQWzVFiy6L0cL8yWPH0NhTbUc50SIQkSX67jAPY_nhkURl0YOCg8iz_kbnFU4jfLCgGPew_0lz87y5DFFGqG_kvhm2dwaT/s1600/meltdown.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 351px; height: 400px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisy4gZwzYPAQ-e0dXcft3cqkKPvktfv0zSslDPeq0cU-wc5WTQWzVFiy6L0cL8yWPH0NhTbUc50SIQkSX67jAPY_nhkURl0YOCg8iz_kbnFU4jfLCgGPew_0lz87y5DFFGqG_kvhm2dwaT/s400/meltdown.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5461937944530273106" border="0" /></a><br />Last night Lindsay and I had to make a midnight run to Walgreen's to buy some milk. We had already bought some earlier in the day, but that half gallon turned out to border on the disgusting flavor of the kind of coconut milk you use for cooking* and it had to be replaced.<br />Here is a quick summary of the conversation we had with the cashier. He was a man probably in his late forties:<br />Cashier: "I'm going to have to run your card as credit."<br />Me: "That's fine."<br />Cashier: "Then you'll just have to sign, but it's going to take a while because our machines are running slow."<br />Me: "Oh, that's okay."<br />Cashier: "Yeah, technology is great when it works, you know?"<br />Lindsay: "Yeah I have that same problem at my work sometimes."<br />Cashier: "The scary part is, if all the computer stop running one day, little stores like this are gonna be toast."<br /><br />...<br /><br />What?<br />Like all the computers? In the world? And they're all totally beyond repair? Like, Y2K?<br /><br />I wanted to share this because it was really surprising to me that there are people out there who still think that this kind of situation is a potential reality. As though this whole "technology" thing is just a fad. It won't last, and one day all the computers are going to fail. Then where will we be? There won't be any records of any kind! Airplanes will fall out of the sky! Mass chaos!<br />I think this speaks to a deep misunderstanding of how the world is working right now, don't you? If anything the change will be completely the other way. As computers become more and more essential to our lives, they will become more of a part of us. Computers aren't going anywhere.<br /><br />*Yeah, I know what coconut milk for cooking tastes like. Lindsay and I went to an Indian restaurant, and the first thing I saw when we got in the door was a cooler stocked with pop and coconut milk. What was I gonna do, not order it? Anyways, it was awful. Unfortunately for me, the waitress didn't know it was the kind you cook with either.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-80468189845228571902010-04-18T18:36:00.003-04:002010-04-18T18:43:57.861-04:00BEDA 18: Doing NothingIt's hard for me to do nothing. There is this ubiquitous guilt that comes with it; a nagging sense in the back of my head that I should be actively pursuing some goal. I should be creating, I should be writing, I should be working, I should be reading.<br />There are dishes to wash and laundry to do and a dog to walk and books to finish and runs to take and a novel to write and comics to write and blogs to write and floors to vacuum.<br /><br />It's hard to commit to doing nothing because I have consciously made the decision to forgo any and all responsibilities and instead sit around staring at glowing boxes. (Even though I tend to count video games as at least semi-productive activity because there are goals to accomplish there.)<br />Most of the nothing I do comes out of procrastination. I sit down to check my internet for five minutes before I move on to my next project for the day, and I end up surfing around comedy websites and facebook.<br />I have a strained relationship with doing nothing because of the guilt that comes with it, but I also see it as completely necessary to my sanity. If I was 100% productive 100% of the time, I think I would lose my taste for it all together. You have to keep the balance.<br />Anyways, today is a Nothing Day, and I'm going to go do some more of it.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-3610582291178339852010-04-17T15:47:00.002-04:002010-04-17T16:02:41.777-04:00BEDA 17: Remaking MoviesI'm just gonna say it: I thought the original Clash of the Titans was pretty bad. That guy's face alone is enough to wreck the entire movie. He looks like a young Jay Leno running around in a loin cloth trying to be an action star. Like, straight-up, dinner-plate face. What a moron. Not to mention he's playing Perseus, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/PirateKing86#p/u/4/fHWDre5VlGc">a mentally-retarded young man</a> who is an utter embarrassment to Greek myth and possibly the least likable hero ever.<br /><br />My impression of this film as a whole is that it is generally accepted as a classic B movie, so much so that the kraken scene is actually used in the hella-cheesy intro to Malcolm in the Middle. So why remake it? Well, probably because it's a popular name and most people have seen the original (I myself had to watch it several times throughout my eduaction, including once in college.)<br />But, it raises sort of an interesting point, and one that I've been saying for years: Film-makers should ONLY remake bad films.<br />Because what's the point of taking a movie that was already good and just doing it again?<br />Well, besides making boat loads of money, I mean.<br />But where's the challenge in that?<br />Plus, if instead of remaking already successful movies the fellows in Hollywood decided to remake bad movies and make them good, we'd have twice as many good movies.<br />So that's my challenge, movie-makers. Your first assignment: Chopping Mall. Good luck.<br /><br />P.S. I really hope they included the R2D2-esque robot owl in the new movie. That would be weird enough to make it worth watching.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI0-J1zwm6NcdGh6FhAo3ZQTqIJhAgt_tzWOQojM3_RYmNJeqUzsR_8fTMREdZL1_rZ4wuNWNmCTxwCR0yU1lkepvXh7GfnBX0E7xlpbbSc8Cg2sAB5gSVbVBllMz5f2Rw61cOS0NPXKoy/s1600/bubo2.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 225px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI0-J1zwm6NcdGh6FhAo3ZQTqIJhAgt_tzWOQojM3_RYmNJeqUzsR_8fTMREdZL1_rZ4wuNWNmCTxwCR0yU1lkepvXh7GfnBX0E7xlpbbSc8Cg2sAB5gSVbVBllMz5f2Rw61cOS0NPXKoy/s400/bubo2.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5461199292279936018" /></a>Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-81464018253727084362010-04-16T15:42:00.002-04:002010-04-16T15:55:58.144-04:00BEDA 16: CareersI spent this morning writing a sample article entitled "What can I do with a Bachelor in Business Administration with a Marketing emphasis."<br />It truly depresses me that people actually pursue things like this in order to obtain jobs such as "public relations specialist" and "financial controller." How can you live your life like that when it's so nice outside?<br />I just want it to be summer forever and get paid for doing nothing and win at everything I do and never have to worry about money again and see the world.<br />Is that too much to ask? To live in such a fantasy world?<br /><br />People that end up making careers out of what they love and are passionate about are probably the luckiest people around. Because you have to have a job, but if you love your job and get paid to do it, how great is that? You probably see this a lot in doctors and authors and video game designers and scientists of all sorts. I just don't think you see it very much in marketing managers and sales representatives. There is no passion in it, no reward, no meat. Just white collar oppression and I shudder at the thought.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2141806024333121976.post-24992290451244702892010-04-15T13:58:00.002-04:002010-04-15T14:08:26.186-04:00BEDA 15: DrawingI wish I could draw. Man do I ever.<br />When I was a kid I could draw. I used to draw all the time. Mostly I drew monsters, which is probably why I never really developed as a visual artist. Nothing I drew actually existed, so there were no rules I had to follow, no technique to mastering certain aspects of reality. I just drew lots and lots of monsters.<br />I can still draw monsters, but in the way that you would expect an 8 year old to draw them. Beyond that, I can do little else.<br />I think visual artists have a huge professional advantage over other artists. Also, it's more fun. Novels take hours and hours to read. Albums take hours to finish, and hours more to fully appreciate. Even songs take whole minutes. But paintings and pictures and comic strips take mere minutes to soak in. Instant gratification! I don't have anything like that.<br />Except for blogs, which aren't really the same. Like at all.<br />I guess it's never too late to learn, but, you know I'm busy.<br />I want to know how to draw.<br />RIGHT NOW.Jordan Whitehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16176786090867621229noreply@blogger.com1