Top Gun and The Astronaut Farmer

Well, my two blogs have been successfully merged. on to some movie reviews

Top Gun
Top Gun, which i haven't seen since i was little, was quite good. The acting was all very good, the action was very believable, and not at all over done, the soundtrack was good, and the whole movie was pretty fun. The plot moved along kinda slowly at times, but that's how movies seem to have been before we got so used to having action constantly thrown at us. Nothing much to say with this one, i give it 3.7 stars, it gets an extra .2 for being a classic.

The Astronaut Farmer
This movie, on the other hand, was not quite good. It was very close to being good, i wanted to like it, but it just didn't pull through. The acting, while not bad, was weird. Almost awkward, especially the little girls. The plot was pretty terrible, and the story itself wasn't believable at all. It was never very engaging, and almost nothing happens. When it does happen, it happens suddenly and it feels forced. While i like rocket building montages, i still don't know how he built a rocket when he had almost no money. The whole thing was just silly. Final vote: 2 stars. I'm just glad i didn't have to pay for this.

two things to do before this year is done:

Learn to play the guitar (i doubt that'll happen)
Learn to solve a Rubik's Cube.

The Daily Blah Indeed

I decided it's silly to keep to blogs. I'll merge my old blog into this blog at some point, and from not on good entries will be few and far between.

So today could have been far better than it was.

Camping is causing all sorts of problems. It would have been so simple if everybody hadn't found out about it. Roberta's being about as unfriendly as possible, which is not the way to convince me to go camping. There's really no possible way for everybody to go on this camp. Why does everybody think they can hike nine miles with 30-40 pounds on their back. I'm not sure i can, and i'm in better physical condition than most of my friends. It's almost worth letting everybody come and then just leaving them, but i wouldn't do that, because that'd be wrong, and the camp would end up sucking.

Other problems arise from other issues. Issues which i have to deal with, i really don't want to, but i need to, and it's going to be hard for me to tell people i'm friends with, straight out, you can't go. It really comes down to either completely scrapping this camp and doing somewhere else, or not caving and pissing everybody off. I love the idea of going camping with everybody. But it's not possible for this one, and i really want this to be exactly what i've planned and hoped it to be.

the other problem is money. Driving is going to cost over $100 per car, which means that we really need people in groups of 5.

So yeah, a simple escape from civilization is turning out to be very copmlicated and rather uncivilized.

In other news i've spent the last hour or so figuring out how to play zelda music using my shnazzy keyboard. So far i've gotten the bass, guitar, second guitar, and almost the trumpet part. I'm planning on putting it all together to make the song sound the same, which when i really think about it doesn't sound that cool on it's own, but i'll know how cool it'll be, and that's all that count.

Oh, and two of my sisters now have blogs. We're so cool.

Ghost Rider

hm, my monitor's a popping, that's never a good sign. Anyway on to movie review #4? sounds about right.

Ghost Rider.
First of all, i should say that i liked it. Now, what was wrong with it? The acting was a bit bad at times (though nick cage was cool like always) the dialogue was pretty terrible, predictable and corny. The plot was nearly as predictable and corny, and the final fight didn't seem quite epic enough. The fights all seemed to easy for him too. The music was great, the effects were pretty good, and i liked it. It was kinda campy, and felt very much like a comic book.

Final count: 3.5

A Vacation...from my problems

I was feeling like posting a picture, and that one caught my eye for some reason, then i messed with it in Picasa for a while, and so there you go.

I've been reading The Poisonwood Bible for a while, delaying the aweful amount of calculus take-home test i need to do, and generally relaxing. Church today was normal, i wore a suit, which isn't normal at all, and that was fun. I also pissed off my teacher by unintentionally calling him a bad teacher. In truth i was frustrated at the inefficiencies of the Socratic Method for teaching, mostly in the way that i answer a whole bunch of questions. I tried to steer us into a nice socratic debate about what freedom is as penence, and that seemed to cheer him up, so i felt a little better.

After church i came home, meandered around as is my custom, and eventually took a stats test, which wasn't so bad. I studied the stuff i figured would be on the test, so i was ok there, but then i kinda blanked on the process it was testing. Luckily it was mostly multiple choice, so we'll see how that goes.

I'm realizing the inherent inefficiencies of having two seperate blogs. Instead of digressing into happy philosophical thinking, i keep myself talking about my day and stuff like that. I guess i'll consolidate my blogs someday, till then i'll leave them. It does make my other blog a bit more interesting to read perhaps, although i'm really not sure which is more interesting, my emo teenager thoughts or my mundane daily toils. I think i'll just let this turn into a thoughtful blog and stick it on my good blog.

I'm realizing i need a break from my friends. I like my friends, they're fun, but when I need a bit of time to just relax and not do a whole lot. My vacations seem to become very busy. I'm looking forward to camping, and wondering how exclusive i should be. It is one of the last big things we'll do together, but in all honesty, i just don't want to go camping with everyone i'm friends with. And as hard as it is to explain, there is a very noticable and enjoyable difference in hanging out, especially camping, with no girls. I don't want my nice small camp get away to be turned into just a normal day but with nature. The other thing is that guys hanging out with their respective girlfriends and/or crushes just aren't as much fun. It's fun for them, but yeah. Maybe i just need a girlfriend. So i'm debating how this camping this is going to go. I also am wondering how everyone and their mom now knows about the camping thing. From my memory i've only told like 4 or so people. Everybody knowing complicates things.

So i'm realizing this blog is fairly revealing, and although only a few people read my blog, it's pretty thoroughly public. Chances are if you're reading this i'm not talking about you, unless you're spencer, and then i most definitely am. Sorry about that, just the way it goes.

Well, it's 7, so i'm going to start working towards doing my homework, starting with writing a quick review of Ghost Rider. Forsooth.

Del Taco?

ew, i just sneezed on my screen. There must be a way to delete entries, but since i can't find it, i'm just going to replace the previous entry with this one.

What time is it? VALENTIMES!

just fyi, i do, infact, know how to spell Valentines day.

So anyway, today was half an adventure, and that's something. English was busyness, as usual. Gov was a bad open book test, and then not much. Latin was reading and that sort of fun.

Then i went to give blood. Giving blood is usually pretty fun, i enjoy it. This time, however, was definitely the least fun. Happily the little finger prick was less painful that usual, that's actually my least favorite part usually.

I got a kinda sub-par nurse lady. When she stuck the needle in my blood spurted out, which hasn't happened before, and it hurt more than usual. She just left the blood there, which was kinda icky. When she pulled the needle out it hurt some more, and i think she may have cut me a bit or something. I held my arm up for a while, and then checked to see if i was still bleeding, and blood gushed out. So then i'm sitting there with blood dripping down my arm, but i can't stop it very well cus if i let go of my bandage i'll bleed all over the place. So then i kinda catch it with my thumb, but it starts to pool, and it's about to drip into my arm pit, which would just be weird. So i kinda wipe it on my arm, and then i make a little smiley face, because that was just cool. So hopefully i'll get some pictures of that when Caitlin uploads those pictures of that. Anyway, after that she had me put my arm down and wiped the blood off, and she checked and it was still bleeding. Eventually she stuck a bandage on it and wrapped the stuff pretty tight. It must have still bled for a little while, cus when i took it off it had lots of dried blood on it.

But that was fun. And i got a nice t-shirt.

After school, me and caitlin walked to my house cus everybody else had vamoose'd. After a little bit i went to the bank and deposited my checks (now i have a bit o' money to spend. fun stuff) and took caitlin home. Aaand, here am I. lost tonight, and maybe i'll do some homework. Mrs. D needs to stop giving us tests to do on our own time. The unfortunate truth is that i don't have a whole lot of my own time while at school. All my time at school is spent going to school, so yeah, that doesn't quite work out very well. So eventually i'll get that done i guess.

So my sister totally has a blog now. How greatly lame.

MirrorMask

Movie Review #3, this week i watched MirrorMask. It was a cool movie. There are some complaints about the plot being a bit hackneyed, which i suppose is true. Very Alice in Wonderland, very labyrinth, but still a really cool movie. The acting was good, the visual effects were pretty awesome, and despite the plot being used, it was still good. Had the plot been a bit less predictable, it could have been amazing, but i still liked it a lot. All in all, i give it 4.5 stars.

I thought i had done this last night, but apparently it didn't work. soanyways, I'm 18 now, birthday post!

Things that've changed:
I've changed a whole lot since last year. I can drive, i've had my first job, i've gotten all my eagle stuff done, I'm applied to college, i'm way more independent than i used to be. I've had to do a whole lot of things by myself that i usually wouldn't think i would have, like getting all my glasses and stuff yesterday. I'm a senior, which is fun. I don't hang out with Johnny as much as i did last year, what with the whole graduation thing he pulled, so my friends group is a bit different. Other things too, but nothing comes to mind.

Things that haven't changed:
I'm not crazy built like i'd hoped. I once again don't have a job, or any money. Relationship wise, things are depressingly similar, although i've decided not to do that again. yeah. I'm still rather shy and non confrontational. What else, i feel about the same personality wise, maybe a bit more confident, and a bit more sensitive, but only a bit. I'm no more expressive i don't think, i still stay pretty bottled up. that's all that i can think of.

Things that are going to change:
College. College, college college. Moving away from my parents, from my friends, and all that should be an adventure. I'm going to vote, register for the draft, graduate, etc. I'm going to get a job, i'm going to get a wii, i'm going to make a whole new set of friends, live almost completely independently, should be fun. Hopefully i'm going to finally manage to work out consistantly, i want to learn how to snowboard well enough to not break myself, and i'm going to leave the south, quite possibly forever.

So yeah, 17 was a good year overall, i'm thinking 18 might be one of the most exciting years of my life. We'll see how that goes. Later days.

18!

firstly, look at all this cool crap i can do now:

18 is the age minimum for for purchasing tobacco. It is also the voting age in many countries.

Eighteen is also the age in most countries at which a person may appear in a pornographic video, if pornography is legal at all, or express legal consent to sexual relations with another.

In addition, eighteen year-olds in the United States have the right to bear arms, own property, marry without parental consent, get an abortion, donate their body to science, obtain a passport, and serve on a jury.

Woohoo, now i can get married.

In other news, today is the rockinest birthday i've had all year. Last night i went to sleep at 10:30, so i'd wake up nice a rested. I slept in, and then my mom came in to tell me there were waffles to be eaten. I went to get my eye perscription renewed and my glasses corrected, and drove around with the windows down and solsbury hill as i sped around meadowbrook. It was a beautiful day. I watched some Wii fun. Then we hung out at my house for a while, which was nice, then went to kroger for a bit, then to Golf World, or rather, Promiseland. Promiseland was pretty fun, Naskarts was awesome, and minigolf and batting cages were only slightly sub par (you know, it always seems like sub par should be a good thing, but whatever, i digress) After that we drove over to spencers house. Me and Meghan almost had an accident because we were driving a tad fast, but we didn't, so that worked out ok. I got cookies and a sweet card, and all sorts of fun. If there's a better way to end my birthday than hanging out with my friends playing video games, i certainly don't know what it is...well i can think of somethings, like kiddy pools filled with olive oil and garlic, but what i did was fun.

So yeah, fun stuff. So far i've gotten $61 in birthday money, a chocolate orange, a pocket knife, a really nice card from my parents, a really cool card from caitlin, cookies, and all around fun times.

I wish everyday were as rockin as today has been.
Oh, and much thanks to all the happy birthdays, and for the sweet presents that i have and perhaps will recieve. They makes me happy.

What Dreams May Come

Movie review #2
What Dreams May Come:
I liked What Dreams May Come a lot. The acting was excellent, Robin Williams was very believable and very likable. I really liked the movie's idea of Heaven, not least of all because it's rather close to mine. The paint was just cool, and reminded me of Hook a bit. I had seen it before, but i didn't really remember much, so it was all pretty cool. Hell was pretty interesting, although they never quite explained whether it, like heaven, was the product of your thoughts and emotions, or if it was a more tangeable place where people were punished. Religious discussions aside however, it was very properly gloomy and bad. Perhaps more than anything else, this movie is really good to look at. All the scenary is amazing, the way colors were used was especially artistic. Now, however, i need to go to school, and so i've got to stop this.

Final Score: 4/5

MC Competition

I guess i'll do this. I have some time before school and not a whole lot to do. I'm really sleepy. Last night i was up past midnight, as per usual, trying to do a poetry response. At some point i feel asleep and my mom came in and woke me up. I went to bed since staying up wasn't getting anything done. Yesterday was pretty fun, i went to school around 8ish and then we drove to Mississippi College for the MAO competition. The testing was decent, bio was really hard. Then we got lunch at Pizza hut, which was pretty good i must say. After that we went back to MC for the quizbowl stuff. The groups our chosen randomly, and when we got there we found that we were in a group with MSMS and St. Andrews. Things did not bode well for us. However, as the questions started coming, we were dominating. Or, more truthfully, spencer was dominating. I got one or two in, but probably 9/10 or our points came directly from spencer. So anyway, near the end we started doing a little bit worse, and when the scores were called, St. Andrews had beat us by one question. We beat MSMS though, and the top two teams move on.

In the second round, the questions got a lot harder. We did pretty badly at the beginning. A lot of physics, which we really don't know. We still did pretty decent, and at the end we had gotten third place, after Prep and Oak Grove. We beat Clinton, Warren Ctrl, and, best of all for spencer, St. Andrews, including spencer's arch nemisis...that girl whose name i can't remember. Anyway, it was pretty awesome. We went to the awards ceremony and the tests had been broken, meaning the awards ceremony lasted about 10 minutes, which was great. We played indian poker before and during it.

After the awards ceremony we went to baskin robins where i got some complimentary ice cream provided by Theresa. That was pretty cool. then theresa, spencer, michael, and I all went back to my house, where i had to do financial aid stuff. We also played fuseball and speed and eventually went to mcnally's to hang for a bit after dropping Michael and Spencer off at Murrah. We went to blockbuster and back to my house (minus Theresa), and eventually michael and spencer came back and we watched What Dreams May Come. Then we made pizza and hung out and messed around and went home.

on my other blog i reviewed What Dreams May Come, but basically i liked it. Now it's time for me to go to school, so so long.

~That Undiscovered Counry