Dear Apple Computer Lords

Dear Apple Computer Lords,

During a recent session on my computer I was once again troubled by the persistent failing of the AIM program. Granted, AIM is a pretty flaky program to begin with. However, it seems as if the success of the program running on my Powerbook is based more on luck than any design of computer programming or other equally technical facet of engineering. For example, the other day, upon engaging the program I fervently prayed for several minutes and it worked perfectly. This evening I forgot to take the time necessary to recite the proper incantations and light the incense, and what happens? This troublesome digital charlatan decides to once again rear its ugly head and plunge my laptop into senseless disarray and confusion. This is obviously quite worrisome for me and has been a persistent problem for some time now. I am more than willing to make any and all amends with the gods that are required in order to grant my computer continued well being and operational success. Should I sacrifice an XBox on a pedestal of marble? Just say the word. What about an Unlimited Version of Vista? Your wish is my command.

Regards,
Andrew "Flapjack" Thomas

Crazy Dream (Part 1)

Last night I had, perhaps, the craziest dream I have ever had. It involved copyrighted video game characters, strange rooms, Halo 3, and my father. The dream started roughly around 12 o'clock and seemed to last for several weeks, although in hindsight, it probably only lasted a few seconds. The dream combined vivid imagery with intense and profound symbolism, leading me to question the true meaning of the dream. But not before I took some time to recreate one of the characters of my dream in Microsoft Paint.

That's right folks. I dream I was Mario last night. The moustachioed, overall wearing, Italian plumber with a predilection for strange tubes and mushrooms (that last bit would sound really weird if Mario was a less known video game figure). I dreamt I was Mario last night, in Mario's 2D world, jumping from box to box, battling those strange blob shaped enemies and gaining a lot of strength from mushrooms and crazy glowing flowers. If you thought that Mario was intense to begin with, imagine living in a world where everything is flat. And I mean everything. No exceptions. Those Japanese video game creators were sticklers for that. But you know what? I didn't mind it that much. I'm not sure if it was because I was Mario or just because I was dreaming in general, but the world being flat was not high on my list of things to worry about. Death by turtles was. That is, until I stumbled upon the magic 3D room.

Alright, imagine this. You're calmly eating breakfast on a weekday morning before going off to work or school or any of your daily activities. You turn on the TV to watch the weather forecast for that day. But when the weather forecast comes on, instead of a map of the United States there's simply a large image of a cantaloupe on the green screen behind the meteorologist. And HE'S talking in Cantonese. And you look down and suddenly your plate is full of pancakes when seconds ago it was full of toast and eggs. Imagine all of this, and then imagine how much you would freak out. Well, if you took all of that and multiplied it by 5 times you would have some idea of the sort of manner in which my mind was blown by this. 3 dimensions? I think I may have said, "What the f*ck?" out loud, while I was sleeping. That was how amazed I was.

Anyway, it was a tiny room, hidden inside the back of one of the many little boxes that you have to jump to and from to get coins, shrooms, etc. in the game. It wasn't very big, but certainly bigger on the inside than one of those boxes was on the outside, which led me to believe that a certain degree of magic was involved in its design. When I got inside the box, a little message appeared to me. "Press X every 30 seconds for a 20,000 point bonus." Now, this struck me as a little odd. I'm not sure if original Nintendo controllers had X as a button, I haven't used one in a long time, but the strange thing about the message was that it was written in the same font/color/style that is used to tell you in Halo 2 when to pick up a new weapon. I was slightly bemused, to say the least.

By this time, the wonder of finding this strange new 3D box started to wear off. Suddenly the entire world was 3D, and if that was so, quick math revealed there was a lot more of the world to discover, so it felt dumb to stay for 30 seconds in some stupid box. Plus, at that point I think I realized that I wasn't playing the game anymore and the points didn't matter. I did notice one interesting thing before I left the box, and that was the names carved on the inside walls. I can't remember any of the names now, but I remember thinking it was funny.

This is turning out much longer than I expected so I will break into sections and post the next installment later. Don't worry, I won't forget how th dream went, as soon as I woke up this morning I told my brother all about it (with embellishments of course), so I've remembered it pretty well.

The Vicious Vernacular

This is my life, and this is the way I write.

This is a way for me to express everything:

Everything I feel

Everything I think

Everything from the most shallow tendency to the most profound insight.

And I promise I will not be humble, I will not apologize, except when I feel so inclined, I will not forgive or forget except when I think I should and above all things I will not submit to the unwritten rule, just the unspoken agreement.

This is the Vicious Vernacular and from here on out I will try to tag every bit of creative writing, whether it be prose, poetry or some strange combination of the two with this lovely alliteration, this titanic and terrifying tower of a tongue twister, twisted and mangled to suit my own needs and with a design beautiful in it's singular nature and singular in its beauty: to, above all things, cause you to disagree, agree, laugh, or maybe just maybe, change your perception.

I am leaving for college in less than six months. I have never been more scared or excited in my entire life and yet it still feels underwhelming, my life whipping past me with such ferocity and speed that I fear I am not aware of some very important things, losing them in the blurry motion of people, places, and thoughtful conversations. If there is one thing that I have an ultimate faith in, it is the strength that comes from the written word and this is something I do not plan on abandoning anytime soon.

Until next time,
Andrew

Sophisticated, Politically Dissinterested, and Socially Apathetic Expatriates of the World Unite!

You know exactly who I'm talking about. The intelligent, mildly apathetic, indie rocker, art fanatic, Hemingway Jr., coffee-aholic who can't seem to shut up about their dream study abroad program in Paris when they go to The Gatsby School of Philosophy in the G.A. Herbert Memorial Foundation University to study European Literature and minor in Thoughtful Conversation. The expatriates of tomorrow. Our next, "almost" generation of quasi Americans who find the profound discussion of Chaucer over French espresso much more interesting than pursuing any legitimate form of existence that might, even for the shortest period of time, guarantee some form of financial and social stability for them and their children.

Now, don't get me wrong. I find an intelligent conversation with a mild adherence to grammar just as intellectually compelling as the next guy. I just can't see myself living for an extended period of time in a street corner cafe. I do plan to study abroad. However, I am not subscribing to the same hormonal rush that has seemed to draw so many college kids to the bricked pavilions of Italy or the rustic slopes of Monte Carlo.

No, I plan on journeying to the steep mountains of Nepal or Kashmere where I will devote my time to studying the remnants of ancient civilizations with far more historic worth than what, in my opinion, could be observed from behind the gauzed lens of a tour of St. Peter's basilica.



Also, I hate coffee.

Spanning the Gap

So, I know that I haven't posted an update in a really long time, and while I would like to say that this is due to the intense amounts of time and energy I've been devoting to preparing an epic update of content, the truth is profoundly less dramatic. As my senior year gears up for an epic conclusion the tight curricular grasp that my academics currently have affixed around my throat has only tightened. I've found myself struggling to devote equal amounts of time to matters both inside and outside of school, while keeping my sanity at home. All in all, I feel pretty good about the pace I'm keeping, as I've witnessed many of my fellow classmates begin to lose hope, dropping to the right and left of me and making me feel very much like Tom Hanks in the Omaha Beach scene in Saving Private Ryan, and instead of a bunker full of German's, my only goal is graduation.

So I'm writing this to assure you, my loyal fan-base (ha) that I haven't forgotten completely about you guys, and actually have two articles in store that should be up by the end of the week. If you don't hear from me by then, assume that I have suffocated to death under a tragic collapse of textbooks.

Until later,
Andrew

Under Sodium Lights

We're learning about poetry now. I'd just like to get one more in before this too is stripped of its mystery.

Let's take a walk together,
you and I
Along these city streets
Under sodium lights

It's cold now, more than before
I'm not sure
Mirages can exist in these conditions
But here you are

It's one paradox too many
I must confess
to be an artist in this grand city
I guess you've got it figured out

And I'm tired now
And I'm stumbling now
And I'm crisscrossing these sidewalks
Moving from shadow to shadow

And it's intoxicating, spilling from street lamps
and from the sticky notes left on your fridge
I didn't know it could get dark in these conditions
and these sodium lights are flickering and out of existence

So come with me,
and well flicker in and out of existence all night
we'll transverse this great expanse
lit by a sea of sodium lights.

My Spirit Animal

Hey folks. I realized I haven't blogged in a while, and so in order to remedy this tremendous disservice I've decided to update you with a particularly juicy story from my life recently. See, the extent to which I'll betray myself for the sake of this blog is becoming clear; I just sacrificed the last of my dignity by using the word "juicy" to describe something besides a fruit.

I have, for a long time, been interested in spirit animals. I'm not talking about the strange fascination that a 12 year old girl would harbor for a horse, or the grotesque emphasis placed so highly on wolves or bald eagles (so memorialized in countless examples of bumper stickers and strange carved oak wall ornaments). No, I was interested in the profoundly deeper side of spirit animals, how our subconscious mind and our most inane and seemingly thoughtless tendencies affect our overall behaviors and how they might closely link us, in some manner, to an animal. Now, I have always believed in a very traditional approach to finding one's spirit animal, namely constructing a sweat hut out of available material, in the forest, and spending a great deal of time meditating and perhaps reading The Economist. And at the end of a long period of time, I would emerge from the hut extremely happy, and be able to say confidently that I know what my spirit animal is.

Instead I decided to embark upon a strange and mystical journey where, by means of a complex series of personal and abstract questions (in a fight, would you resuscitate your enemy after delivering a punishing blow to his/her larynx?), they determined, within a margin of error of .5% that my spirit animal would be a Jaguar.

I was crushed, needless to say. If the accompanying illustration does not completely illustrate my distaste for this choice, let me elaborate: I don't like the jaguar. It's a stupid animal that relies on its speed and stealth to take down jungle creatures, instead of its wit and charm. It's content to hide in the bushes all day waiting for a meal to come by than to just be proactive and take down something bigger than a turtle, like say, oh I don't know, a hippopotamus. It seems content to sit back and let the world pass it by instead of working to positively better its situation in the world, and in the scope of animal history. Many years from now, people will not look back on the jaguar with a pleasant sense of nostalgia. No instead, they will look back and grimace as they struggle to remember whether the jaguar was the one with oval spots or round spots.


Here are some other examples of spirit animals that are so cliché, so steroetypical, and so astoundingly pointless, that the fact that millions of preteen girls descend into a frenzy throws my brain into a series of complicated knots.



The majestic bald eagle.




I've yet to determine what the actual name for the this type of ornamental decoration is.




If Harry Potter cast a hormonal spell that went horribly awry and ended up changing all of his testosterone to estrogen, this would be the spirit animal he would pick.