Saturday, July 9, 2011
Roller Derby
One thing I have been more involved with down in Tampa is the local Roller Derby league: The Tampa Bay Derby Darlins. Tonight I am going to volunteer to act as an NSO at the bout at Skateplex. If you can make it out I highly recommend you come. It's 10 bucks at the door for an hour and a half-ish of entertainment and hard hits. Also there is an afterparty that's always a blast. The Bout is being held at Skateplex in Temple Terrace Doors open at 7 and the afterparty is usually getting going by about 10:30 I think it is being held at the Dogs Bollocks in Ybor.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Review: Things I found in the woods today
I get bored a lot now that I'm unemployed. Today it's raining really hard in Tampa so I figured it was the best possible day to get some warrior training done. I went out running, which quickly turned to jogging, then walking, then gasping for breath then wandering around in the woods aimlessly. The woods near my house are probably more accurately described as a "hellswamp" or "doom-morass." Needless to say I found all kinds of cool stuff. Unfortunately I didn't have my phone with me to take pictures because it was raining so hard I was afraid it would get water damaged.
Thing 1: A giant turtle that was in the middle of laying eggs.
At least I think it was laying eggs, it was digging a big hole and its butt/lady-turtle-parts was hanging over the hole. I didn't see any eggs and I didn't want to bother her too much. It looked like some sort of Slider or maybe a River Cooter. I rate this turtle and her wicked sick beast nest a 4 out of 5.
Thing 2: A giant skeleton.
Actually not to far from the road I found the remains of something very large and mammal-y. The thing I found was completely skeletonized. The bones were jumbled up and I didn't find a skull so I can't be sure what it was. The only animals I can think around here that would leave a skeleton this size would be a large dog, a Florida panther, a deer, a human, a bear, or a skunk ape. It certainly was not an alligator, or turtle because the limbs where too long, there was not a shell, and there was not a lot of dermal plates like an alligator. The skeleton was pretty cool, but without a skull I can't give it a rating hirer than 3 out of 5.
Now lets do some math! This being Florida the skeletonizing wouldn't have taken very long at all (its hot here, and we have a lot of carrion eating birds and stuff.) Assuming you can take your medical forensics equations from death metal lyrics (HERE) then the critter must have died at most 44 days ago. That is assuming no birds or anything else ate on it, which is a HUGE assumption in these parts. It's probably really been there less than a week.
Thing 1: A giant turtle that was in the middle of laying eggs.
At least I think it was laying eggs, it was digging a big hole and its butt/lady-turtle-parts was hanging over the hole. I didn't see any eggs and I didn't want to bother her too much. It looked like some sort of Slider or maybe a River Cooter. I rate this turtle and her wicked sick beast nest a 4 out of 5.
Thing 2: A giant skeleton.
Actually not to far from the road I found the remains of something very large and mammal-y. The thing I found was completely skeletonized. The bones were jumbled up and I didn't find a skull so I can't be sure what it was. The only animals I can think around here that would leave a skeleton this size would be a large dog, a Florida panther, a deer, a human, a bear, or a skunk ape. It certainly was not an alligator, or turtle because the limbs where too long, there was not a shell, and there was not a lot of dermal plates like an alligator. The skeleton was pretty cool, but without a skull I can't give it a rating hirer than 3 out of 5.
Now lets do some math! This being Florida the skeletonizing wouldn't have taken very long at all (its hot here, and we have a lot of carrion eating birds and stuff.) Assuming you can take your medical forensics equations from death metal lyrics (HERE) then the critter must have died at most 44 days ago. That is assuming no birds or anything else ate on it, which is a HUGE assumption in these parts. It's probably really been there less than a week.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Announcement: Monathalon
So, one thing I do a lot now is watch music videos on youtube.com. I know what you're thinking. "Hey Warrior, couldn't you be doing something more useful with your time? Training for battle or inventing new anti-biotics?" You know what, you are right. That is why I am hereby officially announcing that in 6 months a new sport will explode the dank swamps of Tampa Florida: The Tampa Monathlon.
What is a Monathlon you say? You are familiar with a Triathlon, where you run, swim and bike over the course of a day? Well I don't have all day. In the Monathlon you run through waist deep water while carrying a bike.
Rules: you run a half mile course in waist deep water carrying a bike. First Monathalete to cross the finish line wins. The bike has to be fully functional and ride-able. Anybody with a questionable bike will be asked by the judges to ride on it for 200 yards. The Monathlon is open to all competitors, reguarless of age, gender or athletic ability. There are no divisions, everybody races every body else.
Saturday January 7th, Location to be announced. Monathletes respond in the comments to sign up.
I'm serious. This is happening. Even if I am the only one to run it.
What is a Monathlon you say? You are familiar with a Triathlon, where you run, swim and bike over the course of a day? Well I don't have all day. In the Monathlon you run through waist deep water while carrying a bike.
Rules: you run a half mile course in waist deep water carrying a bike. First Monathalete to cross the finish line wins. The bike has to be fully functional and ride-able. Anybody with a questionable bike will be asked by the judges to ride on it for 200 yards. The Monathlon is open to all competitors, reguarless of age, gender or athletic ability. There are no divisions, everybody races every body else.
Saturday January 7th, Location to be announced. Monathletes respond in the comments to sign up.
I'm serious. This is happening. Even if I am the only one to run it.
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
In Which I Try and Fail to Explain why the Illuminatus! Trilogy is so Great.
It's been a while since I wrote anything on here. I am bored today so lets talk about some books. I'm a bit of a reader and surprisingly I've read a lot of books since I last updated. I don't really remember them all and while a few of them undoubtedly had awesome covers, I cant really remember which ones did and didn't. The book I plan on reviewing today has a pretty normal looking cover so I won't even really bother judging it today. (Take that name of my blog!) I also recently picked up a netflix subscription so expect a lot more movie reviews. (At my current rate of writing you can expect those reviews a few weeks before judgement day, probably around 2021).
Today I am reviewing a huge book. Actually a trilogy.
Review: Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy (always spelled with the exclamation point) is series of sci-fi/fantasy novels from the early 70's that focus on conspiracy, philosophy, horror, sex and comedy in pretty equal measures. The Trilogy is technically composed of three novels, but pretty much the only way to buy them now-a-days is to get the omnibus edition with all three in one volume. This is how I read them and I don't think they suffer at all from being condensed like this.
The novels were co-written by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, who were employed as editors of Playboy Magazine at the time. Notice that I also wrote a review of The Guinea Pig Diaries by A. J. Jacobs, who is an editor at Esquire Magazine. Apparently being the editor of a crappy nudie mag equips you with the skills needed to be an awesome author. I enjoyed both the Guinea Pig Diaries and the Illuminatus! Trilogy immensely.
Part of Shea and Wilson's duties at Playboy was to read and publish letters to the editors. Back before the internet, I guess crazy people just sent their crazy theories to Playboy where they were read by Shea and Wilson. The duo started playing a game with one another where they tried to imagine what the world was like if all the conspiracy theorists sending them letters were right: JFK really was assassinated by the mob, satanists, the Illuminati and aliens... all at the same time, John Dillinger was alive and well in 1970, Atlantis existed, but was also only a myth, Gods exist but religion is a lie, Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism is the only thing that will save the free market, The being we call Satan is really an immortal Atlantean who discovered science, and so on an so forth. Shea and Wilson were having so much fun trying to fit all these crazy conspiracies together that they decided to write everything down in the form of a novel. Eventually the idea got split into three novels and the Illuminatus! Trilogy was born.
The cool thing about the Illuminatus! Trilogy is that it (especially the first book) acts like a primer on critical thinking. The entire first novel is dedicated to presenting new characters with new philosophical ideas (say, a submarine full of Objectivist Anarchists, or a tantric sex loving Satanist, or a Discordian that feels like she came from a blaxploitation movie) and then ripping that philosophical belief to shreds. Over the course of the novel pretty much no philosophy is left unscathed. Religion, politics, and economics are all completely destroyed and built back up again over an over again. The authors have a knack for making you identify with each new character only to have them and their personal philosphies discredited a few pages later. By the end of the first book in the trilogy your brain is trained to think critically about each new philosophy presented to you. It really makes you wonder how many people who have read the Illuminatus! Trilogy go on to be keen critical thinkers in their real lives? Of course if you are a person who prescribes to a particular philosphy you will probably find a lot to be offended about in the books as nothing is sacred to the authors.
The plot of the trilogy is way to complex to summarize here. It is pretty much the story of a newspaper editor who gets caught up in several world wide conspiracies after investigating rumors related to the Illuminati. That really doesn't do the book justice though, as the plot veers wildly from plot point to plot point. It's hard to explain and while you're reading the novels, you honestly never know what is going to happen next.
The book is also written in a style that will drive many readers crazy. It is presented out of chronological order and from the perspective of several characters at the same time. Sometimes the perspective jumps from one character to another in the middle of a paragraph. It's made even more complicated by the fact that many (if not most) of the characters are telepathic to some degree, and are capable of viewing other peoples experiences. It's not unusual for a character to watch an event unfold from another characters point of view, then suddenly leap back in time a few weeks and view the events that lead up to the first event from the perspective of several other characters. It's a challenging read and you will find yourself re-reading passages two or three times just trying to wrap your head around which characters are actually present for events, much less what actually happened. That makes it sound daunting, but its actually quite fun. I have not enjoyed a book this much for its style in quite some time.
I have failed to mention up until this point that Illuminatus! is hilarious. Ask the The Lady Warrior. She frequently caught me laughing out loud while reading the book. Hardly a page goes by that doesn't have some kind of joke or gag on it. A lot of the gags are really very clever. For example, early in the second book there is a section that talks about acronyms and their importance in the occult and in secret societies. A few pages later an organization is introduced called the White Heroes Opposing Red Extremism. The book doesn't draw attention to the acronym formed by that name, but because you had just a few pages ago, read how important acronyms are, the name jumps right out at you.
Finally I should note that there is BOATLOADS of sex, violence, drug use, and the occult in this trilogy. I enjoy all that stuff in fiction but if you're uncomfortable with any of that, you might as well avoid Illuminatus!. (double punctuation... weird.) If you are comfortable with all that stuff and you want to read what is probably the craziest fictional account of the JFK assassination ever, then Illumintus! might be for you.
Today I am reviewing a huge book. Actually a trilogy.
Review: Illuminatus! Trilogy
The Illuminatus! Trilogy (always spelled with the exclamation point) is series of sci-fi/fantasy novels from the early 70's that focus on conspiracy, philosophy, horror, sex and comedy in pretty equal measures. The Trilogy is technically composed of three novels, but pretty much the only way to buy them now-a-days is to get the omnibus edition with all three in one volume. This is how I read them and I don't think they suffer at all from being condensed like this.
The novels were co-written by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, who were employed as editors of Playboy Magazine at the time. Notice that I also wrote a review of The Guinea Pig Diaries by A. J. Jacobs, who is an editor at Esquire Magazine. Apparently being the editor of a crappy nudie mag equips you with the skills needed to be an awesome author. I enjoyed both the Guinea Pig Diaries and the Illuminatus! Trilogy immensely.
Part of Shea and Wilson's duties at Playboy was to read and publish letters to the editors. Back before the internet, I guess crazy people just sent their crazy theories to Playboy where they were read by Shea and Wilson. The duo started playing a game with one another where they tried to imagine what the world was like if all the conspiracy theorists sending them letters were right: JFK really was assassinated by the mob, satanists, the Illuminati and aliens... all at the same time, John Dillinger was alive and well in 1970, Atlantis existed, but was also only a myth, Gods exist but religion is a lie, Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism is the only thing that will save the free market, The being we call Satan is really an immortal Atlantean who discovered science, and so on an so forth. Shea and Wilson were having so much fun trying to fit all these crazy conspiracies together that they decided to write everything down in the form of a novel. Eventually the idea got split into three novels and the Illuminatus! Trilogy was born.
The cool thing about the Illuminatus! Trilogy is that it (especially the first book) acts like a primer on critical thinking. The entire first novel is dedicated to presenting new characters with new philosophical ideas (say, a submarine full of Objectivist Anarchists, or a tantric sex loving Satanist, or a Discordian that feels like she came from a blaxploitation movie) and then ripping that philosophical belief to shreds. Over the course of the novel pretty much no philosophy is left unscathed. Religion, politics, and economics are all completely destroyed and built back up again over an over again. The authors have a knack for making you identify with each new character only to have them and their personal philosphies discredited a few pages later. By the end of the first book in the trilogy your brain is trained to think critically about each new philosophy presented to you. It really makes you wonder how many people who have read the Illuminatus! Trilogy go on to be keen critical thinkers in their real lives? Of course if you are a person who prescribes to a particular philosphy you will probably find a lot to be offended about in the books as nothing is sacred to the authors.
The plot of the trilogy is way to complex to summarize here. It is pretty much the story of a newspaper editor who gets caught up in several world wide conspiracies after investigating rumors related to the Illuminati. That really doesn't do the book justice though, as the plot veers wildly from plot point to plot point. It's hard to explain and while you're reading the novels, you honestly never know what is going to happen next.
The book is also written in a style that will drive many readers crazy. It is presented out of chronological order and from the perspective of several characters at the same time. Sometimes the perspective jumps from one character to another in the middle of a paragraph. It's made even more complicated by the fact that many (if not most) of the characters are telepathic to some degree, and are capable of viewing other peoples experiences. It's not unusual for a character to watch an event unfold from another characters point of view, then suddenly leap back in time a few weeks and view the events that lead up to the first event from the perspective of several other characters. It's a challenging read and you will find yourself re-reading passages two or three times just trying to wrap your head around which characters are actually present for events, much less what actually happened. That makes it sound daunting, but its actually quite fun. I have not enjoyed a book this much for its style in quite some time.
I have failed to mention up until this point that Illuminatus! is hilarious. Ask the The Lady Warrior. She frequently caught me laughing out loud while reading the book. Hardly a page goes by that doesn't have some kind of joke or gag on it. A lot of the gags are really very clever. For example, early in the second book there is a section that talks about acronyms and their importance in the occult and in secret societies. A few pages later an organization is introduced called the White Heroes Opposing Red Extremism. The book doesn't draw attention to the acronym formed by that name, but because you had just a few pages ago, read how important acronyms are, the name jumps right out at you.
Finally I should note that there is BOATLOADS of sex, violence, drug use, and the occult in this trilogy. I enjoy all that stuff in fiction but if you're uncomfortable with any of that, you might as well avoid Illuminatus!. (double punctuation... weird.) If you are comfortable with all that stuff and you want to read what is probably the craziest fictional account of the JFK assassination ever, then Illumintus! might be for you.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
A Bunch of Mini Reviews!
Hello All! I subscribed to my own blog on Google Reader a few days ago and was shocked, SHOCKED I say, to discover that it already had 4 subscribers. 1 of those, I know, is my wife. Another, I assume, is my college roommate. But the other two? Mysteries within mysteries.
Anyway, since I have such a rapidly expanding fan-base I have decided to re-un-give up on this blog. Just cause I haven't been updating doesn't mean I haven't been reading crappy books. This post will cover the stuff I have been reading in the interval period.
Mini-Review #1
Ill Wind:
I will go ahead and admit that I didn't make it all the way through "Ill Wind." The premise was pretty interesting and the first about 100 pages were great, then nothing happened for the next about 150 pages so I put it down and started reading something else. I might finish it one day.
The idea behind Ill Wind is that, after an oil spill (topical!) an oil company tried to use a genetically engineered bacteria to clean up the spill. The bacteria mutates like all good sci-fi bacteria should and becomes airborne. long story short all petroleum and petroleum derivatives (gasoline, plastic, etc.) get eaten up by bacteria and human kind is thrown into a new dark age with no plastic TV dinner trays.
Cool idea and based at least kinda on real science. Too bad the book hit such a major slowdown halfway through.
Also of note in this book is the authors weird aversion to cursing. One of the characters was supposed to be a major criminal who was in and out of jail his whole life and he walked around calling people butt-head. This just struck me as odd.
On to the next review!
Mini Review #2
The Einstein Intersection.
Normally in these Reviews I try to avoid spoilers, but to fully explain my feelings about this book I am going to have to pretty much spoil everything about it. In addition to that, the image above is different from the copy I read. My copy had a picture of the main character fighting a more regular looking bull (less minotaur-like) on the cover.
First off let me say that I have a great respect for Samuel R. Delany. He is a really awesome African American sci-fi and fantasy author known for writing really trippy, mind expanding type stuff. This book is no exception from his usual absolutely crazy-pants writing style. If you don't want to read the spoilers my one sentence review is: "The Einstein Intersection is a really good and incredibly odd book. if you like very weird sci-fi or fantasy, you will probably like this book."
(WARNING: SPOILERS START NOW!!)
The Einstein Intersection is a book about Orpheus, the Greek (or African in some myths) story teller and singer who went to Hades to find his lost girlfriend. Except the Einstein Intersection takes place several hundreds of thousands of years in the future.... after humans have gone extinct... and the Earth is inhabited by alien ghosts.... some of which are suffering from horrible mutations... and who are controlled by computers... and forced to reenact the myths of Earth. if that sounds awesome to you (it does to me) then this is a pretty good read. If you know the story of Orpheus then the ending will not really surprise you... except for the part where you realize he was an alien ghost controlled by a computer the whole time...that part would have surprised you.
(END OF SPOILERS)
Mini Review #3
Riverworld
Riverworld is a neat little peace of what I call "Setting Sci-fi." Setting Sci-fi is any book or movie where I consider the setting to be as important or as interesting as the characters and story. Other examples would be: Ring World, Dune, The Matrix and probably those Rama books (I haven't gotten around to reading them yet). The premise of Riverworld is that every human being that has ever lived and will ever live awakens on a strange new planet that's primary physical characteristic is a billion mile long river that snakes across its surface. Other than humans, fish and earthworms there are no other animals on the planet. Everybody wakes up on the planet at the same time in a perfectly healthy 25 year old body, even people that were sick, crippled or deformed on Earth. If you are killed on this planet you wake up 24 hours later in a new body somewhere else on the planet.
There are 5 Riverworld novels total and a handful of short stories as well. All of the Riverworld novels are pretty short (this one is only about 75 pages!). One interesting note is that "Riverworld" the novel is actually the 5th Riverworld book. I didn't realize this before I read it but I didnt have any trouble at all keeping up with the story. It looks like each of the Riverworld Books are pretty self sufficient.
This entry into the Riverworld series dealt a lot with the concept of religion and how it would change if there was no afterlife and everybody just kept waking up a day after they die. It was a neat little book but the big "plot twist" at the end was kinda obvious. I enjoyed Riverworld though and its short enough that you can read it in one or rides on the DC metro though. It comes with my recommendation.
If you really like Riverworld and role playing games, you might want to check out "GURPS Riverworld" I do not own GURPS Riverworld but I think its really cool that such a thing exists. I am a bit of a role player myself and I will probably be checking out the Riverworld source book one of these days when I am not super broke. When that day comes I will try to remember to put a full review up on this blarrrrgh.
Anyway, since I have such a rapidly expanding fan-base I have decided to re-un-give up on this blog. Just cause I haven't been updating doesn't mean I haven't been reading crappy books. This post will cover the stuff I have been reading in the interval period.
Mini-Review #1
Ill Wind:
I will go ahead and admit that I didn't make it all the way through "Ill Wind." The premise was pretty interesting and the first about 100 pages were great, then nothing happened for the next about 150 pages so I put it down and started reading something else. I might finish it one day.
The idea behind Ill Wind is that, after an oil spill (topical!) an oil company tried to use a genetically engineered bacteria to clean up the spill. The bacteria mutates like all good sci-fi bacteria should and becomes airborne. long story short all petroleum and petroleum derivatives (gasoline, plastic, etc.) get eaten up by bacteria and human kind is thrown into a new dark age with no plastic TV dinner trays.
Cool idea and based at least kinda on real science. Too bad the book hit such a major slowdown halfway through.
Also of note in this book is the authors weird aversion to cursing. One of the characters was supposed to be a major criminal who was in and out of jail his whole life and he walked around calling people butt-head. This just struck me as odd.
On to the next review!
Mini Review #2
The Einstein Intersection.
Normally in these Reviews I try to avoid spoilers, but to fully explain my feelings about this book I am going to have to pretty much spoil everything about it. In addition to that, the image above is different from the copy I read. My copy had a picture of the main character fighting a more regular looking bull (less minotaur-like) on the cover.
First off let me say that I have a great respect for Samuel R. Delany. He is a really awesome African American sci-fi and fantasy author known for writing really trippy, mind expanding type stuff. This book is no exception from his usual absolutely crazy-pants writing style. If you don't want to read the spoilers my one sentence review is: "The Einstein Intersection is a really good and incredibly odd book. if you like very weird sci-fi or fantasy, you will probably like this book."
(WARNING: SPOILERS START NOW!!)
The Einstein Intersection is a book about Orpheus, the Greek (or African in some myths) story teller and singer who went to Hades to find his lost girlfriend. Except the Einstein Intersection takes place several hundreds of thousands of years in the future.... after humans have gone extinct... and the Earth is inhabited by alien ghosts.... some of which are suffering from horrible mutations... and who are controlled by computers... and forced to reenact the myths of Earth. if that sounds awesome to you (it does to me) then this is a pretty good read. If you know the story of Orpheus then the ending will not really surprise you... except for the part where you realize he was an alien ghost controlled by a computer the whole time...that part would have surprised you.
(END OF SPOILERS)
Mini Review #3
Riverworld
Riverworld is a neat little peace of what I call "Setting Sci-fi." Setting Sci-fi is any book or movie where I consider the setting to be as important or as interesting as the characters and story. Other examples would be: Ring World, Dune, The Matrix and probably those Rama books (I haven't gotten around to reading them yet). The premise of Riverworld is that every human being that has ever lived and will ever live awakens on a strange new planet that's primary physical characteristic is a billion mile long river that snakes across its surface. Other than humans, fish and earthworms there are no other animals on the planet. Everybody wakes up on the planet at the same time in a perfectly healthy 25 year old body, even people that were sick, crippled or deformed on Earth. If you are killed on this planet you wake up 24 hours later in a new body somewhere else on the planet.
There are 5 Riverworld novels total and a handful of short stories as well. All of the Riverworld novels are pretty short (this one is only about 75 pages!). One interesting note is that "Riverworld" the novel is actually the 5th Riverworld book. I didn't realize this before I read it but I didnt have any trouble at all keeping up with the story. It looks like each of the Riverworld Books are pretty self sufficient.
This entry into the Riverworld series dealt a lot with the concept of religion and how it would change if there was no afterlife and everybody just kept waking up a day after they die. It was a neat little book but the big "plot twist" at the end was kinda obvious. I enjoyed Riverworld though and its short enough that you can read it in one or rides on the DC metro though. It comes with my recommendation.
If you really like Riverworld and role playing games, you might want to check out "GURPS Riverworld" I do not own GURPS Riverworld but I think its really cool that such a thing exists. I am a bit of a role player myself and I will probably be checking out the Riverworld source book one of these days when I am not super broke. When that day comes I will try to remember to put a full review up on this blarrrrgh.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Blogger Payola
Recently the concept of blog shilling has been in the news. Apparently some bloggers that review products on their sites have been receiving payouts for positive reviews. Under a new rule from the FCC, bloggers that are compensated for their reviews need to make this information clearly and conspicuously available. This whole business of blogger payouts has really taken me by surprise because I have a blog that reviews stuff, and I haven't received one red American cent. Come on H. Beam Piper, I probably gave Fuzzies the best review its had in 30 years. Where is my money?
So after thinking about it for a few minutes I realized, maybe I am not reviewing the right kinds of things. Ski School is a 20 year old movie, And Tuf Voyaging is old enough to rent a car in Korea. Today I am going to review a few products that I recently got my hands on. While I am not getting paid for any of these reviews, I would like this to act as my audition for companies looking for a blogger to shill for them. My specialty is book reviews so lets start there, then move on to a product review.
Book Review:
The Guinea Pig Diaries by is a new book by A.J. Jacobs, the author of Know-It-All and The Year of Living Biblically. A.J. Jacobs is a writer/editor for Esquire magazine and despite working for "Playboy Without the Tits Magazine", he seems like a pretty decent guy. I have read two of his other books and have thoroughly enjoyed them. The Guinea Pig Diaries is not as good as Know-It-All or The Year of Living Biblically but that doesn't mean it's not a good book. In fact, if I had to describe it, I would call it the ballinest most gangsta book I have read all year.
A.J. is a proponent of what he calls "Participatory Journalism." In this type of Journalism the author takes part in the activity he or she is writing about. In A.J. Jacobs case it takes the form of a series of bizarre experiments. When A.J. wanted to learn about religious peoples mindset, he spent a year trying to follow every single law in the bible. Like a true thug A.J. jumps in feet first and doesn't give a shit about anything.
His books alternate between hilarious, educational and strangely sweet. The Guinea Pig Diaries is different from his previous books because instead of focusing on one Sisyphean task for an entire year, he spends the year on a series of smaller challenges. For one month he outsources every aspect of his life to India. During another month he tries to be the perfect husband, following the every recommendation and command of his wife. In yet another month he tries to live life by the rules of etiquette that George Washington wrote down way back when.
The only thing I was disappointed by was that many of these stories started out as Esquire articles and appear in the book largely unchanged. Why did I just buy a new hardback book when I could have read the articles in "Maxim for Fake Rich People?"
All in all though, The Guinea Pig Diaries is rad to the power of sick. I enjoyed it and I would recommend it to anybody familiar with Jacobs's work. If you are unfamiliar with Jacobs I would recommend reading The Year of Living Biblically 'cause that book is dank as hell and thug as shit.
Product Review:
Bigelow Cinnamon Stick Tea is the ballinest most gangsta tea on the planet. This shit is so delicious that when it hits your lips you will swear you just got smacked in the grill by Mike Tyson.
When I drink Bigelow Cinnamon Stick Tea, and then I think about all that bunk ass black tea shit I have been drinking my whole life, I want to demand the hours of my life back.
Iced black tea is an unmistakable force of evil, most likely related to Monsanto or The Builderberg Group. Let me be clear. I am stating with authority that the makers of normal iced tea intentionally released a product that they know causes cancer and possibly miscarriages. The only way to stop the black tea menace is for everybody on earth to immediately switch over to using Bigelow Cinnamon Stick Tea at once.
Bigelow tea makes you irresistible to the ladies, makes you more efficient at work and I guarantee that you will get a promotion while getting a blow job if you drink this tea.
Note to Sponsors: So there you have it potential sponsors. If you like what I'm doing here I will gladly support your products. I am pretty much the awesomest guy ever, and when I talk, people listen. You want me on your side, and I want your sweet sweet money.
So after thinking about it for a few minutes I realized, maybe I am not reviewing the right kinds of things. Ski School is a 20 year old movie, And Tuf Voyaging is old enough to rent a car in Korea. Today I am going to review a few products that I recently got my hands on. While I am not getting paid for any of these reviews, I would like this to act as my audition for companies looking for a blogger to shill for them. My specialty is book reviews so lets start there, then move on to a product review.
Book Review:
The Guinea Pig Diaries by is a new book by A.J. Jacobs, the author of Know-It-All and The Year of Living Biblically. A.J. Jacobs is a writer/editor for Esquire magazine and despite working for "Playboy Without the Tits Magazine", he seems like a pretty decent guy. I have read two of his other books and have thoroughly enjoyed them. The Guinea Pig Diaries is not as good as Know-It-All or The Year of Living Biblically but that doesn't mean it's not a good book. In fact, if I had to describe it, I would call it the ballinest most gangsta book I have read all year. A.J. is a proponent of what he calls "Participatory Journalism." In this type of Journalism the author takes part in the activity he or she is writing about. In A.J. Jacobs case it takes the form of a series of bizarre experiments. When A.J. wanted to learn about religious peoples mindset, he spent a year trying to follow every single law in the bible. Like a true thug A.J. jumps in feet first and doesn't give a shit about anything.
His books alternate between hilarious, educational and strangely sweet. The Guinea Pig Diaries is different from his previous books because instead of focusing on one Sisyphean task for an entire year, he spends the year on a series of smaller challenges. For one month he outsources every aspect of his life to India. During another month he tries to be the perfect husband, following the every recommendation and command of his wife. In yet another month he tries to live life by the rules of etiquette that George Washington wrote down way back when.
The only thing I was disappointed by was that many of these stories started out as Esquire articles and appear in the book largely unchanged. Why did I just buy a new hardback book when I could have read the articles in "Maxim for Fake Rich People?"
All in all though, The Guinea Pig Diaries is rad to the power of sick. I enjoyed it and I would recommend it to anybody familiar with Jacobs's work. If you are unfamiliar with Jacobs I would recommend reading The Year of Living Biblically 'cause that book is dank as hell and thug as shit.
Product Review:
Bigelow Cinnamon Stick Tea is the ballinest most gangsta tea on the planet. This shit is so delicious that when it hits your lips you will swear you just got smacked in the grill by Mike Tyson. When I drink Bigelow Cinnamon Stick Tea, and then I think about all that bunk ass black tea shit I have been drinking my whole life, I want to demand the hours of my life back.
Iced black tea is an unmistakable force of evil, most likely related to Monsanto or The Builderberg Group. Let me be clear. I am stating with authority that the makers of normal iced tea intentionally released a product that they know causes cancer and possibly miscarriages. The only way to stop the black tea menace is for everybody on earth to immediately switch over to using Bigelow Cinnamon Stick Tea at once.
Bigelow tea makes you irresistible to the ladies, makes you more efficient at work and I guarantee that you will get a promotion while getting a blow job if you drink this tea.
Note to Sponsors: So there you have it potential sponsors. If you like what I'm doing here I will gladly support your products. I am pretty much the awesomest guy ever, and when I talk, people listen. You want me on your side, and I want your sweet sweet money.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Movie Review: Ski School
When in 1991, Moviestore Entertainment (Yes that's really the companies name) announced that they would be basing their next movie on the windows classic video game "Ski Free," they were met with some skepticism. Detractors commented that Video game adaptations were almost always terrible. (reference the Atari game E.T. and the horrible movie made out of it.) More fuel was added to the "Fuck Ski School" fire when it was announced that the movie would be a sports and sex comedy. How could a game with such a serious plot as Ski Free be played up for laughs on the big screen?
Perhaps the genre of Sports and Sex Comedy was not the correct term. I prefer to classify Ski School as an avaunt garde exploration of the limits of film that forgoes all traces of traditional plot or character development.
The film opens with a montage that cuts between slow motion shots of ski stunts and regular motion shots of young revelers at some sort of modern Bacchanalia. Though the film never completely gives up on slow motion, most of the remainder of the film is presented in regular motion.
The film proper starts with a cold open. Expecting us to be able to identify the characters without any sort of introduction. And we can!
The characters in this film all represent archetypes based on those of classical mythology. Many of the characters do not have names, or at least, this reviewer does not recall them being named.
The dark haired dopey looking guy plays the rogue-ish good guy with a checked past. Similar to Han Solo or Robin Hood, he is talented and Capable but undisciplined and not adverse to breaking the law to do what he thinks is right. Most of what he thinks is right seems to be partying and sneaking peaks at girls while they are undressing.
The brown haired good looking guy that always wears all black is the bad guy. He is also talented and capable but he is a douche. He has a hot girlfriend (not named) but shows absolutely no interest in having sex with her.
The other dopey looking guys are the comic relief/side kicks. They are not talented or capable but love partying just as much as the dark haired dopey looking guy. They fill much the same role as Friar Tuck, Little John, C3PO and R2D2. Needless to say their shenanigans are hilarious.
Finally there is the Blond haired good looking guy. He is new to Ski School and is eager to impress people. He has a vast natural talent for skiing and a pure heart. He is the Luke Skywalker of the movie.
Although the plot is made of of a series of vignettes that are loosely related at best, a common thread does seem to occur. The good main characters are are in some sort of skiing competition against the bad character and his team of expert skiers. Although the competition involves skiing proficenctly the main characters prepare for this competition by drinking massive quantities of alcohol and tricking women into taking their clothing off.
Also at one point two of the comic relief good guys hypnotise the third comic relief good guy into thinking he can no longer have sexual intercourse. This clearly hearkens back to the fear of feminine power and castration that provaded so many ancient Greek myths. The character then spends most of the rest of the movie explaining to various women exactly why he will not have sex with them. It is hilarious.
After this point the plot becomes difficult to follow. It is difficult at times to determine if the films plot is progressing in a linear fashion or if it is going out of order similar to Memento.
Also in keeping with the non traditional nature of the films construction the movie seems to keep introducing important characters throughout its entire running time. In a movie that had any sort of character development this would be a problem. But in Ski School a character introduced within the last ten minutes of the film can be just as developed as a character introduced in the first ten seconds.
The film does break with its source material in several areas. Mainly the inclusion of dozens of pairs of naked breasts and the lack of the original "yeti eats you" ending of the game.
Many critics also commented that extending the running time from the original 1.4 minutes to the extended length of slightly more than an hour made the movie unwatchable. I believe that these reviewers were missing the point that many of the events represented in the film were happening simultaneously in 4 dimensional space time. If the film were compressed down to the its linear events I believe that it would only run 10-15 minutes longer than the original game.
All truth be told, the movie does have some flaws. The motivations of the female characters are never quite explained. For example, the female characters are clearly only motivated by sex, but they never explain why they spend so much time hanging out with the grown haired good looking bad guy, who has little to no interest in sex. In fact unlike the Good Guys he never ONCE sexually harasses a woman. I do not know why these poor sex starved women would spend so much time with him. This incongruity really took me out of the movie in any scene featuring the brown haired good looking bad guy and his hot girlfriend. Luckily one of our main characters is up to the challenge of satisfying her carnal urges.
The ending of the film appropriately devolves into madness as the Good Guys and Bad Guys use various wacky methods to try to cheat each other out of victory on the ski slopes. I will not spoil the ending, but it is good. (lets just say that the wacky good guy isn't the only person who gets hypnotised over the course of the film!)
Eventually the film ends but the emotions it stirs up will stick with you for years. Sometimes I like to rate things on a scale of one to five, but I will use a qualitative measure for Ski School. Ski School is Life Altering. This is a paradigm shattering movie that proves that comedies don't have to be funny or even make sense.
Perhaps the genre of Sports and Sex Comedy was not the correct term. I prefer to classify Ski School as an avaunt garde exploration of the limits of film that forgoes all traces of traditional plot or character development.
The film opens with a montage that cuts between slow motion shots of ski stunts and regular motion shots of young revelers at some sort of modern Bacchanalia. Though the film never completely gives up on slow motion, most of the remainder of the film is presented in regular motion.
The film proper starts with a cold open. Expecting us to be able to identify the characters without any sort of introduction. And we can!
The characters in this film all represent archetypes based on those of classical mythology. Many of the characters do not have names, or at least, this reviewer does not recall them being named.
The dark haired dopey looking guy plays the rogue-ish good guy with a checked past. Similar to Han Solo or Robin Hood, he is talented and Capable but undisciplined and not adverse to breaking the law to do what he thinks is right. Most of what he thinks is right seems to be partying and sneaking peaks at girls while they are undressing.
The brown haired good looking guy that always wears all black is the bad guy. He is also talented and capable but he is a douche. He has a hot girlfriend (not named) but shows absolutely no interest in having sex with her.
The other dopey looking guys are the comic relief/side kicks. They are not talented or capable but love partying just as much as the dark haired dopey looking guy. They fill much the same role as Friar Tuck, Little John, C3PO and R2D2. Needless to say their shenanigans are hilarious.
Finally there is the Blond haired good looking guy. He is new to Ski School and is eager to impress people. He has a vast natural talent for skiing and a pure heart. He is the Luke Skywalker of the movie.
Although the plot is made of of a series of vignettes that are loosely related at best, a common thread does seem to occur. The good main characters are are in some sort of skiing competition against the bad character and his team of expert skiers. Although the competition involves skiing proficenctly the main characters prepare for this competition by drinking massive quantities of alcohol and tricking women into taking their clothing off.
Also at one point two of the comic relief good guys hypnotise the third comic relief good guy into thinking he can no longer have sexual intercourse. This clearly hearkens back to the fear of feminine power and castration that provaded so many ancient Greek myths. The character then spends most of the rest of the movie explaining to various women exactly why he will not have sex with them. It is hilarious.
After this point the plot becomes difficult to follow. It is difficult at times to determine if the films plot is progressing in a linear fashion or if it is going out of order similar to Memento.
Also in keeping with the non traditional nature of the films construction the movie seems to keep introducing important characters throughout its entire running time. In a movie that had any sort of character development this would be a problem. But in Ski School a character introduced within the last ten minutes of the film can be just as developed as a character introduced in the first ten seconds.
The film does break with its source material in several areas. Mainly the inclusion of dozens of pairs of naked breasts and the lack of the original "yeti eats you" ending of the game.
Many critics also commented that extending the running time from the original 1.4 minutes to the extended length of slightly more than an hour made the movie unwatchable. I believe that these reviewers were missing the point that many of the events represented in the film were happening simultaneously in 4 dimensional space time. If the film were compressed down to the its linear events I believe that it would only run 10-15 minutes longer than the original game.
All truth be told, the movie does have some flaws. The motivations of the female characters are never quite explained. For example, the female characters are clearly only motivated by sex, but they never explain why they spend so much time hanging out with the grown haired good looking bad guy, who has little to no interest in sex. In fact unlike the Good Guys he never ONCE sexually harasses a woman. I do not know why these poor sex starved women would spend so much time with him. This incongruity really took me out of the movie in any scene featuring the brown haired good looking bad guy and his hot girlfriend. Luckily one of our main characters is up to the challenge of satisfying her carnal urges.
The ending of the film appropriately devolves into madness as the Good Guys and Bad Guys use various wacky methods to try to cheat each other out of victory on the ski slopes. I will not spoil the ending, but it is good. (lets just say that the wacky good guy isn't the only person who gets hypnotised over the course of the film!)
Eventually the film ends but the emotions it stirs up will stick with you for years. Sometimes I like to rate things on a scale of one to five, but I will use a qualitative measure for Ski School. Ski School is Life Altering. This is a paradigm shattering movie that proves that comedies don't have to be funny or even make sense.
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