I hope I'm not just really behind in viewing this video, and that you guys will be able to have a good first-time laugh.

Scarlet Takes a Tumble

Señor Chinarro "Del Montón"

This is a song I had to transcribe to practice hearing/understanding spanish...

And I liked it.

(I ended up going to the place where this video was shot.  and climbed to the castillo that he sings about.)

If I am not back to the haus in time for the meeting, since this is my last haus meeting, please, someone, propose that the haus constitution be changed from Phoenix Haus Constitution to "The Order of the Phoenix". I know that J.K. Rowling already has a work by this name, but it is uncomfortably inappropriate if we don't follow through with this.

HELL ON EARTH.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHoxl8IK7po
I feel so, so sorry for the male figure in this household.

and in less embarrassing news

As a separate post, because I don't want to taint it with all the Twilight nonsense, here are a few links for you guys, because I know you like food. I read a lot of food blogs and it would selfish of me not to share some of my favorites.

1) Bread and Honey - two ladies from Portland who blog about their foodie adventures. The recipes always please me (they are even split between the two authors, one does baking and one does cooking), their photography is really great, and their writing styles (especially Alice's) really tickle me. I used to follow her personal blog while it was up (sadly it's gone now).

2) TasteSpotting - this is not a blog per se, but rather it aggregates a bunch of submissions from various foodblogs in one totally fucking awesome hub. It is kind of dangerous because I tend to get engrossed in it and spend an hour looking at delicious food and then wanting to eat some delicious gourmet shit but just end up with a bagel.

3) The Crepes of Wrath - I really like this one because the stuff she cooks is like, top-notch comfort food. It all sounds like stuff that a) I could cook and b) would be really satisfying. And not to mention it has a ton of crock pot recipes and Y'ALL KNOW HOW GUNG-HO I HAVE BEEN ABOUT CROCKPOTS LATELY.

this is the skin of a killer!!!

Alright, all y'all make fun of me enough for the dumb shit I like, and I am not saying it isn't warranted (except for all the House Hunters I watch because that is just good planning for the future alright), so I am just going to cut you off at the pass and talk about Twilight.

Number one, I am sorry, Mary, that I am dumb and didn't remember what day your birthday was, and that I had to go see a midnight showing of Days of our Sparkly Vampiric Lives but OH MY GOD you guys IT IS SO RIDICULOUS.

Here is the thing about the whole Twilight phenom: I didn't read the books until just recently. I had been perusing a couple blogs that mocked them at great length and was equal parts offended and enthralled by it. I kept verbally shitting over it hard enough that eventually my cousin, who digs them a lot and without any facetiousness (she is a fan whereas I am sort of a lolfan; I love it mostly just to lol at it) said "YOU HAVEN'T EVEN READ THEM OH MY GOD." Alright, fine, I'll read them! JUST TO SHOW YOU.

Basically all this did was multiply my initial feelings sevenfold. It is SO BAD and REALLY OFFENSIVE ON SO MANY LEVELS - intellectual, feminist, literary - but GOD HELP ME I COULDN'T PUT IT DOWN. Maybe I won't get into a too-deep primer because I already suspect that no one who reads this besides me gives a hoot, but just in case you want to go more in depth (I ASSURE YOU THAT YOU DO), this wiki is good (and appropriately snarky).

The jist is: Bella moves to forks Bella is awkward and yet every boy falls in love with her including dark brooding vampire Edward who, along with his vampire family, only eat animals and not people because they have morals or something, blah blah there is angst about whether they can be together and also I guess there is some action involving bad vampires who want to eat Bella beause I guess the author realized that sometimes plot is worthwhile. That is just the first book, it goes on and on and becomes exponentially more absurd by the time you get to the fourth and final book.

I guess here is my abbreviated list of why it is so bad and yet why I have such a horrible, masochistic fondness for it:

1) I am sucker for terriblarious repetitious dialogue, and the book is like Stephenie Meyer got drunk with a thesaurus almost all the time. Every is "brooding" and "chagrined" and "windswept" and "irrevocably in love" with someone ALL THE TIME.

2) THE VAMPIRES CAN'T GO OUT IN THE SUN BECAUSE THEY WILL LITERALLY SPARKLE LIKE DIAMONDS I am not making that up.

3) Book 4 includes: appropriately chaste post-marital vampire-human sexing; a subsequent pregnancy with a half-vampire fetus that comes to term in a month; and said fetus BREAKING ITS MOTHERS SPINE AND RIBS FROM THE INSIDE OUT and then Edward, the vampire-daddy, BITING THE BABY OUT OF BELLA'S ABDOMEN WITH HIS TEETH WHILE SHE VOMITS A FOUNTAIN OF BLOOD.

4) There is also this hilarious love triangle with a Native American werewolf, Jacob, and Edward and Bella. Jacob is all in love with Bella, but her "WHOLE WORLD" is Edward (since he has been like, sneaking into her room to watch her sleep since about a WEEK AFTER THEY MET because THAT IS WHAT YOU DO WHEN YOU'RE IN LOVE I GUESS) and he gets rejected and butt-hurt.

BUT THEN, it turns out werewolves can IMPRINT on people, where that person becomes their entire reason for existing, and the imprintee basically has no voice in the matter because you "can't resist" such a powerful love or something retarded like that. One of the werewolf lackeys imprints on a two-year-old (IT'S NOT SEXUAL OKAY HE WILL JUST TAKE CARE OF HER UNTIL SHE IS HIS AGE [THE WEREWOLVES DON'T AGE]). Anyway Jacob apparently never loved Bella, just one of her eggs, because as soon as the half-vampire baby is mouth-Cesareaned out of her, HE IMPRINTS ON IT. Also it is named Renesmee. You know. As a combination of her grandmother's names (Renee and Esme). ~beautiful~.


It is so bad, and yet it is so good. I couldn't stop laughing while I read it (because I might have had to hunt the author down if I started taking it seriously), and the movie just improved on it so much -- it was appropriately mockable, but at just the right frequency. Not to the extent where it would have been unbearable, just to the point where it was PERFECT.

Amadou and Mariam

Apparently we don't know about too many international super-groups here. I just learned about this song called "Sabali", produced by Damon Albarn (Blur, Gorillaz, Good t Bad a t Queen). I like the buildup in the song as well as all the pictures of comfortable chairs.

DOUBLE POST

i can say with absolute certainty that scientists don't like movies. 

you might ask "come on now, ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY?"  and i would answer, "yes."

this is because all people who like movies have seen and loved jurassic park. even though movie-lovers love jurassic park, none of them love it enough to reenact it. everyone knows you don't clone dead animals, especially big dead animals. 

these scientists think they can clone MAMMOTH dead animals. therefore, they don't like movies. 

MORE CRAZY SCIENTISTS!

SECOND POST (unrelated)

This woman was arrested for "impeding traffic and chasing children." the report also notes that she was "on a drinking binge."

that sounds like a recipe for some terrified kids to me. 

i got snacks on snacks.

"if he could just do small things to his shit like his kitchen and his bathroom, he'd have women everywhere, dropping vagina panties all over the place."

but fuck that shit, fuck that shit.

Crazy Video

Mal posted this on my facebook wall and it's absolutely crazy. Check it out.

http://tapespace.com/view/Amazing_Wall_Animation

Good stuff.

It's just like a mini-mall!

hey obama you so fine you so fine you blow my mind heyobama

mission accomplished!

SPACE!

If you would please direct your attention to the link above, you can see that we have recently completed our mission to mars, or as the science dudes at NASA so endearingly call it, "the red planet."

I don't know about the rest of you, but I am so sick of martians. What a snobby culture. 

The article proposes some hopes of the science dudes:

"The project team will be listening carefully during the next few weeks to hear if Phoenix revives and phones home."

To that I say, don't get your hopes up, Houston. Don't you know this is paste week?

One thing they did get right though was when they said:

"Phoenix has given us some surprises, and I'm confident we will be pulling more gems from this trove of data for years to come."

Calling All Ragers - It's Rage O'Clock

Holy god, what a rage week that was. I cannot believe we made it twelve days this time. This semester's week took a lot out of me, as evidenced by the fact that I found myself hammered and trying to write a paper at 8 this morning because Andy, Kevin and I went and raged in Detroit until 2:30 last night. In addition to the extra days of rage, my ipod was stolen and I broke my phone, spent way too much money and probably threw a few too many things in the street. I also hit Andy in the face while raging with rock stars. I have been infected with the rage virus, and it's time to clean up my act until Wednesday or Thursday or whatever. I would like to use two photos to convey what Rage Week has done to me:

Life before Rage Week (10/28/2008)

Life at the end of Rage Week (11/10/2008)

To the average person this juxtaposition would suggest that something went wrong; but it went perfectly. Congratulations, guys - we did it again.

Unregistered Panda Votes Three Times in Tuesday's Election

All I'm sayin' is he should have registered.

As most of you know, I am not too pleased by the fact that I am graduating in a month, but this has encouraged me to embrace many things that are easily taken for granted, such as rage week and just hanging out with people as much as I can. Given that, most of the time I spend not raging or interacting with pals consists of daydreaming. My mind has been wandering more this semester than ever before, but I think it's just because I am overwhelmed with how fortunate people like us are. When it comes down to it, the biggest wrench in my works is the occasional bicycle parked in a place I disapprove of.

I had conversations with a few people this weekend after I saw a Southeastern Asian couple collecting cans at the tennis courts during tailgate on Saturday, because for some reason they really struck me a lot harder than the usual underprivileged family collecting our trash. Between class and the media lately, the commonly sought intangible of the American Dream keeps being tossed around, and I cannot help but to dwell on it all the time. When I saw that couple wandering around amidst hundreds of drunk, soon-to-be young professionals, all I could wonder is what brought that couple here? What were they seeking that they thought they could find here, only to end up cleaning up after a higher social class? To see my empties turn into someone's livelihood is an undeniably humbling experience, especially when you have a face to attach to it. Every now and then the can collectors are dancing around and having a seemingly good time, but this couple just looked different - very intent on their work, trying to make the most for themselves and possibly others. Even though we are capable of recognizing these class differences, the fact of the matter is that it really doesn't change us. I would never argue for a classless society because I believe in the importance of differing social classes, but these moments are something I think we ought to enjoy for ourselves more than we might sometimes.

For me, being human, of course I feel sorry for people like that couple; it's easy for us to feel that way since we are sitting comfortably on the top. At the same time, though, it makes me wonder what they must feel toward us. Envy? Disgust? Anger? Who knows? They were just there to pick up enough garbage to eat or maybe pay rent if they can afford a place to live. And there I was last spring collecting cans so I could go to Mexico and Europe to rage with some of my best friends. It makes me so happy to be able to do these things, but it also makes me glad for all of my friends because they can, too.

So, to wrap this all up, tomorrow is Election Day and I can't help but to feel that this American Dream is a reality for some, but for so many others it is only a myth. I can recognize these differences, but it doesn't slow me down in my pursuit of success. I have everything I would ever want or need, but I still want more, because that's what I have to do. I have to find a job so I can make money and do and have the things I want. I am about to graduate from a respectable university, I can vote in the election tomorrow, and I can look forward to the weekends when I can afford to drink with my friends. The point is, I am glad you guys are here with me and that we were all fortunate enough to be born into the families we have. The Asian couple didn't look that fun, anyways. All this country is is working to be a part of the drunken student mob. How silly it is that we transition from drunken student to professionals overnight.

I just like to realize how apparently perfect everything is every now and then.

It's good to be on the top. So, so good.

LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE! RIGHT NOW! I MEAN IT!!!

Appears to be a popular video, so some may have seen it already. This will not disappoint.