Héroe de Guitarra

April 03, 2007So I got a guitar on indefinite loan from my totally wonderfully awesome pseudo-fiance of love, and now I understand why people play them.  They're just fun!  Who knew I'd be playing Elvis songs?

Anyway, I just got it Sunday night, but I've practiced a little bit, and it's really not too hard to do...I still need the diagrams of which fingers go where for which chords, but I'm learning a few of them now so that I don't need all of them.  As for transitioning between them, that's getting easier, too.

Now if I could only stretch my fingers out to play bar chords and an F.

Clinton vs. Obama: An Intellectual Analysis

March 22, 2007One of the most popular political conflicts this election season is shaping up to be the primary showdown between Hillary Clinton (henceforth referred to as Hill) and Borat Osama (or however you spell his name).  Yes, that's a joke.

Anyway, this article is not about the political showdown, but about a particularly exciting ad that was run on YouTube.  What happened was a guy, acting entirely on his own time (a couple hours, according to him), made a video parodying an '80's Apple commercial depicting a 1984-esque world.  In this commercial, though, Hill was depicted as a Big Brother-type character, with Obama being supported in the end.

First - This commercial was of a much higher quality/caliber than your typical, ordinary political commercial.  You know what I mean: political commercials suck ass as far as quality goes.  It's as if they spend so much friggin money on everything but their most valuable advertisements.

Second - Some political analysts are actually taken aback by the awesome influence that a simple private citizen can work out in a short amount of time.  This is starting to look a little bit more like a government by the people.

Third - The man who made the commercial was employed by a company that does political advertising and is contracted to Obama.  However, he claims that he quit to keep them from being connected to it while they claim that they fired him over it.  What happened?  Who cares?!?  This guy could do work for any political organization and do a hell of a lot better than they're doing now.

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On a completely different note, at 6:27 tonight, Memphis tips off against Texas A&M.  This should be a good game.

Deterioratingly depressed dolt decides depression definitely desired

March 14, 2007So I'm hitting what I call a funk, what others call a period of mild-to-serious clinical depression (the level depends on what's going on in my life at the time).  It occurs every so often, but rather sporadically.  Anyway, today I was feeling a bit under the weather, so that + my newfound funk puts me into ultra-pensive mode.

Naturally, being in such a mode encourages me to reevaluate, you know, everything in my life...
What makes me different from anyone else?  Why do I think that I deserve a chance to do something, but that others do not?  Who is it I want to be, and how does that relate with who I'm working to be?  Bleh...I hate self-examination, because I know the questions that are going to come, and I know several answers I could give, but I'm never sure which one is the one I mean.

Oh, well...at least the Tigers will be playing soon.  :D

Celebrating Cynic (Same Starting Sound Streak)

March 10, 2007Memphis won the C-USA tourney today.  Big surprise.  Now they're just gonna have to win the NCAA tourney.  Woohoo!

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I just got back from Memphis where I met up with a few of my high school friends and introduced them to Brittany.  Now, I'm usually not one to balk at another person's spiritual experiences because I have no clue what's going on in their spiritual lives.  Usually.  One thing was said, though, that got me thinking again...

"I've just been so broken by God lately.  I've never felt more humble than I do now; it's like all I can do is praise God all of the time.  I feel so great!"

Sounds nifty, honestly enough.  Except for the referring to the self more than referring to God, that is.  Even that wouldn't be so bad, except that the actions are done by the self.  Rather than "I've just been so broken by God lately," wouldn't it make more sense as "God broke me."?  As I said, I can't judge what others are going through, but I do notice things like that that make me wonder.

Anyway, we had an interesting discussion at the dinner table last night.  A teacher at the Baptist school where I attended for 13 years was reprimanded for referring to Mormons as a cult in a class in which there was a Mormon student.  During my 13 years there, I spent several years being told that my denomination was a cult and my grandparents' denomination was a cult, as well as my aunts, uncles, cousins, and many friends.  We dealt with it.

Anyway, that's not the thing I'm actually a little irritated by.  Mom stated that they (the Mormon family) should not be offended because, by definition, they are a cult.  She then told us that the definition of a cult is a group that doesn't believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.  I knew better than to try to explain that Mormons believe in Jesus (she got pissed at me last time I mentioned something even close to that), but I corrected her definition of a cult, using the Merriam-Webster dictionary defnition.  She told me in so many words that I was wrong, forgetting the conversation from about 20 minutes before when I had talked about having just given a presentation in a class about cults.  I think I have a little bit of an idea about the topic, you know?

Anyway, that's enough for now.  Going to sleep.

Abstinence and Age (Almost Alliteration)

March 05, 2007I don't have a full opinion on whether or not abstinence-only sex ed should be taught because my school had no sex ed.  What does irritate me is the following argument:

"They shouldn't teach abstinence only sex ed because kids will still have sex."

Excuse me?  Maybe we should stop telling men not to beat their wives because it still happens.  Or perhaps we should stop saying that murder is wrong because it still happens.  This is not an argument to help your case.  Good gracious.

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So Mom was fairly unhappy today to find out I had gotten off the meal plan at Tech without first consulting her and Dad because I shouldn't be making these decisions.  This re-raised a question I've been pondering for about a month now - When do I hit the magical barrier at which I am "old enough" to make certain decisions?  I'm going to sound a bit like a whiny teenager here (I am one; why shouldn't I embrace it?), but why is it that I'm too young to make decisions like this?  At lunch today, Mom was lamenting (and mentioned lamenting to various other bystanders at church this morning) about my not studying engineering anymore.  Apparently I'm too young to decide what to do with my life.  I mean, I'm only 19; I know I have tons to learn and tons of experience to gather, but let's face it: I can't learn and I can't experience if I let her live a life through me.  So I'm frustrated about the following:
a. Direct quote - "I keep saying you need to be an engineer."
b. Direct quote - "You can't make decisions like this.  You need us to do it."
c. Direct quote - "Are you really, really sure you don't want to come to Memphis for your degree?"

Is it too much to ask to let me make a few decisions and, likely, more than a few mistakes for myself?

The reason I'm putting this on Phusebox is that if I confronted her about this (as I tried to do before), she gets upset and starts crying, then Dad gets pissed at me, too.  That never turns out well.