What do people want me to talk about?

So, I'm here, and I'm not going to lie, I had pretty much abandoned this place, largely because I ran out of things to talk about, without breaking my tradition of "nothing serious". I mean, there's only so much food to talk about, and my music tastes have gotten too obscure for most people, so I don't talk about that anymore either. And theres only so much random stuff you could write about before realizing how useless it is, especially since I have no idea if anyone reads this, or will even check back to read this. However, the recent unexpected wave of comments I received have inspired me, so here's the deal; I will keep writing if you give me a topic to talk about. It doesn't really matter what it is. I look forward to hearing some ideas.

Shoelaces

Whats up with shoelaces? They dont ever stay tied, you can double tie them, triple tie them, quadruple tie them, whatever, and they still managed to come untied. What a hassle, you know what would solve this? Velcro, what ever happened to that? People are like "ha ha you cant tie your shoes!" Uh, no, its because I dont want to tie my shoes! Its a hassle to keep retying them! Seriously. Bottom line is that Shoelaces are impractical.

Nintendo

I'm not a fan of Nintendo. In fact, I think their outdated. Let me explain, yes they are responsible for some of the greatest classics in video gaming. But they are now a mere shell of themselves. One thing I don't like about Nintendo is the outdated technology they use now. It's been this way for years. It all started with the Nintendo 64, the rise of The Playstation as a serious competator (I still have mine). They used CDs, while The Nintendo 64 still used outdated old fashioned cartriges still. Although they did have the game Goldeneye. I will give them that. But the Nintendo 64 was outdated already because of that. Then we get the Gamecube, it used really small disks for some reason. It wasnt that good. The PS2 and X-box were ahead technologically still. And now we get to the current generation of consules. The Wii. The Wii is outdated, its just a gamecube with a controller shaped like a remote that you flick to give the illusion of movement. It's quite hyped. Revolutionary my foot. I read in an article Wiis only cost 99 dollars to make but that you buy it for like $250. Meanwhile, Microsoft sells their X-box 360 below what its worth to make you buy it. Not to mention, the only reason Nintendo is still relevent is because now they tap into the market of "casual gamers". In other words, people mostly over the age of 30 something, or people who do not really play video games. Regardless of who exactly, these people represent the effects of the hype bubble. It's when something becomes very popular in the mainstream it attracts a fanbase of mostly hanger-oners who will drop it and move on to the next big thing. Pop music is solely based on this. Which is why songs have such a short shelf life. Not to mention, Nintendo has milked Mario and other such characters for the past 20 or so years at least, how bout some new characters? X-box has Master Chief from the Halo games. How about some new characters???? Without it's massive hype machine, Nintendo would be far less influentual in todays video game market.

Food Labels

Whats up with food labels? I go to the store and I see something that says "98% fat free". That language is misleading, what it really means is 2% fat. If something said 50% fat free, its still 50% fat. Its wording designed to hide that it is still somewhat unhealthy. Although I admit it is a good idea, I wouldnt have realized it unless I thought about it. Clearly this is a tactic to make food sound healthier.

Weird Names (written 7/23/09)

I can't stand trendy or weird names. It's so stupid, why can't you just name your child right? Celebrities seem to be in a contest to find the weirdest name. Whats that about??? But what I can't stand even more, are names intentionally spelled wrong. That's bull. It's not funny or cute, it makes you look like an idiot who can't spell right. Thanks to all the trend following, tabloid reading moms who want to be "different" we have this. You know, that actually seems like an oxymoron, they contradict each other, how can one be trend following, and want to be different? Exactly. Everyone wants to be different, so to try to be different than everyone else, you do what everyone else is doing to get away from being the same. It's like things that started out different, everyone catches on too, and they all start doing it. In this case, everyone was already doing it before you got the chance to spell your kids name in an idiotic way. Seriously check out some of this I found on a website (it says "Creative baby name spellings, creative? How about stupid?), Abigail can be spelled Abbigail, Abagale, or Abigael. Caleb can be spelled Kaleb, Cayleb, or Caeleb. Zachary can be spelled Zakary, Zakkary, or Zacharie. Michelle could be spelled Mashell, M'shell. Jennifer could be spelled Jennyfer, Jennipher, or Jennafer. Are you kidding me?? What intelligent person would buy this nonsense? How would you like your kid spending their entire lives, telling people how to spell their name??? Seriously. Name your kid right, don't spell like a 7 year old. Another thing I don't like, is when parents give their kids ethnic names, even though their heritage is not at all what they named their kid. For example, giving your kid a Russian sounding name, when you're not even Slavic. Whats up with that?? That's another thing I don't get. And why are there names only old people seem to have? Like Agnes or Merle. Why do we never see those names anymore? Why can't parents just name their kids after Saints or people of the Old Testament, like David or Adam like normal people? That's what most people do, why can't you do that? Bottom line, at least for their sake, and the sake of sounding educated, name your kid a normal name.

A review of the middle school talent show

So I'm at school right now in the math room on a computer, we just got out of the talent show. What did I think of it?? I think it was worse than last years. Almost all of the entries were girls who think they could sing. Now some did pretty good, one espeshally, but most of them were not of much quality, even worse, about half were a-cappelas, ugh, thanks alot American Idol. On the bright side, there was one juggling act, Devin did this really cool thing where he made the balls look like they were floating, that was cool. Giana played the violin, i didn't really understand it, she says it was something called "rockin' strings" or something. One other girl played violin and did good. The first act was a kid playing the "Star Spangled Banner" with a guitar, and there was one kid who played guitar and did good. Later the teachers did stuff, some of them tried to rap and was dressed up like steryotypical rappers, that was hilarious. The last thing was a bunch of teachers singing a song, which really didn't seem to be much but a time waster considering it was kinda loud, and the microphone got screwed up (I remember). But the best act of the day was this skateboarding dog. Now that was cool. All in all, it was pretty lousy considering almost everything was a girl thinking they could sing. Let the word go out, UMS has very little talent!

The Swine Flu

Whats is up with this swine flu? Its front page, first topic covered story in every news media outlet. The amount of hype surrounding this practically non-existant disease is ridiculous. 19,000 people a year die from the regular flu every year, and now, because we have 1 or two cases of this "swine flu" which from what i hear isn't even as bad as the regular flu, we've got a panic, over nothing!! This is bull. We shouldn't be panicking because theres a case in china and maybe Mexico, ok so what? Some people in Mexico died from it? Mexicans die all the time. You can die from drinking the water there. Comon. The local news has a "hot line", Oprah (who shouldn't even be on TV) did a whole spot about this. Its insane and ridiculous. Theres a few cases and its called a "pandemic". Yeah, a few isolated cases and we have a worldwide "pandemic". Unbelievable. What about the normal flu? It sweeps across quickly, there are many, many more people that get that than this "swine flu" which has nothing to do with pigs at all. Yet Egypt killed all theirs. 19,000 people a year die from the regular flu. And here we are panicking over an almost non-existent disease that that is hyped up so bad it isn't even funny. Its ridiculous.

Nickelodian, the ultimate sell-out

Nickelodeon is terrible now. After the 90s it was all over, all the good shows were cancelled and replaced by mindless stuff meant to appeal to 8 year olds. I don't buy the argument that I'm biased towards the shows I grew up watching. This new stuff really is terrible. There used to be shows such Kenan & Kel, Doug, The Rugrats, Rockos Modern Life, All That (before they replaced the cast with pre-teens), Hey Arnold, and Ren and Stimpy. All classics in every way. Now, we have stuff like The Naked Brothers Band, iCarley, Avatar:The Last Airbender, and the Abomination known as All Grown Up! That was supposed to be a 1 time special. Not a whole series, now the Rugrats is ruined even more! Speaking of The Rugrats, they stopped being good when the Rugrats movie came around, think about it, all the previous episodes were about their imagination. Now their actually lost in the woods. Isn't that kind of dark considering it's the Rugrats, and they added a new character. Bad move. Then they had another movie and another new character! Then it was dead as a creative show. Anyway, the new stuff is terrible. They had a very brief comeback, with Invader Zim, which is a very good show, but apparently the bizarre humor went over most kids heads and they cancelled it, terrible, I liked that show, with its freaky drawing style and just plain weirdness. Probably one of the weirdest shows ever created. Now it's gone and we have nothing. I watched this channel slowly turn to garbage. Eventually I became fed up and discovered King of The Hill, the best cartoon ever made, when I was flipping channels one day. Nickelodeon is nothing now, they sold out to Disney-esque attitudes. Now they are losing to Disney. Truly sad. Later.

Professional Critics

Professional critics are for the most part, idiots who have no idea what their talking about. Take for instance, All Music Guide. And then take something which I've spoken of frequently before, say St.Anger. What a terrible album by a formerly great band (well, I guess not formally since the new album is actually good). AMG gave this 3 stars, which is the equivallent to a 6! Thats a hesitant thumbs up, that ridiculous. If you love low-tuned guitars, a drum with a terrible snare sound, a non-existant bass, no solos, and terrible compositions where the guitar is just an extention of the awful drums, this is it. I like the stuff Metallica did in the 80s, I have the first 5 albums (plus Death Magnetic) I don't have Load, Reload, and definatly not St.Anger. This is clearly nott the band that made Master of Puppets. But AMG doesnt think so, no, AMG does its typical idiocy. AMG uses alot of descriptions and nonsense to try to sound like they know what their talking about. So many descriptions. Useless. The fact they thought this was a decent album shows their idiocy in itself. To compare, listen Master of Puppets first, than listen to St.Anger. Compare the two songs, and I think you'll come to the same conclusion I did. But it's not just AMG, its the Rolling Stone. An organization run by very biased people who refuse to give anything not from their day (probably the 60s or 70s) a fair chance. It's not just music either, movie critics have no idea what ther talking about either. National Security, a hilarious movie i love, got a bad score. How can you not laugh at this scene? Movie citics don't know what good movies are. Professional critics don't know what their talking about. What the problem is?

Mike Bauer of The Washington-Missourian

You might have read about Mike Bauer, he's a highschooler who writes for the Washington-Missourian in the "My MO" section. But here's the problem. He writes about the same stuff I do. Except he does it badly. I don't know him and I'm not a regular reader, but what is this? He makes me and people like me look bad quite frankly. My posts have 10 times the quality his columns ever had. Now if he reads this, I'd be delighted to have him as a co-author. But nonetheless, let me run down the substandardness of his disorganized non-sense. This guy always switches topics within a few sentences. In his January 16 column discussing the economy he switches from Governor Rod Blagojevich in one sentence commenting on his haircut in one sentence (really, it was one sentence), to a Chevrolet ad he saw next to a test he was taking, going on to gas prices, then in advising people to save money in tough times (He's what? 2 years older than me? I bet he knows all about tough times), he goes on about drive thrus and not buying a soda there then back to gas prices, then talking about how using your cell phone at school to check the time can somehow effect the electric bill at your house and telling you to get a watch, not an expensive watch, mind you, "just one that lets you know what time it is." I guess he's never heard of a clock. Then he moves on to how, when you go to a Cardinals game, you should check the outside vendors for food, instead of buying it inside because its cheaper. This is in one column about the economy. What is this nonsense? People read stuff like this to get away from their problems. This guy is always changing the topic. Why?? Stay on topic, seriously. Maybe we just have different styles, wait a minute, no we don't. In writing quality opinion pieces, there is only one way. THE RIGHT WAY! This guy is all over the place. With things that no one cares about. At least I take time to think of interesting topics. Not something you hear everyday. He says he writes about sports, pop culture and stuff that annoys him. But he's writing about the economy. That has nothing to do with any of that. The economy isn't a sport, a pop culture phenomenon, or annoying, its troublesome, but not annoying. He should be writing about pens at the post office and NASCAR, but at the same time he shouldn't because those are mine. (Well, to be fair, the NASCAR one isn't entirely my idea, 62365 thought of it first, but i took it an made it made it my own, so to speak. And JamesNintendoNerd got the pens at the post office, but I expanded if i recall, besides, everyone looks up to him *Nostalgia critic*cough*Irate Gamer* but I made them mine to an extent.) This guy needs to organize his thoughts. Alot of the time, he barely writes 2 sentences about a topic. Now, I've had 2 occasions where that happened but at least I padded it out with alot of filler that was vaguely related to the topic at hand. His column isn't amusing, in fact, I find it somewhat annoying at times, although he usually has about 1 good point among his sea of garbage. Later.

Casino commericals

Whats up with casino commercials? At the end they always go, "If you have a gambling problem call this number." Usually its 1-800-BETS-OFF. Yea there required by law, but whats the point? Its like an alcoholic calling Budweiser. Seriously. Well, pretty soon it'll be Budweiser-Inbev. Dang Europeans. Speaking of which, we've bailed them out of 2 world wars, communism, and we get nothing, by the way, why are we always fighting there wars? When we're Iraq toppling a dictator and gaining a strategic position in the middle east people whine, but when we're in Bosnia fighting a country trying to suppress a rebellion people cheer. Genocide or not, who's getting in the middle of another countries civil war now? But that's for the political blog I'll probably start soon. I've never talked about politics here and I'm not starting now. Anyway those casino commercials make no sense. That's all I really had to say about this, I didn't really talk about casino commercials but whatever. Later.

Album review-Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory by Dream Theater

So, another musical related post, don't worry, I'm not turning this into a music blog, I'm working on Casino commercials and something I've been wanting to do since i started this blog. But this will not become a music blog, just saying, anyway, I listened to this album, its been called Dream Theaters masterpiece. But what did I think of it? Its sort of like Yes crossed with Metallica. And according to Brad’s Completely Useless Record Reviews
, Pink Floyds The Wall. But Yes had substance, Metallica (not the terrible St.Anger Metallica, the good one.) had substance, this doesn't. Its nothing but flashy show-off ism. Now, these guys are very technical and some of the stuff they do just blows my mind; they've got the potatoes but where's the meat? WHERE??????. Yes the guitarist can play multiple notes at a time really fast, and yes the drummer can hit the bass drum really fast, but maybe it should sound like a normal bass drum. Let me explain, most bass drums sound like boom or thud, not this, this sounds like a possum getting run over by a car, "squash", seriously. This flash gets old after 10 minutes. Not to mention, some of these lyrics are just plain stupid and these guys have no songwriting skills. Take out the flash and you have nothing. The ballads on here are terrible. The vocals are over the top operatic nonsense and there's rarely a moment when somethings not getting overplayed. Its so empty. But like i said, the technical skills are mind blowing. Another thing, the bass line and riff in the song "Home" reminds me of Tool. But this is no masterpiece, i stopped paying close attention around track 8 or so, and i cant remember how any of these songs go. All flash, no substance. 6 out of 10

I-pod Music download quality

I dont normally download music, but with this particular album, i already did along time ago with rhapsody. Im not getting rid of rhapsody, you get 25 free plays a month, so i can review an album for free. But for the most part iv'e switched to I tunes because i got an I-pod touch. This album i couldnt transfer becasue of copyright protections embeddded. I had a giftcard and thought, it wouldnt matter if i downloaded it again. So I do. I look at it on my computer. 128 bit rate! Thats bad. I like to have the highest quality sound i can get. Now I try to set all my music the highest it will let me, 320 Kbps. Now, when i downloaded this album the first time, i came as 193 bit rate, acceptable in my eyes. Of course thats before i relized i hadnt set it to a higher bit rate. But 128 is bad. Good thing I didnt pay for it. Im just gonna but a physical copy of the album like i always do. 128 bit rate is unnacceptable. I-tunes needs to get higher quality download quality.

Guitar hero world tour is disappointing

Edit: okay, maybe i was a bit too harsh. Its fine on multiplayer, its a good game, but the set list sucks. GH 3 had tons of classic rock. This is full of new stuff and just plain bad stuff. Korn? Breaking Benjamin? Paramore? Why? Its all whiny emo-ish stuff. That's not rock. They do have some good bands. But not enough. And the only metallica song in this is trapped under ice. I was hoping for a good song after all the terribleness. but they give me that? Why not "Creeping death?" or "For Whom The Bell Tolls"? or maybe even "Fade to black". There from the same album as that. Why? I'll just have to wait for the expansion. And i hear theres a Jimmi Hendrix one coming out too. So theres that. Good game, bad songs. Rock band 2 did it better, its not worth $200 in my opinion. Anyway, now that that's out of the way, read my original review below.


So, flushed with Christmas money, about 2 $50 visa cards, $20 in cash, a $50 gift card to Barnes and noble, a $20 check and a small $10 gift card to borders, i like books. But anyway, i didn't ask for much so i got a ton of money. So i go to the store to spend some. I got 2 books. I was going to spend the rest of the money on albums, but i got an X box 360. I figure, why not get a game? After arguing over rock band 2 or guitar hero: world tour, we got GH. Yes, i knew rock band had better songs but i figured, stick with guitar hero. Big mistake. I pay $100 because me and my brother split it. it cost more than i thought, i thought id have some money left but no, both the gift cards are used. This better be good, I thought. I get home, i set it up. It was disappointing. Its not very user friendly on multi player. Some things you cant tell. And the songs, terrible choice. Rock band 2 nailed it. Guitar hero missed. There are some good songs, but many of them I've never heard of. Some just suck. Why is Korn here? Why? Blink 182? They don't deserve a spot. The thing with Guitar hero 3, which was great, was that every song was a classic. Even the new stuff was really popular at the time. And another thing, id heard of almost everyone on there. On this, i don't even know who half these people are. HushPuppies? Stuck in the Sound? NOFX? Who are these people? Your supposed to be doing songs that actually have something significant about them. Another thing, Why does Tool have 3 songs?? Why? I don't have a problem with Tool, but why 3 songs? O yeah, one of them isn't forty six & 2. In comparison, Rock Band 2 features Pearl Jam, Joan Jett, Kansas, AC/DC, Alice in Chains, Tenacious D, Megadeth, Ratt, Billy Idol, Soundgarden and a better Metallica song than GH. ("battery" from master of puppets as opposed to "Trapped under Ice", one of the few songs off Ride the Lightning i don't like.) Not the Hushpuppies. To be fair, its an alright game, its got Creedence clearwater revival, Nirvana, Ozzy Osbourne, the smashing pumpkins, jimmi Hendrix and even a Willie Nelson song, but so much stuff that tries to appeal to the casual gamer. Instead of Black Sabbath, we get Blondie, instead of Slayer, the mars Volta, seriously, the mars Volta. Some songs on GH are the same as on rock band 2, and there are some of the same artists with different songs, for instance, system of a down, its great there on there, but rock band 2 has "Chop Suey!" this has "B.Y.O.B". Both are good songs but "Chop Suey!" is clearly the more classic song. Ive also heard complaints about the note chart being way off what it is in real life, and how sometimes theres a note that isn't really there or something. Its not worth $200. Worst $100 I've ever spent, possibly the worst purchase I've ever made. At least I have the Metallica Expansion to look forward too. That's gonna be great. Probably alot harder too. At least i got that. GH world tour is overrated, its clearly slipping, i cant believe they screwed up like this, if the next one isn't better then they've clearly jumped the shark. Buy rock band 2 instead, it has much, much, much, better songs.

Movie commercials

Whats with advertisements for movies? They always have a similar sounding narrator every time, do they only have 3 guys they pay to do movie advertisements? Also, they claim every single movie advertised is number 1 or "the best of the year" or something like that, i bet if you played 2 in order, they would both say that. You cant both be the best! Choose 1 jerks! Another thing, they always claim its the film every ones talking about, but I've never heard of it, who's talking about? Stop making yourselves look stupid, seriously. Movie advertisements should be about enticing you to see the movie, not spouting a bunch of overused, cliche phrases that do nothing.

Americas funniest home videos

Its a TV show that has become a staple of television, it has gone through many time slots, channels and hosts, it has become a classic in its own right, except one thing. It outdated. Yes, Americas Funniest Home Videos is an outdated show. With websites such as youtube and others, we dont need a TV show to watch people's hilarious videos anymore. And the humor is outdated also, its pretty much the last holdout of 70's style shows which are so cheesy. and the videos, where do I begin, the videos are so repetitive, oh look, that guy fell, that kid got scared, and so on. How many times can you watch someone fall or a kid get scared of santa during the kids scared of santa montages? The show is obsolete, period. If i want funny videos, i go to youtube where theirs more than physical comedy, although it is funny, and youtube is of gennerally of a funnier quality than anything they show there. Another thing, the video that wins is never funny. Its just something with a baby or an animal thats supposed to be "cute". It's so rediculous. America's Funniest Home Videos is nothing but a relic of an era that is long gone, its time to get rid of this outdated show.

Video and song(s) of the week

yeah, i know i missed the last one or two but I'm really here for the rants, this is a side thing i started due to popular demand, well maybe 1 or two when i told them my idea, anyways here's more videos.

Now this is funny, a kid gets hit by an exercise ball and flys 3 feet back. I showed it to kids in my advisory class and they thought it was hilarious.


Kid gets owned by exercise ball



So for song of the week i figure, why not Metallica? But which song, so hard to choose. Well, i skipped last weeks, so why not two?

This song is very simple compared to their earlier stuff, i can guarantee you've heard it at least once, still a good song though.

Enter Sandman-Metallica


I will not hesitate to say this is one of the best power ballads ever made, the whole song is brilliant, it has one of the smoothest transitions I've ever heard, it goes from a ballad to a heavy thrash metal song so flawlessly. The music video has clips from the movie Johnny got His Gun which is similar to what this song's about. Its about a soldier in World War I who's wounded when a mortar shell lands right on top of him, he survives, but he losses his arms, legs, eyes, ears, jaw, and nose. So he's essentially trapped in his mind. His wish is to either die or be put on public display to showcase the horrors of war. But enough of that. Its a good song, period. (edit: it looks like all the music videos for "One" are gone due to a copyright claim, so I've been forced to use this video of just the band logo with lyrics. But it has the song. Unbeleivable.)

One-Metallica

Other people that do rants that I like

besides doing my own rants, i also read and watch other peoples as well, many of these people inspired me to start this blog.

62365

This guy, with his strange name of a few numbers, is the guy who originally inspired me to do this blog. And i admit, i steal some of his points on things too, in fact, i liked his NASCAR one so much, i decided to use alot his talking points, cause its so true, yeah, my best rant isn't even completely mine. I admit, alot of my really early posts, were not completely my own ideas, but really, this guys hilarious, o yeah, i started using his Later thing too cause i liked it so much. It works doesn't it?

http://www.youtube.com/user/62365

Angry Video Game Nerd

I like this guy, he's very funny, he also cusses alot, but i try to keep this clean, which is why I don't post his videos. I did however, take some of his pens at the post office rant. Off his you know whats Bull$*1* series of videos. He normally reviews really old games and are hilarious. But besides for that pens at the post office, i don't take any of his ideas or reviewing style.

http://www.youtube.com/user/JamesNintendoNerd


Brad’s Completely Useless Record Reviews


Now this guy is called Brad, and hes not my cousin. He inspired me to do albums occasionally, even though he admits he ripped of 99% of Mark Prindles writing style. he also used to cuss in alot of his early reviews, but he almost never does anymore, hes matured alot. He also seems to be really slow in updating lately, but whatever, I also adopted his simple 1-10 rating system, instead of letters, grades or such. he also likes Led Zeppelin alot for some reason. Other than that he seems to have somewhat similar tastes to mine.

http://www.geocities.com/bradreviews/

Theres also some random teens who did some things on HSM that i can't pinpoint.

Those 3 are ones i like alot. Theres probably more, but i'll edit this list over time. Later.

Kids who text people when they're sitting right next to them

Whats up with kids texting people on their cell phones when the kid is sitting right next to them???? really! why??? Are you too lazy to talk??? Its a waste of money, i don't care if you have unlimited texting or not, its ridiculous. What ever happened to passing notes? If you get caught you don't lose your phone. But really, whats wrong with you? electronics destroy your social skills or your ability to speak English fluently? Don't text when the persons right next to you. Its ridiculous and absurd.

Gift Cards

So, since holiday shopping season has just started for most people, i thought id tackle something so utterly unnecessary its not even funny, its not funny because it costs you money. Gift cards are almost useless, you can only turn them in at the store it was bought from. It costs the same amount of money, why not just give them money? Its much more flexable, gift cards are nothing but corporate shills. You have to spend that money at their store and if it expires your screwed, and they get free money. Then it wont even be worth the cheap chinese plastic its made from. Dont buy gift cards, just give them money, its a much better gift becasue its redemmable anywhere. Thats all I have on giftcards. Later.