Not that I don't love Blogger...

Wordpress just came out with their online version of their blogging software and it's just so simple and cool and easy on the eye. Some of the things that sold me: no ads, completely free, great search, great look. Go to http://wordpress.com/ and find out for yourself. My new wordpress blog is at http://mindofben.wordpress.com/ (surprise, surprise). So go and check it out, I'll probably be updating from there from now on.

Crazy awesome new service SuprGlu

First of all, mine is here, but for the ones who want it explained to them, this is what it is: it's an aggregator just like a news reader, except you enter in all the different services that you use into it for the benefit of other people wanting to keep track of all the popular sites that you post on. All can be learned at SuprGlu.com. Create your own and be sure to tell me about them!

Busy past couple of weeks

First and foremost, I am now (as of this writing, not necessarily this posting) in LAX waiting to go to New York to visit my family and just get away mostly. It's only for the weekend. I might get a chance to go to the Met tomorrow also! The last time I was there I was much to young to appreciate the amazing art collection, and with this AP Art History class I've been taking it can't hurt to visit one of the most revered museums in the country.

Speaking of art, on Sunday I went to the King Tut exhibit at LACMA, which was astounding. I couldn't have wished for a better show. The only disappointment was that the death mask of King Tut (the central image to which this entire exhibit was sold to people) couldn't move from its place in Egypt for fear (allegedly) of damage. Which is true; any amount of padding won't prevent vibration, which can easily damage a precious 3000 year old artifact.

Second: my mom dropped her 3G (3rd generation) iPod 40 gig about a week ago. This beast is a little less than two years old (not as old as my 3G 30 gig), so it was understandable that it might be a bit more susceptible to failure than the newer models. Alas, a blinking folder appeared and little clickity-clickity noises occurred when it was shaken. Hard drive failure is my guess. What's my point in relaying this story? one may ask. My dear mom would be too apprehensive to venture into buying a new video enabled iPod (5G), but would gladly buy me one as an early xmas present in exchange for my 3G 30 gig. So I am now in possession of one of these beautiful machines and wow. Now that I have two working iPods (the nano and the video), it's hard to decide which to use. I've been using the video mostly to "break it in" and get used to it, but I imagine that I'll be switching back to the nano as soon as the case I ordered from Tunewear arrives and I've bought iPod cleaner and worked out those awful scratches. Despite the gorgeous screen and video capabilities, when you're on the bus for 2 hours a day (mostly standing) one can imagine how much more size matters than, say, riding on a comfortable train or Greyhound bus where one can sit down and relax without the worry of dropping one's music/video player.

Other big news: the biggest reason for my laziness in posting was due to two sold out U2 concerts at the Staples Center... in the middle of the week... on school nights... that lasted until midnight. I have a feeling they screwed up my biological clock (although going to NY certainly isn't helping either). Besides, it was worth it. This was their second visit to LA on the same tour, the Vertigo tour, and they may even make one more. This has been one of the most infamous U2 tours of the band's career. First they never sold the promised pre-sale tickets to U2 fan club members (not smart) and then they oversold almost every concert they've given (hence the visiting of the same cities twice or more).

...

I'm now in Cincinnati, Ohio, waiting for my connection. I'll update another time on how amazing watching Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children and Frank Miller's Sin City on my video iPod was as well as the surprisingly long battery life and ease of watching.

Poo-tee-weet?

This is an analytical essay I wrote on Slaughterhouse-Five in which I was assigned to analyze a quote from and show how it conveys the theme of the book.

A massacre can never be justified. In the book Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, a man named Billy decides to write a book about his experiences in Dresden, a city in Germany that was bombed by the Allied forces in World War II in order to destroy its railroad and freight yards. As Billy relates the events, he also tells his life’s story, up until the day he dies. Billy can see the day he dies clearly because he was abducted by aliens who called themselves Tralfamadorians, and they taught Billy how to see any given moment in time as they do, otherwise known as seeing into the 4th dimension. The Dresden bombing remains to be one of the most controversial moments in the entire war because the city was almost totally destroyed and the civilian casualties were staggering (approximately 25,000 people died, although this figure has been changed many times for propaganda purposes). Vonnegut’s theme throughout the book is clear: war, and the massacres it causes, are pointless. The following quote shows how he conveys this idea: “Everything is supposed to be very quiet after a massacre, and it always is, except for the birds. And what do the birds say? All there is to say about a massacre, things like ‘Poo-tee-weet?’"

The literal and figural meanings of these words are one and the same: whatever there is to say about a massacre always comes out the same. The author’s point is made by the word ‘birds.’ Birds bring to mind innocence, peace, and calm. After the Dresden massacre, there was nothing; everything was destroyed. This brings to mind the image of a deserted wasteland. The author’s attitude is very sarcastic because he seems to make very little of what actually happened. When Vonnegut writes ‘and it always is,’ his words create emphasis on the next ones, ‘except for the birds’. There is irony in the fact that the author uses a bird tweeting to show the innocence of it after a massacre. After all, what else can a bird say?

The quote is significant because it conveys the author’s feelings toward war. Kurt Vonnegut is trying to say that war is a horrible act that should never occur. Yet at the same time, he writes “...that there would always be wars, that they were as easy to stop as glaciers. I believe that too.” So in essence, he’s saying that he can’t help wars arising, but he is firmly against them when they come about. I do not agree with this statement. Any one person can help stop a war, no matter how unimportant he may seem at first.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.

Flock

I've been curious about the whole Web 2.0 concept from the beginning and I'm pretty sure I'm starting to get it now. It's all about social networking with services such as Blogger, Flickr, and del.icio.us, and no app works better for all of this than Flock. Only problem is, it is in a very early beta stage. Flock has features such as del.icio.us bookmark integration, using your del.icio.us bookmarks as "favorites" rather than everything staying on your computer, Blogger integration, blogging straight from your browser, and Flickr integration, allowing you to post pictures to your weblog straight from the browser.

I love it. It's going to be the next big thing to hit the browser world since Firefox (which Flock based its entire project on, the engine used is the Firefox engine). But until they get the big bugs worked out, I'm just going to be using it occasionally, or maybe until I can find out why everything is so slow and CPU intensive, or just plain doesn't work (mainly just the blogging feature).

I look forward to seeing what this amazing app will have to offer.

Technorati Tags: blogger, browser, del.icio.us, firefox, flickr, mac

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Instead of studying for my PSAT tomorrow, I decided to watch one of the movie's I rented. I love movies, and I was deprived of them as a child (probably for the better). So now I'm renting as many of the classic (or not-so-classic) must-sees as I can.

I rented this movie knowing absolutely nothing about it except that it was a Stanley Kubrick film. Now I'd heard of this guy from some english classes in my day. A Clockwork Orange (1971) was a frequented title, yet I never gathered the energy to get up and read it.

I'm not much of a critic, so I won't attempt to be.

...

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) was one great movie though. It had all my favorite aspects of a good film. Good stuff always gives me a weird kind of vibe, and this one did it without exception. This movie had some scenes that have been parodied so many times that I was astounded to see that it was this movie that it came from.
Next up: Fargo (1996)

I have to finish Slaughterhouse-Five A.S.A.P., need to write an analytical essay on it by Tuesday.

Technorati Tags: movie

Gum

Orbit gum is my new favorite. It doesn't have a particularly strong flavor, but the flavor is persistent for a very long time. I hate stick gum that gets all soft and crumbly after chewing it for a little while. This kind stays rather tough for extended periods of time. Not to mention the box is a near perfect fit as an iPod nano case.



Another gum I like is one you're not likely to find in your ordinary convenience store. Watering Kiss Mint gum has very unique flavors and comes straight from Japan. While I was in Japan for 3 months the package and name just seemed to appeal to me and I wanted to try all the unique Japanese candy I could. This gum certainly isn't misleading when it says that it's 'watering.' I could swear that it makes my mouth salivate more than normal gum, but I've never done an experiment to prove this. It comes in a variety of flavors such as (clockwise from top right) "Clear Mint," "Pear Mint," "Lemon Mint," and, my personal favorite, "Apple Mint." Luckily, there's a big Japanese communnity where my Japanese school is which contains a fairly big Japanese grocery store.

I'm not a big gum person (as this post may lead one to believe), but I do enjoy the occasional chew of a good piece of gum.

Technorati Tags: gum, japan

Nano Cases

I bought Slaughterhouse-Five to read for my English Independent Reading Project after reading the first few chapters out of this-guy-I-met's copy. Pretty cool ideas in it. I was thinking it was more about time and the 4th dimension while reading it rather than an anti-war book as the back cover suggests.

My nano has some very light scratches all over the top. As Walt Mossberg says, "I would include a strong, prominent, warning that it scratches too easily in normal usage. This is a real downside to an otherwise excellent product."

I still love my nano, but what he says is true. Luckily, these scratches are easily taken care of by some cleaning solution, yet nonetheless, I've been eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Tunewear Prie Ambassador, which is finally coming out tomorrow. It looks by far the best, and I hate those silicone skins and faceplates, so this is perfect.

I'm now actually updating my del.icio.us bookmarks, so subscribe to see the blog posts and websites that are important to me.

Technorati Tags: apple, ipod nano