In search of a midnight Sled

This past Saturday evening was a rather interesting one, especially considering I did not partake in any substance consumption at all (I know, I am responsible and studious =). I spent the begginning of the night viewing the truly epic 3:10 to Yuma for about the twentieth time. This was an amazing experience as always. However someother individuals down the hall were partaking in some certain stress relief methods and after the viewing was over I meandered down the hall.

Upon investigation I discovered that a certain couple altered floormates had decided that it was time to go sledding. I found this to be an excellent idea for some reason, it was probably just out of sheer boredom and a slight urge for an adventure on the scale of Yuma. A detail worth noting is that it was in the single digits plus wind chill. WE armed ourselves to the teeth, each of us three bundled to the brim, all carrying our stolen trashbag "sleds" as we exited the warmth and comfort of Millis.

The initial stages of our quest were unsuccesful and cold. We traveled towards Redston in search of an adequate hill. Unsuccesful, we decided to make an exodus towards Davis where we knew of a ideal slope. Upon the way we encountered a large snow mountain formed by plows. The logical thing to do was to try to sled down that. As we ascended this miniature hill we were startled as people emerged from inside the mountain. This was startling to say the least, especially for my more twisted friends. They implored us to get off of their igloo for fear of a collapsed. We realized the merit of the situation and ascended promptly. We ere then invited inside to partake in some extracurricular activities. The absence of neccesary materials dictated that we move on. We said farewell to our hosts and continued into the night.

Unfortunately, the "igloo" has long since been washed away. The rest of our quest was succesful, and yes, large trashbags are surprisingly effective as sleads.

What the F*** happened to winter?

It seems as if Kaleb's wishes were granted; God decided to cancal winter this year. Ok, it supposed to snow alot this week so its only temporary but serious, how does it go from being wind chill of -10 to nearly 55 degrees out overnight? I happen to enjoy winter and find freshly fallen snow to be incredibly sublime and beautiful. The current state of brown mud combined with the ugliest, damp, green grass and the little bit of whats left of the snow amkes for an incredibly depressing sight.

Granted it was awesome to walk to the Marche this morning in gym shorts, but I still miss my Winter. When I decided to go here I signed up for a solid 5 months of harsh snow, ice, and wind, none of this weak early groundhog day shit. I am not even one of those skiiers who constantly is bitching about the conditions at Jay, Stow, Bolton, or wherever. Plus I think the mountains should be fine. As far as those of us who opt for the Nordic variety of skiing, we should pretty much accept that conditions will be invariably shitty down here next to the lake.

The forecast is looking good for the rest of the week for snow, so maybe god decided that he would reinstate winter and give us humans one mroe chance after fucking up the environment so much.

The best of Broomball

Many are probably familiar with the sport of broomball, and intramural favorite here at UVM. It's pretty much floor hockey on ice but without skates, a bigger ball, and weird sticks. Apparently it originated in Canada (the first week I was under the imprssion it was UVM exclusive, false) and now has spread throughout North America. I made a post a while back about the specifics of broomball. The jist of it probably was that it is incredibly fun to play and hilarious to watch since pretty much everyone sucks unless they have a lengthy background in hockey. Also the fact that many students choose to participate inebriated can add to the potential humor.

My perception of the sport changed drastically when a floormate showed me a highlight video of the Canadian National Broomball team. It is nothing short of ridiculous, although prior experience actually playing the sport would enhance one appreciation of the amazingness of these guys. It is also a much more rugged game at a higher level, I think UVM should chill out about some of the sliding and contact rules personally

Enjoy  

Laundry at UVM

One of the most pleasant surprises that came with attending our fair University was the realization week before we moved in that laundry was free here. My older brother insisted that I must collect quarters all summer in order for a successful first semester laundry-wise at college. that was a nice little bonus at the coinstar the day before I left.

However, actually doing your laundry is far from a happy, loving, egalitarian environment. The laundry room in Millis is nothing short of a battlefield, where a constant war is being waged by hundreds of students who often do not know each other out side of the laundry context. There are only 6 washing machines accompanied by 12 dryers. A load of laundry will take about 38 minutes in the washer and 60 minutes in the dryer. If you so dare as go even a minute or two past the time when our laundry has finished, youd best watch out. People are ruthless, they will remove your laundry and replace it with theirs, usually giving no thought to the sanitary integrity of your clothes. Most will respectfully place them on top of the machines or the bench next to the dryer. But every once in a while you will return the laundry room to see half of your clothes strewn on the floor. This is a devastating sight especially considering that grossness factor of the floor there. It is pretty bad.

I would never mind doing laundry at home but here it is a dreaded weekly routine that just adds an unneccessary amount fo stress to my free time. The key is to find a time when other laundry patrons are few and far between. On a final note, I am deeply grateful to the University for providing free laundry. At least we know that tuition is going somewhere =).

The Dark Knight

As most people are already aware, The Dark Knight was released on DVD last Tuesday. This is kind of a big deal considering how popular it was in the theaters and just how good a movie it was. I am not going to make some absurd, overarching statement like "the best movie ever", but its damn good especially from a genre not known for consistently producing critically acclaimed films. And of course Heath Ledger's last performance was incredible.

Most recently a friend down the hall purchased a copy of the film and ever since it has made it's was around to pretty much every room on the floor. This was initially a good thing since I got to experience the movie again, but it has quickly turned into a black hole for wasting time. It seems like ever time I walk into a room now, The Dark Knight is playing and I am obligated to stay for at least the current awesome scene. Next thing I know I have wasted two plus hours of time on  a movie Ive already seen three times. This wouldnt be that bad except that it was not limited to an isolated incident. I haven' actually watched through and through more than once since it has been on DVD, but I have committed too many hours to bits and pieces that form a huge chunk of time.

It is still a great movie, and probably one that I will still be watching decades from now. It would have been awesome if they decided to release it after finals week. Also RIP Mr. Ledger, it's too bad we werent able to see more examples of this caliber of acting talent that he displayed.

Red Neck Rock

Half of the reason that Atlanta soimetimes gets a bad reputation is because of it's surroundings, and something called Stone Mountain. Atlanta is surrounded by the most Conservative states in the country, so for some one that is ignorant Atlanta would fit into that mold. Atlanta is extremely liberal and far from deep south, except for one huge red neck monument directly in the center of the city.

Stone Mountain in Atlanta is really just a gigantic piece of granite. It is not a mountain it is a rock. First of a little history about stone mountain. The KKK was started there(I heard that the avid members still meet there today). For some reason that I seem to missing, tourist and people that come into Atlanta always go to Stone Mountain. One reason is that Stone Mountain advertises there "spectacular" laser show. As a new comer to the city a laser show sounds awesome(how could a laser not be cool?). Personally I think that the Laser show might as well replace the KKK meeting that used to be held at Stoned Mountain. At one point the laser show projects a giant confederate flag onto the mountain, and the southern crowd in the audience erupts in cheers. I really do not understand the pride in a confederate flag. All sorts of things like this happen through out the show. The worst part about this display of "southern Pride" is that Atlanta is associated with Stone Mountain to new comers.

Stone Mountain really is a huge advertising ploy. Only half of the name is true. Stone mountain is just a large stone, maybe a hill, but not a mountain. Also Stone Mountains clever advertisement about the laser show helps sway new comers to go to Stone Mountain. I am sure that after the new comer pays ten dollars to go look at a huge rock they are thoroughly disappointed. The moral of this story is if you are ever visiting Atlanta do not go to Stone Mountain.

The Epic Death of a rat

I have always hated rats. I have can never really do anything about the diseased filled rodents other than almost throw up every time a see one. There tails are the worst part, so long, fat, and hairless. This is a story about me and a couple of friends acting on my hatred for rats.

It all happened back home in Atlanta. My friends and I were walking out of my other friends dorm at Georgia State when we saw it. For a moment of my life I had the eyes of an eagle, I spotted it way down the hill behind a stop sign it was so fat, long, and hairless. I knew it was a rat the moment I spotted it. I alerted my friends of the situation. We decided to make an attempt at hitting the rat with rocks that were at the top of the hill. I grabbed a dense gravel piece and hurled it in the general vicinity of the rat. The rock made contact disabling the rat. After the rat was disabled to a pathetic squirm my team of rat killers finished the job with there rocks. The deed was done, my friends and I actually killed a rat for the good of human kind. Of course one person had to take killing a rat to the next limit and hit the body again with an extra sized rock.

Usually I hate hunting, or just killing something uselessly, but I make two exception to my rules. The first exception obviously is rats. The second exception which rivals the rat is the cock roach. When I see either of these fowl creatures they turn me into a stone cold killer. Usually I am not able to act on my deep hate for the two creatures but this story is an exception.

Streeter

Streeter is a gigantic, old, psychotic, and great teacher at my high school. I thought that it could be interesting (or just take up one of the four posts I have to do in three days) to post about him because of how ridiculous this teacher is.

First of all if you just look at him you would think he is crazy. He is about six feet tall, and his stomach actually looks like he swallowed a television. Also he is bald just in the center of his head, and all around that lone spot he has hair down to his shoulders. His looks are not the weirdest part. He has had the same teacup since the ice age when his kind went extinct. Also that same teacup does not get washed. He was quoted in our school paper saying,"I will wash it when something crawls out." He washed that disgusting cup the year that I graduated (I will let you imagine why). Also everyone that has been in one of Streeter's classes has seen his never ending but crack(Especially when he gets the latter out). The final thing that I want to describe about Streeter is his insane appetite. He let students cut class to eat if they brought something back for him. Sometimes in class you could catch a glimpse of him shoving a whole hard boiled egg into his mouth as a snack. If you were really lucky you could see Streeter eating his daily package of cold cuts and mustard. He began by placing the ham into his mouth, while the ham was still in his mouth Streeter would squirt packages of mustard in to go with the ham.

Even though I make Streeter sound like a nasty fat man, he was actually the best teacher I had. I learned a ton about photography and also enjoyed every minute of his class. It was best to laugh at his cheesy jokes and then look away when he climbed a latter, but other then that he was a great nasty fat man.

Semantics

HAHA funny title.

Anyway, to business. This is my last blog post. Possibly ever. You might think that makes me sad. It does not. If I had anything interesting or funny to say on a regular basis and the drive to post about it online I would probably continue this blog. Sure, maybe in some abstract way this is all electronic literature, but I just can't get the will to blog.

That wasn't the purpose of this post, just so you know.

I am actually posting about the old game Sim Ants. Yeah? Now the title seems funnier? Oh well. I still think it's kind of clever.

Anyway, I played Sim Ants for the first time in a long time a few days ago and it was a lot of fun. I won't lie, the spiders are still very scary and I am not really sure how to kill them, but overall my colony is doing well. No complaints, anyway.

The graphics aren't great and the interface isn't entirely simple and the objective is rather trite, but even so I don't hate it. I will even play it again. Now.

Blog over.

Good Green Landlord!

Green Team by Will Ferrell

The Landlord by Will Ferrell

Good Cop, Baby Cop by Will Ferrell

Yeah, I know those videos have been around for a while and that everyone in the known universe has seen them, but I just love them. My friend Chris was showing me a clip about Wayne Brady from Chappelle's Show, and it reminded me of those so I figured I would blog about them and kill another homework assignment. Seemed legit.

After having had watched them, I realized that Will Ferrel is actually funny. When I was younger I always thought he was an idiot and ought to die. Well, not so! He is actually quite droll, as it turns out. I won't speak as to how intelligent or unintelligent he is because I frankly have no idea, but I know that he makes me laugh quite often.

I wonder how I didn't see that before?

What's All This About Exams???

As we enter into the home stretch for the semester, most of the students at UVM are preparing themselves for final exams. I, through a combination of luck and... luck, only have two!

These two exams actually don't require too much in the way of studying. One is for French, and it is an exam that is broken down into three sections. The first is a short answer section on the readings over the semester (so I need to read... all... of those), the second part is a paragraph that is full of mistakes of all sorts that needs correcting and the third part is a short essay on an undisclosed topic.

My other exam is in Calculus. It will be the standard math-style test wherein I shall have to find derivatives and integrals. I will have to be able to evaluate critical numbers for extrema and decide when the MVT and Rollé's Theorem are applicable. All of this seemed easy enough when she was telling us about it... but now that I look at it maybe I should go study some of this...

Umm... I am going to go study. I guess I'll post later on or something...

See you in class (?)

The Office

Okay, it really doesn't need to be said, but The Office is the best show ever produced and everyone who watches it becomes a better person. Some people say that it isn't that great. They are stupid and have no idea what they're talking about. That or they watched it for the first time alone and had no idea what was going on or anyone there to prompt them when things were funny and they should laugh.

Once you're hooked, you're hooked for life, though.

I have seen almost every episode of The Office that is out and I am rapidly coming to the point where I will have seen them all. I have seen all of Seasons 1-3 and most of Seasons 4 and 5.

The Office, if you aren't aware (and if you aren't, make yourself aware) is about Dunder-Mifflin, a paper supply company in Scranton, Pennsylvania. The stars are Michael Scott (Steve Carell), the Regional Manager of the Scranton branch, Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson), the leading salesman for the branch, Jim Halpert (John Krasinski), the funny and charismatic salesman and Pamela (Pam) Beasley (Jenna Fischer), the receptionist.

The Office is based on the premise that every activity in the Dunder-Mifflin office at Scranton is being filmed. The characters interact with the cameras watching (held by real people in the show) and give interviews to those cameramen about what is going on throughout the day. While I am not sure why the Scranton branch of a failing paper supply firm is being filmed, it is still funny.

This show is absolutely amazing and I would recommend it to anyone who asked, and many who didn't.

Also, if you "like" John Madden (It's hard to express what I mean here. No one really 'likes' him, but anyway...) and know anything about Dungeons and Dragons then you should watch this. It's called John Madden: Dungeon Master.

Sprained ankle

The other day I decided to attempt to play pick up basketball with a couple of friends from my hall, now I am scarred from embarrassment and have a sprained ankle. I made the mistake of believing that even though I am horrible at basketball I could still try and play it just for fun. That is where I went wrong...

Pick up basketball at the gym was everything but fun. First of all it seemed like everyone knew what they were doing. That was bad because I had no idea what I was doing but tried to act like I have played the game my whole life. My first game(which my team lost horribly) I ran around and got dominated by a huge guy that seemed to have roid rage. Every time I touched this beast of a man his face would turn bright red and he would scream,"FOUL! FOUL!" Even if it was a foul all of the screaming was completely unnecessary. After running around the court aimlessly for an hour I found my one opportunity for glory. A player on the opposing team was on a break away and I was the only one that had any chance of catching him. I ran as fast as I could and was able to catch up to him. The opposing player went up for a lay up completely oblivious that I was right behind him. I went up to swat the ball and find my glory, but alas I missed and landed on my ankle side ways. So now I am hobbling around realizing once again that basketball is not my sport.

I believe that this fatal attempt at playing basketball is once again telling me never to play basketball. I have not been blessed with any attributes that would be help full in basketball, I am short, I have an awful shot, and I can not jump. This instance of terrible play is just another sign that basketball is not meant for me.

Il a ete tres chere

This weekend I went to Montreal for the first time, also I went to a bar for the first time. Apparently it is very obvious that I am a stupid young American that has never been to a bar. To introduce my stupidity me and two friends bought three hot chocolates for forty Canadian Dollars.
Sucked in the glee of being in Montreal and also feeling the extreme cold my two friends and I decided that it would be a good idea to find some hot chocolate. We stumbled across a very fancy bar that advertised there hot chocolate as tres bien. In the bar we all ordered our hot chocolate and everything would of been fine if one of my friends did not ask the bar tender to "throw a little" vodka in his hot chocolate. Obviously being a naive American going crazy that the drinking age is 18. Of course that gave my other friend and I the brilliant idea of asking the bar tender what would be really good to mix in Hot chocolate. Of course the Bar Tender suggested something that sounded absolutely perfect. We got our hot chocolates and they were probably the best drink I have ever had in my life. Then we got the check... Suddenly the drink left a bitter taste in my mouth. It turns out what ever vodka the bar tender "threw" into a drink was ridiculously expensive. Also it turns out that nothing is perfect because what ever the stuff he suggested to put into my other friend and my drink was eighteen bucks. The bill came out to forty dollars for three hot chocolates.

My friends and I seriously contemplated running out of the restaurant to avoid paying the bill. We decided against that course of action and spent a chunk of our Canadian money on hot chocolate. I learned many things from simply buying three glasses of hot chocolate. One is figure out what you are buying before you buy it.

Final project

I am severely dreading our final project that is due next week. I chose to go with the boring not so creative route and just write a paper. Hopefully my paper will be some what unique but that is unlikely.

The main question that my paper is trying to answer is how is the Internet changing literature, and how is that change in literature affecting our society?In the first half of my paper I will give examples of changing literature based on the Internet. In the second half of my paper I will give examples and explain how the Internet is creating a whole new community based on the literature that is being created. I want to show that changing society and changing literature are connected. Also I plan on using many examples from the things that we have already done in class to help explain my two points. Almost everything we have read/watched in class are perfect examples of how literature is changing using the Internet. I plan on using different kinds of examples such as blogs, digital stories, YouTube etc.

I am hoping that my paper will show the connection that I am trying to make while showing many valid examples. Also I will be arguing that all of the examples that I am using are literature. I am explaining that literature is no longer just something you can hold in your hand and is written down. I am asserting that literature is much more then something you can hold in your hand, literature can really be anything. As hopefully my paper will explain digital literature and non-digital literature are really not that much different in what they are but it is what they are doing to society that makes them different.

Wall-Ewood

Like the title? I thought it was clever. A nice little portmanteau (of course) of Wall-E and Hollywood. Yeah, I know, you got it. Shut up.

Okay, so I have been railing against Wall-E for the past few months because it sounded like a terrible idea. A robot that compacts trash and somehow is going to make the Earth life-supporting again? It really sounds ridiculously stupid.

Well, I watch it. And then I ate a lot of crow. It was actually a really cute movie. The plot maybe wasn't too original, but then, what plot is? The movie looked really cool and the fact that all of the humans on the ship had gotten so lazy that they were supermassively obese was funny when compared to today's society where obesity abounds.

Wall-E builds buildings (why don't we call them 'builts'?) with the compacted trash squares in order to help clean up the environment. A girl robot, EVE, comes to the post-trashpocolyptic Earth on a 'classified' mission. I won't disclose too much for fear of spoilers, but a nice movie follows the beginning with cute animated infatuation and more hilarity than expected. This movie is, of course, good for the entire family. The kids will see a fun film about robot shenanigans and the parents will actually be able to look into the plot a little deeper to get some meaning from the movie.

Oh, and this is really funny.