2009 in Review (Best & Worst)

so, i have done this two years running, my favorite songs/albums, books, movies, and tv of the year.

boring blog, but hey, it lets me know what i may not remember.

---

movies:

tough year for choices so i am doing a top 4 (or three, the first two are tied).

1. avatar
2. up
3. the princess and the frog (yep, deal)
4. star trek (great non-fan movie)

worst movie, easily, is transformers 2


---

album, no list, obviously for me it is:

backspacer, pearl jam

song, also off backspacer, "just breathe" OR "get some".

---

novels... top 10.

1. under the dome, king
2. jonathan strange and mr. norrel, clarke
3. the terror, simmons
4. drood, simmons
5. the strain, hogan/ del toro
6. the graveyard book, gaiman
7. the two towers, tolkien
8. prince of theives, hogan
9. oryx and crake, atwood
10. return of the king, tolkien

biggest disappointing novels:

1. death troopers, schreiber
2. the standoff, hogan
3. pygmy, palahniuk

surprise?


toss up between, the strain, oryx, or the graveyard book.


---

short stories, top 3:

1. ur, king
2. the dream hunters, gaiman
3. creatures of the night, gaiman

---

that's it, happy new year :)

oh, and tv, house or lost.

2010 (Hours Before)

you know, i don't know about 2010. things are going to go so terribly wrong i feel in about a week. everything is bound to that event, an event that will probably take part of my soul, my heart, maybe my mind.

yet, in truth, i also feel like it would, will, be a better year. maybe i can recover some things i lost, recover from things i gained.

who knows?

i will be blogging more, but haven't decided if on this blog or elsewhere. i really like the release the blogs give, the way i can vent without having to deal with immediate repercussions. so, yeah, more blogs.

more personal blogs too.

because it's a show ender:

Rockie, Your Mix

not the best, but hey...

i miss you, truly miss rockieforte.

---

everyday, buddy holly (don't get the wrong idea, just love the song)
the man who sold the world, bowie
don't pray on me, bad religion
unthought known, pearl jam
unfinished, bnl
trouble, cat stevens
vice and virtues, dropkick murphy's
25 minutes to go, cash
porch, vedder solo
castaway, green day
ain't this the life, boingo
tender lumplings, boingo
drive, r.e.m
i'm so tired, beatles
last exit, pearl jam
all apologies, nirvana

2009 in Stories

everything i read this year.. best year ever for books. as with last year, this blog is for me.

---------

1.Cujo- Good-B

2.Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell-Great-A

3S.The Curious Case of Benjamin Button-Good-B+

4.The Fellowship of the Ring-Blah-C

5.The Two Towers- Great-A

6.The Return of the King-Very Good-A-

7.The Children of Hurin-Great-A

8.The Silmarillion-UNFINISHED

9.Diary of a Wimpy Kid- (4/20-4/21)-Good-B

10.Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2 (4/21-4/22)-Good-B-

11.Diary of a Wimpy Kid 3 (4/22-4/23)-Ok-C+

12.Something Wicked This Was Comes (4/23-5/8)-Blah-D*

13.Of Mice and Men (5/8-5/9)-Great-A

14.Pygmy (5/9-5/15)-Good-B-

15.Outcast (5/15-5/18)-Great-A

16S.The Man Who Would Not Shake Hands (5/20)-Good-B-

17S.Beachworld (5/20)-Good-B

18S.The Reaper's Image (5/20)-Good-B+

19.The Terror (5/22-6/15)-Amazing-A+

20S.Mortality (6/5-6/6)-Good-B+

21S.Nona (6/16)-Very Good-A-

22S.Survivor's Type (6/16) -Good-B

23S.Uncle Otto's Truck (6/16)-Good-B+

24S.Morning Deliveries *Milkman #1)-(6/16)-Good-B

25S.Big Wheels: A Tale of the Laundry Game (Milkman #2)-(6/16)-Good-B+

26S.Gramma (6/17)-Great-A

27.The Pearl (6/17-6/18)-Great-A

28.Drood (6/18-7/10)-Amazing-A+

29NF.Silent Bob Speaks (6/27-7/4)-Good-B

30.Omen (7/11-7/13)-Good-B

31.Path of Destruction (7/13-7/21)-Good-B

32.Rule of Two (7/24-8/4)-Good-B+

33.Fragment (8/5-8/7)-Good-B+

34.The Strain (8/8-8/12)-Amazing-A+

35.Prince of Theives (8/15-8/22)-Great-A

36N.The Ballad of the Flexible Bullet (8/22-8/23)-Good-B

37S.The Reach (8/23)-Good-B

38S.Jerusalem's Lot (8/23-8/24)-Very Good-A-

39S.Graveyard Shift (8/24)-Good-B

40S.Night Surf (8/24)-Very Good-A-

41S.I Am the Doorway (8/24-8/25)-Good-B

42.Abyss (8/25-9/4)-Very Good-A-

43S.The Ladies of Grace Adieu (9/5-9/6)-Good-B-

44S.The Mangler (9/5-9/6)-Very Good-A-

45S.The Boogeyman (9/6)-Good-B-

46S.Gray Matter (9/7)-Ok-C

47S.Battlegorounds (9/8)-Ok-C+

48S.Trucks (9/10)-Good-B

49S.Sometimes They Come Back (9/9)-Good-B

50.The Standoff (9/12-10/6)-Good-B+

51S.The Ledge (10/6)-Good-B

52S.The Lawnmowerman (10/7)-Good-B-

53S.Strawberry Spring (10/6)-Ok-C+

54.Oryx and Crake (10/7-10/18)-Amazing-A+

55.I Am Legend (10/19-10/23)-Alright-C

56.Diary of a Wimpy Kid #4 (10/19-10/24)-Good-B

57.The Graveyard Book (10/24-10/27)-Amazing-A+

59.Stardust (10/27-11/01)-Good-B+

60.Death Troopers (11/02-11/06)-Alright-C+

61S.Premium Harmony (11/03)-Good-B

62G.Preludes & Nocturns (11/04-11/06)-Great-A

63.Coraline (11/05-11/07)-Very Good-B+

64N.The Dream Hunters (11/07-11/08)-Amazing-A+

65G.Violent Cases (11/07)-Very Good-B-

66G.Doll's House (11/07-11/09-Amazing-A+

67G.Marvel 1602 (11/09-11/12)-Very Good-B+

68.Under the Dome (11/13-12/04)-Amazing-A+

69G.The Comical Tragedy or the Tragical Comedy of Mr Punch (11/14-11/15)-Good-B-

70G.Superman for All Seasons (11/23-11/24)-Very Good-A

72G.Creatures of the Night (11/24)-Good-B+

73G.The Last Tempation (11/24-11/26)-Great-A

74G.Dream Country (11/26-11/28)-Alright-C+

75G.Seasons of Mist (12/04-12/07)-Great-A

76S.Quitter's Inc (12/07)-Very Good-B+

77.Odd and the Frost Giants (12/10)-Great-A

78.American Gods (12/10-

79N.Ur (12/27-12/30)-Amazing-A+

---

American Gods is what i am reading now.

Trouble

Trouble
Oh trouble set me free
I have seen your face
And it's too much too much for me

Trouble
Oh trouble can't you see
You're eating my heart away
And there's nothing much left of me

I've drunk your wine
You have made your world mine
So won't you be fair
So won't you be fair

I don't want no more of you
So won't you be kind to me
Just let me go where
I'll have to go there

Trouble
Oh trouble move away
I have seen your face
and it's too much for me today

Trouble
Oh trouble can't you see
You have made me a wreck
Now won't you leave me in my misery

I've seen your eyes
and I can see death's disguise
Hangin' on me
Hangin' on me

I'm beat, I'm torn
Shattered and tossed and worn
Too shocking to see
Too shocking to see

Trouble
Oh trouble move from me
I have paid my debt
Now won't you leave me in my misery

Trouble
Oh trouble please be kind
I don't want no fight
And I haven't got a lot of time

-Cat Stevens

A Dream, a Note, and Dream Again

i'm sitting on the picnic table where we had our first real conversion. it's afternoon, near sunset, and everything is picturesque.

no, no.

no, not quite right. it's not picture-like, the scene seen through my dream, the "dreamscape", is nearly animated. it is perfect, but not quite real.

leaves are falling, slower than they would in real life, slower than i imagine would be possible in anything but in this dream. it's fall, and in my dream, it becomes dark super quickly.

too quickly.

it's dark now, early dark, and i look over the eastern horizon to see the yellow moon glowing behind the hazy autumn night.

harvest moon, i think in my dream.

---

i remember that first conversation, that first night i really talked to you, and knew that i was meant to meet you. meant to learn from you, to be friends, to be.

we talked about everything that we seemed we could, and everything seemed without limitation.

---

in my dream, i am sitting, watching.

watching maybe, the dreamscape is still night. still september.

and i hear your voice, you're quiet.

no, i think, just afraid.

but why? my dream-self thinks.

---

again, a sudden shift and the moon turns red. the blood moon, and it is october.

i realize that i am holding something in my hands, a book. i know, in my dream, where everything is heading. i am still sitting on the bench where we had our first real conversation more than two years before.

i look down at the books cover, and in my dream, i smile. it is harry potter and the half blood prince.

i look back up, and i feel the smile vanish, and know why your not there, in my dream i do at least.

---
**
---

rockie,

this is not a creepy dream or anything. no awkwardness, not that i intentionally put out there at least. i think, by how i felt as i woke is that you were just gone. that we didn't talk, or something happened, or something.

not sure exactly what.

i think, honestly, i feel... well, i am not sure how i feel.

---
**
---

i have been working on a poem called "dream again" for the last seven or so years. monday night i finished it, and feel, finally, as if i can truly come up with new ideas writing now.

that even though all the whispering voices from the dead that come from underneath my bed are here to stay, maybe they are meant to be heard.

because, after all, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

it is evolutions cruelest joke.

Alice in Wonderland (2010- Post 2)

still no "real" blog although i do have a couple ideas. one for sure tomorrow morning or friday morning.

Leave Karma to Karma [Pry, To post]

"Anjin-san forget the village. A thousand million things can occur before those six months occur. A tidal wave or earthquake, or you get your ship and sail away, or Yabu dies, or we all die, or who knows? Leave the problems of God to God and karma to karma. Today you're here, and nothing you can do will change that. Today you're alive and here and honored, and blessed with good fortune. Look at this sunset, it's beautiful, neh? This sunset exists. Tomorrow does not exist. There is only now. Please look. It's so beautiful and it will never happen ever again, never, not this sunset, never in all infinity. Lose yourself in it... and do not worry about karma, yours [or mine.]"


-Excerpt from James Clavell's Shogun

Top of the World [Pry, To]

a few days ago. maybe a day or two after the rain had ended. had washed the streets. the sky. everything. i was driving home down brea blvd, and i saw the hills, that most of the year round are brownish-green. dieing, i guess. and i noticed how green the hill looked.

how alive.

i was looking at the hills, and i came to the stoplight near choice burgers. and i looked out my window. up at the sky, and i saw what remained of the storm that had cleaned what seemed like the world. then i looked at the hills again, the light turned green, but the light it gave off wasn'talive. it wasn't like the hills were. then i noticed the mountains behind. miles away.

miles away.

and i felt small. looking at these monumental outcroppings of the world, i felt so minuscule. but alive.

then i started thinking what it would be like to go to the peaks of those mountains. or even the top of the hill and look down at everything. look down at brea.

look down upon the world, and thinking this, i knew that would make me feel even more alive then i did at that moment.

alive.

rambling again.

Without Pause [Pry, To]

if i had known then

what i know now...


---


act like you care.


seriously, it'll help us both get through this.


---


a few days ago, months, years, it's all the same now.


then and later.


now and later. ha.


we're sitting on this bench and you look at me, say, "tell him?"


"what?" i say.


like i don't know.


---


hey, look at this. time goes by, and i'm talking to the future.


future. let these waves dissolve away my past.


this is. this is.


---


all these surreal posts, it's how i think. a mile a minute.


confused images in black and white but brilliant with color.


fuck it, i think i'm a little insane.


but it's what makes me sane.


---


"what?" i say.


like i don't know.


suicide is not something contemplated to forget.


now or later.


now and later. ha.


---


i'm walking and these waves are running over my feet.


fall back. breath.


float away.


hey, we all float down here.


---


light years pass. it's days and days and i still haven't told the person i trust most. but that conversation i am having. it's all in my mind. park benches built with a shattered imagination.


it's what i was supposed to tell you.


never found the time.


nerve.


too late now.


---


waiting by the side of the road, i'm looking up and the rain is falling.


falling.


and i wonder exactly what is the meaning of free.


---


all these thoughts. jumbled.


confused. broken.


trying to sort through this mess of broken memories. hearts.


rules, hearts.


promises are not so serious.


---


i look over and she is lying next to me.


sleeping (one more day in hell).


i wonder, (hail, hail) are the lucky ones the ones in love?


---


what the fuck images back black to white.


white to black.


---


if i had known then
what i know now


---


hey, no one understands
i don't need no one to understand
you just don't understand.


---


understand.


being alive is only being conscience to remember it.


little voices telling you.


telling you.


telling.


---


don't you wish.


wish.


hey, i've got a feeling.


a feeling deep inside.


i feeling i can't hide.


whoa, no.


---


hey, it's okay.


don't you know.


it's okay.


whoa, everything is going to be okay.


---


these are thoughts.


---


thoughts.


thoughts.


thoughts.


---


to fix my broken soul (again).

Untitled

a room and empty shelf...
a book on mental health...

Ranking Stephen King (Update #1)

so, since i started dome i have been wondering... how would i rank all the king books? decided to blog them.

---

1. the stand (HS)
2. the dark tower (HS)
3. the drawing of the three (HS)
4. the gunslinger (HS)
5. the wizard and the glass (HS)
6. the wastelands (HS)
7. wolves of the calla (HS)
8. song of susanna (HS)
9. bag of bones
10. salem's lot
11. insomnia (HS)
12. pet sematary (HS)
13. the shining (HS)
14. just after sunset
15. blaze
16. the green mile (HS)
17. hearts in atlantis (HS)
18. the talisman (HS)
19. black house (HS)
20. it
21. different seasons (HS)
22. christine (HS)
23. the eyes of the dragon
24. cell
25. lisey's story
26. duma key
27. desperation (HS)
28. the dark half
29. needful things
30. the dead zone (HS)
31. gerald's game
32. the regulators (HS)
33. misery
34. the coloraldo kid
35. firestarter
36. cujo
37. rose madder
38. from a buick 8 (HS)
39. dolores claiborne
40. rage
41. roadwork
42. the longwalk
43. roadwork
44. cycle of the warewolf
45. carrie (HS)
46. thinner
47. dreamcatcher (HS)
48. the tommyknockers
*on writing would be around #30, but it is non-fiction.

---

there are two collections on the list (three if atlantis is counted, which is shouldn't be) but here is my list of those and the rest:

1. just after sunset
2. everything's eventual
3. different seasons
4. skeleton crew

*i am reading: night shift off and on.

---

what i have yet to read (no novels):

1. danse macabre (non-fiction)
2. four past midnight (collection)
3. nightmares and dreamscapes (collection)
4. storm of the century (screenplay)

i am also sure there are a few short stories, a comic or two, and such randomly. most of which (or all) would be pretty much unobtainable. as well as"weeds" which was an earlier short that was posted on a men's magazine (cavalier) site... can't find the story there any longer though.

---
wow, that took longer than i had thought it would. planning on updating this after dome and again as i read what's left.

Update: "HS" are books I read in high school.

:)

Guaranteed

"On bended knee is no way to be free
Lifting up an empty cup, I ask silently
All my destinations will accept the one that's me
So I can breathe...

Circles they grow and they swallow people whole
Half their lives they say goodnight to wives they'll never know
A mind full of questions, and a teacher in my soul
And so it goes...

Don't come closer or I'll have to go
Holding me like gravity are places that pull
If ever there was someone to keep me at home
It would be you...

Everyone I come across, in cages they bought
They think of me and my wandering, but I'm never what they thought
I've got my indignation, but I'm pure in all my thoughts
I'm alive...

Wind in my hair, I feel part of everywhere
Underneath my being is a road that disappeared
Late at night I hear the trees, they're singing with the dead
Overhead...

Leave it to me as I find a way to be
Consider me a satellite, forever orbiting
I knew all the rules, but the rules did not know me
Guaranteed"

-Eddie Vedder

---

: )

Commala-come-come
The battles now begun!
And all the foes of Men and Rose
Rise with the setting sun.

---
Stephen King said today that he is not yet finished with the Dark Tower novels.

Under the Dome

---

november 10th, although i am going to be on the mercy of the USPS. over a thousand pages, and every review i have read has been stellar.

i'm not expecting it to be as good as the stand but i would not be disappointed if it was.

also, up comes out this week... the 10th as well.

good week, sobering week.

Slanted Light

walking through these busy streets
seeing these empty sights
and bright lights
of the city of night

carrying my habit in my hand
wearing my heart on my sleeve
we say we once knew
each other from faraway

drifting like leaves
grains of sand in endless winds
wandering and wondering
where the next turn will take us

just like yesterday
tomorrow is indifferent to today
so we are one
on these city streets of slanted light

Used to Be We Knew Who We Were

it's weird when you hear that someone you have not seen, but were once close to, had been thinking of you. i get this e-mail , and it says, "i've been thinking of you. thinking of those stupid pictures we used to draw in physics.".

that is literally the entirety of the message. 16 words, 21 syllables.

at first, i was happy that someone had been thinking of me for no reason, then, i started to think about physics and how i felt about this person at the time we were "drawing those stupid pictures". i don't remember what they were of, because most of the time i was analyzing everything everything about devynne. i don't know why, i don't know why it mattered.

still don't, not really.

i tend to try to read people, and usually i am pretty good with it. i can read moods pretty well, lies and truth, anger, happiness.

maybe i shouldn't, but it's in my head that i need to. some compulsion (excessive?), a need, to understand how people are the way they are. i waste time doing this though. waste time thinking of why someone said this, or wrote this, or laughed at this joke, or smiled at me this way, or had a tone of anger in their voice, or kissed this way, hugged that way...

see what i mean?

thoughts, too much thinking kills me.

so here i am sitting on this computer for the first time in what feels like months, spilling out my soul, my thought-process, into the empty space of the internet.

---

i miss people i still talk to.

contradictory, no? i mean, how could i miss someone i talk to on a  more or less regular basis?

i just do though, it feels like jennifer all over again... where i am losing touch with people for no reason, people i love, and i feel it's me at fault in some way.

it isn't me blaming myself, just how i feel.

---

i used to know what it meant for me to be in love, and i am not going say i don't still know.

i guess that would be a lie. it's just that my definition of love is no longer the same, not since three months ago.

---

i am just rambling. i guess i am just trying to say that i am not okay.

not okay.

Pessimistic Optimism

no, no, no. he thinks. striding from one side of the room to the other he cannot seem to still, quiet, the voices running rampant through his mind. no. no. no.

he knows he has done something wrong, out of place, the words in his mind are trying to remind him. tell him how he got to this place.

he looks around at the walls in the room, the bed with the messed sheets, the woman lying under the thin sheet. breasts exposed, he doesn't know her name. he sees the tattoo of the rose on one breast, the right, and thinks again, no. no. no. this could not have come to this. that woman could not be who he thinks she is.

she also couldn't be dead, and the blood on his hands cannot be hers.

---

walking down the sidewalk, the women standing on street corners look like photographs out of a pornographic magazine. he has seen all kinds, striding the streets late, early, the time doesn't matter. they're always there, floating on the wind, drifting down the gutters that fill with refuse, sludge.

the sewage of the world living on street corners.

he walks past them, they call to him, wearing his shirt and tie. he looks safe. respectable. but, he knows they think, he is just like all the others, a man with needs and desires. the calls unnerve him, in a way they are frightening. some of the grins are partially toothless, some show lips obviously riddled with unnameable decease. one says, "hey, hon, a twenty is all it takes. for sixty, i'll walk you around the world."

the man just walks past, not slowing for the scowl of the woman. not slowing for the others like her, all wearing willing grins, but all alone.

---

the bar.

every night he ends up here, he never drinks anything that would do any damage then what has already been done in his life, short though it may have been. is. he walks to the counter, the bartender just looks at him and turns to the soda machine at his back. "i know, i know," he says in a voice that has a hint of bitterness. of knowing the world just as well as the man himself does, "just a coke. always just a coke. don't you know what a bar is for?"

"i used to know," he says, loosening his tie, a noose. he looks at the bar-back as he walks over over with the glass, sets it down. he wonders about being here. every night he comes, he wonders what makes him return.

his past?

or maybe it's his future playing the game fate is allowed to play.

either way, he thinks, uncontrollable.

---

On the Verge

if you could stay
shrouded in mystery
would it be such a shame
to pretend mastery
of these mundane
day to day breakdowns
in communications
and insubstantial memories
of times gone by
when everyone believed
in living lives full of broken lies
counted down from zero
to death and then maybe
absolution on the edge of denial
on the verge of being a hero.

Swine Flu

it made me laugh.

Must Reads?

i have been thinking of doing this for quite awhile and just have been too out of sorts to really think about it...

i'm going to be doing a top-ten thing for the next few posts... more for myself to see how this changes, and how quickly it DOES change. first up, novels. and it will include series. only gonna write anything about the first five of the list.

1. the stand, stephen king

this is one of those books i read (and have only read once) that changed my way of thinking in pretty much every way. it made me see king in a new light, it made me see literature itself differently, and the nature of good and evil is so clearly defined while still being someone... shadowy. hands down my favorite novel of all time.

2. the dark tower (series), stephen king

king's self-proclaimed magnum opus. my favorite series of books of all time in any genre (but thinking about it,  how many series of books are there that are not fantasy?). the ending blew me away, the tale was one i felt an attachment to, and the connections with king's other works are astoundingly insane/genius. 

3. dragonlance (series)

only the weis and hickman books count here. another fantasy epic, but one that never takes itself too seriously. it has become a sort of guilty pleasure for me to admit loving these books, but they really were my "life after harry potter" novels... started them after reading harry potter 4 and loved every minute. 

4. the terror, dan simmons

i read this novel this year, didn't expect much... i have never really been into novels that take a real event and fictionalize them. this though, it was just that good to me.

5. jonathan strange and mr norrel, susanna clarke

another book that i read this year.. the second i read this year as a matter of fact. it was one of those novels i had tried to read numerous times and just couldn't get into, the writing style just bored me to no end. plus the footnotes really bothered me. yet, when i finally managed to get through it this year... i realized how well thought out it was. how much back story was laid out. just everything sort of came together in one package.

6. salem's lot, stephen king

7. bag of bones, stephen king

8. harry potter (series), j.k. rowling

9. shogun, james clavell 

10. the strain, chuck hogan

11. invisible monsters, chuck palahniuk

12. insomnia, stephen king

13.drood, dan simmons

14. of mice and men, john steinbeck

15. pet sematary, stephen king

16. the shining, stephen king

so not really a "top ten" i guess, and yes, i think stephen king is the best author of the last 75 years.

Two for Thursday

out of the dark
i called to a memory
reigned in the past
but i left my heart long ago
wasn't even listening

ran so far
from the things i know
before i could see anything

long in the dark
i was wandering
out from the past
to where i should never be

but we kids got lost
along the way
and we never knew
where we were

no,
its not where i planned to stay
but i knocked and got let in

got lost along the way
got lost along the way

so,
i guess we move on
things never turn out
the way we plan

well, this is the world
it doesn't make sense
'til the very end

sold my heart
for the things i own
never wanted anything

sold my heart
and the things i own
never got back again

got lost along the way
got lost along the way

---

when you barred in,

you're so patient
you got it all so worked out
you have it down to a science

but i'm trying not to try
i look like a dead man
flying a kite

'cause it only makes you upset
you tear your dress
just to make these puppets

and that only makes me nervous
i bite my nails
trying to deserve this

i can see where this is going
it's only going to be trouble

i'm such a sucker
for your kindness
i wrote your name in the back of my bible

but,
i'd like to come and go as i please
i'm not worried about the in-betweens
i'm not worried about the things i miss

this ain't that
and that ain't this

lights out when you move
you're the kindest king of cruel

the best mistake
that i've ever took

train me know
i'm a big boy

i can take it
if you want to be in my room
and we can wait for the lights to break
63 bottles that i've haven't seen

train me for lights out
train me for time
it only gets better because you never do mine

so,
i'll take it back when i want to

i'll take it back when i want to

la, la, la, la, la

Public Execution

take these words
they're meaningless
soften them
give them a twist

take your lens
focus in
'cause these talking heads
are at it again

abuse my past
it's just another lie
brutalized
before your eyes

because i am not one
for holding back
while all these hounds
are on the attack

but who is going to watch my back?

have you heard
all there is to say?
so what's your determination
what's my conviction?

distorted
two headed terms
delusional, conditional

covered in
all these lies
so i am now crucified

associate me
with all these broken standards
i am the sheep
so might as well give me the wool

come one
come all
this is a group affair

hey, look at me
i'm just another telecast
live from the edge of the world

godless
soulless and numb
so, tell me,
do you see the picture

of this public execution?

Realized

it's all we've been
realized
it's all we've seen
realized

all the thoughtless meandering
the aimless wondering
throughout time
in space

distances covered in novel ways
romantic slight of hand
just carried away

it's all we've been
realized
it's all we've seen
realized

counting seconds
ticking like a bomb
you have to wonder
just what heaven has in store

towards tomorrow
imminent disaster
where all these words
are just blank pages

it's all we've been
realized
it's all we've seen
realized

all is different now
on the edge fall
steps are heard
just past these walls

and questions remain
all unanswered
in all this space
all this time

realized

Talk About the Way it Was

oh, i had come
oh, i guess i did it
just so,
i didn't have to remember what i tried to forget
blanked out the night we met
she did (we did)
'cause something got tangled
and we both got it bad

oh, if it takes too long
oh, we waited too long

oh, i know you've changed your mind
oh, i know i never changed your mind
and now it's time to close the door

'cause now you talk a lot
you talk about the way it was
you don't have to remind me
i remember the way it was before

i never got it
but you thought i did
to go, take from remembrance
to go, take from the man
he led me here
to stand by the side of the road

i wish i knew
i wish i knew
but i never know

oh, if it takes too long
i wait too long

oh, i know you've changed your mind

oh, i know i never changed your mind

and now it's time to close the door

'cause now you talk a lot

you talk about the way it was

you don't have to remind me

i remember the way it was before

before

oh, if it takes too long

and i wait too long

i will never change your mind again for good

oh, if it takes too long

and i wait too long

i'll never change your mind.

Progressive Abandonment

“I don't believe in fate or destiny. I believe in various degrees of hatred, paranoia, and abandonment. However much of what gets heaped upon you doesn't matter - it's only a matter of how much you can take and what it does to you.”

-Rollins

---

Because Escape...

... is never the safest place, i am going to stay away from this for the rest of this month.

Speed of Sound

Yesterdays how quick they change all lost and long gone now.
Want to remember anything moving at the speed of sound.
With the speed of sound.

And yet im still holding tight
To this dream of distant light
And yet somehow ill survive
But this night has been a long one
Waiting on a sun
Just don’t come

Can I forgive what I cannot forget
and live a lie?
I could give him one more try

Why deny this drive inside just looking for some peace
Everytime I get me some it gets the best of me
Not much left to see

And yet im still holding tight
To this dream of distant light
And that somehow ill somehow survive
But this night has been a long one
Waiting on a word
That never comes

The whisper in the dark
Is that you or just my thoughts?
Im wide awake and reaching out

Its gone so quiet now
Could it be I’m farther out
Moving faster than the speed of sound

Silence

is better than the sound that our voices make.
---

i'm not overanalysing.

---

you keep saying that is what i am doing, and it is not what i am doing.

---

i'm sorry for saying anything.


---


this whole blog makes it seem that i am pissed. i'm not.

i just shouldn't have opened my mouth.

---

history repeats, so many fucking coincidences were defined by fucked up circumstance.

and i'm fucking done with this bullshit.

with my bullshit.

with trying to understand when i can't.

it's a trap. a soundproofed room where i can't hear myself fucking think no matter how quiet it gets.

or scream so someone hears in all the roaring voices.

---

i'm not overanalyzing, if you only knew what that would mean.

you don't. hell, i don't.

i do love you rockie.

really do.

i don't want you to be alone. i don't mean to make you feel bitter.

but, believe me, my loneliness is different than what you know.

---

so, once again, through the silence...

...i'm sorry.

Understanding Through Memory

we are sitting, talking about the days events in monotone voices. speaking of the mundane happenings that run through the minute details of our lives.

i constantly look over his shoulder to the booth behind him, to the girl staring at me. she looks familiar but i cannot put i name to the place or time where our paths may have previously crossed, and eventually took us to the current place.

the noise is palpable; felt, heavy, and somewhat oppressive.

i hear him say, "you know, i never understood peoples fascination with girls who look like plastic."

i laugh, thinking for a moment before i say, "what about amy?" i am looking at andrew, but still trying to place the girl in the black tank-top just feet away from the current space-time of my life.

"what about her?" he says, looking at me.

"she was pretty fake, sir," i say. "and now? have you seen her and jessica's myspace pages? jess especially. looks like a fucking barbie doll."

"that's probably why she changed her profile name." he laughs, but i don't know what he means. he knows this by looking at me, "american barbie."

i am looking over his shoulder again, looking at the black hair, black eye-liner, and star tattoo on her right breast.  still, i cannot place the name. cannot name the face. "really?" i say.

from outside i hear, "fuck off, man." and hear the unmistakeable dropping of a can of beer on cement followed by laughs by the others who have been through the fake anger intoned by the faceless voice.

andrew is looking at me staring over his shoulder. smiles, jokingly says, "you look like megan just walked in the door." and he turns to look over his shoulder, at the girl with the slightly browned skin.  "oh." he says, and i know that he knows who this person is.

"don't," he says.

i look at my phone, 1:23 AM. "who is she?"

"remember awhile back, at my house we had the party? it's the day you met christie." he is looking in my eyes, i am looking over his shoulder at the girl who's name is a blank in my mind.

---

don't feel like finishing this as these thoughts are killing my mind.

Pandora's Box

is full of curiosities that should not be allowed to exist.

Memory (Pry, To)

You stare out my car windows.

You hate how they are always open. How your hair blows into your face. How the wind rushing into my car makes this heart beat sound sometimes.

But it's not that now. It something else. You are thinking of something. Some time I may or not remember. May not recall even if you asked.

You stare out the car windows and there is this silence I don't quite understand. This quiet that is too loud. It's shattering.

I'm taken back. I hear the voices in my head arguing over some such event or another. Some such mistake I have been told I have made. Some falter.

I hear you say, "really is that all you can say?"

I feel you leave my room, slam the bathroom door. I hear your tears.

You're already gone in this vision of past tense. You're already gone and it's days later in my memory. I'm sitting in my room looking through this note book, this scrapbook. Looking through pictures of memories, words past by ink and paper. Memory is a funny thing in that it isn't always in your head.

I remember reading one, "i love you" it says on the bottom.

I remember another, it says to me, "i can't trust you anymore"

I remember another one, see the memory, "too far."

I remember hitting the wall next to my closet. I remember the hole it made. The Kroq sticker still covers my anger. Rage.

You're staring out the open window, your hair is in your eyes, on your lips, you say, "I love you".

I remember that feeling.

Family Guy: Three Kings

yep, of the last "1,000 years".

Unraveling Seams

somehow, somewhere, i'll survive.

---

i'm sitting and watching the two of them on the bench, both of them talking to me about lives and realities i can only understand because i know him.

i know her too, if only because she is so like him. so similar.

i look at him with his head in her lap and they are both talking to me. but he really doesn't know what he is saying to me because he is drunk and staring into her eyes looking at me. he denies feelings because of the lack of control he has on the future.

their future is already in the past tense. always a "remember when".

always a "could have been".

---

earlier i remember saying nothing because there were no words to say.

no, i do know what i should have said but whatever unraveling i need to do would tear me apart at the seams, and knowing this i say nothing.

---

we are sitting, saying all this stupid shit to one another and everything just flows. one event to the next, we are chatting about futures and pasts.

that time at the downtown disney amc, or earlier. eighth grade. seventh.

six, fifth, forth.

it's been so long, and i know him more than anyone.

but now reminiscencing, i feel i know him on another plain of his reality.

---

hours later, "what happened?"

"nothing," is all i say and walk away. "you two a great for each other, you know that right?"

"yes." he says, but doesn't see.

and she looks at him, at me, and asks, "why do you think that?"

and i look at her, and say, "once he told me that he was happy with [her]. i believed him, but didn't understand. now? it's a lie. he is happy now."

he had put his head on her lap moments before, and now, with his eyes closed, he says drunkenly, "yeah."

and i say, "see."

---

the lights in front of my third grade classroom mean nothing to me, and the memories have faded.

like old pictures in magazines, the pages have yellowed and the colors are fading to a shade of grey.

undefined.

---

in all the silence, there is no place for whispered hopes.

---

she is dropping me off at my house, he is asleep or passed out. and she asks me, "what really happened?"

and i look down at him, smile sadly, and say, "he didn't tell you?"

"well, you said 'nothing' " she says. her car is idling and the radio is playing a song i don't hear. i look back into her eyes.

"yeah, nothing. but nothing is what will happen to the two of you. i don't mean that in a bad way," she is looking at me trying to decipher whatever words are passing for this conversation. "he knows that something happened because he knows nothing happened. he knows that nothing is what he will have when you leave." again i smile sadly, "you know what i think he loves about you?"

and she smiles back, "no."

"you understand him," i say, "but you will leave. and he will be with christie. like he is now."

"yeah," she looks away slightly. "i'll leave, and then things will go back..."

i cut her off and grab her hand, "you know, you have time with him. i really think that time is what he needs. even if it is only the next two weeks, only the next few hours. you're making him more. more than i think he cares to admit."

she looks back at me, and says. "he was worried about you tonight."

"did he tell you why?" i ask.

"he says you're never happy. he says that when you learn something you become sad. like there is no mystery in that subject anymore" she is looking down at him, and i drop her hand unto his.

"tonight," i say, thinking, "tonight was what it was. i'll move ahead, past the fact i drink again. but i am not sad. what andrew is worried about i think is that. the fact that i may not have been sad."

she looks at me for the last time that night, "that's what i told him."

---

the last thing i say is, "don't question the next two weeks, don't hold back because of her. questioning it would be making it into less than it obviously is."

and she smiles once more, "okay."

and i smile, say goodnight and step out into the light of the night.

---

somehow, somewhere, they'll survive.

Wandering

everything has chains...absolutely nothing's changed

Rockie

you know, every time i sit here, in front of this glowing screen in this dark room, i find myself writing to a future self.

i find myself leaving little hints about what goes right, what has gone wrong, and what is stuck in neutral when the world is in drive.

---

my first post in my pry, to blog i wrote why i was having certain people read all the non-sense i was posting. all the insane ramblings from a sane (or nearly) person.

rockie, i wrote about you:

"The second person is new to me. My way of thinking. But that's okay. For whatever reason I trust you more than I trust most people, and I still have no idea why. But I'm comfortable with it now, and have been. But I never see you, so... I haven't been able to tell you that. I'm not going to say anything else, but thank you. Don't ask why, just... thank you. Although you're somewhat creepy."

i still stand by this. we never talk anymore for some reason, but i wish we were not losing touch. that little paragraph was written nearly two years ago now, and all i can think of is still how much it meant that you understood me. that i had someone to trust.

i said i didn't understand you. and i think i know why. i know you wanted to know this, so i wanted to know you would, hence the posting of it here. but i think it's not what you think it is.

i am not going to go off on you, or say anything about how you're tired of asking people what you are doing.

i care about those things, but i feel it is not my place to say anything.

instead, my lack of understanding lies in something you said to me awhile ago... or emailed me. you asked me if i was okay. this was over a year ago, and it meant a lot. not because you asked, but because you were the only one to ask. even andrew didn't, even when he knew something was up.

you asked me, "are you okay?"

that's it. you didn't ask what was wrong, nor did you demand of me to tell you. but you asked. you asked if i was okay because you knew i wasn't.

so i read all the blogs you have been writing, and even without hearing anything from you i worry. i worry because i don't want you to feel your life is wasting away. i don't want you to feel that you are failing at anything.

you do feel that way i think. your just enough like me where i think i know.

and that's what i don't understand. why don't we talk? for whatever reason i think that we could help one another because of our similarities.

maybe this is all sounding like complete bullshit.

i don't understand you because i understand myself.

i think awhile ago you were somewhat worried that i would say that i was in love with you. i am not rockie, but i do love you.

truly.

even without words passing between us, even as we drift apart for reasons i can't really define nor give reasons to, i love you.

and i am here for you.

even through the silence.

Momentary Recognition (Pry, to)

you were standing.

leaning. waiting.

for something, someone.

i knew you once. long ago.

and standing there, across the room. across the invisible distance of time. i wonder.

wonder if you would remember that time.

or that time.

times i have forgot.

times i have forgave.

those i haven't.

you're leaning against the wall. smoking.

american spirits.

the only cigarette that still tastes good.

i watch. wait. some song is playing in the backround.

i don't know the name, just that it's hand has been overplayed.

leaning. standing. you glance over.

and for a second. split second.

calculated. reduced. and divided.

i see the recognition. i see the judgment.

one night.

one night and it was all washed away.

i remember saying. saying.

that i can't find a feeling i buried long ago.

i remember saying, that i don't have an answer.

and that i would rather be alone then feel alone.

i see your momentary recognition. i see that green flash in your eyes, so like hers. so like mine. so like no one i remember.

i remember saying i can't trust another. that it's easier to hide.

i think, looking at you leaning. we're staring at one another from across the room now.

you look. i look.

memories are passed without words.

voices that were silent for so long, i realize, are not gone.

i remember the tears we never cried.

i think as i turn around.

think. one night. one night.

one night.

one night.

i think.

one night.

i think

if i could change the future, i would change the past instead.

"Did You Feel You Were Tricked..."

"...by the future you picked?"


i am sitting here, reading something and wondering about you. really wondering about what you believe. what i believe, and if either of those things matter in the least.


it is one of those moments where i am realizing that what i thought was pointless is not, but what i thought was worthwhile is pointless.


if not meaningless.


the pursuit is what is starting to matter though.


the knowledge that there is something to gain in the knowledge.


the hope that there is knowledge to be gained in the first place.


do you have hope anymore? are you okay?

Love is Madness

"there is always some madness in love. but there is also always some reason in madness"
-nietzsche

"love is a devil"
-shakespeare

---

"i love you," she says. tears are flowing like streams down her cheek, and i know that the lie i am about to tell is my only way out of the hole i have dug to the center of this little tear in the universe.

"i love you too," but, again, it is a lie. this affair holds no love. it is just a rip in my current reality. a selfish escape from my day-to-day. love, i think, is useless here. 

---

it's hard to imagine where all this began. this idea that i have two loves. always one hand to hold. always one heart to break upon the rocks.

but i think looking into her eyes (lie), this is my destiny. 

she says, "do you love me?"

"yes," i say. this time, years later it is truth.

---

distance is a killer of understanding. the further away the less you have to share with another person. the less you have to share, the less you have to know.

---

i remember hearing a song that meant love only to know it meant nothing when she was no longer around.

---

"what do i think of love." i say, repeating her question as a statement of my own. i know exactly how to answer this question, it is rehearsed. it is on the tip of my tongue, but i can't bring myself to answer truthfully and i say, "i don't know."

it is an easy way out, but thinking about it now, it's also a killer of time that could be had.

---

she is kissing me and it is the best experience of my life. it's perfect.

passionate, yet fully intimate.

it is the first time i understand just how important the act is, it is the first time i feel that love is more than words. that it can be more than soft compassion.

---

time ticks by. i know that i am running out of any remaining sand in the hourglass in my mind.

slowly it's draining.

slowly i am drifting.

---

she said to me over the phone, "i think we should see other people."

i smiled, and sarcastically, i said, "look around. they're every where."

---

love is madness.

---

everyday i think of three people. one who knows i love. one who used to know, but at this point wants me dead. one who lives in the dark.

i can't say what love is. because it is no singular emotion. it is a chameleon, taking on different shapes to fit the people of our lives into what we see them as.

on one hand it is the person we are balanced with, the "yin to my yang" scenario.

then there is the love that you passed up on. the one who broke your heart, or the one you left abandoned on the side of the road screaming your name in sadness or despair but still filled with a misunderstood love.

and always, there is the one who you love but cannot be in love with because of so many under(lying) reasons. the one who is perfect for you in understanding. or by definition.

but love, for me doesn't fit into a box. it's is not pandora's little chest of curiosities.

i know what love means to me.

---

it is life.


--

it is infinite

An Insane Curiosity

"my mind has wandered from the straight and narrow,

my mind has wandered from the flock you see."

-oingo boingo, "insanity"

---

lately i have become strangely interested in insanity, or "psychopathology".

i have no idea at all what has brought this interest on, maybe it is drood that it is causing the interest, but i think it has been on my mind longer.

i mentioned two blogs ago that various famed, and extremely intelligent, people have been eccentric. and often times have been recorded (historically) as being somewhat outside of the social norm of the time (or of anytime).

what interests me is the defining qualities of insanity, or just what being insane means.

day-to-day it is something i feel i want to experience on some level. that sounds in-itself somewhat insane, but really, when looking at those geniuses of the human species one has to wonder if there is true insanity.

i look at it in a way that leads me to believe that some people, those who are not violently insane, see things with more understanding.

it's why i believe many musicians, authors, and artists, have found clairvoyance (of sorts) in drugs... the substances create a short-term insanity.

a way to see beyond what is considered the "norm".

Defining Circumstances

"i can't remember who said it first, and i mark it as one of life's great ironies: so often, the details of what shapes us most are forgotten over the course of our day-to-days. if we knew how important a moment was going to be to us one day, i imagine we would record it or preserve it better. sure- we'll pay through the nose to have our weddings videotaped; but can we say the same thing about the first time we discovered masturbation, or the moment we realized that the true nature of the opposite sex was to lie and humiliate? usually not."
-kevin smith

---

this blog, along with the next two, are sort of an experiment. they are all going to be very loosely (even vaguely) connected, but hopefully, all will be pretty personal.

why?

i don't think i have enough "real" personal blogs posted, and i feel that is the point for this blog.

---

i can think of only a handful of moments that have defined me: that have truly given a definition to me. maybe some of these events haven't really given meaning to me to others, but they have, in a short period of time, all given an understanding of me for myself.

and maybe that understanding of self is more important than some some projected half image.

---

in order. order may be best.

---

first kiss.

i think my first kiss is something that made me understand people, attraction, better than any event before (maybe since). it was something that just made me see things differently, even if those things i saw were still from an adolescent viewpoint.

my first kiss just meant so much to me. it was an event i didn't expect, didn't really see coming at the time, but something i think about constantly.

in fact, i wonder if there is going to be a kiss, or any physical act that will explain more in seconds than my first kiss had.

---

first fight.

another "first", another event that explained so much so quickly.

getting hit in the face twice is something that i just won't forget. not because of pain, not because of surprise.

instead, i think it was the first time i felt hate. i knew the person this event happened with disliked me, but after those two hits to the face i knew that it went far beyond a simple sense of fucked-up teenage rivalry or angst.

it was hate.

and like love, it's just something that is incomprehensible, dangerous, and completely uncontrolled.

---

freshman year was a very odd experience for me (hell, being honest, it is probably bizarre for many a 14 year old).

two things happened that defined pretty much my entire existence in high school.

one, i think i fell in love with "my best friends girl". or ex-girl. or something. but maybe love is too strong a word-- maybe it was more an insane infatuation. or maybe a misunderstanding.

but it defined me in ways i still sometimes think of from time to time: it made me realize that i would break friendships for relationships- a trend that undoubtedly it still within my blood, my mind, and my heart.

the other thing? megan.

---

megan fucking was a bane and boon to my high school life. i loved her in ways i still, to this day, cannot, and will not explain nor question.

something she gave to me, something she made me into, made me me for the years that followed... and ninth grade we had only met. nothing happened.

nothing but a friendship formed in zero period earth sciences.

then came tenth grade, and the kiss i will never forget as long as i live. it remains to this day the best non-sexual physical experience of my life.

it's all a bit fucked up.

---

tenth grade is also the time where i figured out i could get away with saying things through writing. i found out that i could express so much without vocally saying anything about anything. i could symbolize, i could write in metaphor, and it would all be meaningless to anyone but me.

and learning how to write in such a way is the most important out of mind, out of body, experience i ever have had.

---

if you knew me in high school, in late 10th, 11th, and senior year, you know that i drank. a lot. too much.

it was also a habit, at times, i still find myself fighting back. still find myself unable to control without guidance from those who have stood by me for all the insane, intense, drinking periods.

but i would be a liar if i acted as if it didn't shape me in some way. drinking is a choice, but it was choice i made for knowing the consequences that would haunt me from day to day, moment to moment in the years that followed.

so much of my writing, so many of my current "philosophies" have come from the act.

---

8/2/2006.

andrew saved my life, and for that i will love him forever.

---

a little over a year later (or less?) i met rockie, who unknown to you (rockie) until now-- you also defined me in ways that i cannot explain.

not because of any one reason, not really. but you have been someone who i know i can depend on more than many of my closest, "forever"-known, friends.

and i love you for that.

---

i think that's good for now. i'm leaving a lot out. obviously things that happen (or have happend) more than once i can't write much about (sex and the like)... i also am leaving things that happened previously to this presented time frame out. and things that have happened more recently.

there is so much more. specific teachers (the teals, missiakian, andrews), friends (jino, jennifer, colleen), family (my brother, my dad)...

there are always things that i just can't write. both good, bad, great and terrible.

or can't bring myself to write (my mom, and such things)... but i will.

i think this blog is really opening a purpose for those of you i have ask to read this.

so, next blog is on insanity, followed by love.

Uncontrolled Thoughts

i'm looking out the window right now thinking of what to write on this virtual paper, this place where i sometimes escape.

release.

it has been ten days or so from my last "blog" that really wasn't a blog at all, but when you can't put thoughts down, when i can't put thoughts down, i might as well put something harmless up so i don't forget i have this blog.

but maybe that is an exaggeration. i really don't forget i have this space to vent even when i neglect it.

---

i'm listening to the molo session of "long road" right now, realizing that the three pearl jam songs vedder recorded with the south african choir are probably the best versions of those songs.

it's sometimes is odd to me when my favorite songs by a band are not done by the band.

---

"that's my place to get away"

i just realized, reading through my texts, how similar we are.

not in a creepy romantic way or anything, and in all honesty i didn't think so when you told me you thought so. but every time, over the past few months, i have got a text or message from you, i have thought about it.

it's an odd thing to realize, but i am not sure why.

---

why do people watch wrestling?

---

i am reading a book (fictionalized-but historically accurate) on the last decade (or so) of charles dickens's life. it's told from the standpoint of william collins (moonstone), a close friend of dickens, and it really examines a spiraling obsession and how it effected the genius author.

it is one of those thought provoking novels. every time i read a novel or book (non-fiction), or even see a documentary on someone who had an unmatched intelligence, it always hints that the person was not quite right.

that as they grew, or became more popular, or whatever they sort of went insane.

there are theories on this for shakespeare, da vinci, einstein, dickens...

it's just sort of worrisome that so many of the greatest minds the world will ever know were somewhat insane.

but at the same time, it makes me realize that one cannot label, or define, "normal".

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i really want to write a parody of a brother's grimm fairy tale. i don't know which one i would pick, but thinking about it, i really think it would be "little red riding hood".

i think that is probably the most interesting to reinterpret.

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friendships are really bizzare to me.

if only because i never understand them.

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i think that's good for today.

Alice in Wonderland (2010)

I love Tim Burton. I love when Tim Burton directs Depp.

:)

Next Blogs

...will be personal blogs.

: )

probably.

Harry Potter (2) and The Terror

two people have complained, or had issue with my last blog. still, i stand by everything i said in the blog.

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i'll start, again, by saying the harry potter series will go down as one of my favorite series ever behind only two (maybe three) other series of books.

my issue is that it is (the series) a one-way street for many. a lot of people i know feel like they are the best books of the last 15 years. definitely the best in the fantasy genre.

which is fine. opinions are different, i get that. nor am i saying that i want to challenge opinions held by so many people i know.

again, i just feel it is a one-way street. people refuse to move to different genres after the series, and in fact, i know of at least two people who have read nothing since the series (underwhelming) conclusion.

that bothers me. it really does. i don't know why. i would just think after reading one great series of novels one would want to move on to more. maybe they won't like what they read nearly as much, but not reading is closing doors. for many (see my earlier blog) reading is like the alamo of the imagination.

it's where it is taking its last stand knowing it is out numbered.

my other (major) issue is that people believe these books are the lord of the rings of our generation. which it is not. i like the hp novels MUCH more than i do lotr but the latter series defined everything that followed. i can't see harry potter and his seven years at hogwarts doing the same.

i don't want to see that because they are lacking the originality i feel is needed to define all fantasy novels that i read for the rest of my life.

i just don't want them to become some gold-standard, with all reviews for future fantasy novels saying, "it is no harry potter" or "the next great fantasy for those looking for something after harry potter".

which the diary of a wimpy kid books already did.

yeah, i have other issues with the books. mostly having to do with lack of the world-building that wasn't there in the novels, the lack of threat to those outside of hogwarts, or the fact that the real "meat of the story" didn't occur until book 5.

but i can lay that aside. i still love the books, and i think i always will. again, there is just more out there that i like more.

but maybe i just want rockie to stop reading these over and over and spend more time devoted to me. : )

(15:56)
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a quick note on dan simmon's the terror. it was fucking amazing. one of the best novels i have read in 2009, and probably one of the best novels (or at least favorite) i have ever read.

that's two for two on the over 700 page novels this year (jonathan strange and mr. norrel, by susanna clarke, which was also amazing and a fantasy novel).

Harry Potter

you know, the further i remove myself from the harry potter series the more i wonder why people are so hung up over it now.

in truth, i think it is that many people stopped reading outside of the modern genre defining novels in-between releases. even now, i think (twilight novels) that many have refused to move on.

they just move from one similar type of novel to the next.

i'm not saying that the hp novels are bad or anything of the sort. i actually love the series, and they were one of the defining series of what i have read thus far.

what i am trying to say, is that after reading a good amount of fantasy novels before and since, they are nothing new.

nothing particularly special.

i read lord of the rings (finally) earlier this year, and so many of the characters in rowling's opus seem to come out of the novel. yes that issue is inherent in many, many fantasy novels, but it's too apparent with the archetype characters, the villians, everything besides hogswarts itself.

yet, even then, magical schools are nothing new to the genre (dragonlance).

i also, for whatever reason, have a gripe with deathly hollows. the 700+ concluding novel it just a tad too agsty. i don't know what it was, it was almost too much of a departure from the preceding six chapters.

plus, none of the novels seem to have any "felt" threat. you know voldemort is coming back, you know he is powerful but outside of glimpses, you never feel like anyone is in any danger. you don't feel the effects he is having outside of the uk area... if there are any.

it almost all seems simple and overblown.

---

again, i don't hate the potter novels. i actually, really, really, like them.

it's just that i feel there are so many books, both in the genre and out, that do more.

king's dark tower and the connections that run through the majority of his works seem like more of an achievement. not only do you feel the effects of the main characters story in his main story, but you see and feel those effects across most of king's non-series books.

martin's a song of ice and fire are better fantasy novels as well, more original, and again, you feel the threat of something wihin the novels.

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i'm glad i read the books, but i am sad that people are stuck in that series. reading is just a huge part of my life, and every book i read opens a new door. a new place for me to explore, and i think it is something that many don't feel.

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15:11

Education (Trade the Magic for Facts)

"i am questioning my education,
is my education who i am now?"
-Pearl Jam

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what makes us who we are on a day-to-day basis?

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i woke up today thinking about the question and what it means to us. all of us.

individually. as a group.

and i thought, i don't know.

so i thought, staring up at the white nothingness of my ceiling.

---

but, thinking about it today i really have to say that i believe it is our imaginations that make us who we are. i am also, slowly, starting to believe our educations break down the walls of our castles in the mind. our ability to say, looking up at the clouds passing overhead, "that one looks like a turtle".

"a bird."

"a castle in the sky".

---

what am i trying to say, what point am i trying to get across?

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i think that the further things come in the world, the more we learn, individually or as a group, the less we can create (or imagine) anything new.

it's like when you are very young, and you look up at the night sky, at the full moon, and you wonder if the moon is following you over head.

then, just a few years later, you decipher that magic. realizing it's a trick, you trade it in for fact, and by doing so you trade in the magic of your imagination.

you lessen yourself through learning.

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i look at friends who are graduating, and what career paths they have chosen, be it business, education, or entertainment, and i just see them looking blankly at cubicles.

at white walls. and monotone.

monotony.

you get to a point where education is just a way for you to make money. yet along the way, no one seems to ask at what cost is the price you pay for losing what makes you you?

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you're told what to do, and ask no questions.

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i am not saying education is bad. i want to teach.

i just think that it lessens us to a point.

every semester i delve deeper into literature, into academic writing, and i find myself less able to come up with poems, with stories, with anything creative.

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i don't know. i just want to look at the clouds and know that it isn't just randomized.

i want to know what i see is a fucking bear, not just accumulated moisture.

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12:21

Up (2D) v. Up (Digital 3D)

let me start this blog with what i think about up as a whole.

the first 10 or 15 minutes really made the movie, it was almost completely silent (past the childhood parts) and was done almost as if it were one of pixar's own short films. actually, i think they actually titled the segment, "married life", so who knows?

that 10 minutes or so, that opening sequence, was one of the most heart-felt few minutes i've ever seen in a film. it really made you feel for the movie's main character (carl fredrickson), and it made me see, like wall e last year, that animated film making could be so much more.

from there the film is truly an adventure film, from the meeting of russell ("tiny mail man"), to the films climax in a blimp, you feel as if you are on an adventure. more than that, the film captures a distinct '50's or '60's adventure film feeling. the way it was animated, the over done "acting" of it all, it really captured that earlier film ages focus on pop adventure films.

in short, it feels almost like an indiana jones film. i'm not kidding, lucas could really take what pixar did and apply it to his planned indiana jones 5 and i think it would be much better than kingdom of the crystal skull was.

so there is my brief thoughts on the movie as a whole, and after seeing it a second time, i still love it. maybe not as much as wall e, but it was close. it's probably my second favorite pixar film, and definitely in my top 5 of all time.

so was it worth the 3D?

yes and no.

it made certain moments of the film more immersive, and of course, it made some scenes more... adventurous?

yet (and this is good), unlike many, many 3D films, up doesn't really come across as a "3D experience". Instead, scenes have more depth of field, more small touches in 3D. These touches do enhance the experience, and it does make the film look really amazing at parts, but it is never in your face about it.

i saw coraline last year without the 3D, and the whole time i couldn't help but notice which scenes were obviously meant for 3D. because of this, i just didn't enjoy coraline as much as i could have...

it's like i was missing some vital part of the film... like watching star wars without darth vader's breathing sound effect.

up does things differently. never did i see a scene while watching the "2D" film, that made me wander what i would look like in 3D. and while i did notice some things in the 3D showing, it won't be on my mind when the DVD ships (obviously) without the 3D.

i guess all of this is trying to say that while up is good in 3D, it is just as good seeing it traditionally.

it is an amazing achievement for pixar to have such a long streak of fantastic movies, and up is one of those films (unlike dreamworks films) that will be remembered as a classic.

go see up. 3D or no, it is an amazing hour and a half.

oh, and the short "partly cloudy" is cute. much better than "presto" which was attached to wall e.

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18:40

No Post

no real post today.

just a busy day.

tomorrow's will  be "up (2D) versus up (3D)".

boring, but it is more for me to remember than anything.

friday a personal blog.

saturday a "book" blog, but not sure what that means yet.

sunday, most likely another personal blog.

Our Lives are Parallel

"go then, there are other worlds than these."
-jake chambers, the gunslinger


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i'm sitting here, and for whatever reason that quote is stuck in my head. it won't go away, it is just sitting in the fore of my mind, and, as always with (anything about) king's dark tower epic, the idea of it is really fascinating me.

king's tower epic deals in so many ways with the idea that there are multiple universes, and everything in all the universes run parallel and what happens in one directly effects the rules and history of the other.

it just always makes me think, not because it is a theory (einstein's "parallel earth" theory) that is a real-life idea, but because i look at life in a way that is so similar to this idea; this idea that worlds are connected is how i look at life.

i think that everyone on earth somehow, eventually, effects every other person.

maybe not in real meaningful ways, but still, i believe we all have some effect on one another. i know all of those i asked to read this, and they may go on to say something about what (to someone else) i wrote in one of these (mostly) nonsensical blogs, and thus i am interconnected with someone i have no idea of.

i keep thinking of this parallel lives idea, that even without knowing someone, i am connected to them.

similarly, one of you may say something to me, have me listen to a song, and i may pass THAT on, and thus you have touched someone you don't know.

it's like a wave, and by doing one thing, you actually could effect dozens. hundreds.

thousands.

it's a bizarre thought, and i think the idea that writing... blogs, stories, poems, essays, whatever... can make people more connected than so many other forms of communication, and because of this, connect to more people...

i think it's what makes writing so important to me.

it just makes me really wonder...

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time: 10:38