Great Movies We Forgot About

It happens a lot. A new movie is scheduled to come out, advertisements are plastered all over our walls and televisions, hype is built up to the breaking point, leaving people impatient and eager to see this marvel of a film.

And then it opens.

People line up for miles to get in, pitching tents and eating cold food out of cans just to preserve their space in line. Finally they make it in to the theater and get comfy with their popcorn and over-sized sodas, practically pissing their pants during the coming attractions.

They sit through the movie for a couple hours, and it eventually ends.

And it was nowhere near as good as they had hoped.

It happens all the time. Either that, or the movie did turn out to be great, but a month or two later, people forget that it even exists.

I can think of 2 movies this happened with quite recently. "300" and "I am Legend." Both movies had an enormous amount of hype and fan fare behind them, but no one even talks about them anymore. I could ask anyone on the street, "What did you think of 300?" and they will probably say, "Oh yeah, I forgot about that movie. It was pretty good."


My question is, if it was so good, how did you forget about it?

There's a ton of movies I love and think were great, and I haven't forgotten about them. Anytime I want to watch a movie (which is often) I go over the least of great movies I've seen in the past before I even consider watching a movie I haven't seen.


If a movie's good, you'll always remember it. I have a hard time believing that a movie is a good movie if no one remembers it.

The Drug Wars

The Drug Wars

Check it out. I know it's a sensitive topic for a lot of people, but believe me, it's not promoting drug user or anything. I have been involved and believing in the Harm Reduction standpoint of drug use for quite some time. I think it's a much better policy to adopt when dealing with drug use, simply because it will be impossible to eradicate drugs completely and/or convince everyone to stop using them completely. Because of that, it's smarter to help people stay safe, prevent over-dosing, prevent the spread of blood-borne diseases, and to ultimately keep people alive.

I'll be posting about any interesting articles I can find in the news, whether in the paper or online, and will update anytime I find one. If that's multiple times a day, so be it, but I will update at least once a day.

Girl Power

Sci-Fi action movies are great and all, but there is always something that makes them better: a woman playing the lead role.

Three of my favorite movies of all time are the Resident Evil films with Milla Jovovich playing the main character Alice. I have trouble believing those movies would have been good without her. That may be a stretch, but she played Alice perfectly.

She seems to be stuck in that genre now. The "a virus breaks free, setting humans against mutants/zombies while she's stuck in the middle and trying to save humanity," genre. Not that there is anything wrong with that. She does them well.

Ultraviolet was kind of like the Resident Evil movies, but at the same time, vastly different. Again, she played Violet very well. I don't know who else could have fit that role the way she did. What's cool about her doing all these movies is that she does all the action herself. She learns the choreography, jumps around, shoots guns, all that stuff. In an interview on the Resident Evil 3: Extinction DVD, she says it's her favorite part of doing the movies.

Why did I make this post? Mainly because I just watched Ultraviolet again today and I saw it as an excuse to post pictures of her and talk about how hot she is. There really is no other reason. So one more time just for the hell of it:

She is one of the sexiest girls you will ever see in an action movie. There have been others who came close, like Kate Beckinsale in Underworld, or Charlize Theron in Aeon Flux (which sucked, by the way), but neither can touch Milla in my opinion. There is something about her that says she was made for this type of thing. To be honest, I don't know what MTV was thinking when they put Charlize Theron in Aeon Flux. That movie had Milla written all over it. But in a way, it wasn't good enough for Milla either. What she does is good, and Aeon Flux could have never been good.

She isn't perfect though. There is one thing she doesn't look good doing. Being pregnant:

Just kidding. She's still beautiful, just not as.

What Is This Country Coming To?

Like I said before, I don't follow politics. I don't want to say it's boring, but it's boring, and most of the time, I don't understand what they are talking about.

But this I understand:

Beginning in October, the Army plans to station an active unit inside the United States for the first time to serve as an on-call federal response in times of emergency. The 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team has spent thirty-five of the last sixty months in Iraq, but now the unit is training for domestic operations. The unit will soon be under the day-to-day control of US Army North, the Army service component of Northern Command. The Army Times reports this new mission marks the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment to Northern Command. The paper says the Army unit may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control. The soldiers are learning to use so-called nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals and crowds.

Well, at first I didn't understand it. Why would we need an active unit "to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals and crowds?" In the short time I've been on this planet, I can't remember anything taking place that required an active duty Army unit to keep things under control.

But then there was all of this in response to the federal bail-out package for the economy:

Representative Brad Sherman Martial Law

Brad Sherman and Martial Law Again (The fact that it's on the Alex Jones show makes it lose some of its credibility to me. He thinks George Bush carried out 9/11.)

To top it off, there is now talk of postponing the election.

Now it all makes sense. If the elections are postponed, we are going to need Martial Law to be instated because people are going to flip out. An active duty Army unit will be required to maintain control.

I can't imagine American troops firing on their own countrymen, but I can totally picture countrymen firing on American troops, and American troops returning the fire. So, if you see an Army unit in the streets, do not shoot them. Meet them in the middle with a case of beer and some good American food and try to keep things from getting any worse.

Hopefully we won't have to deal with any of this.

You've Got To Be Kidding

Since when was baseball so important that it could bump Seinfeld out of it's regularly scheduled rotation? I rely on Seinfeld to survive. It's more important to me than food, water, oxygen, and sex all rolled in to one. I have to watch it everyday on TBS at 5:00, then FOX at 7:30, then again at 11:30. And then on Fridays, TBS at 8:00 pm. All last week, all I got was my 7:30 and 11:30 doses.

I'm going crazy.

Then get this. Sopranos wasn't on at 3:00 pm twice this week. Instead, they played the idiot Cris Angel's stupid TV show. It's so obvious that guys a fraud. A 2 year old could point out the camera tricks. One continuous shot, my ass. Every single time he says "this is one continuous shot" they ALWAYS cut to a different camera at least twice during the trick. And if this guy is so good, why doesn't he do live shows or tours? Because he can't! He needs cameras and fake audiences to do his tricks. You're no David Copperfield, Cris. I take shits more magical than you.

Now check this out. Sex...With Mom and Dad on MTV. Hottest show ever. Now, I hate everything MTV stands for. Every show on that channel (excpet True Life) is a complete joke, but I swear to god. One of the chicks on this show was 16, so sexy (so what if she's 16? It's not like I'm trying to fuck her, I'm just talking) and had tits bigger than my head. They show her poolside in this skimpy bikini with her boobs hanging out. It was incredible, but why are they letting a 16 year old girl show her body off like this on TV? Then she's talking about these guys she slept with. I had to turn it off when I started imagining what it would have been like to be one of those guys.

I want my TV back. If TBS doesn't cancel baseball and A&E doesn't stop replacing the Sopranos with Miss Angel, I will fly to each channel's headquarters and smash everyones head with a tire iron.

Unsinn Image

photo courtesy Unsinn Photography
www.unsinnimage.com

Body Traffic

I refuse to ever go inside a grocery store again. Besides the fact that I want to buy everything I see because I always go when I'm hungry, I hate dealing with people who do not understand the dynamics of moving around in a grocery store.

For those of you this applies to, let me explain something.

The aisles are not very wide. At the most, they are about 5 or 6 feet wide. This is not enough room for your 3 foot wide cart and 4 foot wide ass to walk down the very middle of. Just like in real traffic (in a car and on the roads, in case you weren't sure), stay to your right, leaving the left hand side of aisle open for people coming the opposite way. Or, if you don't want to stay on the right, go the left side, it really doesn't matter. Just please, STOP WALKING DOWN THE MIDDLE.

If you refuse to do that, and you choose to walk down the middle of the aisle still, at least move out of the way for someone coming towards you. Is that too much to ask?

If you are walking down the aisle (hopefully on the right hand side) and you see someone is stopped on the left hand side looking at their potential dinner, DO NOT stop right next to them to look at your potential dinner. This makes it completely impossible for anyone else to get past you. All you have to do is walk an extra 3 feet past the stopped person, or stop 3 feet before that person, leaving an area open for the rest of us to get by.

I swear to god, I will kill the next person I see do either of these.

What is a 'Stock Market?'

I don't follow current events, except for when it has to do with a girl drinking pesticide in fear of black holes. Odd news is the only news I care about. So, when I hear constant talk about "pullouts," naturally, the first thing that comes to mind is...well, you get the idea.

I don't know what is going on with the stock market. And honestly, I don't even know if I am supposed to care. I don't care. But should I? Probably not. I don't own stocks. Why would I care if a market full of them crashes?

I do know that it will have repercussions in other areas I am involved with, but still, I can't seem to get myself to care.

Is it only in my slightly paranoid head that it seems ironic this comes right before an election? To be more specific, does it seem ironic that this comes right before Bush leaves office? Sabotage, maybe? Probably not, but it's fun to think about. If I was President and my 2nd term was coming to an end, I'd leave a giant mess for the next President to clean up. It'd be hilarious. Unfortunately, if this is Bush's idea of a joke, it's affecting all of us instead of the next Commander in Chief, whoever that unlucky man may be.

The words "Rome" and "burning" come to mind. Is history repeating itself?

Masterpiece Theater - 28 Days Later - In A Heartbeat

This is seriously the BEST piece of music I have ever heard. I remember hearing it for the first time when I saw 28 Days Later in the theater and thinking, "Jesus Christ this is PERFECT." It fit the movie so well. If you haven't seen the movie, WATCH IT. If you have, just have a listen to this one more time. I was also ECSTATIC when they used it a few more times in 28 Weeks Later. Genius. It's like they did it just for me, knowing how much I was obsessed with it. I don't know what made me think to look for it again, but when the movie first came out, I tried to find it to no avail. Somehow I found it this time. I am so HAPPY I did. I love it. It makes me miss being in a band. This is the exact type of music we used to play. I would do anything to do it all over again.

6 Things I Hate About You

I was watching TV and I came across one of those reality shows where they do the ultimate make-overs or whatever you call them. The women were discussing what men liked and the way they should appear to have a better chance of attracting men. I watched for a minute just to see the stupid things they had to say (ok, I get in to shows too easy sometimes, I admit) and see if any of it was something I looked for in a woman.

Almost everything was something I didn't give a shit about.

It got me thinking about the things women (including my girlfriend, unfortunately) do that the average, every-day man doesn't care about. Now, obviously there are men who are very strict about styles and fashions and what women are supposed to do to look pretty. They don't count. I am talking about an average man like me, some loser you'd find in the local bar or club.

Eyebrows - This is one that I deal with personally on a daily basis. My girlfriend is obsessed with her eyebrows. Of course no man is going to be attracted to thick, wild, out of control bushes on top of your eyes, but as long as they are kept in check, that's good enough. The don't need to be expertly groomed to impress us. My girlfriend will spend so much time making sure hers are absolutely perfect. I don't know how she has the patience for it.

Makeup - It seems to me, no matter how many times certain women are told, they don't understand that it is completely possible to wear too much makeup. In my not-so-expert opinion, I think it's a realistic idea that any woman could look her most beautiful with a minimal amount of makeup. Hell, some even look great without any at all. But NO ONE looks good with too much. No one. A little work on the eyes, touch up the cheeks, and that's enough. You're done.

Long Nails - This is the one item that actually makes me sick and creeps me out. Long fingernails. The worst is when they are so long that you can paint little intricate designs on them and attach jewels to them. Come on. As with makeup, natural or minimal is the way to go. Stick with nails that either stop at the fingertip or just barely grow past it. It looks much more womanly and a lot less skanky.

Nail Paint - Any color will do. I don't care if it matches your eyes, shoes, underwear, hair, whatever. Pick your favorite color or the color that suits your mood, wear whatever you want, and let's get to the restaurant before I die of starvation. In fact, none at all would be even better. I don't know about other guys, but I think it makes a woman look younger when her hands and nails are untouched.

Fake Eyelashes - I really think the only people who actually pay attention to how thick a girls eyelashes are are other girls. Eyelashes can look good with using fake ones or pouring on excessive amounts of mascara. If you don't have naturally thick eyelashes, who cares? Either be proud of what you've got or use a tiny bit of mascara and I assure you that you will be good to go.

Collagen in Lips - Just makes you look uglier. If you don't have lips that are so small you can't even see them when your mouth is closed, you don't need botox.

If you haven't noticed, there was common theme among all of the listed items: Natural/Semi-Natural is good.

They weren't kidding when they said a woman's body is a work of art. It is. Everything about it is genetically programmed to be gorgeous. It's sculpted for perfection. It is purpose built to attract men. 90% of the time, nothing about it needs to be changed. Often trying to change it diminishes how attractive it already was.

The point of this post is to tell women that you need to learn to be happy with what you've got, because more often than not, you're perfect the way you are. Media has created an image of what a woman should look like, and it is completely fake. No woman should look like what you see in magazines and TV and movies. You don't have to be super skinny, covered in makeup with objects glued to your body and bacteria injected under your skin to be beautiful. Take a look at yourself one more time. You are beautiful already.

Yeah!

After writing up my Ultimate Mixed Tape (thanks to Tia at Clever Girl Goes Blog for that idea, too) post, I started listening to those songs over and over again. The memories attached to all are significant to me, but there is one song that there aren't memories attached to, just current thoughts and emotions.

That is Jesus Christ by Brand New.

I know I already posted about how it seems to fit my life perfectly at this point in time, but at the time, I didn't even realize how accurate that statement was. I feel like this song was written for me. Now, I know I can't be the only one who feels that way about this song - or any song for that matter. Everyone has that one track that is like the soundtrack to their life.

So what I decided to do was go through the lyrics, break them down, and figure out exactly why this song affects me so much. So, let us see what's going on with this song:

Jesus Christ, that's a pretty face
The kind you'd find on someone that could save
If they don't put me away
It’ll be a miracle

The first thing that comes to mind for this part is when I met my current girlfriend. She didn't realize it at the time, but I was a wreck. I had just quit using heroin for the first time and broke up with my now ex-girlfriend after she went behind my back and had an abortion without even telling me. I didn't know up from down, and I felt like I was losing it. My now current girlfriend coming in to my life, to be honest, probably saved my life.

Do you believe you're missing out?
That everything good is happening somewhere else
With nobody in your bed
The night is hard to get through

This part is a perfect description of what I feel like I am going through right now. In the last 3 years, I've managed to isolate myself from my friends and a good portion of my family. I sold my car for $90 to buy heroin. I fucked myself over. I feel like I am missing out now. Like everything good is happening somewhere else. I sit alone in my bed at night while my girlfriend is working from 4pm to 2am 6 nights a week, and it's so hard to get through. I have no reason to leave my house everyday. I feel stuck. I feel like there should be so much more to life, but I just can't find it right now.

And I will die all alone
And when I arrive I won’t know anyone

I hope thats not true. I've never been a religious person, but just like any human being, I wonder. What is there after life? I think I'm at the stage in my life where I really want to figure it all out. Is there a heaven? Is there a hell? Which one will I go to? I feel like, based on everything I've done in my life, it will be hell, and I think that's what they mean in the song. He will die all alone, and when he arrives he wont know anyone, because he's going to hell while everyone else went to heaven. Just my interpretation.

Jesus Christ, I’m alone again
So what did you do those three days you were dead?
Because this problem is gonna last
More than the weekend

Jesus Christ I’m not scared to die
But I’m a little bit scared of what comes after
Do I get the gold chariot
Or do I float through the ceiling

The first verse brings to mind the fact that what I'm going through right now is not a temporary problem. If I don't do something to change the way my life is going, my loneliness and unhappiness will go on and on. The second verse is exactly what I was talking about in the last section. I personally am not scared to die at all. What scares me is what happens after. I'm sure we would all feel better if we somehow knew.

Or do I divide and pull apart
Cause my bright is too slight to hold back all my dark
This ship went down in sight of land
And at the gates does Thomas ask to see my hands?

This part is probably the most significant to me. "Cause my bright is too slight to hold back all my dark." In my life, I've done much more bad than good. The ship sinking before it gets to land is like trying so hard to make a good life for myself but falling short. My bright could never hold back all my dark.

I know you're coming in the night like a thief
But I’ve had some time, O Lord, to hone my lying technique
I know you think that I’m someone you can trust
But I’m scared I’ll get scared and I swear I’ll try to nail you back up
So do you think that we could work out a sign
So I’ll know it's you and that it's over so I won't even try
I know you're coming for the people like me

This part, to me, represents the fact that I know, one day, I am going to die, just like everyone else. Despite trying to do good to make up for all the bad I've done, it isn't going to change the fact that I still did bad. "I know you think that I'm someone you can trust, but I'm scared I'll get scared and I swear I'll try to nail you back up," is another way of saying that. I've done what I can to make myself look worthy of being accepted in heaven, but in the end, I'll probably just do something to fuck up my opportunity. The last three lines are like me trying to figure out a way to know when the end is coming so I can prepare for it and try my hardest not to screw up.

I realize this is probably a very depressing post, and I'm sorry for that. I just had to type it out. I had to get how I felt about this song out. I had no idea it resonated so much with-in me. I must say, I feel better now. I promise this will be the last depressing post I ever put up here.

My Ultimate Mixed Tape

I totally stole this idea from one of the blogs I follow, Clever Girl Goes Blog. She did a post called 'The Art of the Mixed Tape' and it got me thinking about what I would put on my mixed tape if I had to pick thirteen (I only did 10) of my favorite songs.

It wasn't easy at all. There were so many I wanted to put on that I couldn't. Putting two great songs next to each other and trying to choose which one of them you like better is very hard, as I'm sure most of you know. It took a while, but after three nights of beer and swapping CD's in and out of my stereo, I came up with what I think would be my Ultimate Mixed Tape.

(The hardest part was finding some of these songs on YouTube.)

So, here it is, 10 songs that mean the most to me. Of course, if this were a different stage in my life, all 10 of these would be different songs. But for right now, these are the 10 songs that mean the most to me:


Better Go Home Now by The Dirty Three - This song takes me back to high school - early high school - when my friends and I had just discovered what music sounded like on various drugs. Drugs are bad, I know, but we were young. The single memory that comes to me when I hear this song is sitting in my Ford Ranger at a gas station, waiting for the other car full of friends to meet us for a night out. My friend Jim and I lied back in the reclined front seats, out of our heads on ecstasy, and this track was playing on my CD player. The world seemed strangely perfect for 3 minutes and 41 seconds

East Hastings by Godspeed You Black Emperor - I am such a sucker for dark, eerie, instrumental pieces, and this song epitomizes that description. When I heard it used in the movie 28 Days Later, I about shit myself. I couldn't think of a better pairing of music and film.

Dramamine by Modest Mouse - The first Modest Mouse song I ever heard. The raw sound and emotion in this track has stuck to me ever since that day, back in 9th grade. It reminds me of my first band and sitting in my basement all night with my friends, trying to imitate their style. We never could do it, but we did have a lot of fun trying.

Under The Bridge by Red Hot Chili Peppers - This track goes way back to my childhood and driving to the beach with my mom and two brothers, all of us singing it at the top of our lungs. It was my oldest brothers' favorite song, so it was also my favorite song. I rediscovered it later on in life, and it continues to be one of my all time favorites.

Love Song by Snake River Conspiracy - Besides being the best cover of The Cure's 'Love Song' I've ever heard, it's one of the sexiest songs I've ever heard. This song + slow, rough, steamy sex = WIN.

How Did This Room Get So White? by The Red Stars Theory - Another instrumental masterpiece. Chaotic and beautiful. This sounds totally lame, but I could imagine floating through sounds and lights with this song. It's mellow then loud and out of control. Just like Dramamine by Modest Mouse, it takes me back to 9th or 10th grade when I was just discovering music like this (I guess you could call it Indie.) I realized that mainstream music wasn't the only kind of music there is. It opened my eyes to the vast horizons of what was possible with sound and music. This song made me want to be a better musician.

Cat Faces by Ugly Casanova - Yet another throwback to my drug using days. On a high dose of a certain three letter psychedelic, this track - and the rest of the Sharpen Your Teeth album - contributed to a mind blowing trip that left me contemplating what my life was all about and helped me get a little bit closer to understanding who I am on the inside. Even when I hear it today, I think of that night and how profound it was. The lyrics have nothing to do with any of that, but something about the way it all sounded got me thinking about crazy things.

The Package by A Perfect Circle - Reminds me of who I was when I was hooked on heroin, and reminds me to never be that person again. The lyrics perfectly describe the thought process I went through all day, every day: always lying to get what I needed. This is the only song on this list that touches something in me that I don't like to think about, so I have nothing else to say.

Stinkfist by Tool - Along the same lines as 'The Package,' this song reminds me of my heroin addiction. The difference is, Stinkfist is almost like an internal dialogue I would have with the drug as I was falling into the addiction. The soft spoken parts are what the heroin would say, and the screaming is my pleading response. Besides all that, it's one of the best Tool songs. Musically and lyrically amazing.

Jesus Christ by Brand New - Perfectly portrays where I am at in life today: lost, alone, confused, and terrified of death. At this point in time, I have more in common with this song than any other.

There it is folks. Enjoy.

Out Of The Ashes, The Phoenix Rises

Fatal Beauty was a website I knew and loved. If you like alternative, tattooed women, this would have been the site for you. It was packed to the brim with them. Why am I speaking in past tense? Because sadly, the site is no more. It closed. I will post a new picture from my small collection every now and then, just to keep the spirit alive. Fatal Beauty, you will be missed.

But its not all bad news...



I've added a link on the sidebar to the website of one of the best artists I have ever seen in a very long time. Geoffrey Ashley of unsinnimage.com shoots some of the most gorgeous, sexy women in a very tasteful yet erotic way under the banner 'UnSinn Photography'. Check out his site and his galleries for some of the images. You'll fall in love with them just like I did.

The Ultimate Dinner Championship

I found the perfect dinner for under $5.

For those of you that don't know me personally, you don't know that I have an avid obsession with Taco Bell. I can name every item on their menu, and then tell you exactly what they put in everything, and for the most part, the prices of each item.

Recently I've been trying to conserve money by only spending $5 dollars on dinner. I've tried going to McDonald's, Subway, Burger King, Rallys/Checkers, and Taco Bell, getting different combinations of items, trying to find something that is both cheap and filling.

McDonald's is too expensive. Combo meals usually end up coming out over $5, and if they don't, it isn't enough food. Same with Burger King and Rallys/Checkers. Subway you can get a 6 inch combo meal for $5 dollars, or a foot long for the same price. A foot long is good, but none of the subs they have for $5 are the kinds I like, and 6 inches in the combo meal just isn't enough.

So I stuck with Taco Bell. I tried various combinations of things, most of them coming short on the filling requirement, and others breaking $5, sometimes by only 25 cents. But $5.25 is not $5.

Then, about 2 weeks ago, I found it. The perfect order that comes out to total of $4.94. It doesn't break $5 and it leaves me satisfied when I'm done eating it. So what is this magical combination? Here it is, in all its glory:

• A Hard Taco
• A Volcano Taco
• A Bean Burrito minus Onions plus Sour Cream
• A Nacho Supreme

There it is folks. The ultimate dinner from our friends at Taco Bell. Enjoy. You know you are going to try it now. The seed has been planted.

Incredible

How Seinfeld Saved My Life

I am not a big TV watcher. I mean, of course I watch TV, but only a select few shows. It's hard for me to really get in to something new, and with most shows (besides reality TV which I hate), each season picks up where the last one left off. I like going in knowing everything, so I won't watch season 4 of Generic Crime Drama if I haven't seen seasons 1 - 3.

So I stick with the shows I do know. CSI (Vegas, I refuse to watch Miami because of David Caruso, and New York is just boring), House, Sopranos (thank you A&E), Family Guy, and then whatever else is on The History Channel, Discovery, Science Channel, Military Channel, or National Geographic. All those shows/channels are great, but I won't really make an effort to watch them during the day.

But there is one show that I will clear my schedule for. If I was a brain surgeon removing a tumor from a dying patient, I would put the scalpel down the minute this show came on.

That show is Seinfeld.

I grew up watching Seinfeld (yes, I grew up in the 90's. I'm only 21). My father was a fan since the pilot episode when the show was called The Seinfeld Chronicles and Kramer's name was Kessler. Every week, we would gather in the living room and sit tight for a lesson in hilariously simple comedy. Of course, I wasn't old enough to understand 90% of what they were talking about, but it still captured my attention.

I watched every episode the day it was aired. I didn't miss a single one.

Then comes high school. Seinfeld had long since been canceled (ok, not long, maybe 2 years) and I felt a huge void in my life. TV just wasn't the same. I actually had to spend time outside of the house with my friends, riding bikes and smoking pot and chasing girls. How could Jerry Seinfeld DO THAT TO ME?!

Yeah, so they played re-runs, but it wasn't the same. Plus, my story is more dramatic if we just forget re-runs ever existed, so can we do that? Thanks.

It came first as a rumor. Quiet whisperings on the internet about a SEINFELD DVD SET. 'No way,' I said. It won't happen. See, this was before TV on DVD box sets became a big thing. In fact, DVD players were still a big investment for some families.

(If you are with the FBI, please skip the next paragraph.)

It was also ironic because I was downloading all the episodes off of Morpheus and Kazaa and burning VCD copies of all the season. It was a huge undertaking, and really, I never made it past season 1. Actually, I never even got season 1 on a CD.

(FBI can start reading again.)

But then it happened. Major news sources started talking about Seinfeld DVD sets. I couldn't believe it! It was the best news I have heard since the fall of the USSR, and the crazy thing is, I don't remember ever hearing about that. I was 4 at the time, and I imagine someone had to tell me.

Me and my dad went out on a cold November day to Best Buy and we came home with a shiny cardboard box with 4 of our favorite comedians on it. We put the pristine DVDs in the 5 disc changer and pressed play.

I felt whole again. I had my Seinfeld back.

The show seriously has affected my life. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has things happen to them and you say to yourself 'I could totally see that being in a Seinfeld episode.' It's true. We all have those moments, and what is so amazing about it is usually they are the most boring and mundane moments in our day to day lives. Jerry Seinfeld made those moments mean something to us. He made them significant. In essence, he has enhance our lives, adding an extra 1% of enjoyment to the 4% of enjoyment we got out of our lives before him.

So, to conclude, I just want to say, thank you Jerry Seinfeld. You have made my life worth living.

Hmm...Maybe She Was On To Something

Not 10 minutes after posting my last post about the girl in India who drank pesticides to kill herself over fears of the Large Hadron Collider, I found this:

Glitch Shuts Down 'Big Bang' Collider For Two Months

Young Girl Kills Herself Over 'Big Bang' Fear

I was reading through a forum I often visit (bluelight.ru) and in the Current Events section, I came across an article from Reuters about a teenager from India who drank pesticide and killed herself after hearing 'doomsday predictions' on local television. The 'predictions' said the world would be coming to an end on September 10th, and would be brought on by experiments taking place in a particle accelerator - the Large Hadron Collider - on the French-Swiss border.

The experiment is being done to see if a miniature 'big bang' can be recreated in the lab.

Apparently, when news spread through India that the machine had been switched on, thousands rushed to temples and began fasting in preparation for the end of the world.

Now, I am not trying to make light of someones death. I've lost plenty of my own friends to suicide. I think it's terrible when anyone chooses to take their life. But there was no reason for this to happen. This solidifies the need for proper education in these countries. How can a perfectly safe (we wont be creating entire new universes in the lab anytime soon) experiment scare the living shit out of people so bad that they flood to temples for deliverance and commit suicide to avoid the 'inevitable'? There is no excuse for this, and shame on the Indian media for perpetuating the fear.

Full article can be found here

The Importance Of Harm Reduction

It is my personal opinion that we - most of the world - are looking at things the wrong way when it comes to drugs. The fact that we all have to face is that people will use drugs no matter how hard anyone tries to stop them. Humans have been using them for thousands of years, and will continue to for thousands of years to come.

With that in mind, it shows that we are going about things the wrong way. Lying about drugs and refusing to give truthful information about them to the public is the real cause of a majority of drug related deaths. Little Johnny knew he had to drink water when he took Ecstasy so he could stay hydrated. What little Johnny didn't know is that too much water can kill you. Sadly, he found out the hard way.

In an effort to spread the word of Harm Reduction to the masses, I've added a few VERY important links on the side bar.

Bluelight.ru - A harm reduction message board that has a vast encyclopedia of user shared knowledge regarding every type of drug imaginable. There are also community forums, focused on everything from sex and love (Sex, Love, & Relationships) to a forum called Second Opinion, where you can go to get a, yep, you guessed it, second opinion on just about anything you need one for.

Erowid.org - The true drug encyclopedia. Erowid has information on every recreational drug, down to dosing (safe dosing and toxic doses) to the legality of the drug to experience reports written and submitted by users of the site. It also contains information on nutropics and legal, over the counter drugs.

For now, these are the only two that will be posted. I will be gathering more as time goes on and adding them to the list. If you or anyone you know is a recreational drug user or drug addict, I urge you to check these sites out. Bluelight especially is a great resource for family members of drug addicts. It's a place you can go to help get advice on dealing with a loved on caught in whirlwind that is drug dependency.

Stay safe.