Woodshop

One of my favorite classes in middle school was woodshop. In fact, I took it all three years from sixth to eighth grade. Looking back it seems kinda crazy - that a sixth grader was permitted to operate power tools and bandsaws and belt sanders. How old were we in sixth grade? Eleven I think. But eventually, when you know, I have kids, could I imagine letting my eleven year old kid take woodshop? When I was sixth grade I felt pretty mature, didn't feel like a kid, so I think that's something to keep in mind. Despite how tiny they look now, kids are smarter and more savvy than we might think. After all, we were all once kids. It's just too bad that woodshop has been canceled at my old middle school, 'cause it was really fun.

Side note, I think the only "serious" injury I sustained from woodshop was actually trying to cut... felt. With a box cutter. I had the box cutter upside down, and pressed my thumb against the bladed side. There was lots of bleeding, but my blood clotting kicked in and I healed like Wolverine. And then I judo chopped that box cutter.

Jaywalkers

I hate jaywalkers. Let me be more specific. I hate jaywalkers who TAKE THEIR TIME. If you want to dash across the street when there's no incoming traffic, be my guest. If you can make it across without requiring a driver to half to slow down, fine. BUT if you slowly saunter across the street, such that I have to slow my car to a crawl, then you my friend, or really that should be enemy, are on my hate list. If there were only some way to teach these people a lesson... you know... without running them over. Because that's the lesson they need to learn! They're lucky I have catlike reflexes.

Drag Me To Hell

... I don't really want to be dragged to hell. That's just the name of a movie.



I don't particularly like horror movies. I don't like loud creepy noises, things jumping out at me, or grotesque images. But occasionally I will watch one -- provided that it;s good. Last week, I watched Drag Me To Hell, which has 93% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Before that I watched The Orphanage, which is 86% on RT. Before that it was probably the Resident Evil movies. I kinda equate people who like Horror movies to people who like Spicy Foods. They're spicy movies that target the senses beyond what is comfortable. But I do like spicy foods.

So back to Drag Me To Hell. It's actually a fun horror movie. Pretty much right from the beginning it was trying to scare you. And it wasn't torture pr0n. There were some gross out moments, but nothing that relied on blood and guts. Where the Orphanage was more atmospheric in it's scariness, Drag Me To Hell had things jumping at you and then quickly relieving the tension with ridiculous gags, like projectile vomiting. Director Sam Raimi has a quirky sense of humor. I haven't seen any of his old horror movies, but you can certainly see the similarities in his style of directing for the Spider-Man movies.

Horror movies are fun with large audiences, when other people are also jumping in their seats or making comments about how coming to watch this movie was such a bad idea. When the movie is over, you feel good that you "survived" the experience. According to Michael, Drag Me To Hell was one of the scariest movies he's seen. And he whined like a little baby that the speakers in the theater was too loud. And then he huddled in a corner with his hands covering his ears. JK. Well some of it is true, you can guess which parts.

Although Drag Me To Hell was a pretty "fun" experience, I still don't like to be scared in general. But I am perfectly willing to watch a good horror movie.

Ads

When Google started providing targeted ad service, I always wondered how they could generate enough revenue from people clicking on these ads. I know I never click on them -- okay maybe a couple times a year. Even if people are tricked into clicking on ads, as people get more Internet savvy, wouldn't people learn to eventually navigate the advertisement minefield? I'm sure some people intentionally click on ads, but what percentage is this? And when people expect everything on the Internet to be FREE, understanding that there will be ads everywhere, but avoidable, can purely ad supported sites even stay afloat in the long run?

Now that the economy sucks, I feel obligated to randomly click on ads on the sites I frequently view, so that they can earn 10 cents from me each time I visit. I will single-handedly save my favorite sites from a pitiful demise.

Slacking

90+ posts later and there's finally been a lull in the regularity of my posts. I haven't forgotten about this blog, and I can't promise that I'll pick up the pace again, but... actually there is no but. There's really no point to this post other than to make the obligatory acknowledgment that I haven't posted in a while. Given the quality of my posts, it may not seem like I spend a lot of time composing a post, but I do -- more than I'd like to, so laziness has kinda set in. Oh well! I guess I'll... try harder? Or maybe not. I dunno. Hopefully I'll still find stuff to talk about and be motivated enough to write about it.

Trivia

I've been going to trivia night at a pub occasionally. It's pretty fun, but it makes me feel fairly useless - that I don't know enough useless knowledge. And it makes me feel like a Philistine. Current events? I am useless. History? Useless. Art and literature? I can sometimes get the more pop culturey questions. Music? Useless. Recognizing famous people on photographs? Somewhat okay. I'll be happy if I can contribute like more than five answers per night and I am quite pleased when I do get a more academic type trivia question.

I should learn my presidents. Every trivia night there's like one or two questions pertaining to presidents. Like... who was the first president to have an assassination attempt made on him? The following are some questions I was able to answer this week. From what state was the winner of Miss America? In what movie is Dr. Cockroach in? What instrument does Jamie Foxx's character play in the Soloist? See the kind of questions I can answer? Haha. I can sometimes get sports related current events, as I pay more attention to sports than the people I usually go with. I am by no means a fountain of sports knowledge though. I wish there was less downtime in between rounds, because sometimes it feels like the waiting goes on foreeeever. The prize is fairly worthless: six bottles of beer. Teams are capped at six people.

Answers:
Andrew Jackson, the seventh President
North Carolina
Monsters vs. Aliens
Cello

ATM

Holy monkey butt, there's an ATM within the north side of campus that I can use. The myths are real.