I know I haven't posted here in a long, long time. I regret it dearly, but the good ol' public school system has really put a damper on my creative endeavors. How sad it is, then, and how angry I am that my return must be because of celebrity death news. I was infuriated by the extended, beating-a-dead-whale coverage of Anna Nicole Smith, and since then I have been jaded by anyone and everyone dying. However, I found something today that deals with the recent death of Heath Ledger that relates in a big way to a post I did a long time ago.
It must have been at least two years ago (the WoW has been around THAT long?) that I posted this, in which I railed against a radical Baptist church for protesting the funerals of American soldiers. It has since been two years, and during this time I have lost my support for organized religions and my hope in those who follow them. Some things remain static, however, as it turns out that these closed-minded, judgmental, completely-missing-the-entire-message-of-religion whack jobs are at it again, this time protesting the funeral of Heath Ledger. Why? For doing his job, of course.
Let's get something straight (figuratively, of course): I'm not what you would call a "fan" of Ledger's. I loved him in The Patriot, but I never really saw any of his other movies. I'm not defending him because I am a huge Ledger follower or anything. I'm defending him because he is a person, a person who deserves to have his memory preserved, a person whose family and friends deserve to mourn him uninterrupted.
Heath Ledger starred in Brokeback Mountain, a movie which garnered much controversy when it was released in 2005. Redneck white trash religious zealots who knew only that the two main characters were homosexual railed against the film. I'm not here to discuss the film in itself, though. I'm writing this merely to point out some objective facts, facts that maybe these uptight ignorant bastards have overlooked.
This movie came out in 2005. That was three years ago. Get over it. Even comedians have stopped making gay cowboy jokes, which is a clear indicator that something is of the past. Since then we've seen the release of The Da Vinci Code and Golden Compass, two movies that are at least relevant to religion in general. Please, go raise a fuss about something a little more recent, and maybe then you'll be taken seriously.
Secondly, Heath Ledger is what people with any sort of education would call an "actor." He gets paid to portray characters formulated by someone else completely in movies. That's his occupation. He portrayed a character who was a homosexual cowboy. He wasn't gay himself, and him dying has nothing to do with him playing a "degenerate" in a movie.
And finally, the man is dead. Wouldn't you, my dearest assholes, say that he has already faced the judgment that you seem to seek for him? I don't know the whole time frame between death and a meeting with the Big Man, but chances are it has already happened. You're too late, and what you have to say matters very little right about now. Let the lovers of that poor heathen mourn their loss in peace. You know what it's like to love, right? Right? Isn't that what Christianity's all about? Love? Why don't you take a little time to find some love yourself? I hear your siblings are looking better and better every day.
Sorry about the long time without posting, guys. For what it's worth, I've started maintaining a journal of ideas, which will hopefully at least spark up some creativity again. I'll try to post more often from now on.
Heath Ledger, Rest in Peace
The REAL, real Hojo
But first.
Some of our contributers here and I hang out with at a few forums. YPG, my Indian friend, propose this interesting question today at on of them, which I think is an interesting debate and philosophical question. I post it to you to hash out among yourselves as it brings some interestng questions. Now, this is a hypothetical, and go with the hypothetical . . . .
Imagine you yourself discovered without a shadow of a doubt that there is no God, Heaven, or that any religions philiosophy is false, there is no all powerful being, nor afterlife, etc. You can prove this to anyone who you tell it to, and once they find out, it will show irrefutably, any spiritality they believe cannot exist. Would you reveal this to the world?
Interesting question, and my immediate answer was "Of Course, religion and spiritual thought have caused many wars, and behind much of the problems and fighting in the world". But then I also thought further, many people live for their Heavenly reward, what if that is one of the only things keeping people kind and good? It is a very interesting thought, and I would love to hear anyone reading this, their opinion.
And remember this is hypothetical, don't go changing the whole thing.
The Real Hojo
Yes, supposedly the Angry Piper revealed this month's back, but like usual, he was wrong. Today, more doorbell was rung and the Bucko Brigade, lead by Palmer was there. Evidently the boy has cracked a mysterious nut. Palmer, through cunning, seduction, and subterfuge got a copy of Hojo's High School Picture:
"Hojo . . . he is the Joker"
Hmmmm, that boy might be right, even though he is a bit cracked. There is a uncanny resemblance . . . So I went into my computer to pull up some pictures of the Joker . . . my god . .
. . . it can't be . . .
I am Malach, hold me.
A Self-Negating Convenience
Americans are all about convenience. Things that never bothered us before suddenly become tiresome and unnecessary once someone invents a way to make it faster, easier, and more streamlined. There's a new product out that does just that.
Now that you've seen an ad for birth control, I will console you. Scroll down a bit to see who wrote this. It's me, guys, your friendly, non-confrontational Horacian satirist. I'm not going to get into some political discussion about how birth control was invented by Dakota Fanning in order to halt the return of Christ or how birth control is a better invention than the combustion engine. You know what to expect with me, so take two breaths and come with me.
This new birth control pill is chewable, which is so much harder than, you know, swallowing a pill. Swallowing, which is so easy your grandparents do it every day to stay alive, is just way too hard. I can see where the whole "birth control on the go" idea would technically be a revolutionary step in a birth controlled world, but there is just one little thing that keeps this from being a miracle drug.
My mother pointed something out to me. If you'll take a look at the bottom of the ad at right about 12 seconds or so, you will see the phrase that is the two hours traffic of my rant:
"Followed by a full glass of liquid."
What? Wait, you mean to tell me that this pill is chewable, but it still requires the liquid that most people use when swallowing a pill? Isn't that, like, adding unnecessary exercise to taking a pill? And they're marketing this...to Americans? It seems like they are really missing the target audience here. They've not only destroyed any hope of "convenience" with their product, but they have actually tried to add steps in their process that make it more complicated than what is already available.
So the next time you rush out to buy the next tier of ultimate convenience for what is probably hundreds of dollars more than what you are currently paying, take a step back to realize that birth control was actually made by Dakota Fanning in order to halt the return of Christ.
Proof That You Can Make People Pay for Something That Is Free
Have you ever seen a piece of exercise equipment that was so useless and that made users look so ridiculous that you wonder why anyone would even bother inventing it?
On today's trip through the world of Amazon, there was an item on the front page that caught my eye. Okay, it only caught my eye because it was right next to the pictures that were trying to sell me lingerie, but my eye was caught regardless.
"Noooo," I laughed to myself in disbelief as I clicked the link, "They can't be serious."
They are. They actually want to sell me a ropeless jump rope. Yes, even Mozilla's spellchecker does not believe its figurative eyes. A jump rope that isn't a rope at all? Isn't that, you know, sort of like jumping? Yes, but with this your friends will know you spent so much money in an effort to get in shape! They say that it is to prevent tripping. Chances are if you didn't learn how to jump rope as a kid without tripping or if your hand-eye coordination is so off that your brain can't process "jump!," you have bigger problems on your hands.
The product feature list goes on to talk about how portable it is. Rope isn't portable? Rope manages to make it onto every wilderness survival "must-have" list, but carrying around a few feet is just so cumbersome. Mankind has been utilizing rope to do pretty much everything for centuries, but apparently it's fallen out of fashion because it fails to be flashy and expensive.
This thing is packaged with 3 DVD workouts. 3! If I were to make a DVD of a ropeless jump rope, it would contain:
•Slow jumping
•Fast jumping
•Double Dutch (for two lazy people and their stupid friend)
•Criss-Cross (For those who don't think they look stupid enough jumping up and down waving their hands about)
The rest would be a constant shot of my middle finger. They wouldn't notice, though, because once they hear the word "fast" they will turn the DVD off in fear of breaking a sweat.
And, finally, it's patented. Someone went through the trouble of making sure no one else would be "brilliant" enough to steal their idea.
The only use I can see for a ropeless jump rope is to prevent people from hanging themselves once they find out they spent money to jump up and down.
Truth in Advertising
I have decided that since tomorrow is officially the first day of my summer vacation, I should stay up a little later than usual in some sort of celebratory gesture. I neglected, however, that Sunday night television sucks. After a short burst of Arrested Development (which I still hold to be the best show on television) I decided to find something to watch.
I've never seen the show Cheaters. I could tell from the first time I heard the title that it was a show about cheating and it was probably something that would not tickle my proverbial fancy. I flipped through the channels and I saw the last 30 seconds or so of Cheaters before a commercial break. I was right - the show is about infidelity and it doesn't interest me. The first commercial of the break, however, did.
Those crazy "CALL FOR PHONE SEX LOL" commercials are standard late night programming fare. They actually preceded television, and commercials for dirty phone calls could be heard after FDR's fireside chats in the 1940s. I was not surprised to see such a commercial in the rotation, seeing as how it is after midnight, which seems to be the official time to be in the mood to talk to hot singles in my area. I was very surprised to see a commercial like this come on after a show called Cheaters.
"Aha!" I yelled, pointing at the TV as the commercial began, "so that's how it works!" You see, the show Cheaters was created to oust, well, cheaters. To have a reality show that tracks cheaters, you have to have a couple in which one member is unfaithful. To be unfaithful, you must first be tempted. You see, I would be very surprised to find that the dirty phone sex people even had to pay for that advertising space. They're basically saying "Hey, want to talk to local singles and make an appearance on the show you were just watching?" The fine folks at Cheaters would be crazy to force people to pay to create potential cheaters. It's the most brilliant advertisement campaign I've ever seen!