I live-Twitter MATH TEST 4 '09.

To bring up the absurdity of my Twitter account, I present to you my tales in the Math Lab for my fourth test of the year. THIS IS USELESS INFO~!

Test day = evil, finding new albums by Omar Rodriguez-Lopez = eh, maybe it's good.about 7 hours ago from TweetDeckTime to awkwardly stare at people in the math lab. WOO!about 5 hours ago from TweetDeckI prepare my punching hand as I hear the words "I got an 84. Bullshit."about 5 hours ago from TweetDeckHmmm, 42 minutes before test time here and no interesting test-takers have appeared. Oh, and some bull about a concert is happening. Fun.about 5 hours ago from TweetDeckMore noise! Not surprising. Still no one interesting, though.about 5 hours ago from TweetDeckMy follower count has fallen by 1 since the LIVE-TWITTERING MATH TEST 4 '09 started. I view this as a giant success.about 5 hours ago from TweetDeckOh no, the dreaded Southern accents are coming into my ear. Whatever will I do!?about 5 hours ago from TweetDeckMATH TEST '09 WRAPUP: I made a high C on a test, a significant improvement from a low F.about 1 hour ago from web
In short, I just WASTED YOUR LIFE. YAY!

This writing is probably mildly embarrassing.

It felt like a goddamn bombing.

I stood out to the beautiful yet murky Black Warrior River and had a little bit of a sigh. I was staring out into the water, noticing that once again the whizz and hum of planes exploded in front of me as the noise behind me continued to be a similar explosion of noise.

Something about this seemed sensible, joyous even. In a world where the seas were once clear, there's a bit too much noise for everyone's liking and a bit too much dirt and piss in the water.

I stared at all of this nature and wildness around me and felt mixed feelings. I felt happy and satisfied because of the events that took place, because of the sun's constant ability to beam at just the right moments. I just don't know if I can handle the bad things, though. The world is obviously fucked up, so it's not like this is new information nor does my feelings on the world really change it. But it's still savagely affecting.

At one moment, I was reminded of the simple beauty of the world. Of the gaze of a totally beautiful woman, or the view of leafy green trees composed against the backdrop of totally barren trees. Everything was totally contradictory. Jet fighter planes only reminded me that our world is shitty, wars happen, and that people predictably suck.

But this same day, at one moment, I lay there on a blanket. I have no idea whose blanket it was or why they might have left or even the reason why they would have left. All I knew was that I was in a living photograph. And I was lying next to the most beautiful woman in the world. There was an old man rambling, but this didn't matter. I suspected that I would not have many moments like this in my lifetime, so I probably should appreciate that moment because I don't know how many great friendship or lover opportunities I'd ever have with this person. But I think that there won't be too many of those simple chances. That isn't a pessimistic outlook—well, mostly not—it's just how things work in this world. No one trusts anybody else and no one lets themselves go nearly often enough in front of a giant bunch of people. Pure inhibitions take a backseat to keeping a self-important facade.

I don't know. And maybe that's all I should keep in mind.

I Blog Shitty Burned CDs I Made Three Years Ago.

We've all done it. We've all made a billion burned CDs that a few years later, on a lark, we find and listen to and abhor our own taste. So I will guide you on a journey of my poor taste and my thoughts on each song I am about to hear. The first CD I inserted was a green Sony burned CD, which is completely unrecognizable on my shitty laptop and totally recognizable on my Playstation 2. This CD, as it turns out, had Korn's Greatest Hits! I was not a kid who knew of irony in those days. You also have not missed much. Go figure. Another was one of the eight copies I burned of Arcade Fire's Neon Bible record. This was great and awesome! I also found it scary that it's been over two years since I heard an outright life-changing record. That's just weird to me. But now I have found another one! Let us begin!

This appears to be one with only seven tracks and might've been burned for my sister once. Also, it plays well on the aforementioned shitty laptop while a few DVD-R discs are completely troublesome. No idea why.

Track 1:

Justin Timberlake - "Senorita"

This was a fine song for the time period, all things considered. I mean, Timberlake got the right people around him to make certain that he didn't fail and all that jazz, and when he talks about his senorita, he could talk about anything and he had a hot beat. I'm not totally crazy about it, but I can understand it, at least.

Track 2:

Justin Timberlake - "Like I Love You"

Oh crap, I think I grabbed one of my great discs where I burned a lot of crap by one artist. I boldly predict that "Rock Your Body" is next. Though, this one was a lot better than I remember. Notably for Timberlake's Prince impression. And you know, everyone loves Prince because everyone loves Minnesota and Lake Minatonka and all that nonsense. It rubbed off on Timberlake here. Also, The Clipse were involved with this, and everyone loves The Clipse.

Track 3:

Justin Timberlake - "Rock Your Body"

This is also awesome. This was more of a progressor for the Timberlake I like, namely anything from FutureSex/LoveSounds. The cheesy dance stuff seems to work for this guy. I have no other comment for this, though, I still laugh heartily at Timberlake boasting that he'd have the girl naked by the end of this song, because I'm certain he's re-lived that fantasy over and over and over in real life.

Track 4:

Britney Spears - "Boyz"

I think this was my sister's Justin Timberlake/Britney Spears forever tape CD. Except...I'm certain they broke it off and Klosterman wrote his awesome piece about Britney before this CD was burned. Also, I think all of these songs had a Neptunes production, might explain why they're fine pop music, though, Brit's voice is more annoying and nasally than Timberlake's, it's not as natural to me.

Track 5:

N'Sync and Nelly - "Girlfriend"

I think this also had a Neptunes production. Also, Nelly is one of those guys who was hilarious back in the day, but I never got why I and millions others loved him so damn much. Maybe he was the best thing for St. Louis since the Rams' Greatest Show on Turf. And for boy band stuffs, this was better than a lot of their other stuff. Also, I'm certain I spelled N'Sync wrong. Screw it. No one cares that much.

Track 6:

50 Cent - "In Da Club"

This might be a little bit older than I thought, but nonetheless, this is not as good. And I listened to a lot of hilarious hip-hop back in the day. "Move, bitch, get out the way," "Awnaw, hell naw, I ain't gon' up and done it," etc. This isn't cutting it as much.

Track 7:

Inside joke song.

One time, when we tipped a song to the computer, the mic was accidentally turned on. In this recording was me, an older cousin, two younger cousins, and my sister. "Make Em Say Unggggggh" was referenced. Lil' Bow Wow was referenced. I refer to Sean Combs as the "Baddest Boy in Hip-Hop." Me and the older cousin get into a debate/slight argument over who sold more in hip-hop, and I talk about Combs being richer than Eminem. Eminem sold more, though. And then I bring up 50 Cent's debut. Older cousin briefly sings what became "Sugar, Sugar" by the one hit wonder Baby Bash. And then, at the end, older cousin says that there was one song that I "wish I never downloaded." Those were the days, huh. When DOWNLOADING hurt me. Those days still happen.

The Idea of Greatness

Lately I've been reading (elitist alert) a couple of books focused on radically different shades of music, Our Band Could Be Your Life by Michael Azerrad and The Rolling Stone Interviews. By nature of the fact that Our Band talks about iconic indie acts like Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. and Rolling Stone Interviews has interviews from outright icons like John Lennon, Jim Morrison, and Pete Townshend, it's interesting to see what some of the greatest musicians of all time perceived as great.

There are even a few outright surreal statements. When Townshend brings up the entire story and plot that would become The Who's Tommy, there is a feeling that he loves this idea but has no idea how it would be formed in music. It's almost like the band was desperate for a good sound to come out of the ideas they had. And I'd say that that definitely happened with Tommy.

On the same point, Lennon's interview is also downright mind-blowing. He felt that the Beatles' best music was never recorded and done in the early days of the band. Mind you, this interview was done in 1972, when the breakup of the band was fresh in Lennon's memory, but it's still an awe-striking comment that a scant few heard the best of the band, at least according to one of the two chief songwriters of that band.

So what is the idea of greatness? I'm not sure, and neither is anybody else, really. Objective opinions tell us that something is great or is shit, but you never quite know until you put it out there. You could compare this theory to film. Blade Runner was reviled by most critics upon its release, and it's not really as great a movie as it's been made out to be, but you see pieces of it in everything.

This leads to another point: artists, writers, musicians, etc. have all been influenced by the simple brilliance of Pete Townshend's music or the eloquence of John Lennon's take on the world or the swagger and attitude of Jim Morrison, who clearly used the media as his playground to experiment with his image as something more than even a mere rock star. But does influence really create greatness or amazement? I mean, I really love The Strokes and would love to make a band that sounds exactly like Is This It-era Strokes, but I wouldn't dare call Julian Casablancas great. He might influence me and my nonexistent musical stylings, but I don't necessarily think he's great. He's cool and I like him. Not great.

I don't know, it's just a question that has no real answer. What is great? It's subjective. So I don't know, it's maybe just a passed down sort of achievement. I will say this, though, Pete Townshend really is damn great.

A Piece I Wrote Months Ago.

(Context: This was planned by me to be submitted to my local campus' newspaper around mid-October of 2008. This was weeks before the historic election, and so on and so forth.)

"Continual prejudice enshrouds American life"

On October 15, 2008, a group of vandals ransacked 200 copies of this fine newspaper by changing a column title from “Obama fans rally at Gorgas” to “Obama fags rally at Gorgas.” They did this to send out a clear message: that they thought changing an "n" to a "g" was hilarious and that they associate emasculation and the "alternative lifestyle" with Presidential candidate Barack Obama as opposed to the manliness and steady power of Senator McCain. Of course, that's what they intended to do.

Instead, they more or less made a statement about the silly bravado of American culture. For a country so dedicated to saying that we are united and that the 300 million of us can take on anything in the world, we seem to deeply hate each other more often than not. America has struggled through a political season filled with pure vitriol of the views, decisions, and ultimately, the followers of the other candidate. Everyone seems to be in the spirit of hatred of their fellow man merely for supporting two people that they feel should lead the country. This is not even getting into the vast topic of prejudice and how much the country seems to give a care about others' sexual orientation. Does it just look silly if our brawn is sullied by another's choice, or must it be about the muscle-headed nature of the people of this country?

Worse yet, these ingrates also re-affirmed the misguided stance of the South's prejudice towards other kinds of people. While it doesn't seem as worse as say the past century or so on the surface, there's still a black eye given to any concept of even being close to gay, especially among males. The word "fag" (regardless of intention oftentimes) is meant to sting the person in public, like the phrases "geek," "goth," "nerd," or "spaz." And to say that the state is the most tolerant state of other lifestyles is ridiculous, as anti-Christian culture is often immediately classified as "devilish" and homosexuality considered a sin, despite the fact that the same hallowed book offers up the point to "judge not, lest ye be judged."

The South and America reach the fun paradox that keeps the country focused despite our own self-hatred: we are too stubborn to change, even when that change is probably the correct choice. America simply never wants change, and it makes no bones about this. Lack of change could be as small as not wanting to convert to the metric system or as big as thinking that white people and black people should have separate bathrooms, and prejudice be damned on any need to change as a region or as a country because it's the "right thing to do" or because it's the proper thing to do. Keeping a steady path does not always lead to a good end.

Ultimately, what October 15th's incident displayed is the continual ugliness of American culture. This is not to say that our country (and to a lesser extent the South) is entirely filled with bigots, sexists, and generally horrible people, but that those people actually exist. An obvious statement to make, yes, but one that at the wrong times everyone seems to be depressingly oblivious to seeing.

This existed.

I found my old blog of film, music, and video game reviews. It is a wonderful waste of time. I don't remember anything that I reviewed, an early effect of being so damn old. Anyways, http://roc06.wordpress.com/ is where to go. Read up, suit up!

Last Night's Party

I knew this blog would have purpose. I have a great great excuse to talk about how great lastnightsparty.com is. To define it simply, LastNightsParty is the dirty underbelly of American party life, complete with random shenanigans, slightly naked (or totally naked) women and men, and the feeling that being in a drunken stupor and making "drunken mistakes" isn't so bad if a good photographer catches you in the right moment.

I mean, it's porn, but yet not. The photographs are extremely detailed and well designed and outright beautiful in the context of the site as an archive of photography, but it's still pornographic in its material. But it's also sort of real in a way, and it's not pure exploitation. But yet, it kind of is. The site leads one to assume that any image that isn't blown out to huge proportions is probably because the girl regretted a naked picture of herself on the internet for the world to see about five seconds after she saw said picture.

Still, it's nice to see a place where regret, fun, and flightiness combine with nice pictures. Good job, guys.